S E R M O N S

Once again, we have great privilege to come together and to look into the Word of God, and we are going to do so under the heading of "The Humanity of the Son Incarnate." A little three-part series that I wanted to do at Christmas to help us understand more of the glory of Christ, and this is the second part; we will do one more next week. But I want you to remember something that is easy to forget in this holiday season in our culture, and that is Christmas celebrates the birth of our Savior and our King, the Lord Jesus Christ. May I remind you from the outset of a couple of passages. You remember when the angels came to the shepherds in Luke two, beginning in verse 10, it says, first of all, "But the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ, the Lord.'" And then the great prophecy in Isaiah nine, we read beginning in verse six, about the coming Christ, "For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; and the government will rest on His shoulders; and His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government, or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts, will accomplish this." And how I long for that day, as I'm sure you do as well, when he establishes his glorious kingdom on this earth.

Now, we increasingly see Satan doing everything that he can to obscure the glorious truths of who Christ is, and ultimately then, what Christmas is all about - the incarnation of Christ. And it's been turned into kind of a big party time, a time to give gifts and a lot of materialism, a lot of fun and family and certainly that's appropriate to enjoy those things, but if you look even at the average yard, at the Christmas season, very seldom will you see anything that speaks of the incarnation of Christ. It's hard to even find the nativity scene anymore. I mean, you'll see Santa Claus and Rudolph, the Red Nosed Reindeer and Frosty the Snowman and all of those kinds of things. But you typically don't see anything that really symbolizes the magnificent reality that God became man to save us by his grace.

In fact, it's even politically incorrect today, isn't it, to say "Merry Christmas." You have to say what "Happy Holidays" or whatever. By the way, whenever I hear that, I will always respond, "Merry Christmas" and hopefully I'll have an opportunity to say something more. Isn't it wonderful to know that God sent his son to die for our sins and save us by his grace? And it's even sad that among those who acknowledge that Christmas is all about the birth of Christ, a lot of Christians really don't live as if he is their Lord and Savior. In fact, John MacArthur said it well, quote, "The world is happy to let Jesus Christ be a baby in a manger, but not willing to let him be the Sovereign King and Lord that he is. Yet that is the central truth of the Christmas story. The child of Christmas is God."

Beloved, please hear this, there is nothing more important in your life than your understanding of who God is, than your perception of who the Lord Jesus Christ is. In fact, your view of God will determine how you worship. It will determine how you will live your life. It will determine how you treat your wife, your husband, your children. It will determine the habits of your life. It will determine, certainly the kind of church that you will attend, and certainly it will determine where you will spend eternity. And how sad to watch people live out their lives as if God doesn't exist, or perhaps worse yet, worshiping a god that doesn't exist; and many times,calling him Jesus, because they have no understanding of who the real Jesus is. "Eat, drink and be merry," that tends to be the attitude. That was what the Greek philosopher Epicurus promoted, "eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die." It became kind of a popular English idiom, promoting kind of a carefree lifestyle, no concern about anything. Certainly, no concern about God and his glory, his judgment or eternal life.

I was looking at some of the ways hedonism is lived out today. And that's what that is; sometimes that's called, by the way, Epicureanism or hedonism. And I think of what Paul said when he extolled the certain hope of the resurrection from the dead unto glory for believers. In First Corinthians 15:32, he says, "If the dead are not raised..." in other words, if, if there's no resurrection, then he said, "...let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die." And that, by the way, isa direct quote from Isaiah 22 and verse 13 that described the damning hedonism of the backslidden Israelites and the tragic futility of living your life for yourself apart from the glory of God; separated from God, and contrary to his word and his will. So many sad and hopeless people, even around Christmas. Have you noticed that? Beneath the smiles there's a hollowness, there's a sadness. An unknown writer has summarized this perfectly, and perhaps you have heard this frankly hopeless statement that has been made popular on social media. Let me read it to you. I want to get you good and depressed so that I can really contrast the glory of what it means to be in Christ. The statement goes like this, "Have you ever wondered in 100 years and 2124 we will all be buried with our relatives and friends. Strangers will live in our homes, which we fought so hard to build, and they will own everything we have today, all our properties will be unknown, including that car you spent a fortune on. It will probably be scrapped. I guess it will be in the hands of an unknown collector. Our descendants will hardly know who we were, nor will they remember us. How many of us know our grandfather’sfather? After our death, we will be remembered for a few years, then we will only be a portrait on someone's library. And a few years later, our history, our photos, our deeds, go into the dust bin of oblivion. History. We won't even be memories. Maybe if one day we stopped to analyze these questions, we would understand how ignorant and weak the dream of obtaining everything was. Certainly, our approaches, our thoughts would change. We would be other people, always having more and more, without having time for the things that are really worthwhile in this life. I change all of that to live and enjoy those walks I've never taken, those ungiven hugs; those kisses to our children and our loves, and those pranks we never had time for. Those would definitely be the best moments to remember. Basically, they would fill our lives with joy. And that is what we waste with greed and intolerance, day after day. There is still time for us. Think about it." End quote. How sad. Just another way of saying, "eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die." What a stark contrast to the hope and the joy that we have as believers. Paul put it this way, "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain." In Philippians, three, eight, he said, "I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish, so that I may gain Christ."

Now compare Paul's testimony to that of unbelievers who on their death bed, as they face eternity, uncertain of what lies ahead; on the brink of death, all they can do is sing with Frank Sinatra, "I've lived a life that's full, I traveled each and every highway, and more, much more, I did it my way." Not God's way, but my way. And as a result, they will perish in their sins. They will slip into eternity, and they will enter into the solitary confinement of an eternal hell where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. But not so for those who trust in Christ, and herein is the hope of the Gospel. Jesus said in John 8:12, "'I am the Light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life.'" You see, life is found in Christ and in John 11:25, he said, "'I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die.'" And I think of the eyewitness testimony of the apostle John, who said in First John one beginning in verse two, "And the life was manifested, and we have seen and testify and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us. But we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us, and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. These things we write so that our joy may be made complete."

You see folks as believers, we live in light of eternity. This world is not our home, and the darker the world gets around us, the more we realize how important it is to live in the light of his grace, and to know the light, to walk in that. You see folks, without Christ, there is no gospel; there is no good news. And without the Good News of the Gospel, there is no eternal life, and therefore there is no joy in this life, except those things that you pursue to try to make yourself happy, the fleeting pleasures of life. Oh, the smell of a new car, and a year later you're wishing you had the next model. Isn't that how it works? Well, this Christmas season is a perfect time to elevate the Lord Jesus to his proper place, to behold the excellency, the majesty of Christ and the hope and the joy that we have living our lives in him and so to do so, we are once again going to look at the mystery of the incarnation, focusing primarily on the humanity of the Son incarnate.

Just a quick review. The last time we were together, part one, we looked at the virgin birth of the eternal Son. We saw how that Jesus had to be born of a virgin. He had to take on human flesh, to be punished for our sin as our substitute, but he also had to be God in order to endure the sufferings of all that the Father had given him, all who would believe in Him. Remember that God's holy and infinite justice required a holy and infinitely glorious ransom, and that was the Lord Jesus. So the work of redemption required a theanthropon - a God-man - one who would supernaturally fuse together the human nature and the divine to form an indissoluble bond.

We secondly looked at the self-emptying of the eternal Son, called the kenosis from it's drawn from the Greek word "kenoó", meaning to empty oneself. This speaks of Christ's voluntary surrender of the independent use of his divine attributes when he took on human flesh.  Jesus "emptied Himself," Philippians, two seven, "taking the form of a bond servant." And again, remember, this does not mean that he in any way divested himself of any of his divine attributes. He didn't take something from himself or out of himself, thereby becoming less than God. But to "empty Himself" really means that he poured out himself - the idea of making himself void, nullifying himself. In fact, the King James says he, "made himself of no reputation." And so he did this not by pouring something out of himself, but by taking on human flesh, and thereby adding himself to true humanity. This is, as I say, an addition rather than a subtraction. So he chose not to exercise the full limits of his attributes during his earthly life as the incarnate Christ. He emptied himself by refusing to access his divine rights and privileges. He made void certain aspects of his divine prerogatives. And so, as a result, the full manifestation of his deity was veiled; it was restricted. it was limited by his human nature. And that's why the Apostle Paul would say in Second Corinthians 8:9, "...though He was rich, yet for your sake, He became poor."

So we looked at the virgin birth of the eternal Son and the self-emptying of the eternal Son. And we're going to return to the third point in my little outline, and that is the spirit empowerment of the eternal Son. And last week we began, I kind of introduced this a little bit, we began to answer the question, you know, was Jesus perfectly obedient because of his intrinsic divine nature? And if his obedience was empowered, therefore by his divine nature, how can we, not having a divine nature, obey the commands to be like him? I mean, is it fair for God to ask us to be like him? Well, the answer that we began to look at, and we're going to see it more here today, is that his obedience to do the will of the Father was not enabled by his intrinsic divine nature as God, but rather it was solely through the power of the indwelling Spirit working in his human nature. He did not depend upon his divine nature to resist sin, but through the power of the indwelling Spirit in his human nature. And of course, this is immensely encouraging to all of us as believers, because the same resources that enabled Christ are available to us. Those of us who, according to John 3:8 are "born of the Spirit." We have the same supernatural, divine enablement available to us. And yet it's so sad to see so many millions of people reject Christ. They're just ruled by their lusts, ruled by their flesh. They chase after all of the fleeting pleasures of life, rather than being ruled by the indwelling Spirit,yielding to him, surrendering to him, walking by the Spirit. And as a result, enjoying all that is available to those who know and love Christ. But rather than that, they live for themselves. Their own selfishness is the center of gravity around which their lives orbit, and they end up living a life of misery.

Well, no wonder, according to the CDC, suicide continues to be on the rise. It is one of the leading causes of death. I was reading an article the other day where it said over 49,000 people died by suicide in 2022 that's one death every 11 minutes. I couldn't find the stats for where we are now, but that was 2022 and we know it's more than that now. It said that many adults think about suicide or attempt suicide. 13.2million people seriously thought about suicide. And again, this is 2022. 13.2 seriously thought about suicide. 3.8 million made a plan for suicide, and 1.6 million attempted suicide. The number of opioid overdose deaths in the United States in 2022 was 81,806. And I was reading from some research from the Kaiser Family Foundation, and it said this, "The sharp rise in drug deaths in recent years was driven by fentanyl deaths." And you hear about this a lot with the illegal aliens bringing this in and so forth. Went on to say, "Fentanyl involved opioid deaths surged more than 23 fold over the last decade, while prescription opioid deaths remained steady, and heroin deaths declined. Fentanyl deaths more than doubled during the pandemic, increasing from 36,359 in 2019, to 73,838 in 2022." And now it's more than that. Also, one of the statistics that stuck out to me is 32% of US adults report how drug abuse has caused trouble in their families. And I know some of you would attest to that. I certainly would with issues in our family.

Folks, people need the Lord. People need the Lord, and so it's to him we turn our attention as we reflect upon the humanity of the son incarnate. And in doing so, I really want to look now more closely at this whole issue of the Spirit empowerment of the eternal Son. This the babe in the manger. You cannot separate these things. You must see this. I return again to Isaiah 11 and verse two, "The Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him," the Spirit of God tells us in his prophecy. "The Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD." Now, bear in mind, while the Holy Spirit contributed nothing to Christ's deity, he contributed everything, all ofthe supernatural power and enablement to his humanity. It was the Spirit, as we see here, that gave him wisdom and understanding. Isn't it wonderful to know believers who, by the power of the Spirit, have wisdom and understanding. It was the Spirit that gave him counsel and strength. It was the Spirit that gave him knowledge and the fear of the Lord. And we know from Proverbs that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

And again, in Isaiah 42 verse one, "'Behold, My servant whom I uphold; My chosen one, and whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations.'" And Isaiah 61 beginning in verse one, "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the LORD has anointed Me to bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners; to proclaim the favorable year of the LORD and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn, to grant those who mourn in Zion, giving them a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a spirit of fainting. So they will be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified."

Now I want you to think about just the life of Christ in light of the Spirit's work within him. Once again that is available to us. Do you realize that Christ's dependence upon the Holy Spirit began at conception? The miracle of conception. Matthew 1:18, we read, when "...Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit." It reminds me of John the Baptist. Remember the forerunner of the Messiah, who was indwelt by the Spirit while he was yet in his mother's womb. Remember in Luke 1:15. And then at his baptism, we see the Spirit at work in and on him. Luke 3:22, "The Holy Spirit descended upon Him in bodily form, like a dove." We know that the Spirit was at work in him, empowering him, sustaining him at his temptation in the wilderness. Matthew 4:1 "Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil." I think about that a lot in my life. When some great tragedy is there, some great temptation, I realize that somehow the Spirit is involved with this, and I have an opportunity to be obedient or to be disobedient, and he empowers us to do that which is pleasing in his sight. "And after Jesus was tempted by the devil," Luke says, in Luke 4:14, "that he returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee."

So beloved, please understand, Jesus resisted temptation not by resorting to his divine nature, not by relying on the supernatural power of his divine nature, but by relying on the resources available to him through the indwelling Spirit of God. And his dependence obviously upon his Father; we know that the Spirit of God empowered him throughout his ministry. We see this for example in John 3:34 There we read, "For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God; for He gives the Spirit without measure." We see it in his preaching, Luke four, beginning in verse 17, we read about the book now, "...of the Prophet was handed to Him." And it says, "And He opened the book and found the place where it was written, 'THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD ISUPON ME, BECAUSE HE ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO ARE OPPRESSED, TO PROCLAM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD.'"

Now I want to pause for a moment. There is a common misnomer, especially in the south, where you will hear about "God-called" preachers, they’re called. They're just Spirit empowered preachers, meaning, and one of the main things about these preachers is they brag about the fact that they've never been to seminary, that they've never had any formal education, that they just stand up and the Spirit just tells them what to say. And there's all kinds of reasons why that is a very dangerous thing, and that's not what we're talking about here, but certainly what we see is that the Spirit of the Lord was upon Jesus that instructed him in his word, and we're going to see more of that in a moment. And the same thing is true of any man who has been called into pastoral ministry. It is the Spirit of God that gifts them, the Spirit of God that teaches them and sustains them, etc, etc. We read about this in Ephesians four in particular. It was also quote, "through the Spirit" that Jesus gave commandments to his chosen apostles, Acts one and verse two. And according to Matthew 12:28, He cast out demons by the Spirit of God. And he also healed people by the Spirit; Acts 10:38. Remember Paul's great sermon to the Gentiles. He says, "You know of Jesus, of Nazareth, how God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how he went out doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him." Folks, once again, this is so encouraging, so profoundly encouraging to us, because the very things that Jesus had going for him, you might say, by the power of the Spirit, is available to us.

So again, Jesus promised you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. These are the very resources that Jesus used to live an obedient life, a powerful life. And again, the same resources that are made available to not only his apostles, but all who follow Christ. And is it any wonder why the Apostle Paul would just be so overwhelmed with his these realities that he would pray this, as we have recorded in Ephesians three, beginning in verse 14, "For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened..." here it is, "...with power through His Spirit in the inner man." And here's why, "...so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God." And then he burst forth with this great doxology, "Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power..." catch this, “...that works within us." Alright? "To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ,Jesus to all generations, forever and ever."

And we can consider what he promised his disciples, and by extension, to all believers, in Acts one eight, he said, "You will receive power when.." what? "...when the Holy Spirit has come upon you." You see, before the Holy Spirit hadn't come upon believers and indwelt them, but"You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be My witnesses, both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the remotest part of the earth." Now certainly the apostles had already experienced the Spirit's saving power in their lives and ministry. Not only did he save them, but he empowered them to preach and to teach and to perform miracles and so on. But again, soon now, at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was going to come upon them and dwell within them. And it's a miracle of miracles to me, that God has redeemed us, that He might inhabit us; that we might be empowered to do all that He has commanded us to do. And how sad when we have that power available to us, but we do not avail ourselves of that power because we're living by the flesh, or we're not taking advantage of the various means of grace that are available to us that I will elaborate on a great deal the next time we are together. And of course, when the Spirit of God dwelled within them, it just supercharged their witness, right? You see this change. You see the old Peter and the new Peter, for example. But remember at Pentecost in Acts two four, "And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit was giving them utterance." The tongues there are foreign languages that heretofore they did not know so that the gospel could go forth to all of these different languages. There it was not the ecstatic gibberish - that is the fake tongues that you hear today in our culture. And in First Corinthians six beginning in verse 19, we read, "Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore, glorify God in your body."

Now, I want you to think about the Spirit's work in Jesus, even as a child. You will remember in Luke two, beginning verse 40 we read that "The Child continued to grow and become strong, increasing in wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him." And then in verse 52 we read, "And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor," or in other words, grace, it could be translated, "...with God and men." Now, obviously this passage makes it clear that Jesus did not live his life dependent upon his intrinsic divine nature, but according to the indwelling Spirit that was working within him in his human nature.

There's a great story that we read about in the Gospels. Remember, in Luke two he went with his family to the feast in Jerusalem, and Jesus got separated from the family when the caravan was returning to Nazareth, and he ended up remaining in Jerusalem. And his parents freak out about this. They look around, as we've all done before. It's like, where's Jesus? Have you seen Jesus? And Luke two verse 46 says, "Then, after three days they found Him in the temple." Not on the playground, he was in the temple, "...sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Him were amazed at His understanding and His answers. When they saw Him, they were astonished; and His mother said to Him, 'Son, why have You treated us this way? Behold, Your father and I have been anxiously looking for You.' And He said to them, 'Why is it that you were looking for Me? Did you not know that I had to be in My Father's house?' But they did not understand the statement which He had made to them. And He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and He continued in subjection to them." Let me pause there. Though he knew that he was a child of the Heavenly Father, that he was God very God, he still chose to submit to the authority of his parents. Isn't that a wonderful thought?

"And He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and He continued in subjection to them. And His mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men." Now, again, I want you to think about this. In his deity, he is God very God. He is omniscient, all-knowing, and his omnisapient, which means all-wise. He not only knows all things, he knows how to apply the wisdom. But not so in his humanity. Because what we see here is he had to not only grow physically and emotionally, but also spiritually and intellectually. I mean, when you stop and think about it, if I can put it this way, he was not ready for Gethsemane and the cross at age 12. Remember Isaiah 11 in verse two that we read earlier. "The Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD." So you have a 12 year old boy operating according to his human nature, empowered by the indwelling Spirit. And here he is in the temple, interacting with the greatest theological minds in the world - absolutely astounding. But still in his human nature.

We read in the text that he had much to learn. You see, the Father was preparing him. The Father was developing his character by the power of the Spirit through his word, he had to quote "increase in wisdom." In other words, the Spirit of God dwelling within him had to take the great truths of the Word that that he was reading, that he was hearing about, and illumine his mind so that he could live them out. He had to increase in wisdom. I will elaborate on this a whole lot more next week. But this means he had to learn the word, he had to understand the word, he had to be able to articulate the word, he had to be able to exhort in sound doctrine and refute those who contradict. He had to be able to converse with others concerning the word. So he sat at the feet of those who knew more than he did at that time to learn the word of God, and he sought them out. He submitted himself to discipleship. And the Lord used all of that to help him increase in wisdom.

And through these things, and other means of grace, his heart was open to the leading of the Holy Spirit, so that in the life of Christ, the fruit of the spirit that we read about in Galatians five, was perfectly manifested in every single way; the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, all of it perfectly manifested.

But I want you to see some more here concerning the Spirit's work in Christ's humanity. I mean, think about this, every act of perfect obedience placed him increasingly at odds with a hostile world. I mean, the more we obey Christ, the more we're hated, right? I mean, if you capitulate, if you compromise, and everybody kind of likes you, that's why I say anytime somebody's promoting a Jesus that the whole world loves, you know, it's not the Jesus of the Bible. But every act prepared him for the next stage of opposition; for the next stage of suffering, which would naturally increase the power of temptation to compromise. And think about temptation in our own lives. When we're tempted, we typically give in pretty quick, don't we? And then the temptation goes away because we've disobeyed, and then we have 1000 reasons to justify what we did and ignore it and kind of move on. But not so Jesus. And here, I want to take you to Hebrews five for a moment, if you want to turn there.

Here in Hebrews five, the context it's part of this inspired argument given to the Hebrews to prove the superiority and the deity of Jesus Christ. In Hebrews five, beginning in verse seven, we read some fascinating things about our Lord. It says, "In the days of His flesh," that, is his human incarnate life on Earth, "In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of his piety. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered." Now again, I want you to notice here, Jesus' obedience was not some automatic response, enabled by his divine nature that somehow, he was tapping into, and thus eliminating any real struggle to trust and obey, come what may.

If I can digress for a moment, I mean his experience in the Garden of Gethsemane alone would refute that notion. Remember Mark 14, beginning in verse 33 it says, "And He took with Him Peter and James and John, and began to be very distressed and troubled. And He said to them, 'My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death.'" And in Luke 22 beginning in verse 42 he says, "'Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done.'" Then we read, “Now an angel from heaven appeared to Him, strengthening him. And being in agony, He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground." It's absolutely astounding to me; Jesus' obedience was a manifestation of the Spirit of God at work in his human nature.

So again, in Hebrews Five verse seven, "In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying." Obviously, you see his humanity here, and I find it interesting too "loud crying" - “kraugēs," in the original language, a very significant term. It doesn't refer to a cry a man chooses to express, shall we say, on his own, to kind of own, his own utter it out. Rather, it speaks of a cry that is extracted from him. He's in such grief, if you will. It is a cry that is pulled from him. It's forced out of a man as a result of excruciating anguish. Again, this points to his humanity and the need for the Spirit's work to sustain him.

So, "He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from..." or could be translated literally out of death, "...and He was heard because of His piety." Then you have this phrase, "Although He was a Son." I mean, think about this, the Father didn't give him a pass here on his suffering, even though it was his Son; he was given no exemption from all the sorrow and all of the pain associated with the human condition. And because of his perfect obedience to the will of the Father, he ultimately experienced death. Sothere was nothing that we can experience, there is nothing that we can experience, that he did not experience far greater. And for this reason, he is affirmed, is he not, as our sympathetic high priest?

Now notice again in verse eight, "Although he was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered." As I reflect upon this, I think "my, yes." I mean, every new affliction would be a new learning process, something else that he had to deal with; every new agonizing form of rejection, every new pain required a new kind of obedience. It required a new level of dependency upon the Father. It required a new level of faith in the Father'sprovision and protection. It required a new level of submission to the inner working of the Holy Spirit; a new level of commitment to the directives and the applications of the Word of God, whatever the cost. So indeed, "He learned obedience from the things which He suffered."

And then verse nine, "And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him..." Now, this can confuse people. You think, well, he was already God, I thought he was already perfect. Well, that's not what the term means. It's not a metaphysical perfection here, but it's speaking in terms of function. In other words, that is having completed all that was necessary to make him perfectly fitted to become our Savior and High Priest. And so, once again, the Father and the Spirit now are systematically forming the character of Jesus, helping him grow in the grace and the knowledge of Christ. Helping him to increase in wisdom until he is made perfect, in other words, until he is completely ready; is perfectly fitted to do what the Father is going to ultimately ask him to do. And that is to suffer and to die in our stead.

Folks, never forget that this is the same work of grace that operates in each one of us. Bear in mind that those seemingly trivial opportunities for obedience prepare us for more costly areas of obedience; seemingly insignificant areas of service, prepare us for more significant areas of usefulness. You just must remember that if you truly belong to Christ, if you've truly been born again, if you've truly been raised from spiritual death to spiritual life, and you're a new creature in Christ, and your disposition is one of wanting to know and love and serve Christ, then everything that you go through in your life is part of the Spirit's work to conform you into the likeness of Christ. I want you to also notice that he offered himself on the cross by the enablement of the Spirit. Hebrews nine and verse 14, we read, "...how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit, offered Himself without blemish to God..." and he says, "...cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?" Again, think about this, it was the Spirit that enabled and preserved Jesus during the horrific agonies of Gethsemane. It was the Spirit that preserved and sustained him during the humiliation at the hands of the authorities during the unbelievable torture of the scourgings - plural; the crown of thorns, the crucifixion. It was the Spirit constantly helping him.

I might want to add, however, it was Christ who voluntarily submitted to the will of the Father, as he suffered in our stead, who went to the cross voluntarily. John 10 verse 17, he said, "'For this reason, the Father loves Me because I lay down My life so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.'" It's important to understand from scripture that all three members of the triune godhead were a part of the resurrection, but Paul speaks specifically, at one point, about the Spirit's role in Romans eight verse 11, it says, "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you."

The point with all of this, dear friends, is from conception to resurrection, the Holy Spirit empowered Jesus' human nature to be obedient to the will of the Father and ultimately accomplish our redemption. That's what I want you to see. In fact, this was Jesus' own testimony. Remember when the Jewish leaders accused him of doing all those miraculous things by the power of Satan to try to get people to hate Jesus and still keep them in a position of power. Jesus accused them in Matthew 12 verses 30 through 32, I won't read it all, but he accused them not of blaspheming him, but speaking against whom? The Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit. And Paul summarized the very essence of the humanity of the eternal son with his assertion in First Timothy two and verse five, where he says, "There is one mediator between God and man, the man, Christ Jesus." Folks, this was the babe in the manger.

Well, I have one final sermon, I think, on the humanity of the Son incarnate. I want to go back and help you understand something that sometimes people will ask. I've answered part of it, and you will see it as we go forward expect, especially next week, but I want to answer the question that many will ask surrounding the issue of the temptation to sin in the life of Jesus. James 1:13 says, "God cannot be tempted by evil," right? How could Jesus have been tempted? First John three and verse five, "In Him, there is no sin." The great text in Second Corinthians 5:21, we read that "God made Christ to be sin who knew no sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God." And yet, in Hebrews four verse 15, we read that he was, quote, "...tempted as we are, yet without sin." Doctrinally, this is the doctrine of the impeccability of Christ. He was impeccable, meaning he could not sin. So therefore, on what basis was he genuinely tempted? We will discover and rejoice in the answer to that question that emerges from the Word of God the next time we get together.

And I might also add that the biblical answer to that, to this shall we say, perceived dilemma, will accomplish a second goal that I will have next week as we come together, and that is to demonstrate the very practical ways we can avail ourselves of the resources that we have in Christ by the power of the indwelling Spirit; resources that will  empower us and protect us and sustain us and bless us. Because again, we see that Jesus was a man who labored to obey. He was a man who struggled through the Father's maturing testings; a man who maintained purity and faithfulness to the very end. And as we contemplate these great truths, I trust that you will celebrate all the more, who Christ is, as we reflect upon his birth as our Savior and our Lord during this Christmas season. And I challenge you to measure your life against him.

I know that many of you are struggling right now. There's not a day that goes by as a pastor that I don't talk with, sometimes multiple people, even in this body, who are dealing with some very difficult issues. And isn't it wonderful to know that we have the Spirit of God as our resource. So let's reflect upon these great truths this Christmas season. Amen? Oh, we serve a glorious God, do we not?

Father, thank you for the truths of your word. May they find lodging in our hearts to such a point that that we manifest them in how we live, and that we experience them as we enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ. And Lord if there be one within the sound of my voice that knows nothing of what it means to truly be born again, to truly experience the miracle of the new birth, to know that their sins are forgiven, to enjoy Christ even this side of glory, Oh, Father, will you, by the power of your Spirit, overwhelm them with the guilt of their sin that they might cry out for saving grace and be saved. I ask this in the name of Jesus and for his sake. Amen.

This morning, we will depart from our study of Zechariah and I would like to begin a three part series that will lead up to Christmas regarding the humanity of the Son incarnate. Christmas is the season, of course, when we celebrate the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ and all that that means for the redeemed; an opportunity like no other time, perhaps in the year, when we can focus on his incarnation; when we can reflect upon him as not only our Creator but our Redeemer, certainly, as our King. And I have a responsibility before the Lord to teach you the Word of God, to feed you the great truths of scripture. And that responsibility must be fulfilled in expository preaching, in the in-depth, systematic teaching, preaching and application of the word. In other words, doctrinal preaching. And apart from that a congregation will be banished to an island of spiritual infancy. You will never really grow in Christ. And your responsibility when you hear the word, when you hear these great doctrinal truths, is to master them, to learn them, to apply them to your life. And I wish, therefore, to set the stage for what is to follow by giving you some examples to show you the stark contrast of what happens when people that are ostensibly Christian abandon the great doctrines of the Word of God and wander off into all manner of religious folly. And Christmas being the time when we focus on, often, the deity of Christ, as we should, I fear that many times we don't focus enough on the humanity of Christ. And so that will largely be my focus today and in the days to come. So let me step set the stage for these profound doctrinal truths regarding the humanity of Christ by sharing a few thoughts from things that perhaps you're even familiar with.

There is a very popular app out there today called the Hallow app, perhaps you are aware of it. It is a Roman Catholic app with prayers and meditations. If you look on the website, they have a special right now. Quote, "Hallow celebrates Advent with Pray 25 Challenge. And you hear about this on television. I thought I would look into it a little bit. So I looked at the website, and it has little clips that you can click on. I'll give you a sample of some of them you can click on - How to Pray the Hail Mary, How to Pray Mary in Consecration. In the parens, it says, "Entrust yourself to Mary to grow in devotion to her Son, Jesus." Another one, "How to pray the Latin rosary." Another, "How to pray the St Michael chaplet," in parens, "Seek the intercesSsion of St Michael the Archangel by praying this Chaplet." Another one, "How to pray the litany of trust," in parens it says, "Ask Jesus to deliver you from the various fears and insecurities that hold us back from fully trusting Him, and after each petition, respond with, deliver me, Jesus." And on and on it goes.

Of course, anybody that truly understands Christ and the gospel, realizes that all of this is pure folly. It is an apostate religious system, and I notice that nowhere in any of their materials will you see a biblical Christology or a clear presentation of the gospel, an invitation to it. There's no call to repentance, no call to faith in Christ. It's a very man centered gospel, kind of you know Jesus exists for you, Jesus as blesser, not Jesus as Savior and Lord and so forth. And recently, when I was flipping through the news, I noticed one of the Fox News anchor Martha McCallum. She has a show called The Story. She interviewed the Roman Catholic actor Jonathan Rumi, who portrays Jesus in the hit series, Chosen; and he also has a very active role to play in this app. Here's kind of a summary of what happened in this interview that she had with him, and I'm quoting some of what was transcribed off of the internet, and it's a little bit choppy. First they showed a little clip of the Hallow app and John 3:16, and anyway, she said, quote, "Actor and narrator, Jonathan Rumi, is here of The Chosen Season Five in April, and a Hallow spokesman," she went on to say, "Thank you for joining us and Happy Advent." And she said, "You know, this is the kind of thing the people see John 3:16; they see it on people's football helmets and front yards." And then she asked this very excellent question. She said, "Tell us why this is such a really breathtaking part of the gospel." Wow. I thought, what a great question. I can't wait to hear the answer. Here's his answer. "You know, the Christmas story is not just about Christmas trees and presents. The Christmas story at the core, is about vulnerability and risk." Vulnerability and risk. And he went on to say, "and God the Word made flesh in the form of Jesus, as a baby, to live like one of us, to eat, to breathe, to have friends, to argue, to fall, to skin his knee, to go to parties, weddings with his family, and do the things we do, and live the life of a human, sinlessly being the Son of God. So that we have an ally that can identify with us. We have him to go to. This is the epitome that started in the Nativity." End quote.

Well, obviously this dear man is clueless about what Christmas is all about. He has no understanding of who Christ is or the gospel. Beloved, the Christmas story is not about vulnerability and risk. It is not about Jesus taking on human flesh so that we can have an ally that can identify with us, someone we can go to when we have troubles. Even though there's some merit to that. I wish he would have quoted Galatians four, beginning in verse four. There, the Spirit of God says this through the Apostle Paul, "But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons."

Now may I remind you that whenever you see millions of people clamoring after Jesus, you know that that is not the Jesus of the Bible. Popularity was never something Jesus pursued, and it was certainly something he never attained. In fact, Jesus said in John 7:7, "...the world hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil." And in Matthew 10, beginning in verse 34 he said, "Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came TO SET A MAN AGAINST HIS FATHER, AND A DAUGHTER AGAINST HER MOTHER, AND A DAUGHTER-IN LAW AGAINST HER MOTHER-IN-LAW; and A MAN'S ENEMIES WILL BE THE MEMBERS OF HIS HOUSEHOLD.

And certainly John 3:16 that they were discussing is a marvelous text, because God is infinitely holy, and he is also a loving God, and he provides salvation to all who embrace the Lord Jesus Christ in repentant faith; but he is also a God of justice. He is a holy God, and he requires all sin to be punished. That's why, later on in that same chapter in John 3:36 the true Jesus said, "He who believes in the Son has eternal life. But who he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." Of course, this is all too offensive for people to hear.

You will recall in Matthew one and verse 18 and following, we read, "... before they came together..." referring to Mary and Joseph, "she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. Joseph, her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, desired to put her away secretly. But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, 'Joseph, son of David,  do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for that which has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit, and she will bear a Son; and you shall call his name Jesus, for it is He who will save His people from their sins.'"  That's what Christmas is ultimately about. And my goal over the next three Sundays leading up to Christmas is to contemplate the magnificent, miraculous and mysterious reality of the incarnation and what it means for all who trust in Christ as Savior. And I want to use God's own words to answer Martha McCallum's excellent question as to why John 3:16 is quote, "such a really breathtaking part of the gospel." I want us together look at scripture carefully and see what God has revealed to us regarding the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And by carefully examining not just the deity of Christ, but also his humanity as the Son incarnate. And as we do so, we're going to see that the same spiritual resources that were available to Christ and that he availed himself of, are available to us; which is a magnificent truth in and of itself. And what you will hear will be a stark contrast to the popular Jesus of the Hallow app, which is a false gospel. Satan uses every means possible, every means at his disposal, to prevent people from understanding the truth of who Jesus is, the astounding attractiveness of the gospel. Second Corinthians 4:4 we read that, "...the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving." Why? "So that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." And frankly, my heart breaks, in fact, there, as I was watching that whole thing on television, there was a combination of just grief and sorrow for people who need to know who Christ is, and they're getting this distorted foolishness.

But at the same time, I find myself righteously indignant to see the Lord so dishonored. Proverbs four, verse 19, we read that, "The way of the wicked is like darkness; they do not know over what they stumble." They have no clue. It's like they're too ignorant to know they're ignorant. But there is light in the darkness, and that light is the true Christ. In fact, Jesus said in John 8:12, "I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness but will have the Light of life." Moreover, in Acts 26 and verse 18, at his conversion, Jesus told Paul that he was sending him to the Gentiles, and here's why, "'...to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, and that they might receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me.'"

Now again, while we're going to examine the deity of Christ, the primary focus is going to be on the humanity of Christ. I want us to be able to answer questions like this: Why did Jesus have to be born of a virgin? How could Jesus be both fully human and fully divine? What does it mean in Philippians two six, that Jesus Christ existed in the form of God? Does that mean he only appeared to be God outwardly? And what does it mean in Philippians two seven, that Christ "emptied Himself taking the form of a bondservant." Did that mean that he somehow became less than fully God? Is it fair for believers like us to be commanded to quote "follow in His steps"? First Peter two, two, since he was, he was, and he is perfectly God. We aren't. Sois it fair for us to try to do what he does? Was his obedience animated by his intrinsic divine nature as God, or was he able to live a perfect life of obedience through the Father's will, solely through his human nature, which is it? And if he did not depend upon his divine nature to resist sin, then how was he able to do so in his human nature? What was the role of the Holy Spirit in his human nature, and what implications does this have for all believers? Well, there's a few of the questions that we will answer, and certainly, Christmas is the perfect season to look intothese things. And I will add that the answers are deep, they are profound. They will require your great attention, but they are also exhilarating. Frankly, they are life changing.

I've divided what I want to say to you over the next few weeks into three categories. We're going to look number one, at the virgin birth of the eternal Son. And then secondly, the self emptying of the eternal Son. We're going to look at those today. And then finally, the spirit empowerment of the eternal Son; and I will just have time to introduce that to you today.

So, let's look at this mystery of the incarnation, focusing primarily on the humanity of the Son incarnate. And we do that under this first heading here: the virgin birth of the eternal Son. And I might add that this is absolutely foundational. You simply must have this foundation in order tobuild a super structure of the person and the work of Christ, otherwise everything else will crumble. Let me remind you of Luke one, verse 30, and following that I read earlier, "The angel said to her,'Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. He will be great, and he will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father, David, and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.' Mary said to the angel, 'How can this be, since I am a virgin?' The angel said to her, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason, the holy child shall be called the Son of God.'"

Now there's a number of reasons why the virgin birth is so important, and I'll give you kind of a summary of a number of them, without getting off into too much detail, but first and foremost is it allows for the pre-existence of Christ. Remember Jesus' humanity was not eternal. It began with the supernatural union of both the divine and the human natures, when the Holy Spirit caused Mary to conceive, but Jesus was and is the eternal Son that existed prior to this conception. A number of passages will speak to this; Isaiah made this clear in Isaiah 9:6 he said, "For to us, a child is born. To us, a Son is given." In other words, he was already God. Remember, according to John one the first three verses, the second person of the Trinity was not only with God, the text says at creation, but it says he was God, "He was in the beginning with God, all things came into being through Him. And apart from Him, nothing came into being that has come into being." And so Jesus had to take upon his human flesh in order to reveal God to man, in order to reconcile man to God; you might even say in order to reign over the realm of the Earth as the second Adam; to replace where the first Adam failed, and then eventually hand over a successful mediatorial kingdom to God the Father prior to the eternal state.

I want you to think about this for a moment. Jesus had to be born a virgin and take on human flesh, to be punished for our sin as our substitute, right? Yet, he also had to be God in order toendure the sufferings of all of the elect. If Jesus wasn't God and was merely a descendant of Adam, he, like all of Adam's descendants, would have to die because, according to Romans 5:12, "Through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned --." Therefore, the work of redemption demanded a "theanthropon," a god man; one who would supernaturally fuse the human nature with the divine to form an indissoluble bond.

This, by the way, in theological terms, is called the "hypostatic union." Hypostatic means that which lies beneath or is the basis or a foundation. You see Jesus was at the same time, both human and divine. Now, I know your head begins to explode, because this is beyond us, but this is what we see in Scripture. The two natures are without confusion. The two natures are without change. They're without division. They're without separation. You must understand that Jesus is now, and forever, the God man. He was the offspring of David, according to the flesh, yet he was also God, a ruler whose goings forth are from eternity, Micah, five, two. You see, a man had to suffer the punishment that only God could endure, requiring both. And a man had to drink the bitter cup of divine wrath for the elect, but only God could drink it to the very dregs. A perfect man had to die for men, but only God is holy. Human flesh had to go to the grave, but yet only God could overcome it. So both the human and the divine natures had to be supernaturally woven together. Francis Turretin, a 17th century Italian Puritan, a reformer and a scholastic theologian who followed Calvin, said this, quote, "Both natures should be associated, that in both conjoined, both the highest weakness of humanity might exert itself for suffering, and the highest power and majesty of the Divinity might exert itself for the victory."

Now let's think about it for a moment, just very practically. How could Christ be our faithful high priest? How could he sympathize with our infirmities unless he were both God and man? How could Christ be our mediator and thus bridge the infinite chasm between God and man, unless he were both God and man? How could Christ be our king, lest he become united with us as man? Yet only God can transform our sinful nature. Only God could reign in our hearts. Only God can have dominion over us and over all of his creation. Beloved, the babe in the manger had to become a man, He had to be born of a virgin in order for him to be both the Son of Man and the Son of God - to be Emmanuel God with us; the son of a virgin according to the flesh, but Immanuel God with us according to the Spirit.

Now you don't have this text on your slides, but in Hebrews 10 verses, five through seven, we read how in eternity past, the father prepared a human body for the son, a body that would never be tainted by sin, a body with no sin nature, a body that would become the perfect sacrifice, the perfect substitute for us to appease the holy and just righteousness of God, and this was the will of the Father. And Jesus came to do that will. And he knew perfectly, before he came, that he was taking upon himself, according to Philippians, two seven, that we will look at in detail later, he was taking on himself, "the form of a bondservant, and being made in the likeness of men. And, "Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."

Now we see more of this, for example, in Hebrews, chapter two and verse nine. There we read, "But w do see Him who was made for a little while lower than the angels, namely Jesus, because of the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone." Referring to everyone who believes.  Not just to die, but to die for us - a man that could be our substitute. And frankly, this is at the heart of the Atonement. Atonement carries the idea of providing a moral or a legal repayment for a fault or for an injury. And we know biblically that atonement always requires two things. It requires number one, satisfaction of the offended holiness of God that could only be accomplished by number two, a substitute. So it requires satisfaction and substitution; substitution for the guilty party. Have you ever asked the question, How can a holy God show mercy to sinful man? How can he do that and still remain holy? I mean, after all, all sin has to be punished. The wages of sin is death, right? How can God extend his mercy and grace to those who have violated his holiness? I mean, he can't just say, I'm just going to ignore the sin and we'll just kind of move on. He can't do that. How could he shower sinners with undeserved blessing? If he were to do that, just kind of overlook sin and shower us the guilty with blessings, he would abdicate his holiness, would he not? Yes, indeed he would. Ah, but what would appear to be an unsolvable theological dilemma finds its remedy at the cross. It is resolved at the cross of Calvary. You see, the resolution is found in the Lord Jesus Christ, who paid the penalty himself, causing mercy and justice to unite, to come together at the cross. That's why we read in Second Corinthians 5:21 that, "He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." And in First John two, beginning in verse one, we read that, "If anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." And here's why, "and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins." To propitiate means to appease or to placate, to satisfy. Jesus is the appeasement or the satisfaction of divine justice that should have fallen upon us; as well as he is the source of divine mercy and grace.

Remember, sinful man could not atone for his own sin. God's holy and infinite justice could not be satisfied apart from a holy and infinite ransom, and only by his provision could this remedy be accomplished. God, the Father, had to provide his Son. And all this points to the need for the virgin birth of the Lord. Beloved, this is why God had to become man. This is at the heart of the Christmas story. When you explain to people, what is Christmas, you might want to tell them, you know, ultimately, at the heart, it's all about atonement. It's all about satisfaction and substitution. It's all about Christ coming to bear in his body our sins that we might be reconciled to God through faith in him. It's not about vulnerability and risk. It's not about having merely an ally to help us when we have problems.

So to understand Christmas and John 3:16, consistent with Martha McCallum's question, we not only need to understand the virgin birth of the Lord Jesus, the eternal Son that I've just given you a little overview about, but secondly, we need to understand the self emptying of the eternal Son. This is what's called the "kenosis," and that is drawn from the Greek word for "emptied Himself” - comes from the Greek verb, kenóō. And this speaks of Christ's voluntary self-surrender of the independent use of his divine attributes. We read about this in Philippians two, beginning in verse six. We read, "...although He existed in the form of God, did not require equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself..." there's the term from kenosis, "...emptied Himself, taking the form of a bondservant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."

Now I want to give you a brief exposition of this. I'm not going to go into detail of every single word, but notice first that it says he "existed in the form of God." The term "form" in the original language is "morphē." Our English word form tends to convey the idea of outward, the outward appearance of something. But what the Greek is referring to is the inner substance, or the very nature of something. That's what the Greek "morphē" expresses. So Jesus didn't just merely take on the outward appearance of God. No, he existed in the form. In other words, having the inner substance, the very nature. He was God, very God. He existed in that way, and he did not require "equality with God a thing to be grasped." So indeed, he was fully God. And notice, "morphē" is used again in verse seven. He took on the here it is "form of a bondservant." It doesn't mean that he merely dressed up like a slave, that he merely took on the appearance of a servant. He didn't merely just look like that, or just pretended to be something that he really wasn't in his heart. But no, just the opposite is true. What that term means is that he took on the very essence of a slave's nature. He took on the inner substance of a servant, the continuous and and full expression of a servant, state of a servant, condition. And notice it says he did not require, or "he did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped" in verse six.

Now, this is very important. This does not mean that he somehow relinquished his status as God; that he gave up equality with God, and thus became, shall we say, a lesser God, or less than God? No, no, no. I mean, we know that biblically, that God is self-existent, he is pre-existent, he is eternal, he is immutable. He's still omniscient, omnipresent. So what Paul is saying is simply this, though Christ is co- eternal and consubstantial, meaning he is of the same essence, and co-equal with the Father, nevertheless, he laid aside his right to the full prerogatives and benefits of his coexistence and equality with God. He laid them aside, but he did not surrender any of his divine essence.

And furthermore, we see that he took on human flesh, and it says that he did not grasp, in other words, he did not try to hang on to any of the privileges and rights that were rightfully his. Rather Jesus, verse seven, "emptied Himself, taking the form of a bondservant." Emptied Himself. Now this does not mean that he divested something from himself, that is out of himself, thereby becoming less than God. No, it's very, very obvious here, he emptied himself. He poured out Himself. Now, what does this mean? Well, the verb "kenoō" in the original language, to empty; I might say, first of all, it is used exclusively in a metaphorical sense in the New Testament, and it never means to pour out as if Jesus poured out some of his divine attributes, as some heresies would argue. If that were Paul's intent, he would have used another Greek term, "ekcheō." For example, it's in Luke 22:20, "...this cup," which is here, it "is poured out for you, is the new covenant in My blood." John 2:15 Jesus poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. So he would have used ekcheō in order to express that. But that's not what he uses here. The inspired apostle employs the term kenoō - to make void, to nullify, or to make of no effect. We see this, for example in Romans 4:14, "For if those who are of the Law are heirs, faith is made void" - there is that term, "...and the promise is nullified." In other words, if righteousness came by obeying the law, faith would be nullified. It would become of nought.

So here in Philippians two seven, what we see, and I want you to grasp this, this is just absolutely amazing. Christ Himself is the object of this emptying. He made himself void. He nullified himself. The King James says, "He made himself of no reputation." Now, how so? How did that happen? By taking on human nature, by adding himself full and true humanity. So actually, this is addition, not subtraction. I want you to understand. He lost nothing of his divine essence, nothing of his divine nature, of his divine qualities, his divine attributes. He remained fully God. He remained fully omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent, immutable, and on and on it goes, even though he chose not to access some of those prerogatives, some of those attributes in his humanity. Bear in mind that even while Jesus was part of the zygote in the womb, even when he was in Mary's womb, he was still upholding all things by the Word of His power, because Christ is Spirit. And so all of those attributes were still there. But what we see in this emptying is that he chose not to exercise, to the full limit, all of the attributes during his earthly life as the incarnate Jesus. He emptied himself again by refusing to access his rights and privileges. He made void, shall we say, certain rights of his divine prerogatives. Although, I might add, he did not forsake his divine power to perform miracles or to forgive sins, to know the minds of people and so forth. But it's amazing that in the kenosis, he took on in addition to his full divine nature, a full human nature, and he took on the form of a slave. This is the self-emptying of the son. So technically, nothing is subtracted. But rather, he poured himself out by adding to himself the nature of man.

Think about this, the nature of man is created. It is limited. It is a finite human being, and as a result, the full manifestation of his deity is restricted or limited. Why? Because of his human nature. So his divine glory was veiled in his humanity, and he voluntarily refused to exercise some of his divine attributes. I have heard on several occasions the analogy of a great king. Think about this, there was once upon a time a great king, great, powerful king, wealthy king, and he saw paupers in his kingdom, and he wanted to understand more how they thought, how they how they would think. And so he decided to secretly live a life of a beggar, of a pauper. And so although he still reserved all of the rights, possessed all of the rights, and the wealth and the privileges and the power of a king, he nevertheless took on the qualities of a beggar. And so he would eat the same foods, he would have the same friends, the same shelter. If he needed medical care, which was basically, they didn't have any he would have to, he would have to be that same way. And so what would happen then is in order for him to truly, sincerely, understand how the paupers lived and how they thought, he had to become like one. But at no time did he divest himself of any of his prerogatives and power and authority and wealth as the king? So too, Jesus took on the form of a bond servant. A bond servant - literally a slave. A slave who owned nothing and who existed only to do the will of his master.

Now, while that analogy will break down on several levels, it does, I hope, provide some measure of understanding of this inscrutable, supernatural mystery that we have before us. And to think, isn't it amazing how one person can have two full and integral, that is necessary, natures - one that is created and finite and fully human, and the other that is uncreated, that is infinite and fully divine. But this is at the heart of the incarnation. Paul summarized this well in Second Corinthians eight and verse nine, "Though He was rich, yet for your sake, He became poor."

Now, back to this self-emptying of this of the eternal Son, Albert J McClain said this, "Jesus not only emptied Himself, stooping from God to humanity, he also humbled Himself, stooping from humanity to death." Now this was the ultimate reason, or shall we say, the ultimate purpose, of his self-emptying, so that he would become obedient to the Father to the point of death, even death on a cross. Notice again, Philippians two verse seven, “...taking the form" there it is, the morphe, "of a bond servant.." that is, taking on the very essence, the very nature of a slave, "and being made in the likeness of men." Likeness in the original language refers to that which is made like something else, not just in appearance, but in reality, but found in appearance as a man. Appearance in Greek is "schēma", and it refers to the outward shape or the form of something. So, he was, "found in the appearance as a man," and then it says, "He humbled Himself." Humble: the Greek term carries the idea of self-renunciation, of a deliberate, willful, voluntary depression and rank; making oneself lowly. "He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." "Tapeinoō" is the word for humbled. And for those of you theologians, the kenosis refers to how he emptied himself, and what's called the tapanosis, is that he humbled himself. And for this reason, Jesus said in Matthew 20 and verse 28, "the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many. And folks, what is absolutely fascinating here is that the Father planned this redemptive work of the Son in eternity past, and the Son submitted to and obeyed all that the Father commanded Him. In fact, in John 638, Jesus said, "'For I have come down from heaven not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me."

So, back to Philippians two, verse eight, "He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." Now folks, this is obedience unlike anything he had ever known. He had never before suffered rejection, torture, certainly not death, and yet this is why he had to become a human. So again, remember these things when somebody asks you what Christmas is all about. So we've seen the virgin birth of the eternal Son and the self-emptying of the eternal Son. Finally, and again, this is largely going to be an introduction, the spirit empowerment of the eternal Son. And again, we want to ask the question and answer it, was Jesus perfectly obedient to the will of his Father because he availed himself of the resources that were intrinsic to his divine nature? Was he obedient because he was fully divine? If so, if this obedience was empowered by his divine nature, how can we not, having a divine nature, obey the commands to be like him? For example, in First John two six, we read "The one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked." So there seems to be a dilemma here, unless we understand what really happened with Jesus, because I don't have a divine nature. I can't be like Jesus, if Jesus only used his divine nature to be obedient. First Peter two, and verse 21 and following, "For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, WHO COMMITTED NO SIN, NOR WAS ANY DECEIT FOUND IN HIS MOUTH; and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats." Now, let me stop there. I fail on every one of those, and you do too. How can we do this in our humanity? Well, folks, the answer is in the next phrase. "But kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously."

But I want you to understand is that Jesus obeyed not out of his intrinsic divine nature, but out of his human nature by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is such a wonderful truth with enormous implications for every believer. Think about this. Yes, Jesus possessed the fullness of deity in his incarnation, and he continues to do so as he is seated at the right hand of the Father, but when he came into this world and took on human flesh as the God man, he lived out his life and his divine calling as the Spirit, empowered spirit, anointed Messiah. Isaiah chapter 11, I'll not take time to get into all of this, but notice what he says, beginning in verse one. This is the prophet of Jesus coming someday. It says, "Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse and a branch from his roots will bear fruit. The Spirit of the LORD will rest on Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD." Now let me pause for a second. Why would he need that if he was just solely using His divine nature? Well, the fact is, he was operating in his human nature in order to be truly like us. He goes on to say, "...and he will delight in the fear of the LORD, and He will not judge by what His eyes see, nor make a decision by what His ears hear." Then it goes on to yet future, a time yet future, "But with righteousness, He will judge the poor and decide with fairness for the afflicted of the earth; and He will strike the earth with the rod of His mouth and with the breath of His lips he will slay the wicked. Also righteousness will be the belt about His loins and faithfulness the belt about His waist."

You must understand that Jesus, right now, is at the right hand of the Father, and he looks like us. At some level, he is still the God man, both human and divine. Isaiah 42 beginning in verse one, "'Behold, My servant whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not cry out or raise His voice, nor make His voice heard in the street, A bruised reed He will not break, and a dimly burning wick He will not extinguish; He will faithfully bring forth justice. He will not be disheartened or crushed until He has established justice on the earth; and the coastlands will wait expectantly for His law.'" I find it interesting in Luke four, after Jesus was tempted by the devil, Luke says this in verse 14, that Jesus "...returned in the power of the Spirit" to Galilee, and then when he got to his hometown of Nazareth, he went into the synagogue. And here's what happened, according to Luke four, verse 17 and following. "And the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to Him. And he opened the book and found the place where it was written, 'THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD IS UPON ME, BECAUSE HE HAS ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO WERE OPPPRESSED, TO PROCLAIM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD.’ “Then we read that he "closed the book, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down, and the eyes of all and the synagogue were fixed on Him. And he began to say to them, 'Today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.'" In other words, I am the Messiah. And a number of you have been with me on the cliff where they took Jesus to try to throw him off. Indeed, Jesus was born of the Spirit, right? He was conceived in his mother's womb by the Spirit, and at his baptism, we read in Luke 3:22, "The Holy Spirit descended upon Him in bodily form like a dove, and a voice came out of heaven. 'You are My beloved Son; in You I am well- pleased.'"

And remember what Peter said to Cornelius in Acts 10:38, "You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him."  In his great and seminal work, "The Presence and the Power, the Significance of the Holy Spirit in the Life and Ministry of Jesus,” Gerald Hawthorne said this, and I quote, "The Holy Spirit's presence and work in Jesus life is one of the most significant biblical evidences of the genuineness of his humanity. For the significance of the Spirit in his life lies precisely in this, that the Holy Spirit was the divine power by which Jesus overcame his human limitations, rose above his human weakness, and won out over his human mortality." Oh, child of God, don't miss this, in his humility and in his humanity, the eternal Son incarnate accepted the role of living a life of total dependence upon all that the Spirit of God would provide for him, as he did perfectly the will of the Father. And while the Holy Spirit did nothing to contribute to his deity, he did everything to contribute to his humanity. And what I want you to understand beloved is we have the same supernatural resources if we belong to Christ; the divine enablement that he had is available to us.

And I would say to those of you who are struggling with your faith right now, or those of you who are waffling in your obedience, those of you that are discouraged or lonely or angry or afraid, or whatever it might be, please know that the same resources that empower Jesus to do the Father's will, to humble himself, by become obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross, those same resources are available to you. It's available to everyone who is truly united to Christ in saving faith. But as we will learn in coming days, we must avail ourselves of the means of grace; those spirit empowering resources that are revealed to us in Scripture, and then we understand what it means to really walk by the Spirit, to be filled with the Spirit, and all of those magnificent truths. And the next time, I will expand upon this brief introduction concerning the spirit, empowerment of the eternal Son. But what I want you to hear today is that these are the great truths that are at the heart of the Christmas story.

Now I know, as a theologian, I'm giving you all kinds of things that you will have to wrestle with and think about, and I don't expect you to know all of these things right away, but if I can put it to you very kindly and very forthrightly, I do expect you to master these things. I'm not up here to just give you a bunch of great theology, and then you walk out and say, "Oh, that was interesting." No, this is God's way of communicating to you the magnificent truths of his self-disclosure in Scripture so that you can master them, understand them, proclaim them to your children, to your friends, that Christ might be exalted. Now, certainly, as we look at these things, we find ourselves overwhelmed, right? I have a hard time trying to explain things that I don't fully understand. I'm just telling you what the Word says. I mean, there's nothing in our life experience that compares to anything like this. I mean, do you know of anybody that's got two natures, one divine and one human? I know a lot that have human natures, and you're looking at one, but certainly, like the angels in Luke two, we can celebrate this. I don't think you have this on your screen, but we read that, "An angel of the Lord suddenly stood before the shepherds, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened. But the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people. For today in the city of David, there has been born for you a Savior who is Christ the Lord." With the angels, with the shepherds, let's celebrate these magnificent truths. Amen?

Father, thank you for revealing these things to us in your word, and I pray that by the power of your Spirit, we would be able to grasp them in such a way as to change our life, so that we would be so overwhelmed by the transcendent glory of what you have accomplished on our behalf, that we would certainly be a greater witness, a bolder witness; one that others could see in such a way as to say there's something different about that man, that woman, that boy, that girl, so that the gospel can go forth from us with power, with clarity, that many might be saved. Lord, that is the desire of our heart. I ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus, our Savior, our Lord and our King. Amen.

Because this is Thanksgiving season, and you might say, Thanksgiving weekend, I've decided to move away from our verse-by-verse study of Zechariah, and I would like to speak to you about rendering praise to the Lord. And in a few minutes, we're going to look specifically at Psalm eight. We have so much to be thankful for, do we not? Absolutely astounding when you think about it; and certainly, a thankful heart is one of the primary characteristics of a true believer. We are told in Psalm 30, verse four, "Sing praise to the Lord, you His godly ones and give thanks to His holy name." Psalm, 92, one, "It is good to give thanks to the Lord and to sing praises to Thy name, O Most High." Psalm 107, beginning in verse 21, "Let them give thanks to the Lord for His loving kindness and for His wonders to the sons of men. Let them also offer sacrifices of thanksgiving and tell of His works with joyful singing." In Colossians three and verse 17, the apostle Paul tells us, "Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father." And the writer of Hebrews tells us, in Hebrews 13, beginning in verse 15, "Through Him, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is the fruit of lips, and give thanks to His name." We also read in First Thessalonians 5:18, "In everything, give thanks for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." 

I always appreciate the words of Charles Spurgeon. He said this in regard to Thanksgiving, quote, "Let us daily praise God for common mercies, common as we frequently call them, and yet so priceless that when deprived of them, we are ready to perish. Let us bless God for the eyes with which we behold the Son, for the health and strength to walk abroad, for the bread we eat, for the raiment we wear, let us praise Him that we are not cast out among the hopeless or confined amongst the guilty. Let us thank Him for liberty, for friends, for family, associations and comforts. Let us praise Him, in fact, for everything which we receive from His bounteous hand. We deserve little and yet most yet are most plenteously endowed. But beloved, the sweetest and the loudest note in our songs of praise should be of redeeming love. God's redeeming acts towards his chosen are forever the favorite themes of their praise. If we know what redemption means, let us not withhold our sonnets of thanksgiving." 

Indeed, thankfulness to God will always adorn the speech of the humble, but frankly it will seldom be heard from the lips of the proud. The bitter heart of the proud will spew forth the venom of complaints and criticisms, but the contrite of heart will be the wellspring of gratitude and rejoicing. In fact, I must say that I think there's few things that are more revolting than being around a person who claims to know and love Christ and yet all they do is complain and criticize, etc, etc. When I'm around those kinds of people, I have kind of the same attitude as when I'm walking barefoot and I see a mound of fire ants. I want to avoid them. But, O what a joy it is to be around a person that loves Christ; that's filled with the Spirit because of his saving grace, filled with joy and thanksgiving. And at this time of year, we all will think back about the original Thanksgiving and the pilgrims and so forth. And I thought I would rehearse just a little bit of that history to set up what I want to talk with you about out of Psalm 18.  The pilgrims were basically people that came out of the Reformation. They would have believed essentially the same as we do; and you will recall that they had to flee from the persecution of the church of England. And because of its heresies that they were being forced to somehow believe, and they fled to Holland and other regions, but because they did not have the economic opportunities in those places to survive well, they decided to risk everything and to move to America, this land called America. 

And having gained financial backing, and joined by other colonists, they boarded the Mayflower and made their way to Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620 where they founded Plymouth colony. And in the Pilgrim Hall Museum in Plymouth, Massachusetts, there are four Bibles on display, each being brought over on the Mayflower. And one belonged to the first governor of that group, William Bradford. And the museum display reads as follows, "The 1592 Geneva Bible belonged to William Bradford. It journeyed with him from England to Holland and eventually to Plymouth. The pilgrim separatists used the quote 'Geneva Bible.' This was a translation with many commentary notes in the margin made by English Calvinist refugees living in Switzerland. the official English church strongly disagreed with the Geneva Bible's commentary, and concerning the faith of those that he governed. Bradford wrote this quote, 'They as the Lord's free people joined themselves in the fellowship of the gospel to walk in all His ways, made known or to be made known unto them.'" End Quote. 

Well, as you will recall from your history, the early pilgrims struggled to survive. In fact, about half of them died the very first year. Nevertheless, in November of 1621, they celebrated God's mercy and grace on their life with a Thanksgiving feast, and one of the men that attended that first feast was Edward Winslow, and he is quoted to have said this, quote, "Our harvest, being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling that so we might, after a special manner, rejoice together after we gathered the fruit of our labors. And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want." End quote. 

A generation after the first Thanksgiving on June of 1676, another day of Thanksgiving was commissioned by the Governing Council of Charleston, Massachusetts, and by unanimous vote, they instructed Edward Rawson, the clerk, to proclaim June 29 as a day of Thanksgiving. And the following is a part of the proclamation of that day. Quote, "The council has thought meet to appoint and set apart the 29th day of this instant June as a day of solemn thanksgiving and praise to God for such His goodness and favor, many particulars of which mercy might be instanced. But we doubt not those who are sensible of God's afflictions have been as diligent to aspire Him returning to us and that the Lord may behold us as a people offering praise and thereby glorifying Him. The council doth commend it to the respective ministers, elders and people of this jurisdiction, solidly and seriously to keep the same beseeching that being persuaded by the mercies of God, we may all, even this whole people, offer up our bodies and souls as a living and acceptable service unto God by Christ Jesus." End Quote. 

However, on December 18 of 1777, we have the very first time when all 13 of the original colonies joined together in a Thanksgiving celebration. And it commemorated the patriotic victory over the British at Saratoga. And I want to read to you a little excerpt from the official Annals of the Continental Congress of that day. Quote. "For as much as it is the indispensable duty of all men to adore the superintending providence of Almighty God, to acknowledge with gratitude their obligations to him for benefits received, and to implore such further blessings as they stand in need of, and it having pleased him in his abundant mercy, to continue to us the innumerable bounties of his common providence. It is therefore recommended to the legislative or executive powers of these United States to set apart Thursday, the 18th day of December, for solemn thanksgiving and praise that with one heart and one voice, the good people may express the grateful feelings of their hearts and consecrate themselves to the service of their divine benefactor. And that together with their sincere acknowledgements of kind offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins whereby they had forfeited every favor, and their humble and earnest supplication that it may please God through the merits of Jesus Christ mercifully to forgive and block them out of remembrance, that it may please him graciously." He went on to say, "To take schools and seminaries of education so necessary for cultivating the principles of true liberty, virtue and piety under his nurturing hand and to prosper the means of religion for the promotion and enlargement of that kingdom which consisteth in righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost." End Quote. 

Of course, this is Old English, but isn't it a little bit different than what we hear from our government today? Well, as the years rolled on, Americans continued to celebrate feasts of Thanksgiving, but they did it more and more in the fall, and some presidents issued proclamations, but Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation for a perpetual national holiday to be set aside for Thanksgiving, and in 1863 with the nation torn apart by the Civil War, here's what he declared. Quote, "I do, therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens." End Quote. 

Well again, a thankful heart will always be the sure mark of the redeemed, because we have so much to be thankful for and to be thankful regardless of the circumstances, like those people who founded this once great nation. And I find it amazing to see how God used those early saints to begin to really forge this nation to become the greatest nation on Earth. And the values of Christianity are woven through the tapestry of the Constitution, and therefore, it should be no surprise why so many people hate the Constitution and hate our country. In fact, I was listening to Charlie Kirk. Maybe you've heard of him, young man with Turning Point USA, and he recounted the Christian's origin of our nation that the historical revisionists are trying to erase and here's what he said, "13 out of 13 of the original states required a declaration of faith. Nine out of 13 required that you be a Protestant, except Maryland, which was Catholic, but still required a declaration of faith. Every single one of those original constitutions Pennsylvania included stated, quote, 'I profess faith in my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.'" He went on to say, "55 out of 56 of the original signers of the Declaration of Independence were Bible believing Christians. In fact, the last paragraph of the Declaration of Independence reads as a prayer. Quote, 'We appeal to the Supreme Judge of the universe, Jesus Christ, etc, etc.'" But finally, he said, "Look at what the actual founder said." And then he quotes John Adams. Quote, "'The Constitution was only written for a moral, religious people. It was wholly inadequate for the people of any other the body politic of America was so Christian that our form and structure of government was built for people that believed in Christ our Lord.'" End quote. Kirk went on to say, "One of the reasons we are living through a constitutional crisis is that we no longer have a Christian nation, but we have a Christian form of government, and the two are incompatible. You cannot have liberty if you do not have a Christian population." End quote. 

Well, technically, we've really never been a Christian nation. There were a lot of people that were deists; they believed in God, but that's far different than truly believing in the gospel and so forth. But originally, the country's values were far more aligned with the Bible than they are today, and as a result, most people today do not give thanks to God in the way that you heard me just read. They do not see God as the Creator, the Sustainer, the Redeemer, the consummator of all human history; most people scoff at the idea that man is a sinner in desperate need of salvation. They scoff at God's verdict on man; that man stands guilty before a holy God, condemned before an infinitely holy and righteous God. And for this reason, the apostle Paul said in Romans one and verse 18, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven." In other words, his wrath emanates from his throne, and it does so against, "...all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness." A warning concerning three things there. First of all, the nature of divine wrath. There's this settled, determined, righteous indignation that has been provoked by man's sin. And he says it is constantly being revealed. In other words, it's perpetually being manifested. And we see this in God's moral order, for example, through the law of sowing and reaping. We see it in, as well, in his personal intervention in judging the wicked with all the things that can happen in the world. We see it through the wrath of his divine abandonment, where he gives people over to a depraved mind to think and do things that are absolutely, utterly absurd. And we see here that the origin of his wrath, as I said, is revealed from heaven. Heaven being synonymous with God's throne. And the object of divine wrath, he says, it is, "...revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness." So in other words, those whose nature and whose lifestyle are constantly suppressing - that is restraining - trying to keep a lid on having to deal with the truth, they're doing this in unrighteousness. And the basis for his wrath is really twofold in that text; it's because of them denying their conscience and denying God as creator. 

And I want you to think about this for a moment, because this was really why so many people today do not thank God in the way they should, especially at Thanksgiving. First of all, man has rejected the divine revelation of God that is revealed in his conscience. I mean, you think about it, you cannot suppress suppress the truth, as we read in verse 18, if it is not within you, so the truth is there. The truth is there, people just can't stand it. They can't stand the fact that there is a holy God, that he is the Creator, that he is the judge; that God has made it clear in each person that he himself is God, and that we are his image bearers. Man can understand this in his conscience, and man can understand this in his conscience because he is made in the image of God. In verse 19 of Romans, one we read because "...that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them."

But man also experiences God's wrath because he rejects, not only what's in his conscience about God and his relationship to him, but because of creation. I mean, he can look at the theinconceivable vastness and complexity and order of the physical universe. It's utterly mind boggling. And then to say there's no God? Verse 20 went on to say this, "For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse." 

Verse 21, "For even though they knew God..." there again, they knew God in their conscience, the "law is written in their hearts, their conscience bears witness of that." Romans 2:15. "Even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened." Despite all of the blessings that man experiences from our Creator God, the unregenerate, the proud, will be ungrateful to him, and therefore the text goes on to say that he concocts futile speculations. In other words, foolish, useless, godless reasonings about life and about who God is. Great example is the theory of evolution, that order comes out of chaos, that nobody times nothing equals everything. Every time I think of DNA, I'm overwhelmed by it. I'm certainly not a biologist. I don't understand these things, like a lot of you medical people would, but I understand enough to know that DNA is a molecule that contains the genetic information of an organisms development and function and growth and reproduction. And you've all seen little pictures of DNA. It's made of two linked strands that are wound around each other that resemble kind of a twisted ladder. It's it's a shape known as a double helix, and I read that 3.16 billion, catch that, 3.16 billion base pairs are in each human cell. And the DNA is spread across a total of 46 chromosomes in a single human cell. And of course, all of that's a result of random selection, all of these things just kind of evolved. And for people that think that, the wrath of God abides upon them because they are suppressing the truth that they know is there because of their conscience and because of creation. No wonder, human beings do not honor God, as we read in the text, or give thanks, but they pursue futile speculations. Their foolish heart is darkened, which is the result of divine judgment. 

And no wonder, people worship the most ridiculous things, reincarnation. People worshiping trees, worshiping some little, little fat guy with a pot belly over in the corner, you know, blow themselves up so that they can go to heaven and be with 70 virgins. I mean, just goes on and on and on, and the insanity that we see in our country is just every bit as mind boggling that men can become women if they want to, and so forth. 

Well, my earnest desire this morning is for us to obviously be different from all of that, and by God's grace we are because of the work that he's done within us. But I want us to honor God this morning and to give thanks. And I thought that we would do that by looking at Psalm eight for a few minutes, a very short Psalm. 

Notice it says, "For the choir director on the Gittith, A Psalm of David." Gittith, we're not real sure. It's perhaps a way of saying Gath, but it was they believe an instrument from that area, or it could be a joyous song that was sung over Goliath, because the theme here is overthrowing the mighty and so forth. And I want you to notice that Psalm seven ends with praise. It says, "I will praise the Lord according to His righteousness, and will sing praise to the name of the LORD Most High." And so Psalm eight now picks up that theme, and it is indeed a magnificent hymn of praise that those early saints would have sung, exalting the name of of God and his glorious attributes, his his power, especially as we are going to see, his attributes, his glory, his power, his Majesty, as they are revealed in his works of creation. This is one of the favorite psalms of New Testament writers, especially the writer of Hebrews, who quoted from it to describe just the incomparability, if you will, of the Lord Jesus. In Hebrews two beginning in verse six, There we read, "But one has testified somewhere.." and he's referring to Psalm eight, "...saying, what is man that you remember Him, or the Son of Man that you are concerned about Him? You have made Him for a little while lower than the angels. You have crowned Him with glory and honor and have appointed Him over the works of your hands. You have put all things in subjection under His feet. For in subjecting all things to Him, He left nothing that is not subject to Him. But now we do not yet see all things subjected to Him." 

I might also add as a footnote, before we look more closely at the text, that Psalm eight is really a commentary on Genesis, chapter one, verses 26 through 28 explaining the importance and role of humanity in God's creation. In Genesis 1:26, we read, "Then God said, Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." And then we read in verse 27, "God created man in His own image. In the image of God, He created him, male and female He created them." Verse 28, "God blessed them, and God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.'" 

Now let's look more closely at Psalm eight here. Verse 1, "O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name in all the earth. Who have displayed Thy splendor above the heavens!" Would you notice there are twin nouns, both using the names of God in his address. The first one is LORD with the capital letters - that his Yahweh - emphasizing his revealed name; that he is the pre-existent, self-existent, eternal God of the universe. And then you have Lord with the small letters, emphasizing his sovereign rule over all things. And he says, "How majestic is Thy name..." In Hebrew, the term majestic expresses just a display of power that is absolutely awe inspiring; a display of power that is frankly intimidating. It is overwhelming. So this is an expression of overwhelming wonder. 

Over the years, I've had the privilege of spending time in in the Great North, where you can see the Great Northern Lights, and the further north you get, the more awesome they are. But I can tell you, if you haven't seen them, it will absolutely frighten you. It is so majestic. That's the idea here. Some of this also call this Psalm "The song of the astronomer”; It would be good if you are gazing at the stars - you can't see many of the stars here, if you get out west, where you don't have light pollution, or other places, you think you're in a different you're a different planet. But you need to read this while you gaze at the stars, and you see just the vastness of the skies and and the wonder of it all. The planets, my what a humbling effect they have upon us. If you've never been to the Creation Museum, I would encourage you to go and visit the Planetarium at the Creation Museum. And there, I think the heading is the "Created Cosmos,” and it's by Dr Jason Lyle. And your mind, as you kind of recline in these chairs, you see this huge dome, and they take you through a pictorial, actual journey through the universe, so to speak, because of all the pictures that they made. It is an experience like nothing else I've ever experienced. It's worth it, and you want to bring your kids there. But, but what you will find is your mind will quickly get lost in the wonder and the glory of God. 

I also find it interesting that it's good for our minds to be stirred and our imaginations to be stirred, especially our children as they contemplate the glory of God, and as you marvel at the vastness of creation; you marvel as well at the condescension of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Creator, to do what he has done for the redeemed. To think that the God of the amoeba and the God of the worm is also the God of the planets and the stars. To think that from the molten depths of the earth to the farthest galaxy in the universe, He is there. He is holding it all together by the word of his power. And he created all of those things. And everywhere you look into the skies, you see the ineffable brightness, the dazzling glory of God blazing forth. No one can miss it. Therefore, no one has an excuse. We are all without excuse. I want to expand on the display of this splendor by quoting Dr Lyle. And this is a bit of a long quote, but I thought I would do it anyway, because it really expresses it so well. Here's what he said regarding the splendor of God's creation. Quote, "The heavens declare the glory of God. The skies proclaim the work of His hands." There he's quoting Psalm 19, verse one. "This beautiful statement indicates one of the purposes of the created universe. The universe reveals the majesty of its creator. Of course, God's glory can be seen in many different aspects of creation, not just the heavens. Considering the magnificent intricacy of a living cell, the complexity and the amazing diversity of life on earth, and the mathematical precision of the laws of physics and chemistry, these are all indicative of the incomprehensible creativity, intelligence and Power of the Creator. Why then, does the Bible single out the heavens as declaring his glory? Perhaps the heavens declare God's glory in a special way, or to a greater extent. It may even be that the starry universe was specially designed for the purpose of declaring God's glory to us. The range of scales in the universe is truly staggering. The universe contains objects of incredible size and mass at distances which the human mind cannot fully grasp." And by the way, I'mskipping around, taking certain things that he said, alright? 

"Let's start close to home with a relatively small astronomical object, the moon is the nearest natural celestial body. It is approximately 2100 miles in diameter, roughly the size of the continental United States. And the moon orbits at an average distance of 240,000 miles from the earth. Additionally, the moon," quote, 'the lesser light' created on day four was designed to, quote, 'rule the night,' according to Genesis 1:16. Indeed, the moon does rule the night. It outshines every other nighttime celestial object. Let's move further out into space," he says, "and consider the greater light that God has created on day four, the sun. The sun, like other stars, is a glowing, hot ball of hydrogen gas. It derives energy from the fusion of hydrogen to helium in the core. The sun is effectively a stable hydrogen bomb. It is an extremely efficient source of energy placed at just the right distance to provide the right amount of light and heat of the earth. The sun is about 400 times more distant than the moon. Remarkably, it is also 400 times larger, so it has the same angular size as the moon, meaning it appears the same size and covers the same portion of the sky. It is interesting that God made both of the greatlights the same angular size and far larger in angle than any of the other celestial objects. There is no naturalistic reason why the sun and moon would be as just the right distances to have the same apparent size as seen from the Earth. As far as we know, the Earth is the only planet for which this is the case. The sun is over 100 times the diameter of the Earth. If it were hollow, it would hold over 1 million Earths, and it exists at the incredible distance of 93 million miles. The sun is far from the earth, and yet the earth is much closer to the Sun than many of the other planets. Consider Pluto, a tiny frozen world at the outer edge of the planets of the solar system. Pluto, an average, is about 40 times farther away from the Sun than the Earth is." He goes on to say that, "The solar system is truly vast. If it had been the only thing God made, we should certainly be impressed. Yet God has created on even larger scales. Consider the distances between the stars. Let's start with the nearest star system to the earth, besides the sun - the Alpha Centauri system. Unlike the solar system, Alpha Centauri contains more than one star, two bright stars comparable to the sun in size and color, revolve around each otherevery 80 years, a third faint red dwarf star called Proxima lies farther away. The distance to this system is about 25 trillion miles. Such a number has little meaning to most of us who can comprehend 25 trillion miles. This is about 6800 times farther away from the Earth than Pluto is." "Our galaxy," he went on to say, "is shaped like a disk with a bulge in the center. Earth is located in the disk closer to the edge than the center, and the disk has spiral arms. We cannot directly see the spiral structure because we are within it. To us, the galaxy looks like a faint cloud band stretching across the sky on," parens, "(Northern Hemisphere, summer nights or winter nights for the Southern Hemisphere.) This is how our galaxy gets its name, the Milky Way. Our galaxy contains over 100 billion stars. The Bible says that God calls them all by their names. Psalm 147 four and Isaiah 40 verse 26. How amazing that God has a name for each and every one of those stars. Some of these stars are far separated from their nearest neighbor, much like the sun. Some stars come in binary or multiple star systems, such as Alpha Centauri. Some stars come in large clusters. Consider the M 80-star cluster. This cluster within our galaxy is estimated to contain over 100,000 stars. That means that the Milky Way has roughly a million times as many. Imagine, 1 million stars for every single star in this cluster, the galaxy contains more than stars, it also contains nebulae, the same stuff as stars. But whereas stars are compact spheres, a nebula is spread out over a much larger region of space. When a nebula is heated by nearby stars, it glows often with vivid, beautiful colors. Consider the beauty of the nebulae shown." And he has a picture that I'm not going to show you, but keep in mind, and I'm sure some of you have seen these on the internet, right? If you haven't, you can go on and see it; absolutely astounding. "Keep in mind how enormous these objects are." He said, "The Rosetta nebulae is not only beautiful, it is estimated to be more massive than 10,000 suns. And when we consider the immensity of the Milky Way, with its 100 billion stars, countless nebulae and star clusters, the overwhelming power of the Creator becomes clear. Yet our galaxy is not the only one. God has created innumerable galaxies with a wide range of shapes and sizes. Many galaxies come in clusters. The Milky Way belongs to a cluster of a few dozen galaxies called the local group. Some clusters are much, much larger than this. The Virgo cluster has about 2000 galaxies. Clusters of galaxies are organized into even larger, super clusters, clusters of clusters. And finally," he says, "just think about the quantity of energy involved when God created all this. The sun alone gives off more energy every second than 1 billion major cities would produce in one year. Yet our entire galaxy is 20 billion times more luminous than the sun. It is estimated that there are at least as many galaxies as there are stars in the Milky Way, about 100 billion. Just consider such energy and mass filling of volume of space that is immense beyond our ability to fathom. Truly the heavens declare the glory of God and the skies proclaim the work of His hands." Isn't that amazing? 

You know, we marvel at all of this. We're left speechless. And to realize that where God exists is in the third heaven beyond all of that. Go back to the text. Notice now. Only do the heavens above declare His glory, but also the earthlings below, notice verse two, "From the mouth of infants and nursing babes, Thou hast established strength because of Thine adversaries, to make the enemy and the revengeful cease." A fascinating statement out of the "mouth of infants and nursing babes." By the way, nowhere else in the Old Testament is this thought expressed. In the New Testament, however, this verse is quoted and applied to praise that is offered to God by children. Matthew 21:16 you may remember that in anger of the children shouting in the temple "Hosanna to the Son of David," the scribes and Pharisees were just apoplectic with rage, and they became indignant, and they said to Jesus, "Do you hear what these children are saying?" And Jesus said to them, "Yes, have you never read out of the mouth of infants and nursing babe babies, you have prepared praise for yourself." My what a contrast right from from the infinite grandeur of outer space to the utterances of helpless infants, God is being glorified. 

And I often also have to think of the contrast here between those weak little babes, little children praising God and these arrogant scribes and Pharisees. Contrast the infant's utter dependence upon God versus the proud self-sufficiency of the infidel. Isn't it interesting, the weak give praise, but the mighty utter folly? And here David contemplates the reality that God uses the weak to conquer the mighty. 

Again, verse two, "From the mouth of infants and nursing babes, Thou hast established strength because of Thine adversaries, to make the enemy and the revengeful cease." I'm reminded here of First Corinthians one and verse 26 where Paul said, "...not many mighty, not many noble, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong...that no man should boast before God." 

Now obviously, the majesty of the Creator ignites the psalmist introspection, as he contemplates the glory of God, as we all should. And I also find it interesting when you think about it, human beings are the only creatures capable of introspection, capable of contemplating the infinite glory and perfections and wonder of God; not only to be able to think about them, but then to verbalize them in praise to their Creator, and not just speak those things, but sing them and write the lyrics to them. I'll never forget, when I was studying many years ago to be a pianist. I was at Moody Bible Institute. I had the privilege, also, as a director, to be able to help conduct the Messiah there with all of the orchestra and all of that. And I remember just being overwhelmed and  just what I would begin to do with my hands, all of the sound can happen. And to think that God has given us the ability to write these things, to hear these things, to sing these things. And that's what we see here. 

And he says in verse three, "When I consider," in other words, when I think about, when I contemplate, "Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers." Oh, we got to stop here. This is really interesting. This is what we call an anthropomorphism, where it's the attribution of human characteristics to God. And here we see God's fingers. And what he's doing here is, he's emphasizing the infinite power of God who created the vast solar system by just using his fingers. That's the idea. This was no big deal to him. In fact, he spoke things into existence. 

Again, verse three, "When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars which Thou hast ordained. Yet, what is man that thou dost take thought of him." In other words, he's contemplating the utter frailty of human beings. And he went on to say, "And the son of man, that Thou dost care for him?" Alluding to the coming Messiah, the Son of Man. But notice verse four, "Yet what is man?" We see this, this phraseology used elsewhere in Scripture. For example, in Psalm 144 three, we read, "O, Lord, what is man that You regard him, or the son of man, that you think of him?" And Job seven, and verse 17, "And though your beginning was small, your latter days will be very great." So you see the same concept of man's frailty, and yet God is doing great things, even for we frail creatures.

One theologian Conrad Schaeffer said this quote, "In awe of one's immense smallness in this grandiose spectacle, the gaze turns on the self as one becomes aware that the human, small and insignificant, a breath and a shadow, is a marvel of the universe." He went on to say, "The privilege stems from God's creative initiative and rests on incomprehensible grace. As they discover and praise God, they recognize their true dignity, a discovery which confounds God's enemies." And that's what we have here. 

And another theologian, Robert Davidson said this, "We may have left our footprints on the moon, but the further we probe through radio telescope and orbiting satellite, the more awesome becomes the immensity of space and the whirling galaxies." Oh Child of God, one glance at the star filled skies, especially when we can see it through pictures from these telescopes and so forth, and these satellites, all these things that they've put up in the air, as soon as we see these things, we are immediately overwhelmed by our own finiteness; our own frailty, our own insignificance, and frankly, our own ignorance and weakness. That's why I love the Rocky Mountains. If you've ever been on the top of a rocky mountain, some of you are from there. Oh my. You feel like you're about this big, and then you realize you're not even that big. Yet, despite such dramatic, such glaring contrast. Man has the audacity to strut around like a proud peacock? And as Paul says in Romans, one, "...exchange the truth for a lie." Really? You're going to deny the Creator, you're going to exalt yourself? By the way, there is no greater proof of man's utter depravity than to think that somehow he's greater than God and that God's not really all that he says he is, and to ignore him. And what unspeakable blasphemy for people to teach our children the theory of evolution. What a staggering offense to our Creator God to teach Darwin, which, for example, is so thoroughly refuted by DNA. 

But notice the value God has given to man whom he created in verse five. "Yet," even in light of all of this that you've created, "yet Thou hast made him a little lower than God, and dost crown him with glory and majesty." In other words, we have been made in the image of God. You will recall in Genesis 1:26 God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness." Literally, the Hebrew grammar there indicates- what he's saying here is - let us make a creature similar to us. "Likeness" - "dᵊmûṯ" in the Hebrew, denotes something that is similar, okay? But not identical to the thing that it represents, or the thing that it's an image of. So an image here is something that represents something else. So God is saying, Let us make man to be like us, the Triune Godhead, and to represent us. And certainly he's done that. He's given us intellectual ability. He's given us emotional feelings; a sense of morality, the pursuit of moral purity, spiritual nature, and so forth. And he's given us dominion over the earth, dominion to rule, to subdue. He's given us the ability to create, to make ethical choices, and he has made us immortal. We are all going to live forever. But where you will spend eternity depends upon what you do with the gospel, the Lord Jesus Christ. 

And this is why God calls the hideous sins of things like murder, and abortion, and homosexuality, and bestiality and transgenderism, why he calls those things abominations. Because you see all of those things are sins that absolutely mock and seek to destroy the image of God in man and in woman. Can you think of anything more offensive than that? No wonder Satan is pushing this constantly on our children and on our own, our culture. 

Folks, you must bear in mind, in the fall, God's image is distorted, but it is not lost. But in redemption, we experience a progressive recovering of more and more of God's image, until one day we are made into the likeness of Christ in glory. And at Christ's return, complete restoration of God's image will come to pass. And because we are made in his image, notice verse six, "Thou dost make him to rule over the works of Thy hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet." An amazing statement, and this phrase was quoted by the apostle Paul in First Corinthians 15:27, while speaking of the universal dominion of Christ when He returns. There we read, "For God has put all things in subjection under His feet." And we see the same phraseology referring to the exalted position of Christ as a result of his resurrection, His resurrection glory. We see this in Ephesians 1:22, there we read, "And He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church..." and so forth. S

So back to the text in verse six, "Thou dost make him to rule over the works of Thy hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet." Then he gives us a little list here in verse seven and eight, "...all sheep and oxen and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, the fish of the sea, whatever passes through the paths of the sea." And how sad to see the pagan environmentalists try to reverse all of this, to allow the animals to reign over us. But we are to exercise dominion over creation. We are commanded to rule as his representatives over all that he has created, because he has made us in a unique way in his image to do those things in his created order. And therefore we are superior, and we are separate from all of the animals, because we're made in his image. And because of the fall, we are incapable of properly fulfilling God's commission to do all of these things as his administrators. But in Christ, because of his redemptive work, he is the supreme representative of man that can do those things, as we read earlier in Hebrews two, five and following. 

Well finally, in verse nine, he says, "O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name in all the earth." And frankly, what he's doing there now is he is proving his original assertion that he made in the very first verse, "O LORD our Lord, how majestic is Thy name in all the earth. Who has displayed Thy splendor above the heavens!" And so he concludes it in verse nine by saying, "O LORD, our Lord." Our Lord, our Master. "How majestic is Thy name in all the earth." Colossians one and verse 10, we are given the response that we should have. There we read that we should, "...walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience;  joyously..." mark it, "...giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light." 

I close with a very brief story having been in prison for one year, four months and 18 days in a Nazi cell measuring six feet by nine feet. Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote what is certainly a reminder of the meaning of Thanksgiving, one that we can reflect upon over this season in our culture. Here's what he said, quote, "You must never doubt that I am traveling with gratitude and cheerfulness along the road where I am being led. My past life is brim full of God's goodness, and my sins are covered by the forgiving love of Christ crucified. I'm so thankful for the people I have met, and I only hope that they never have to grieve about me, but that they too will always be certain of and thankful for God's mercy and forgiveness." 

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for all you have done for us, and I pray that by the power of your Spirit, you will make our hearts ever more accessible to the realities of who you are and what you would have us do as we endeavor to live out our lives to the praise of your glory. And Father, as always, if there be one within the sound of my voice that has never truly come to a place of genuine brokenness and repentance and faith in the saving work of the Lord Jesus Christ, will you bring them to such a point of misery that they will do so quickly and experience the miracle of the new birth for their good and for your glory. I ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus and for his sake. Amen.

My what a joy it is to be able to come together and worship the Lord and look into his word. And I trust that you have prepared your heart and that it is soft and ready to receive what the Spirit of God has for you. This morning, will you take your Bibles and turn to Zechariah chapter one, we will resume our verse-by-verse examination of this amazing book in the Old Testament. 

And this morning, we are going to look at a passage of scripture that probably you have never studied before, because it seems to be one of those passages that you just kind of read and move on, because there's really nothing in there that's worth examining, or so we think. But we're going to look closely at verse seven, because it will reveal some amazing truths that will help prepare us for what follows in the eight visions that God gave Zechariah. Let me read Zechariah chapter one verse seven. 

"On the 24th, day of the 11th month, which is the month Shebat, in the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah the prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, as follows:..."

And my friends, what follows is a supernatural glimpse of the sovereign authority in the infinite power of God to fulfill all of his covenant promises to Israel, and by extension, to all believers in the church age. And for the next six chapters, Zechariah records eight visions that God gave him on a single night, visions that symbolize the profound spiritual and theological truths pertaining to the exaltation of the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, the priest King, and how he will mediate his glory to the world through Israel, as well as the saints in the church age in his coming kingdom. 

And may I remind you that the kingdom of God is the central and unifying theme of the Bible. It encompasses all other themes, and the glory of God is the primary purpose. You must realize that God's purpose in redemption is to justify sinners that he might make us fit to enter into the kingdom to the praise of his eternal glory. In our church age, today, we proclaim Jesus to the world and we await his return to establish this kingdom. We await the establishment of an earthly kingdom where Christ will finally rule over every square inch of his creation. And my, how I long for that day, and that will happen at his second coming. And at the end of the Messianic reign, King Jesus will hand that kingdom over to God the Father, and the eternal state will begin. The Apostle Paul speaks of this in First Corinthians 15 beginning in verse 24 speaking of the end of the Messianic reign, he says, "... then comes the end, when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet." Then he adds, "When all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all." Oh, what magnificent promises. What a stunning future awaits us. I'm sure you join me in saying that I grow weary of all the politics, especially this time of year, right? All of the godless, immoral, corrupt people; people that God has placed in authority over us. And I find it almost laughable that almost every day, new polls come out to tell you who's ahead, trying to predict the future. But you know the good news for we as believers? Is we know what the future holds. We know how it all is going to end. And it's not going to end with Kamala Harris or the other guy, right? What's his name, Donald Trump. It's going to end with King Jesus. And all through scripture, beloved, we see how God is the majestic sovereign over his universe, and we see that he manifests the glory of his infinite perfections through his kingdom program. We await the establishment of this kingdom reign on earth. And as we look at Scripture, we see that that will be the day when the saved and restored image bearers will finally rule and subdue the earth for the glory of God, as we were mandated to do in Genesis one. It will be that time when Jesus, the son of David, the Messiah, fulfills the Davidic Covenant; when he returns and he rules the earth and all the nations from Jerusalem with all of the saints. It will be that time when all the physical, national, societal and international promises of the biblical covenants are finally fulfilled, and I long for Christ's return. I long to see my king ruling on this earth. I long for the eternal kingdom that will follow. And that is why the prophetic Scriptures are so exciting to me, and I trust they are to you as well. They offer hope, they offer joy. They animate our worship of God as we contemplate all that awaits us in Christ and only a sovereign, omniscient, omnipotent God can predict the future and fulfill all that He has promised. I mean, think about it, about 27% of the Bible is prophetic, and the estimates kind of vary, but for the most part, it's estimated that there are 1817 prophecies in the Bible, and that 351 Old Testament prophecies were literally fulfilled when Jesus came. And we know, therefore, that the Bible is the only religious document in the world containing prophecy. And why is that? Because it is the only religious document that was written by the one and only true and living God; the only one who knows the future. Moreover, the one who has ordained the future and who will accomplish the future as he has decreed. Indeed, Ephesians 1:11 says that he, "... works all things after the counsel of His will." God speaks through Isaiah in chapter 46 and verse 10, saying, "'Remember the former things long past, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying "My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure..."'" 

Dear saints, never lose the wonder that in your hands you have the Word of the living God. And there is perhaps no greater proof of the veracity and divine authority of Scripture than fulfilled prophecy, which ignites within us the certain hope that all that God has promised will come to fruition just as he has said, including our future glory when all that he has promised in the biblical covenants will be fully realized; when all that he has ordained to allow in history will finally be completed. Indeed, everything is inexorably moving towards the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. And as we study Zechariah's prophecies, we will see all of these things unfold. Moreover, we will see how these ancient prophecies apply to our lives today. 

And this morning, I wish to examine this seventh verse of chapter one, which is going to introduce the eight visions. Let me give you just a little sample, and I'll maybe give a little bit more at the end of my time with you this morning. But we're going to see in these eight visions, descriptions of a man riding a red horse standing among myrtle trees, four horns which have scattered Judah, Israel and Jerusalem. We're going to see a man with a measuring cord, measuring Jerusalem. We're going to see a vision of Joshua the high priest, standing before the angel of Yahweh and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. We're going to see a lamp stand with seven lamps and two olive trees. We are going to see a flying scroll. We're going to read about a woman in a basket and four chariots coming forth from between two bronze mountains. Doesn't that sound interesting? What in the world is the Lord saying? Well, we will find out, because I might also add that God will give us the meaning of these things, and we will trace these meanings and many other passages of Scripture that elaborate on them. 

Now, little bit technical, but I hope that this will help you see the genius of the Holy Spirit who has written these words through his servant, Zechariah. It's fascinating that these eight visions are arranged in what we call a chiasm, and that's derived from the Greek letter chi that looks like an X in English. A chiasm is a structural pattern, or a literary technique frequently seen in Scripture, where concepts will be repeated, or they will echo each other and explain each other, and each parallel will build to a focal point. For example, in Proverbs six, beginning in verse 16 through 19, we read, "There are six things which the LORD hates, yes, seven which are an abomination to Him." And as you will see on the screen, you will see that "haughty eyes," that's 1a will revert, will relate to 1b down at the bottom, "and one who spreads" or sowsstrife, "among brothers." 

Secondly, "a lying tongue" matches "a false witness who utters lies." Thirdly, "hands that shed innocent blood" parallels "feet that run rapidly to evil." And the key focus of the entire section is "...a heart that devises wicked plans." Now I give that to you as a mere example. We see a similar chiastic construction in Zechariah's prophecy. We will see that the first vision and the last vision are paralleled, the second and the seventh are paralleled, the third and the sixth, and finally, the fourth and the fifth, which will be the center parallel consisting of prophecies concerning the Messiah. And therefore, that will be the most important; the focal point of all ofthe visions, what they are all pointing to, because it reveals the supremacy of the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. 

Now also bear in mind that the purpose of these visions was to reassure the beleaguered and discouraged exiles that God had not forgotten them, nor had he abandoned his future promises and purposes for his chosen people. You may remember a few weeks ago when we began the study, the context. First, God had sent Haggai to instruct the people to begin to build the temple. And then later he sends Zechariah to instruct them as well; to call them to repentance, to warn them, to comfort them. There were about 50,000 Jewish exiles that had returned to Judea after 70 years in captivity, and this was God's judgment on them for disregarding his law and and the word that he had given them through his prophets. And you will recall that when Haggai commanded them to rebuild the temple, they became very discouraged because they encountered much persecution at the hands of the Samaritans, and they felt like slaves in their own land because they were still under the rule of Darius, the ruler of the Medo Persian Empire. So as a result, they felt discouraged, they felt downhearted, they felt defeated. And so they became preoccupied with themselves. They began to focus on building their own homes, their own states; they neglected true worship. They began to fall into a pattern of of external worship, going through the motions, but they were not worshiping the Lord from their heart. By the way, all of these things are parallels that we must deal with even in our day. 

Well, obviously God knew all of this, so he first sends Haggai, then he sends Zechariah to warn them, to instruct them, encourage them. And the first six verses of Zechariah's message was one of calling them to repentance, because repentance was the key to spiritual blessing. It always has been. It always will be, and God's blessings are revealed in the eight dramatic visions that will follow, and together, they will provide a panoramic unfolding of the events that would eventually occur at the first coming of Christ and the second coming of Christ and the consequent millennial restoration of the nation Israel. 

Moreover, as I said earlier, they will provide for us some very practical, relevant insights for our lives today. But we must not neglect the rich truths in this little verse seven. And I have divided it into three real simple categories. Here we will see that God reigns, he reveals and he remembers. Let's look at it closely. "On the 24th day of the 11th month, which is the month of Shebat in the second year of Darius..."  Now, again, as I say, this is typically one of those verses that you read and you move on to the good stuff, right? That's typically what we do. But we want to ask the question, why would the Holy Spirit inspire Zechariah to record this? Is this little passage worthy of our consideration? What significance does it have beyond mere history and dating, and how would the original audience have received this? In other words, what is the authorial intent in this passage? Now, may I remind you that the apostle Paul tells us in Second Timothy 3:16 that, "All scripture is inspired by God." Not most, but, "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable." In other words, even the flyover passages, even those passages that seem insignificant -  they're all "profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good deed." So let's remember that as we look at this passage.

Again, verse seven, "On the 24th day of the 11th month..."  Hmm, you will recall in verse one of Zechariah one we read, "In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah, the prophet." Now we know that that was in 520 BC. But now here in verse seven we read on the 24th day of the 11th month. So what has happened now is God is speaking to Zechariah about three months after his first revelation where he gave this little sermon on repentance, and it's at this point that he's going to receive these night visions. Now, why the 24th day? Why not just say the month that is was, why include that? Well, I find it interesting in Haggai 1:14, and verse 15, as well as 2:18, we read that it was on that same 24th day, five months earlier, that Haggai stirred the hearts of the people to resume the work on the house of the LORD of hosts. And this was so key. This was so central. This was God's passion, because this was where God dwelt amongst his people, where they offered sacrifices, where the Old Testament believer identified himself outwardly with the covenant of God and the covenant people, and where sacrifices were made and temporarily satisfied the just wrath of God against sinners, and pointed the people to the final, complete and perfect sacrifice of the Lamb of God. 

But it was also on the 24th day, two months previously, according to Haggai 2:10, through 17, that he delivered a stern rebuke to the priests because of their impurity, and to the people for delaying the building of the temple. Moreover, according to Haggai 2:20 it was on the 24th day that Haggai had received the far-reaching revelation of the destruction of the Gentile world powers just prior to the establishment of the millennial rule of the greater Zerubbabel, namely the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. And there we read in Haggai two, beginning in verse 21 again, and this was given to him on that 24th day, "'Speak to Zerubbabel governor of Judah, saying, "I am going to shake the heavens and the earth. I will overthrow the thrones and kingdoms and destroy the power of the kingdoms of the nations; and I will overthrow the chariots and the riders, and the horses and the riders will go down, everyone by the sword of another. On that day," declares the LORD of hosts, "I will take you, Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, My servant," declares the Lord, "and I will make you like a signet ring, for I have chosen you," declare the LORD of hosts.'" And without getting into the details here, this was a foreshadow of the Messiah who would descend from Zerubbabel, who was a descendant of David, and would reestablish the Davidic line of kings after the exile. And all of this would culminate in the glory of the Messiah in the millennial reign. So this 24th day was a significant day. It was a special day that the Lord had communicated his Word and his will. And this is, I might add, a testimony to the perfect plan and absolute rule of God. And therefore it was a fitting day for him to continue his prophetic disclosures in these eight visions. And as I reflect upon this - and I don't want you to miss this - here we see beloved, that God is a God of order. God is a God of precision. God is a God of prophetic proclamations and completions. God is a sovereign God. And here we are reminded, therefore, number one, that God reigns. May I remind you folks that we do not worship a contingent God that merely reacts to circumstances outside of his control? No, no, no, we serve a sovereign God who has written history before it happens, and in His providence, he orchestrates all of the events of his creation and of his people to fulfill all that he has decreed in eternity past, which includes everything that's going gone on in your life, in the past, in the present and in the future. 

Now notice the second part of this introduction. He says, "On the 24th day of the 11th month, which is the month Shebat, in the second year of Darius." Now you must understand that prior to the exile, a statement like this would include one of the kings of Israel or Judah, one of their own kings would be stated in the reckoning, but not here. And so this is a reminder to the people that they are still under Gentile dominance. They still are ruled by a pagan monarch, not an Israelite or a Judean King, even though they're in their own land, what a reminder of the consequences of sin that causes you to long for the glory and the grace and the blessings of Christ, and that's what's happening here. What a salient reality, what a striking, yet sad truth. And it says, the month of Shebat." Well, this was the Babylonian name for the 11th month, and this was adopted by the Jews after the exile. And I might add, this is the only place it's used here in the Old Testament. 

Let's try to put it in perspective. And all analogies break down at some level, so bear with me. Imagine that we are conquered by Russia, and that we are taken into Russia, and we have been there for some 70 years. China then conquers Russia, and China allows us to come back to our beloved country, but everything's in ruins. You're trying to establish your home, but you are still under Chinese power. That at some level, is what is going on here. It. But it would have been even harder for the Israelites, because they would have remembered in their history all of the magnificent things that God had done for them, all the ways that he had manifested his power on their behalf; all of the ways he had delivered them, all of the things that he had done, all of the things that he had promised. And now look where they're at. So naturally, they felt like they were slaves in their own country. In fact, we read their lament in Nehemiah nine and verse 36, "'Behold, we are slaves today, and as to the land which You gave to our fathers to eat of its fruit and its bounty. Behold, we are slaves in it. Its abundant produce is for the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins; they also rule over our bodies and over our cattle as they please, so we are in great distress.'" So you see, the people are still living in what the Bible calls, "the times of the Gentiles." Jesus spoke of this in a number of passages. For example, in Luke 21 verse 24 he speaks of this time he says, "'... they will fall by the edge of the sword, and will be led captive into all the nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.'" And as we look at Scripture, we see that the times of the Gentiles began under Nebuchadnezzar in 605 BC, and will continue until the Lord returns and liberates Jerusalem from Gentile rule and establishes his millennial kingdom. And the following eight prophetic visions all look forward to this time of consummation: the consummation of the season of Israel's sorrows and the inauguration of the nation's prominence in the millennial glory. 

And I might add that even today, Israel is still in many ways in exile. They're still plagued by Gentile domination around the world, and it will get exceptionally worse under the rule of the Antichrist. Perhaps you heard Benjamin Netanyahu speech at the United Nations. I tuned in and watched it, and it was fascinating that virtually all of the nations represented there left the room in defiance of him, in hatred of the Jewish people. In fact, the UN has for many years been ground zero for anti semitism around the world. In fact, the UN has condemned Israel more than all other countries combined.

Folks, this is such a testimony along with all of all that's happening in our country and around the world. It is such a testimony to the irrational and barbaric influence that Satan has on the rulers of the nations and how he is trying to use the rulers of the nations to thwart the purposes of God in the establishment of his kingdom and his purpose to fulfill his covenant promises to Israel and ultimately, as well, to the church at the second coming. How sad to see the blindness of so many Jewish people. And I might also add, to see the salvation of so many that I am aware of even in Israel today, among some of the most devout. Paul speaks of this in Romans 11, beginning in verse 25 he says, "For I do not want you, brethren..." speaking to Gentile believers, "I do not want you [Gentile believers] to be uninformed of this mystery -  so that you will not be wise in your own estimation - that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; so all Israel will be saved, just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.' From the standpoint of the gospel, they are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God's choice they are beloved for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." 

And may I remind you that Israel was God's unique focus of redemption in one dispensation - that in the Old Testament - while the church, consisting of both Jews and Gentiles, has been the focus since their rejection. And ultimately, God's focus will return, once again, to Israel during the pre-kingdom judgments, also known as Daniel's 70th week, also known as the tribulation, And his focus will return to them, as well, during the millennial kingdom, and then all of the remaining promises pertaining to Israel will be literally fulfilled; including all of the earthly blessings and the earthly Messianic kingdom. And certainly we see in the prophetic literature how Israel plays such a pivotal role during this time. 

Now today, the church shares in the promises of Israel, but not in her unique identity as a chosen nation. Again, as I just read in Romans 11:28, "From the standpoint of the gospel they," referring to unbelieving Israel, "are enemies for your," Gentiles, 'for your sake, but from the standpoint of God's choice, they," unbelieving Israel, "are beloved for the sake of the fathers;..." And verse 29 again, "...for the gifts that are," that is the unmerited blessings of divine grace, "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." Folks, it is impossible to escape the conclusion that God's plans for Israel are literal. Amos sounded Israel's hope in Amos nine and verse 14, where God says, "'I will restore the captivity of My people Israel.'" And in verse 15, I"' will also plant them on their land, and they will not again be rooted out from their land which I have given them,'" says the LORD your God." And any plain, normal meaning of language in the Old Testament describes the ultimate and permanent restoration of God's covenant people, Israel, in their ancient homeland at the end of this age. And the New Testament heaps more and more evidence of all of this. And what a thrilling anticipation this would have been for those early saints; those exiles that had come back into the land who were so disheartened. And what a blessing it is to us in the church age, as we look back, as well as look forward, to all that God has promised to faithfully fulfill; and to witness God faithfully fulfilling his covenant promises to national, ethnic Israel, who, to this day, remains hostile towards their Messiah. Because of Israel's rejection of her Messiah, the mystery, as we read in Scripture, the mystery phase of the kingdom was ushered in as the church became the temporary replacement of Israel and the new custodians of divine truth as we proclaim the Gospel; the body of Christ, where Jews and Gentiles are described in Ephesians 3:6 as "heirs together" and sharers together in the promises of Christ Jesus. 

But I would submit to you that Israel is never absorbed into the church. It remains distinct from the church as an ethnic people, and as a nation they still have a prophetic future. God promised Abraham that Israel would one day be a great nation, that they would rule a land that stretched from Egypt to the Euphrates, according to Genesis 15:18. He promised that one day the nations of the earth would stream to Jerusalem to worship the Lord, Isaiah two and verse two. And in Isaiah 60 beginning in verse 20, we read, "'For you will have the Lord for an everlasting light, and the days of your mourning will be over. Then all your people will be righteous. They will possess the land forever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I may be glorified." So therefore, the present church age must be seen as part of the ongoing fulfillment of Old Testament promises that culminate in the Messianic Kingdom. And Israel is just a magnificent object lesson to all of us in how God deals with mankind. He saves some, he judges others to reveal his glory through Christ. 

Now back to the text, even in the short introduction of these eight-night visions, we are reminded of God's sovereign rule, and you will see this unfold. We are reminded of his commitment to fulfill all of his promises, and what a tremendous hope this is to all believers as we watch that plan unfold, as we watch him fulfill all that He has promised to all of his kingdom citizens. And as I was meditating upon these passages, I was thinking to myself, my in so many ways, I feel like those exiles, don't you feel that way? I mean, this land is not our home. We are aliens here. We are sojourners. We're in exile. And we watch the news, we see how depressing it all is, but as I said earlier, we know how it all ends, because God has promised. God is sovereign, and he is faithful to fulfill all of his promises, because number one God reigns. 

But number two God reveals. Notice again the text, "On that 24th day of the 11th month, which is the month of Shebat, in the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah the prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, as follows:..." I love that phrase, "the word of the LORD." Literally, the word of Yahweh. Beloved, never lose the wonder of this. This is the Word of God. And these visions, and their partial interpretations are divine revelation. They were seen in the spirit and heard through verbal revelations from the Lord God himself. These were not dreams, because, as we will see, Zechariah was very much awake. He was very conscious. He was able to ask questions. He was able to interact with the Lord, and what a marvelous reality that the Lord God would speak to Zechariah, as well as to us, through his word. I mean, where would we be without his word? Can you imagine that if we didn't have his Bible, where would we be? I'll tell you where we would be. All you have to do is turn on the television and you will see people that live in a fool's paradise. It is so sad to hear them being interviewed and to see them. I mean, some of these people look so bizarre that you question if they're even human. I mean, what you witness are people who have no fear of God, who are absolutely lost in their sins, and they are dead spiritually. It is such a tragic thing, these people need Christ. They need to come to faith in Christ. They need the Lord. And faith comes by hearing, and hearing by what? It's by the word of Christ. That's what they need. I think of Psalm 33 beginning in verse four, "For the word of the LORD is upright, and all His work is done in faithfulness." It goes on to say, "By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, in the breath of His mouth, all their host." It goes on to add, "Let all the earth fear the LORD; Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him....The LORD nullifies the counsel of the nations; He frustrates the plans of the peoples. The counsel of the LORD stands forever, the plans of His heart from generation to generation. Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people whom He has chosen for His own inheritance." And what a marvelous reality that the word that came to Zechariah, and by extension to all of us, proves the fact that God is active, that he is involved, that he has a powerful presence as he accomplishes all ofhis purposes. And folks, you must remember that his word can never be separated from his person, because who he is, is proclaimed, revealed, disclosed in his word and in what he does through his personal presence and his power. For the Word of God is "living and active" more than anything else. It's like a "two-edged sword."  It pierces as far as the division of the soul and spirit, the joints and marrow. It is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And then to know that Jesus is the preexistent logos, the preexistent word; the one who was God, and with God, from eternity, according to John one.

So what is happening here in these eight visions is more than just the impartation of information, but rather, you must realize that the divine revealer, the pre incarnate Son of God is personally and powerfully active in caring for his depressed and disheartened people. And his word and his presence and his power extends to each of us today. I mean, think about this, the very word that spoke the universe into existence is also the word that unveils the future prophecies that God himself breathed out and gave to his prophets. So the Lord communicated his will and his purposes to Zechariah; a magnificent picture of Israel's future. And as we will see, he not only addresses the exigencies of their current condition, that is, the needs of their own condition, but also it reaches all the way to the completion of his covenant promises in the kingdom age. And that is what's so amazing, the unimaginable, glorious promises for everyone who has come to faith in Christ. 

So we see that God reigns, God reveals, but finally, God remembers. Notice again, "...the word of the LORD came to Zechariah the prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, as follows:..." Now, why would he give these names? Why would he give all that's going to follow? And as we will see, it's because God remembers his covenant promises and he is faithful to fulfill them. Notice in this second revelation that God gives to Zechariah, the Lord repeats the names of Zechariah's father and grandfather. Now, names are very significant in Scripture. They carry profound meaning. Zechariah means "Yahweh remembers," and of course, this will be the dominating theme all through Zechariah prophecy. Yahweh remembers and he keeps his covenant promises. And Berechiah means "Yahweh blesses," a name that foretells God's blessing on Israel solely because of his grace. And Iddo means, "in its time." A reassuring name that forecasts the certainty of God's plans being accomplished according to his predetermined timing. And what a comfort this must have been to those beleaguered exiles, because Yahweh remembers his covenant promises. He has not forgotten or abandoned us. Yahweh blesses those who trust and obey in him solely on the basis of his unmerited grace. And also Yahweh accomplishes his plans according to his perfect and his predetermined timetable. And what a blessing it is to all of us to be reminded that God reigns, God revealsand God remembers. 

And when you look at the eight prophetic visions God revealed to Zechariah, you begin to get the scope of all that he remembers. Let me close this morning with a brief overview of those eight visions, and I'm going to give them to you in the chiastic construction where the first vision and the eighth vision will parallel one another and so forth. Vision one, we see him expressing his compassion for Jerusalem and Judah, his jealous love for them, and he remembers his promises to bless them and punish the nations who sought their destruction. And the parallel vision eight, he remembers his promises to take action on judging those nations of the whole earth by deploying the chariots of his heavenly hosts to accomplish his plans at the end of the age. 

Vision two and vision seven are parallel. Vision two tells us how he remembers the nations that mistreated Israel, those that scattered Judah and cast them out, specifically Babylon, Medo- Persia, Greece, Rome and a future modified Roman Empire. And he remembers his promise to judge them and to subjugate them to his rule. And in vision seven, we see the parallel where he remembers the worldliness of those nations, the false religious systems that they practiced, and how that wicked world system infected everyone, and he remembers his promise to remove them forever. 

Vision three and vision six go together. In vision three, he remembers the gracious choice of Israel to be his chosen nation, the nation through which he would reveal the Messiah and bless all of the nations of the world, and his promise to protect them, his promise to rebuild the temple and Jerusalem so that they can all share in the millennial blessings. And then in vision six, he remembers his promise to enforce all of his covenant promises, to condemn the reprobate, to punish impenitent sinners. 

And then visions four and five are the centerpiece of the chiastic construction. And there, in vision four, he remembers his promise to intercede and cleanse and restore his people by the person and the work of the Messiah so that they can share in the millennial blessings - Israel's great high priest, their ultimate King. And in vision five, he remembers his promise to overcome darkness with the radiant light of his presence, the Shekinah. As Jesus reminds us in Luke two and verse 32 that he is, "'A LIGHT OF REVELATION TO THE GENTILES, and the glory of Your people Israel.'" 

So what a wonderful and much needed reminder to these disheartened people that the light of the presence of the Most High God has not been extinguished. And my, how we can be encouraged with that today. Dear saints, everything is dark, and it's going to get darker, but God still shines above those dark clouds of wickedness on the earth. His light is eternal, and as the light of the world, Jesus came the first time to save sinners, but when he returns the second time, the world will see the unveiling of his glory and the light of his presence. So may I challenge you this morning, dear saints, contemplate these realities that our God reigns, he reveals in his word, he remembers all that he has promised. And I would challenge you to let these great themes occupy your mind and your heart every single day of your life, not just when you hear an exposition like this. But let these be the great truths that become the center of gravity around which your whole life will orbit, so that you remember who God truly is, and you will reflect upon the glory of his greatness; the infinite truths of his attributes, all of those wonderful things. 

And then also realize that he reveals himself through his word which should occupy your mind and your heart on a daily basis, lest you walk in darkness. And then to remember that he remembers. And remember all the things that he has promised, knowing that he will fulfill them for our eternal joy and his eternal glory. Let's pray together. 

Father, thank you for the magnificent truths of your word as we continue to examine all that you have for us in these passages and as we apply them to our own lives today. I pray that each one of us will find ourselves falling more and more in love with the lover of our souls, and that we might live in a way that others might see who he is and what he has done and what he has promised to do. And Lord for those that might be within the sound of my voice that know nothing of what it means to be in true, saving, intimate faith with Christ, I pray that you will bring such conviction to them that they will be miserable until they bow the knee to the Lord Christ, confess their sin and cry out for the mercy that he will so quickly give. I pray that you will accomplish this to the praise of your glory, for it's in Christ's name that I pray, Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to the prophecy of Zechariah. We will continue to look at the introduction that I want to present to you in Zechariah one, verses one through six. This is actually the second part of this introduction. And certainly, may I remind you that my responsibility to you is to be the voice of the Lord on his behalf; that you might have the mind of Christ and that he might be exalted in your life. Also, that you might be protected from sin and to enjoy the fullness of all of the blessings that are ours in Christ. And the key to this is the systematic interpretation exposition of Scripture, so that we might know what God has said and apply it to our lives. And now, in the providence of God, we find ourselves beginning this study of Zechariah, where we will look at it verse by verse over the next many months. It's sometimes called the apocalypse of the Old Testament. In other words, the book of Revelation of the Old Testament. Let me read the passage to you, Zechariah, one, beginning in verse one.

"In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah the prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo saying,

'The LORD was very angry with your fathers.

Therefore say to them, "Thus says The LORD of hosts, 'Return to Me,' declares the LORD of hosts, 'that I may return to you,' says the LORD of hosts. 'Do not be like your fathers to whom the former prophets proclaimed,' saying, "Thus, says the LORD of hosts," 'Return now from your evil ways and from your evil deeds.'" 'But they did not listen or give heed to me,' declares the LORD.

'Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever? But did not My words and My statutes, which I commanded My servants the prophets, overtake your fathers? Then they repented and said, "As the LORD of hosts purposed to do to us in accordance with our ways and our deeds, so He has dealt with us."'"

We are examining this section of scripture under three real basic headings that I hope will be helpful to you. We're looking at the anger of the Lord, the mercy of the Lord and the judgment of the Lord. The last time we were together, I gave you an in-depth historical overview of the context of all of these things. But remember, Zechariah was a contemporary of Haggai, another prophet. We'll look at that more in a moment. These were God's messengers that he sent to the 50,000 Jewish exiles that returned to Judea after being in Babylonian captivity for 70 years.

By way of review, we looked at the anger of the Lord the last time. Verse two, "'The LORD was very angry with your fathers.'" And he said to them, to return and so forth. Don't be like them, etc. And as you may recall, their ancestors - in other words, the exiles - are looking back now at their ancestors, and they realize that they yielded to the satanic ideologies and practices of their pagan neighbors; they conformed to the surrounding cultures, rather than confronting those cultures and remaining separate from them, and they gradually encountered the cultural abominations of polytheistic idolatry, that of the Canaanites. And we read, for example, what the main problems were with those cultures in Deuteronomy 18 verses nine through 12. They are called the detestable things of those nations, and he warned them not to practice those things. But unfortunately, they, little by little, succumbed to the culture.

May I remind you of what they were? Number one, the sacrificing of children and the fire to appease Molech, which included all manner of gross sexual perversions that would be part of their pagan rituals. They practiced witchcraft, seeking to determine the will of God by examining and interpreting omens and dreams and so forth. They practiced soothsaying, which was basically attempting to control the future through the power of evil spirits.  They interpreted omens; they looked at various things to somehow tell the future based upon signs. They practiced sorcery; inducing magical effects by drugs and other potions that they would make up. They conjured spells; they would pronounce spells on people, and demons would help carry those spells out. They were mediums; one who supposedly would communicate to the dead, and they would communicate with someone, but it wasn't the deceased, it was demons. And then there were spiritists that were intimately acquainted with the demonic, with the dead, and they would call upon the dead investigating things from the dead, so to speak, to try to understand various things that they would want to do or hear. And of course, all of these types of things are common in our culture today, because Satan continues to cause us to believe these lies.

And then later on, we find Solomon comes along and he disobeys the Lord. In First Kings 11 one, it says, "Solomon loved many foreign women." Big, big problem. And we read that he had 700 wives and princesses, "....Egyptian, Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian and Hittite." And he had 300 concubines. And his wives led him astray. First Kings 11, beginning at verse four, "When Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of his father David had been." And we looked as well as well in Isaiah five, where we have the sins of Judah that God cursed them for; and by the way, they are the same types of things that we see today in our culture, which explains the moral degradation and free fall that we are experiencing as God has abandoned us to the consequences of our wickedness. Those things included six woes, greedy materialism, drunken dissipation and a party lifestyle, defiant debauchery, where they flaunted their immorality and taunted dared God to judge them. They redefined morality, calling evil good and good evil. They celebrated their gross immoralities, "being wise in their own eyes, clever in their own sight." They had corrupt leaders, drunken authorities and judges who would justify the wicked for a bribe and take away the rights of the ones who were in the right. And of course, all of this continued to lead them away from the Word of God and the proclamations of the prophets, and it produced within them an apathy towards God; and as a result of that, God judged them. First, the northern kingdom of Israel was brutally conquered by the Assyrians. The atrocities that they committed against the people are beyond anything that you can imagine. And then a little bit later, the southern kingdom of Judah fell to the Babylonians. And Jeremiah prophesied the length of their captivity in Jeremiah 25 verse 11, he said, "This whole land will be a desolation and a horror, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon 70 years." And that 70-year captivity was calculated based upon the violation of the Sabbath rest for the land that was required of them that's articulated in Leviticus 26. The exact number of the violated Sabbaths were 490 which would have been from about the period of Saul all the way to the Babylonian captivity. And that probably began around the fourth year of King Jehoiakim, when Jerusalem was first captured, and the treasures of the temple were taken out. And it ended with the decree of Cyrus that would allow them to return.

And what I want you to see, dear friends, is what a reminder we have here that God is serious about his standards of holiness. He is serious about what he says in His Word, regardless of how the culture will mock Him; and how easy it is for the culture, for the world in which we live, to begin to shape us into its image, as we are warned about in Romans 12 two. And for believers, we can very easily be seduced by the things of the world. We can begin to grieve the spirit and quench the Spirit in our life. We begin to forfeit divine blessing; and we literally begin to live in the dismal swamp of divine chastening, and everything in our life begins to deteriorate. That's what happened in those days, and it happens again today. And of course, for nonbelievers and especially for pretend Christians, it results in a permanent hardening of the heart; a resolute rejection of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ and the truths of his word. And often that will lead to an unwitting apostasy that Jesus warns about in Matthew seven, where he says that, "'Not everybody who calls me LORD, will enter the kingdom.'" And sometimes it's a witting, deliberate apostasy that can exclude the possibility of repentance, as we read about in the unregenerate Jewish people that rejected the Gospel in Hebrews six. And Jesus made it clear in Matthew seven that the tragic fate of the majority ofpeople who call themselves followers of Christ, who call themselves Christians, will be that they will be ruled by their flesh, they will love the world, they'll be blinded by Satan, and they will never inherit the kingdom. And so often this is the result of false teachers. And they had the false teachers in those ancient days like we have them today; false prophets.

In fact, Peter reminds us of what they're like here in our church age. In Second Peter two, beginning in verse 18, he says, "For speaking out arrogant words of vanity, they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escape from the ones who live in error, promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome by this he is enslaved. For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last State has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them. It has happened to them according to the true proverb, 'A DOG RETURNS TO ITS OWN VOMIT,' and, 'A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.'"

Well, sadly, this was the fate of most of the Jewish people in the Old Testament, and later on, most of the Jewish and Gentiles in the New Testament. And again, very often, professing believers who have a knowledge of the gospel, can entangle themselves in the things of the world, and they can become like Peter described, "Dogs that return to their own vomit," and pigs wallowing in the mud.

So, God warns the returning exiles, do not follow the rebellious footsteps of your ancestors, even as he warns us today. Verse four, "'Do not be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets proclaim,' saying, "Thus says, the Lord of hosts, 'Return now from your evil ways and from your evil deeds.' But they did not listen or give heed to Me," declares the LORD.'" And of course, we know, as a result, they experienced the curses that he promised in Deuteronomy 28 verses, 15 and following which, in varying ways, are still in effect on the Jewish people in Israel today and will continue until they repent and place their trust in the Messiah, when the Lord returns.

And again, may I encourage you to guard your heart, your mind. Folks, this is so, so subtle. This is how it works; you begin to tolerate little sins in your life. You begin to ignore certain things in Scripture. And you find something out here that you think, "Oh, I like what that preacher said, yeah, it may not be exactly what the Bible says, but that makes sense to me" And you begin to compromise a little here and a little there, and then you begin to teach these things to your family, even if it's just by living them out. And your family starts to conform themselves to the wicked ways that you are adopting. And then that moves to the community, and then it eventually moves to the entire nation. But it always begins with just a little compromise, and little by little, what happens is, we begin to drift away from the word and the will of God, and we begin to embrace things that are dishonoring to him. We begin to pursue the fleeting pleasures of this world, and we start to think like, and act like, and look like the ungodly people in the world. And of course, Romans, one tells us how that will end. It will move down through everything from gross immorality, down to God giving people over to a reprobate, that is, a depraved, worthless mind that will believe things that are utterly insane. And that's where we're at today. The whole transgender insanity is a prime example of that. Folks, sin is intoxicating, and because everybody's doing it, and nobody wants to be isolated and rejected, many times, what happens is we just kind of fall in to the way of the world; kind of a social interconnectedness begins to form within a culture. It's kind of a group think. And don't you see that today with the whole...we saw it, for example, with the whole coronavirus craziness. And then with the woke crowd that we have today.

The secularists, by the way, call this destructive phenomenon, "mass formation." In fact, the social and psychological dynamics necessary for any kind of totalitarian rule to take root, like cultural Marxism in our country today, depends upon this. They have to promote propaganda to begin to get you to think their way. They begin to indoctrinate you through government, through media, certainly through our public schools and colleges. They gaslight you. They cancel you if you disagree with them, to try to silence opposition. And while the secularists may call it "mass formation," what God would call it is "mass depravity;" where people begin to all think alike; a manifestation of the wrath of divine abandonment, whereby God lifts his restraining grace upon individuals and communities and nations and allows them to live out the wickedness of their heart and succumb to the temptations of the enemy. And we see this so rampant in our culture today.

Well, this is what happens when individuals harden their heart and eventually, the leaven of sin influences the whole lump of a person's life, their family, their community, their nation, and God abandons them to their wickedness and judges them. This is what happened to the ancient Jewish people, the wrath of divine abandonment. And then he brings in the Assyrians to the north and the Babylonians to the south. And ultimately, his wrath continues in an eternal hell. So that's a bit of review about the anger of the Lord.

But now let's look at the mercy of the Lord. Aren't you thankful that he is merciful, that He is gracious, that he is long suffering? Notice verse two, "'The LORD was very angry with your fathers. Therefore say to them, 'Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Return to Me,' declares the LORD of hosts, 'that I may return to you,' says the LORD of hosts.'" And folks, here we see his mercy being manifested, really, in two ways: first in his call to repentance, and secondly, and we have to look kind of beyond this passage to see this, but the second reason is that he commands them to rebuild the temple, which I'll explain in a moment.

But first of all, notice his call to repentance. He wants them to return to him. My what a merciful invitation, a call to repentance. You see, God's warnings are always an act of mercy, showing us his desire to bless us and to be in fellowship with us rather than to judge us. And I might point out that there's a word play here in verses three and four, Israel is called to return to the one true God in humble obedience, that he might return to them in intimate fellowship and blessing rather than judgment, but if they refuse, then they're going to return to their land in shame and misery and in sorrow. The same principles apply today. In fact, as I was meditating upon this passage, my mind went to the loveless orthodoxy of the church at Ephesus that we read about in Revelation two. You remember that? Paul brought the gospel to Ephesus, and some of us were just there not too many months ago to see these things; to see the ruins. He did this at the close of his second missionary journey in AD 52 and you will recall, he left Priscilla and Aquila to continue the ministry, and they met the mighty, Old Testament preacher, Apollos, that co-ministered with them. And then on Paul's third missionary journey, he returned, and he spent three years with these dear people, establishing the church, and many idol worshipers came to Christ. And remember, idol makers were furious because they weren't able to sell as many idols, and they threw him out of town. And later, while a prisoner in Rome, Paul writes them a letter, and eventually left Timothy in charge of the church. So Ephesus was kind of the mother church of all of the others. And they what they did is they unwittingly abandoned their love for Christ. Revelation two beginning in verse two, he says, "I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance." By the way, the possessive pronoun "your" is singular, something that you can't see in the English; it's unable to express in our English language won't express this. But this indicates that ultimately, the Lord is addressing the pastor, the pastor who is responsible for the spiritual life of the church that he is shepherding. "I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false. And you have perseverance, and have endured for My name's sake, and have not grown weary. But I have this against you, that you have left your first love, therefore remember from where you have fallen and repent and do the deeds you did at first, or else, I'm coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place unless you repent." Notice the phrase, "You have left your first love." The term "left" in the original carries the idea of abandonment. You have abandoned, you have forsaken. You've laid aside. You've departed from your first love, that agape love. That selfless, sacrificial love that chooses to love without reciprocation; a love that initiates, not one that merely reciprocates. And what is the first love that he's speaking of? It's that passionate love, that fervent love, like that chaste and pure love of the newly wedded bride and groom. You have forsaken that; you've replaced that with something else. And this is what happens unfortunately in many marriages.

But this is what happened to the ancient Israelites - if I can go back and forth to help you see the parallels. They departed from the place where they had originally been, their passionate love for Yahweh had been replaced with a mechanical, dead orthodoxy, bereft of love for God. And their service to the Lord had become a greater priority than an intimate fellowship with him. Their worship had become emotionless and just perfunctory, obligatory. Worship that just a duty rather than a desire; a habit, more than a passion. What should have been first had now become secondary. And as a result, there they became increasingly vulnerable to the values and the lifestyles of the pagan culture, and they drifted into their idolatry and their immorality, and this is what happened in Ephesus. It's interesting. 40 years had elapsed from those first days. The second generation took over, and everything handed down to them was kind of no big deal. They didn't appreciate what God had done, they took things for granted, and a cold fog of mechanical, perhaps dead, orthodoxy enveloped that church, and some were unregenerate tares amongst the wheat. Others were saved, but they didn't possess a deep love for Christ.

And so he tells them, I want you to do three things. I want you to remember, repent and return. It's the same type of dynamic that he's telling the exiles. I want you to remember and repent and return. Verse five of Revelation two, "Remember from where you have fallen and repent and do the deeds you did at first..." "Remember," the grammar indicates, keep on remembering. Don't ever forget from where you have fallen. It's the perfect tense. So it indicates that this decline has occurred over a long period of time. And this is what God was saying to the returning exiles, and obviously what he says to each of us, and we must all guard ourselves against this unwitting departure, because every time you look at a screen, every time you turn on television, every time you go to work, every time you interact with people all around you, what are they doing, unwittingly and perhaps wittingly, they are drawing you away from the purposes of God. We have to guard against that. This is the great danger of the sophisticated deceptions of Satan and false teachers. I'm constantly reminded, as I pray for each of you, on a daily basis of what Paul said in Second Corinthians 11 three, "I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, that your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." And this is why John tells us in First John two, beginning in verse 15, "Do not love the world nor the things in the world." In other words, do not have an affection, or a devotion, to the things in the world. The world here, the "cosmos."  The satanically controlled systems that operate all around us; the invisible, spiritual world that is ruled by Satan and his demons that promote the values and the beliefs and the morals contrary to the word and the will of God. All of these things are designed to lead us into rebellion against God, to blind us from the great truths of the gospel that we might be saved, and to enslave us in our lusts. "If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him for all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world."

So again, the Jewish ancestors of the exiles failed miserably in this regard. But according to His great mercy and grace, God's calling them back, "return to Me" in repentance. But the mercy of the Lord can also be seen in his command to rebuild the temple. Here's where I'll introduce you, just briefly, to Haggai. First let me take you to Ezra, okay, just for a moment. You remember, if you read in Ezra, the enemies of Judah opposed the exiles from rebuilding the temple. And the old people who remembered Solomon's temple saw what they were building,and the text says that they "wept aloud" when they saw the foundation of the house of the Lord being laid because it didn't come close to comparing to the matchless splendor of Solomon's temple destroyed some 50 years earlier. So, construction stopped because of the fierce opposition of their enemies, which included especially the mongrel race of the Samaritans that now lived there.

By the way, the Samaritans were basically ancestors from the Babylonians and the Assyrians; they were colonists that settled the area. This included many that the Assyrian king Sargon the Second had conquered. And these people intermarried with a lot of the Jewish women that escaped the original deportation. And so they blended, you know, the syncretistic worship, all of the pagan idolatry, a lot of the same type of stuff you see even in evangelicalism today. And they had this superstitious blend of Judaism and paganism. And the Jews and the Samaritans hated each other, so the Samaritans tried to stop them from building the temple. And so, for 16 years, what did the people do? They decided to focus on building their own homes. So, God sent Haggai to communicate his frustration to the people. Haggai one, beginning in verse four, he says, "'Is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses while this house lies desolate? Now therefore, thus says the LORD of hosts, "Consider your ways! You have sown much, but harvest little; you eat, but there is not enough to be satisfied."'" In other words, God is judging them for this. "'You drink, but there is not enough to become drunk; you put on clothing, but no one is warm enough; and he who earns, earns wages to put it into a purse with holes.' Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Consider your ways!'" Again, a call to repentance.

And he goes on to say, "'Go up to the mountains, bring wood and rebuild the temple, that I may be pleased with it and be glorified,' says the Lord." And then God describes his judgment for their disobedience. He says, "'You look for much, but behold, it comes to little; when you bring it home, I blow it away. Why?' declares the LORD of hosts, 'because of My house, which lies desolate, while each of you runs to his own house. Therefore, because of you, the sky has withheld its dew, and the Earth has withheld its produce. I called for a drought on the land, on the mountains, on the grain, on the new wine, on the oil, on what the ground produces, on men, on cattle, and on all the labor of your hands.'" In other words, your priorities are out of whack here. You're not listening to me, and so I'm chastening you. He's calling them to repentance and obedience.

And then the Lord encouraged them in verse 13 of chapter one, and said, "'I am with you.'" And he goes on, and he promised that while the Temple of Solomon would indeed be far inferior, nevertheless, he urged them to be courageous. He assured them of his presence and his protection, and he promised that he would be faithful to his covenant blessings. He went on to say that that an exceedingly greater, more glorious temple is going to be built in the future in verses six through nine. In fact, let me read this in Haggai two, beginning in verse six, "'For thus says the LORD of hosts, "Once more in a little while, I am going to shake the heavens and the earth, the sea, also in the dry land."'" Here, by the way, he's speaking of the second coming. "'"I will shake all the nations, and they will come with the wealth of all nations, and I will fill this house with glory," says the LORD of hosts. "The silver is Mine and the gold is Mine," declares the LORD of hosts. "The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former," says the Lord of hosts, "and in this place I will give peace," declares the LORD of hosts.'" And of course, we have a detailed description of the millennial temple in Ezekiel chapters 40 through 48, and that will be built by the Lord in the millennial reign when Christ returns to this earth. And that millennial kingdom will be the consummating bridge between human history and the eternal state. It will be that time when the Lord will finally rule and reign upon this wicked earth with his glorified saints and the kingdoms of the world that have opposed him will finally be overthrown.

Now, this is why it was so important to rebuild the temple. It's because number one, this was where God dwelt among his people in that day; this is where they offered sacrifices. By doing so, the Old Testament believer identified himself outwardly with the covenant God, and with the covenant people. And sacrifices would temporarily satisfy the just wrath against them and point them ultimately to a final and a perfect sacrifice; none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. So, the need for a temple in God's plan of redemption was exceedingly important, and it has been all throughout redemptive history. You will remember that it began, first of all, with a tabernacle in 1444, BC, with Moses. It was a mobile temple, you might say. And then that eventually, in the nine hundreds, turned into Solomon's temple. It was planned by David, and later on it was, it was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BC. And then Zerubbabel's temple, that we're talking about them building now, that was started really in about 516 BC. And that was later destroyed by Antiochus Epiphanes in 169 BC. And then you have Herod's temple, which was basically a restoration of Zerubbabel's temple and an expansion of that, that was built some 500 years later, and then the Romans come along in 70 ad, and they destroy that. But where's the temple now? Well, presently, you're looking at it right here. He's dwelling within believers, the hearts of believers, and he will continue to do that until the Lord returns.

But we also know there will be a tribulation temple. It will be constructed by the Jews. The Antichrist will allow that to happen, and it will be desecrated and destroyed. And then there will be the millennial temple that will be constructed by the Messiah, as I just mentioned, by the way, in Zechariah six, we will read more about that. And then finally, there will be a heavenly temple. There will be an eternal temple of the Lord's presence. It will be a spiritual temple where the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb, will dwell. And we read about that in Revelation 21 and 22. And these last two temples, beloved, that are yet future, were a second reason why it was so important for the exiles to build the temple, even if it was inferior, and that's because he wanted to animate their hearts with the promises of coming glory. I mean, folks, if you have no hope, you have no hope. How miserable we would be. And all of this was part of God's plan and purposes for Israel, both then and in the future. And for this reason, he raised up Zechariah to ignite the hearts of the people both then and now. So he speaks the revelation of God concerning the future glory of the Messiah's reign, as we will see as we get into this, his reign upon the earth, and therefore, how their humble temple points to the glorious, future temple where Christ will rule and reign.

I might add as a footnote, but probably a very important one, there is a parallel here with the way Christ is building his visible church today. When you think about it, the visible Church of which we are a part is far from perfect. It has a lot of inferior, components to it. It lacks in purity and power. But isn't it interesting that it is being sanctified by the power of the Spirit, and it reveals the presence of the Lord in this dark world, and it is pointing to a glorious future kingdom. So we see that even now. So, o, the mercy of the Lord towards his stubborn people; he calls them to repentance, and he commands them to rebuild the temple.

And then finally, and we will close with this. This morning, we see the judgment of the Lord. He says, "'Do not be like your fathers to whom the former prophets proclaim, saying, "Thus says the Lord of hosts, 'Return now from your evil ways and from your evil deeds.'"'" By the way, thisis at the very heart of the gospel, the good news that we as sinful people can be reconciled to a holy God. We have to repent and we have to believe both are gifts from God. What did Jesus preach at the beginning of his ministry? We read about it, for example, in Matthew four and verse seven, his very first word was, "'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. '"And as we look at repentance biblically, we see that repentance includes a brokenness over sin for having offended a holy God, and a longing to be restored to fellowship with him and to enjoy the fullness of his blessings. It is a turning away from sin that we cannot do apart from the empowering work of the Spirit of God. It's a conscious, determined change of direction. It is a surrender to the will of Christ. And that happens when he literally causes us to be raised from spiritual death to spiritual life, and he, by his power, changes the very desires of our heart. Second Corinthians 7:10, Paul describes it as that, "sorrow that is according to the will of God, that produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation."

But not only is there repentance, there must be faith, which is that gift of God that causes the soul to turn to God and trust in the person and in the work of Christ to provide forgiveness, to provide righteousness, to provide eternal life. Please understand that repentance and faith make up the single act of conversion. And in Zechariah one in verse four at the end, he tells us, "'But they did not listen or give heed to Me, declares the Lord." How sad. Like so many people today, they hear the gospel, and they think it's silly, they reject it. But then in verse five, he says, "'Your fathers, where are they?'" Obviously, they're dead. They've been dead a long time ago. "'And the prophets, do they live forever?'" Obviously not, even God's faithful servants die. But where he's going here is, the threats of divine judgment that they prophesied, they don't die. In other words, he's telling them, don't think for one minute that what was prophesied in the past is dead and forgotten. Don't think for one minute that the word of God somehow kind of peters out. No, no. It lives on. The prophetic words of divine judgment that were uttered to their fathers did not die with them. So he's telling them, Do not turn a deaf ear to my warnings, lest you suffer the same fate.

In verse six, "'But did not My words and My statutes statutes…" here is a term referring to the determined purposes of God to punish sin, "...did not My words and My statutes, which I commanded My servants, the prophets, overtake your fathers?'" Didn't that happen? Overtake is an interesting term. It was a metaphorical hunting term, and it implies the unstoppable judgment of God, pursuing and overcoming those who think that they can run away from God in rebellion and get away with it apart from judgment. But notice says, "'Then they repented and said, "As the LORD of hosts purposed to do to us in accordance with our ways and our deeds, so He has dwelt with us."'" As the Lord of hosts purposed. This term is fascinating. It carries with it, the idea of a a predetermined plan that was decreed in eternity past. And what he's saying here is that God's promised decreed judgments are perfectly timed and perfectly just. And he's essentially saying to them, "Hey, folks, look, you've just returned from exile, surely you can see how God pursued your ancestors. So don't trifle with God's words. Don't trifle with his warnings. Don't neglect his call to repentance and faith and obedience. Return to me, the one true God. Do this in humble obedience that I might return to you in intimate fellowship and blessing, because I long to lavish my love and blessings upon you. But if you refuse, you are going to return to the land in defeat and misery and shame and sorrow." Dear Christian, please hear me. Do not be deceived, whatever you sow, you're going to reap right? So hear the words of the Lord, whatever they might be in his word, apply them to your life; know the word, know the will of God. Meditate upon them and live them out. And as a result, he will reward you. He will bless you. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Fear his word, as we read in Isaiah 66 God says, essentially, Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. What can you do to impress me? The answer is nothing. But to this one, I will look, to Him who is humble and contrite of heart, and who trembles at my word. And folks, you must tremble at his word.

If you're here without Christ and you're living consistently with the wicked ways of the world, the only thing that will change your heart is the Spirit of God who will bring conviction to it. And know this, that the wrath of God abides upon you, and you will die in your sin unless you repent, and unless God does a miraculous work of grace. And I plead with you to do business with God if you haven't already, because a day is coming, as Jesus said in Matthew 13, beginning in verse 41 when, "'The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks and those who commit lawlessness, and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"

Please hear me, I have friends and I have loved ones who are in hell right now. Some of them are weeping because they realized what they have done and the hopelessness of their situation. And there are others who are gnashing their teeth in absolute fury that God would dare judge them the way he is. The reason he does this is because he is holy beyond anything that we can possibly imagine. I hear people talk about, well, I can't believe God would send anybody to hell. That's because you don't understand the holiness of God. And frankly, I don't either. It's beyond anything I can...you know, the thing I think of is, can any of you create a strand of DNA? Can any of you create an eyeball? Can any of you create a circulatory system or hang the stars in the sky? No. Folks, we are an atom on an amoeba's hind end, when you think about us in comparison to God. And do you really think we're going to dare judge God because his standard of justice doesn't jive with ours? How dare we do that? So I plead with you. You must come to a saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and God will save you, as he's done with so many. I'm going to close in prayer. We're going to sing, have a benediction, and then anybody that wants to leave you can, but we're going to stay another, maybe 5-10, minutes to hear the testimonies of the seven people to be baptized, then we’re going to go out and we're going to do that. So let's pray right now and then we'll sing, okay?

Father, thank you for this time together. Thank you for the power of your word. Speak to our hearts. May the truths of your word bear much fruit to the praise of your glory. I pray in Jesus' name and for his glory. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to the Old Testament, Book of Zechariah. This morning, we will embark upon a verse-by-verse study of this amazing book that is sometimes called the apocalypse of the Old Testament, the book of Revelation of the Old Testament. And this morning, I want to begin an introduction that will require me to continue it the next time we're together, but I want to read the first six verses of Zechariah, if you will follow along. Zechariah one, beginning in verse one. 

"In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah the prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Ido saying, 

'The Lord was very angry with your fathers. 

Therefore say to them, "Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Return to Me,' declares the LORD of hosts, 'that I may return to you,' says the LORD of hosts.' 

'Do not be like your fathers to whom the former prophets proclaimed. Saying, "Thus, says the LORD of hosts.," 'Return now from your evil ways and from your evil deeds'" 'But they did not listen or give heed to me,' declares the LORD." 

'Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?' 

'But did not My words and My statutes, which I commanded My servants the prophets, overtake your fathers? Then they repented and said, "As the LORD of hosts purposed to do to us in accordance with our ways and our deeds, so he has dealt with us."'"'"

Now you might be asking, why are we studying a prophetic book written 2504 years ago? Well, there's several reasons, but I want to give you two of the most prominent reasons. First of all, because it is part of the word of the living God, and he has given it to us. We are told that all scripture is inspired by God, Second Timothy 3:16, "and it is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work." But secondly, as you will see over time, the primary themes and issues in this book are as contemporary as the daily news in our culture. And thirdly, given the current state of affairs in our world today, the prophecies of this book concerning the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ that are yet to be fulfilled, could easily come to fruition in our lifetime. 

Our country is in a civil war, and it's going to get much worse. Historically, we know that Marxist tyranny always disguises itself with names like compassion, equality, social justice, equity, outcomes, diversity, inclusion, and of course, the promise that everybody is going to share in the material wealth and prosperity of the country. And that's true. I've been to those countries where that happens, and they're all equally poor. And as we witness the steady deterioration of the economic and moral foundations of these United States that are not at all united - they're irreversibly divided - it is important to be encouraged by the promises of God that he has given us in his word. In fact, if you look at the constellation of prophetic signs that are revealed in Scripture, you can see that we are living in the very last days. The entire world is a powder keg right now. We see militant Islam aligning itself with communist countries, especially Russia, ready to come against Israel. In fact, Israel, has been attacking Hezbollah since about 24 hours ago, and it's getting worse. And they are going to continue to come together until we see the battle of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38 and 39; all of this is ready to happen. The world is being prepared for the global rule of the Antichrist and the pre-kingdom judgments of the tribulation that will ultimately destroy the world. And only the Lord, when he comes, can save it. 

And like never before in history, the biblical prophecies of Christ's return and the establishment of his earthly kingdom are set in place, and you are going to see that as we study this book. Dear friends, the stage is set for the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. The drums are rolling and the curtains are about to be pulled back. Jesus said in Matthew 24:37, "For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like in the days of Noah." And what were those days like? Days of unmitigated evil and rebellion in the world. Days of granite indifference and apathy towards God's judgment, which is a perfect description of the world in which we live today. These dark days pose a real danger for believers. It's very easy for believers to get discouraged, to get distracted and feel defeated and disillusioned in times like these. It is easy to lose sight of the character of God, to lose sight of the promises of God, to allow our worship just to become ritualistic, perfunctory, for our praise to become halfhearted, for our service to be minimal. In days like these, our courage can very easily give way to compromise and our holiness yield to worldliness. Perhaps this describes you well. It certainly described the Judean exiles that were allowed to return back to the homeland of Judah after 70 years of Babylonian captivity. Imagine being taken away from where we live, living in another country, another culture, being under their domination and coming back to our home, and it's all ruins. 

I want to give you some history. It's very important that you understand these things, because I found that many Christians don't. Their exile was God's promised judgment because of their disobedience and their violation of the covenant. In Deuteronomy 28 verses one through 14, I read just a little of it a few minutes ago, there were blessings that God promised for obedience. For example, in verse 14, he said, "Do not turn aside from any of the words which I command you today to the right or to the left to go after other gods or serve them." Don't do that. And if you do, Deuteronomy 28 beginning in verse 15, all the way through verse 68 are curses for disobedience. For example, verse 15, "But it shall come about if you do not obey the Lord your God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes with which I charge you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you." And the list is absolutely horrifying. 

The 70-year captivity was calculated based on their violation of the land Sabbath - the Sabbath rest that was required of Israel. You read about it in Leviticus 26, and the exact number of Sabbath years is 490 years. That would have been the period from about Saul all the way to the Babylonian captivity. And that period probably began in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, when Jerusalem was first captured and the temple treasures taken away. And it ended when Cyrus, then 70 years later, allowed them to return. The prophet Jeremiah prophesied the very length of this captivity. We read about it in Jeremiah 25 verse 11, "This whole land will be a desolation and a horror, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon 70 years. 

Beloved, I hope you understand that God is serious about His commandments. These are not suggestions. These are his holy, righteous commands. And because they disregarded God's law, as we would see in Ezekiel 10 and 11, In Ezekiel's vision, the glory of the Lord departed from their midst, and it did so in various stages. First, the glory of the Lord was his Shekinah, that that dazzling, brilliant, ineffable light of his presence. And it first rose up above the threshold of the temple; Ezekiel details all of this, as I say in Ezekiel 10 and 11. And then it moved to the east gate, where it stopped, and it hovered. And then it moved from the midst of Jerusalem, stood over the Mount of Olives, east of the city, and then disappeared. By the way Messiah's return will be westward. It will be the exact reverse order of the way his glory departed. We know, according to Zechariah 14:14, that he will descend upon the Mount of Olives, and then he will enter in through the Eastern Gate, according to Ezekiel 43 verses one and two, and then his glory will fill the house of the millennial temple: Ezekiel 43 and verse five. And Zechariah 14 nine, tells us that at that point he will be king over the whole earth and all ofthe people who live in the kingdom will worship the Lord of hosts, and they will even celebrate the Feast of Booths, Zechariah 14 verse six. 

Now I want to give you a sample of what's in the book. Zechariah's prophecy really describes the covenantal faithfulness of the Lord - of Yahweh. His covenantal faithfulness towards his disobedient people. In fact, Yahweh is God's covenant and personal name, and it conveys his loyal faithfulness to his covenant promises. We read about this, for example, in Exodus, three verses 14 through 16. His name is Yahweh, the great "I AM, "which means he is the one that always has existed and always will exist, underscoring his ever-present faithfulness to his covenant people Israel, even in the midst of their rebellion and disbelief. In fact, in Zechariah one verse 14 and chapter two verses eight and nine, he is presented as the jealous protector of Israel. And dear friends that is continuing even to this day, despite his judgment against them. And this will continue until he returns as the Promised Messiah and reigns upon his throne in a renovated Jerusalem on a renovated earth. And then he will say to them, according to Zechariah 13 nine, "'They are My people.'" And Israel will say," quote, "'Yahweh, is my God.'" And his desire is to see Israel repent and be reconciled. And you will see this all through the book of Zechariah. It's a constant theme, and this is what he wanted the exiles to understand. He wanted them to remember what their fathers had done with their sin and what he promises to do. In fact, Zechariah's very name means "Yahweh Remembers." Yahweh remembers, and this will be another dominating theme that Yahweh remembers, and he will keep his covenant promises. 

You will recall Moses reminded the people to obey God's law, knowing that the Lord will fulfill all of his promises. In Deuteronomy four verse 31 we read, "For the Lord, your God is a compassionate God." He will not fail you, nor destroy you, nor forget the covenant with your fathers, which He swore to them." Now you must remember if you're going to understand Bible prophecy, you must understand Israel's role. Israel was chosen by God to proclaim the existence and the excellencies of the Lord our God, the one true God. They were chosen to be the nation through which the Messiah would be revealed. They were to represent him as a kingdom of priests, mediating between God and men, interceding for  sinners through the sacrificial system. They were chosen to preserve and to transmit Scripture - the divine truths revealed through the prophets; to be the nation that would demonstrate his faithful, loyal, enduring love and to show his grace toward penitent sinners and manifest His justice and righteous anger towards those who refuse. However, God knew that all of these things would require his divine intervention. We tend not to do the things that God has asked us to do without his help. And we see this, for example, in Zechariah chapter two and chapter five, that he would have to, in his own time, refine Israel, restore Zion, which is Jerusalem, he calls the apple of his eye, rebuild the temple, reveal his glory to the nations, destroy all of the nations that had come against her, as we read in Zechariah one verses 18 through 21. And that he would ultimately have to establish his earthly kingdom, as we see in Zechariah 14. So these are the themes of hope that Zechariah was commissioned to reveal to his very disheartened people. For indeed, Yahweh remembers. 

Now make no mistake, God has not abandoned Israel. Jeremiah 29 beginning in verse 10, says, "For thus says the LORD, 'When 70 years have been completed, for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you, to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans that I have for you,' declares the LORD, 'plans for welfare and not for calamity, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you,' declares the Lord." By the way, many people misappropriate that passage and claim it for the United States of America. Folks, this has nothing to do with the United States of America. It is a pagan country under the judgment of God. This has to do with the theocracy of Israel and his covenant promises to them. 

He goes on to say that, "'I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you,' declares the LORD, 'and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile.'" And ultimately, these promises will be filled be fulfilled in the millennial kingdom under Messiah's reign, and at that point, the Abrahamic, Davidic and new covenant promises will all be realized spiritually as well as materially. 

Now, more context, you've got to have these things in order to understand what Zechariah is going to tell us under the inspiration of the Spirit. The Babylonians, under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar, conquered Judah in three military campaigns. The first one was in 605 BC. Then again, in 597 and finally, in 586, and at the last one, the temple was destroyed. The city of Jerusalem was reduced to rubble. And as Jeremiah predicted, in Jeremiah 25, the Judeans were taken into exile for 70 years. And eventually, in 539 BC, God moved upon the heart of Cyrus the Great to issue an edict to allow them to return to their homeland and rebuild Jerusalem and the temple.

And so the next year after that, in 538 BC, 50,000 Judeans returned under the leadership of Zerubbabel, and he was the governor, and Joshua the high priest, along with the prophet Haggai. And a couple of months later, Zechariah. Zechariah was actually born in Babylon. When he began his ministry, he was called a quote "young man," according to Zechariah two four. Nehemiah 12 tells us that he was both a "prophet and a priest." He was the son of Berechiah, who was the son of Iddo, the text tells us. It’s interesting these names, Berekiahmeans "Yahweh blesses;" a name that really foretold the blessings that God would bestow upon Israel. And Iddo means, "In its time." A reassuring name that would really forecast the certainty of God's promised blessings but according to his predetermined time. Zechariah's prophetic ministry spanned about 50 years, and according to Jesus' words in Matthew 23 verse 35 he was eventually murdered, quote, "between the altar and the sanctuary in the temple."  

Zechariah began to write his record, this book, in 520 BC. Again, that's 2504 years ago. Verse one, "In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah the prophet." The "word of the LORD," literally, the word of Yahweh. And actually, aswe look at the grammar here, the idea here is this is a reference to the second person of the triune Godhead. This is Jesus, the Son of God. This is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the divine logos of John one, for example. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Verse 14, 'and the word became flesh and dwelt among us." So what we have here, in Zechariah prophecy, is the Son of God the Messiah, revealing himself in these great truths and these great promises; revealing his own purposes and his plans to his servant, Zechariah, so that he would give them to his people, so that in 2024 at Calvary Bible Church, we would hear them as well. Is that not amazing? 

And then we know that two years later, he received additional revelation in chapter seven and verse one, we read, "In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev." Now, over the next couple of weeks, I want to examine just these first six verses with a lot of other history to help you understand and get a foundation. And I want to do it under three headings. We're going to look at, first of all, the anger of the Lord today. Then the next time we're together, we'll look at the mercy of the Lord, and then finally, the judgment of the Lord. 

So bear in mind, this first category, is the anger of the Lord. Again, notice verse two, "'The LORD was very angry with your fathers. Therefore say to them, "Thus says the Lord of hosts, 'Return to me,' declares the LORD of hosts, 'that I may return to you.' Says the LORD of hosts. 'Do not be like your fathers to whom the former prophets proclaim saying, 'Thus says the LORD of hosts, "Return now from your evil ways and from your evil deeds."' But they did not listen or give heed to me," declares the Lord." Now, why was the Lord so angry with those previous generations? What on earth did they do? What did they do to kindle his wrath against them? And as you will see, the parallels between their sins and the sins of the wicked world in which we live today are undeniable. In fact, if God didn't judge the United States of America, he would owe Judah an apology. Of course, that's not going to happen, because God is infinitely holy and just. In fact, some of the judgments that were meted out upon ancient Judah, both then and now, are already plaguing our own nation, though it is going to get exceedingly, in fact, unimaginably worse during the time of the tribulation. 

Now, more Old Testament history, forgive me, this may be a bit boring to some of you, but others of you will appreciate it. You simply must have this foundation. If we go back in the Old Testament, we will see that in 1445 BC, God gave Moses the law. And then you have the conquest of Canaan under the leadership of Joshua, that happened in about 1400 BC. And as you study the history of Israel at that time, it was cycle, after cycle, after cycle of sin, and then judgment, then repentance, then blessing, then sin, then it just went on and on and on in the period of the Judges. Sound familiar? In fact, I got my picture right there next to that note. 

Well, God knew that they would eventually need a king, and so he set in place the qualifications for an eventual king, we read about it in Deuteronomy 17 verses 14 through 20. I won't read all of it, but beginning in verse 17, he says that, "'He shall not multiply wives for himself, or else his heart will turn away; nor shall he greatly increase silver or and gold for himself. Now it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests.'" Can you imagine that? "'It shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes, that his heart may not be lifted up above his countrymen and that he may not turn aside from the commandment to the right or the left, so that he and his sons may continue long in his kingdom in the midst of Israel.'" Well, eventually, they got their king. They got King Saul in 1051. That was followed eventually by King David in 1011; David reigned for 40 years. Solomon then comes along and follows him, and he reigned in 971; he also reigned for 40 years. The problem with Solomon, according to First Kings 11 one, is he violated much of what Moses communicated. It says that Solomon loved many foreign women, big problem. And we know, according to Scripture, that he had 700 wives and princesses. They were Egyptian, Moabite, ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian and Hittite. And on top of that, he had 300 concubines. And his wives led him astray. How dangerous it is to be unequally yoked. Young people hear this, how dangerous it is to be unequally yoked with an unbeliever. 

First Kings 11, beginning in verse four, "When Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. For Solomon went after Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom, the detestable idol of the Ammonites. Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, and he did not follow the LORD fully, as David his father had done. Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable idol of Moab, on the mountain, which is east of Jerusalem, and for Molech, the detestable idol of the sons of Ammon. Thus also he did for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods." Well, eventually, then, according to Old Testament history, in 931 the kingdom was divided, Israel to the north, Judah to the south, and you have a series of mostly wicked kings violating all of these commandments. The people are polluted by the surrounding cultures; they did not come out and be separate from them. They compromised with the culture around them. They drifted away from God's laws, and they gradually embraced the cultural abominations of the polytheistic idolatry of the Canaanites. In fact, in Deuteronomy chapter 18, beginning in verse nine, there's a list of what is called the "detestable things" of those nations. He gives nine of them, and here's the types of things they embraced. Number one, they sacrificed children in the fire to appease Molech, which was also a worship that included gross sexual perversions connected with this pagan ritual, including homosexuality. Secondly, they practiced witchcraft, seeking to determine the will of of the gods by examining and interpreting omens. They practiced soothsaying, attempting to control the future through power given to evil spirits. They interpreted omens, trying to tell the future based upon signs. They practiced sorcery, where they would indulge in in magical effects by drugs or some other kind of a potion. They conjured up spells binding other people by magical muttering. They practiced being a medium where one would supposedly communicate with the dead, but actually they're communicating with a demon. They practiced being a spiritist, one who has an intimate acquaintance with the demonic spiritual world. And finally, they would call up the dead, investigating and seeking information from the dead that demons would very gladly give. 

They also violated God's laws for morality. I think of Leviticus chapter 18 beginning in verse 21 here's just some of them, "You shall not give any of your offspring to offer them to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the LORD. You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination. Also you shall not have intercourse with any animal to be defiled with it nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it; it is a perversion. Do not defile yourselves by any of these things; for by all these things, the nations which I am casting out before you have become defiled." Unimaginable wickedness, and all of those things exist in our culture. Isn't it interesting that the abomination of child sacrifice and bestialityare bookends of the abomination of homosexuality. It's hard to imagine the depths of perversion that a depraved heart will sink. And today in America, we even have child sacrifice, it’s called abortion, the barbaric dismemberment of a child that is made in the image of God, concealed in a mother's womb. People who have no fear of God and scoff at his law, think they are above the law, and as a result, they their conscience become seared as with a branding iron. They become comfortable with this depraved practice, this brutal murder of millions of pre born infants every year; a sacrifice to the god of self on the altar of personal expediency and corporate profits and so on. In fact, the ancient child sacrifices were made according to Jeremiah 7:31 in quote, "The high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom." This is an east/west valley at the south end of Jerusalem. And the term "Topheth" comes from a Hebrew word "Toph" for drum. And the reason they called it that is when the people of Judah sacrificed their children to the idol of Molech by throwing them into a burning fire, they would beat drums very loudly to drown out the screams of the children. You know, it's incomprehensible that anybody would commit such ghastly crimes against innocent children. But dear friends such is the power of satanic deception. 

Some have said that abortion is a sacrifice to Satan. And this very well could be true. Satan is the master counterfeiter. In fact, I was reading a Roman Catholic philosopher, Dr Peter Kreft, that said, quote, "Abortion is the parody of the Holy Eucharist. That is why it uses the same holy words, 'this is my body,' with the blasphemously opposite meaning." I find it interesting,this is what you will hear them say, "This is my body." Jesus said, This is my body given so that you can live. Women say, an abortionist will say, "This is my body. You must die so I can live." 

In Isaiah five, there is a list of the sins of Judah in a series of six woes. I've preached on this at length before. I'll summarize them very briefly. God cursed them because of their greedy materialism, their drunken dissipation and party lifestyle, their defiant debauchery, where they flaunted their immorality and taunted God to judge them, because of their redefined morality, calling evil good and good evil, because of the fact that they would celebrate their haughty humanism, being wise in their own eyes, clever in their own sight, and also because of their corrupt leaders; drunken authorities and judges who would justify the wicked for a bribe and take away the rights of the ones who were in the right. Sounds like the morning news. Sothese are, in general, the categories of wickedness that ignited God's wrath. 

Well, eventually the northern kingdom fell to Assyria, that happened in 722 BC, and God's judgment on Judah wasn't far behind because of the wicked kings. There was one good king, notably - King Josiah. He ruled in Judah in 641. And of all the kings in David's line, including David himself there was really no king that approximated the royal idea that you would read of, for example, in Deuteronomy 17 more so than Josiah, although he wasn't perfect. Second Kings 23:25 it says, "Before him, there was no king like him who turned to the Lord with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses, nor did any like him arise after him." And so he was a great king, but he also had multiple wives, so there were problems as well. But Josiah has a lot of reforms, and I should say, had a lot of reforms in his reign. I'm not going to read you all of it, but in Second Kings 23 verses four through 21 you read of his reforms. Let me give you a sample of it, "Then the king commanded Hilkiah, the high priest, and the priests of the second order and the doorkeepers to bring out of the temple of the LORD all the vessels that were made for Baal." Baal, by the way, means lord, or it means master, the supreme male divinity of the Phoenician and Canaanite nations. And Baal worshiped involved all manner of gross immorality, rituals, orgies, all of these types of things, and the construction of idols. And so he had them remove all of those vessels made for Baal that they had been put in the temple of the Lord. And even for the Asherah - Asherah was an idol, the fertility goddess. Bring that out. And he says, "and for all of the hosts of heaven." This was referring to the ancient worship of the sun and the moon and the stars. This was the ancient worship of astrology. We still have it today in the zodiac signs and horoscopes, which, by the way, no Christian should have anything to do with any of that that is satanic. Stay away from it. "And he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel. He did away with the idolatrous priests from the kings of Judah had appointed to burn incense in the high places..." Down a little bit further, it says, "He broke down the houses of the male cult prostitutes, which were in the house of the LORD where the women were weaving the hangings for the Asherah." Jumping way down to verse 19, "Josiah also removed all of the houses of the high places which were in the cities of Samaria, which the kings of Israel had made, provoking the LORD; and he did to them, just as he had done in Bethel. All the priests of the high places who were there he slaughtered on the altars and burned human bones on them; then he returned to Jerusalem. Then the king commanded all of the people saying, 'Celebrate the Passover to the LORD your God as it is written in this book of the covenant.'" 

Now that is really interesting, because the Passover had not been celebrated since the time of the judges. Well, Josiah makes all of these great reforms, boom. After he goes, his son, Jehoahaz, succeeds him. He's 23 years old. He reigns for three months. We read in Scripture that he "did evil in the sight of the Lord." He has problems with Pharaoh Neco, and Pharaoh imprisons him and makes Eliakim, the son of Josiah, king and his stead and changed his name to Jehoiakim. Jehoiakim was 25 years old. He was a vassal of Egypt. He reigned for 11 years, and "He did evil in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his fathers had done." So just after you get everything cleaned out, what happens? Boom, they go right back. Then the Babylonians invade Judah. This happened in 605 and Jehoiakim submitted to Babylon as a vassal at first, and then he rebelled. And then Jehoiakim became the king of Judah at 18, he reigned for three months, He did evil in the sight of the Lord." You may recall that Nebuchadnezzar then takes him captive and makes his uncle, Mattaniah, king, and changed his name to Zedekiah. Zedekiah was 21 years old. Zedekiah reigns for 11 years, and "he did evil in the sight of the Lord." He rebels against Nebuchadnezzar; Nebuchadnezzar's had his belly full of it, so he returns to Jerusalem. He laid siege to Jerusalem for two and a half years, and he finally breached the city and utterly destroyed it and the temple, and this was the final conquest in 586, BC. 

Now, why would God allow his chosen people to be treated that way? Because of all of that kind of wickedness. In fact, Jeremiah tells us in Jeremiah 19, beginning in verse four, here's why, "'Because they have forsaken Me and have made this an alien place and have burned sacrifices in it to other gods, that neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah had ever known, and because they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, a thing which I never commanded or spoke of, nor did it ever enter My mind; therefore, behold, days are coming,' declares the Lord, 'when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the valley of Benhinnom, but rather the valley of Slaughter. I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place, and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies and before the hand of those who seek their life; and I will give over their carcasses as food for the birds of the sky and the beasts of the earth. I will also make this city a desolation and an object of hissing; everyone who passes by it will be astonished and hiss because of all its disasters, I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and they will eat one another's flesh in the siege and in the distress with which their enemies and those who seek their life will distress them.'" And that kind of cannibalism actually took place, just as God promised. 

So Babylon's first invasion of Judah, as I said, was in 586 BC. But while Babylon is enjoying all this power, Persia is gaining power as well, and eventually Babylon falls to Persia. That happened in 539 BC, and Persian king Cyrus then gives the edict to allow the Jews to return in 638. Soon after that, as I said, or kind of along with that, Haggai goes with them; few months later, Zechariah goes and he receives the word of the Lord in 520. 

Now, why all of this history? And I'm sure you're not going to remember all of it, but I hope you get the flow. Beloved, let me tell you why. I want you to understand the level of sinfulness that permeated the hearts of those people and continues to permeate the hearts of other people who reject the one true God, and have no fear of God. And secondly, I want to show you what happens to people who turn away from the commandments of the Lord; who compromise with the culture. This is what has happened in evangelicalism. I would submit to you that the majority of evangelicals today are thoroughly apostate, consistent with Matthew seven. Second Timothy four, Paul said to the young pastor, Timothy, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires." And then he makes this fascinating statement, "And they will turn away their ears from the truth and turn aside unto myths." The first portion of the phrase is in the active voice in the Greek; it means that they will deliberately hear the truth, they won't like it, they will scoff at that, they will reject that. They will want something different, and as a result of that, it says "they will turn aside to myths." That's in the passive voice, which means you're not going to deliberately say, Oh, I love these myths, but rather, the myths are going to take you over, unwittingly, and destroy you. You're going to be ruled by your sinful flesh, because of Satan's lies that appeal to your heart; you will unwittingly reject the truth, you're going to be unaware of your desertion, and you're going to allow the myths of false doctrine and satanic lies to take you over and destroy you and your family, your marriage and your country. 

Think of all the ostensibly evangelicals today who embrace all of this wickedness, the social justice gospel, all of the woke, the LGBTQ, the abortion abominations. This is why even believers are warned in Romans 12 two, "Do not be conformed to this world." Literally meaning, do not allow the world to shape you into its image without you even know it's happening. But rather, "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Think how quickly people lose their fear of the Lord and his righteous standards. You can go all the way back to the beginning. God judges the whole world with a flood. And then right after that, Noah's son Ham sins against him, and Noah curses Ham and his son, Canaan, father of the Canaanites. Canaan is the father of Nimrod, Nimrod builds Babel, the Tower of Babel, and the judgment begins once again. 

Think of the Exodus, a miraculous deliverance. The people see all that God did there with the plagues on the Egyptians, they crossed the Red Sea. They see it parted, and what happens within just a few years? They build a golden calf and call it Yahweh. I think of think of the prohibitions in the Mosaic law that were given by God to somehow help them understand the glories of his holiness and how important it is to be separate from the pagan cultures and not be polluted by them. But they would ignore that; ignore the laws, and then judgment would come over and over again. Josiah cleans house, immediately his sons, I mean, it just goes right back down the toilet. In fact, even during the millennium, the Lord himself will be ruling on this earth, we will be ruling with him, and at the very end, Satan will be released, and there will be a massive rebellion against the Lord that he will put down. Dear friend, unless the Lord our God intervenes in the hearts of sinful man, no one would ever be saved. The gospel is all of grace. 

I think of our country. We are a product of the Protestant Reformation. So many of those people that came over here early on, could sit in this room right now and hear what comes from this pulpit and say heartily, "Amen." And look how quickly everything turned. They built Harvard, they built Yale, they built Princeton, to train men of God to be expositors of his word. And now look at those institutions, sins like leaven right? It leavens the whole lump. It's not satisfied with just a little portion. No, it's going to take over everything. And look at our country today, all of the religious syncretism, the idolatry. We've got, Hinduism, Sikhism, Mohammedism; all these phony perversions of Jesus. I shake my head. I shudder at the way liberals love the idea of universal truth, which is just theological syncretism. In fact, at the Republican National Convention, the lady Harmeet Dhillon gave a formal invocation of Wahe Guru she called the one true god, which is the supreme deity of Sikhism.  Unbelievable. Even conservatives promoting all of this satanic deception of universalism. Isn't it amazing? 

Approximately 250 years after our founding as a country based upon biblical truth, we are now a country that celebrates things that God utterly abhors. The Democratic National Convention had a mobile abortion and vasectomy clinic outside of the DNC in Chicago. Unimaginable. 

Folks, in closing, I want you to understand that Satan is doing everything he can, and this has been his strategy throughout history. He's doing everything he can to destroy the two institutions that God has given us and promised to bless - the family and the church. And without the family and the church, there's no foundation of a society. And by the way, familiesand churches cannot coexist with a Marxist country. Dear friends, guard your heart, guard your family, guard your children. Satan's deceptions are so incredibly brilliant. Look what happened to all of the ancient people and look how God judged them. 

And I want to close by answering a question that I hope some of you are asking, What must I do personally? Well, I'm glad you asked. Number one, you absolutely must be saved. You must see the horror of your sin and the glory of the cross and cry out to God for his saving mercy. Repent of your sins and he will save you and transform you and justify you. 

Secondly, you must be sanctified. You must grow into likeness of Christ. And that simply cannot happen apart from the in depth, systematic study, preaching, teaching and application of the word of God. 

And thirdly, you must be submissive. You must be submissive to the word of God. Be a student of the word of God. Cultivate a habit of personal holiness, of personal worship, private worship and prayer. Feed your mind on the preaching of great Bible expositors. Listen to great podcasts. Fellowship with godly believers, avail yourself of the various means of grace. And then in the midst of all of this, you will find that God will encourage your heart, he will strengthen you, He will bless you, He will give you joy and happiness come what may. So this is my warning to you, prepare yourselves and watch what God will do. Amen? 

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. May they bear much fruit in each of our heart to the praise of your glory. For it's in Christ's name that I pray. Amen

Will you take your Bibles this morning and turn to Second Corinthians chapter 11. This will be the third and final week that we will be examining this particular passage, mainly verses five and six, under the heading "Purity of Devotion to Chris."

Like finding a treasure in an unexpected place, we come to Paul's defense of his apostolic authority and his apostolic gospel message in opposition to the false teachers that have made up all manner of wicked accusations against him; and in the context of this, we are unable to unearth many rare jewels of spiritual truth. May I remind you, in our previous two expositions, we've examined, number one, Paul's zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church, and number two, his fear of their vulnerability for a false gospel. Let me read that section for you. 

"I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness; but indeed you are bearing with me.

For I am jealous for you with a godly jealous;  for I betrothed you to one husband so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin. 

But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. 

For if one comes and preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully." 

And this brings us to the third and final point in our little outline that we'll look at today, and that is, his distress over their love for manipulative theatrics over transforming truths. Notice, in verse five, he says, "For I consider myself not in the least inferior to the most imminent apostles." In other words, contrary to what these false apostles are saying, I'm in no way inferior to the Jerusalem leaders, James, Cephas and Joh; apostles that Paul depicted in Galatians, two nine as men who were reputed to be pillars of the church. And of course, this refutes the false apostles inflated opinion of their own status. They were self-appointed phonies who deceitfully claimed the same authority as the other apostles, and they belittled Paul. And so what we see from the very beginning here in this section, is Paul asserts his parody of status, if you will, as an apostle among the the true apostles, equally competent in knowledge and in faith. 

And then in verse six, he says, "But even if I am unskilled in speech..." Let me pause there a moment, "unskilled" in the original language is the word "idiotes." We get our word "idiot" from that. And so Paul here is saying, well, even if I am an idiot as an order, unrefined, untrained, ordinary, he goes on to say, "... yet I am not so in knowledge; in fact, in every way, we have made this evident to you in all things." 

Now, you must remember the context here; his slanderous rivals, these false apostles, practiced flowery rhetoric of the Greek philosophers. They were skilled orators that would sway the naive and the ignorant crowds to get them to believe just about anything on the basis of not so much what they said, but how they said it. We've seen politicians do this before, and sadly, these manipulative theatrics were very effective in the Corinthian church; they became enamored with these people, and we've all witnessed this before. In an effort to attract and entertain a crowd, we've seen preachers that, oh, they tell stories, and they get all involved with other people. Or they start screaming and shouting and dancing around the stage, or orthey get that rhythmic gasp where they're taking a breath in between everything they say. Or they talk up and they talk down. They get that quiver. They got all these things that they do to somehow work up people, rather than just opening up the word and letting the Spirit do what the Spirit can do. And it's the same type of thing that was going on in Corinth. And then, rather than presenting a God-centered gospel of redemption through faith in Christ, they end up preaching a a man-centered gospel about how to find purpose in life, or something like that; needs based preaching that appeals to the emotion rather than to the mind. And then what happens is methodology takes precedence over theology. 

Well, not so with Jesus and the apostles. You will recall how the false teachers said of Paul in Second Corinthians 10:10, "'... his personal presence is unimpressive and his speech contemptible.'" Not very kind words. And here in verse six, Paul humbly concedes to their criticism. He says, even if I lack skill and oratory, I certainly do not in knowledge. Paul knew that it's not the messenger, but the message that is important. You know, the evangelical landscape is strewn with the corpses of those who have been recipients of need based preaching. That type of preaching never offers any true and lasting spiritual nourishment. The authority and the power of scriptures is traded for the sugar high cotton candy sermonettes that give a brief burst of emotional energy, where you think that something spiritual is going on, but then you end up with a long crash of spiritual lethargy. Many young pastors are more comfortable in exegeting Hollywood movies than the inspired Word of God. And what happens, as well, is in many churches, "the sacred desk," as the Puritans used to call it, has become the psychologist couch and sermons are nothing more than self help seminars. So many pastors today consider the pure gospel that Jesus and the apostles preached to be archaic and divisive and offensive, and therefore, like the latest version of iPhone, it continues to be reinvented to meet the demands of the consumer. But dear friends, where you have no true gospel, you will have no true repentance, and when you have no true repentance, you will have no genuine salvation. You will have no genuine justification and sanctification and glorification, and what remains will be a Christless Christianity; churches filled with counterfeit Christians. You know, modern day evangelical gurus that preach pragmatism will be the type of people that would have said to Paul, you know, Paul, in order to be more effective, you need to study the techniques of the preachers of your day. You should study their eloquence. You need to cultivate that in your own oratory. You need to understand the art of persuasion. You need to adopt a manner and method and a style and a demeanor that fits the culture. Otherwise,nobody's going to listen to you. That's what they would tell you. I've been told that many times, let the culture shape your techniques and your delivery. Give the people what they want, and then you will capture their attention. But it's interesting, as we read in Scripture, unlike the manipulative celebrity speakers of today, and even in that day, Paul's manner of delivery was unconventional, so much so that it might have been considered counterintuitive. 

We read in First Corinthians, two beginning in verse one, he says, "And when I came to you brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the Word of God," referring to the message of the one who sent him. Then he adds this, "For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." 

Whenever I think of the apostle Paul, I I try to put myself in his presence. And here my mind goes to, for example, Acts 25 and 26 which gives us a dramatic picture of of who he was in his unconventional manner. Let me remind you of the context there, Paul had been brought before Festus, who was a Roman magistrate appointed by the emperor of Rome and they had trumped up charges against him in Jerusalem that he was causing all kinds of problems amongst the Jews, but Festus couldn't find anything wrong with him, and he had to somehow appease the Jews. And so Paul appealed to Caesar himself for justice, and therefore Festus decided to send Paul to Caesarea to stand before King Agrippa for a hearing. Now, although this was an informal hearing, it was also an opportunity for Agrippa to be noticed with his people, typical of every narcissistic politician. And in 25 verse 23 we read, and, "So, on the next day when Agrippa had come together with Bernice..." Let me pause there for a moment. Bernice, by the way, was his sister with whom he was living incestuously. He goes on to say, "... amid great pomp - "phantasia" in Greek - the word "pomp" refers to a great pageantry, great spectacle. 

Then we read and had, "... entered the auditorium accompanied by the commanders and the prominent men of the city..." folks get the scene here; here we have a parade of the movers and the shakers. I mean, this is a star-studded spectacle of celebrities and nobility; the social elite. And like strutting peacocks, they enter into the auditorium enjoying all of the oohs and the awes of the flattering sycophants while musicians gave tribute to the royals. Agrippa would have been decorated in his finest silk robes, the robes of royalty, draped with colorful sashes. His body bejeweled with ostentatious necklaces, rings and bracelets, and they wore lots of makeup. It was kind of first century drag queen type of thing. He would have had a priceless crown of gold on his head, one that was laden with emeralds and rubies. And he probably clutched a magnificent scepter in his hand as he slowly glided across the floor. And of course, Bernice would have been decked out in her finest and most seductive wardrobe with the flamboyance of a Hollywood starlet at the Oscars. That's the scene. She would have slowly sashayed her way to some exalted seed of prominence next to her lover, her brother; careful to soak up all of the glares of envy and lust. And of course, Festus, likewise, would have been adorned with the highest Roman fashion, slowly bowing and gesturing to the audience as he accepted their adulation. And then you would have had the Roman commanders there as well, dressed in their full military regalia; shining armor, red sashes, magnificent plumes protruding from their helmets; it would have been quite a spectacle. 

Then there were the prominent men of the city, the dignitaries, and probably their wives, each one desperate for their share of the attention and the applause. The smell of garlands and incense would have filled the auditorium, along with the sounds of processional music and cheers and laughter applause. And then suddenly, all the boisterous adulation hushes in verse 23 we read, "... at the command of Festus, Paul was brought in." No pomp, no ceremony, no applause. Suddenly, the majesty of the that moment was turned to mystery, as the soldiers bring in this short, rather hunchbacked, bald-headed man with a rather large nose, imagine the scene. A very unassuming, homely creature; a prisoner wearing the tattered garments of a peasant, a pathetic looking creature bound in chains. We know that, of course, he was a former rabbi, and in Acts we read that in the eyes of the Jews, they considered him a real pest who stirred up unrest among the Jews worldwide; a ringleader of what the Jews considered a non-Jewish sect who tried to desecrate the temple and on and on it goes. 

But if we were there, I'm sure we could look on him, and we would see no fear in his face. We would see no grimace of anger. But rather, there would have been a softness to his countenance, a look of compassion, a look of courage, a look of confidence. I'm sure there was an ineffable aura of godliness surrounding him that just set him apart from everyone. And as God would have it, this great apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ was about to become the entertainment of the hour. I remember standing on the very place where Paul would have stood in Caesarea. If you've been to Israel, you've been there. And my mind goes to what we read from his inspired pen in First Corinthians, four, nine, "... God has exhibited us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death; because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men. We are fools for Christ's sake... we are weak...  without honor. To this present hour we are both hungry and thirsty, and are poorly clothed, and are roughly treated, and are homeless; and we toil, working with our own hands; when we are reviled, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure; when we are slandered, we try to conciliate; we have become as the scum of the world, the dregs of all things, even until now." 

But what did the sorry looking apostle say to the king, to the royalty? What did he say to those accusers who had trumped up these charges against him? Well, we know, if we go to the book of Acts, that he first gives his testimony of how God miraculously saved him after he spent so much time persecuting Christians, and then he explained how he was, according to Acts 26 verse 18 and following, sent to, "'... open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me.'" He went on to add, he was "...stating nothing but what the Prophets and Moses said was coming to take place," all that they had prophesied, "...that the Christ was to suffer, and that by reason of His resurrection from the dead He would be the first to proclaim light both to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles." No flowery rhetoric, no manipulative theatrics; he simply gave them the old gospel of Christ, crucified, buried, resurrected and returning again. 

We read in Acts 26 beginning in verse 27, "'King Agrippa, do you believe the Prophets? I know that you do.' Agrippa replied to Paul, 'In a short time you will persuade me to become a Christian.' And Paul said, 'I would wish to God, whether in a short or long time, not only you, but also all who hear me this day, might become such as I am, except for these chains.'" 

So with that background, let's go back to our text of Second Corinthians 11 six. "But even if I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge; in fact, in every way, we have made this evident to you in all things." All of the saints in Corinth could see that he was no layman with regard to true knowledge. Paul was devoted to the truth; he understood the power of the gospel. He had no other agenda other than proclaiming the unsearchable riches of Christ, that men and women might be saved. You know, we live in an age of satanic deception, don't we? 

By the way, if you can't see that, you are spiritually blind and alienated from God. From the demonic cult known as Black Lives Matter, to the religious hypocrisies of Hillsong, our country is absolutely drowning in deception. The greatest threat to our nation is not systemic racism, it's systemic deception. I read this last week, the United Methodist Church in Bloomington, Illinois has announced that a drag queen, a man who dresses as a woman for perverted sexual pleasure, is a candidate for the pastorate. The article said, "This past Sunday..." gave the man's name, "dressed in his usual garb to celebrate his sexual abnormality, as the church gathered virtually to celebrate drag Sunday." You know, dear friends, as appalling as this is, whatever you do, don't hate these people. Love them for the cause of Christ; were it not for God's grace, we would be among them. Give them the hope of the Gospel. My mind goes to the inspired words in Revelation 21 and verse 8, where we are warned that, "... the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." 

Dear friends, people need the Lord, and we're here to give it to them. America today can be likened to ancient Israel. I was thinking of the prophet Amos. Remember that minor prophet? By the way, the word Amos means burden or burden bearer. He was a Judean prophet. God had called him to deliver a message primarily to the northern tribes of Israel in the mid eighth century BC, and like America today, Israel, in that day, perceived themselves to be militarily invincible. They were secure. It was a time of peace and enormous prosperity, but spiritually, they were an abomination in the eyes of God. Their worship was merely external, ritualistic; they had no real love for God. It was a time of rampant injustice, corruption, moral decay. They were utterly apostate. And they willfully rejected the message of the prophets, including Amos, who warned them of God's judgment, lest they repent. There's a fascinating passage in Amos, chapter eight, beginning in verse 11. There we read, "'Behold days are coming,' declares the Lord GOD, 'when I will send a famine on the land, not a famine for bread or thirst for water, but rather for hearing the words of the LORD. People will stagger from sea to sea and from the north even to the east; they will go to and fro to seek the word of the LORD, but they will not find it.'" The point is, physically, we cannot live without food -that is bread or water. But here, the Lord warned Israel of even a more severe deprivation, and that is to languish from hearing the words of the Lord. Imagine what it would be like today that the word of the Lord was not preached. 

You will recall how Jesus responded to Satan's temptation in Matthew 4:4. He quotes Deuteronomy 8:3 he said, "'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" Dear friends, being deprived of food and water will destroy you physically, but being deprived of God's word will kill you spiritually, eternally. Our country is in the middle of such a famine, is it not? Today we experience an increased shortage of Spirit empowered biblical preaching. And biblically the deprivation of the divine word being preached is always a dire portent, or omen, of God's wrath. If you look back historically, you will see that every revival, every reformation, has been a result of expository preaching. Every single one. 

The protestant reformation of the 16th century is a great example. There you had men like Martin Luther and John Calvin and John Knox and John Wycliffe. Sola scriptura was the banner over their pulpit; the pulpit of a new generation of Bible expositors. Oh, would that we learn that today, instead of reinventing the church to make it relevant. We must once again capture the essence of the New Testament church whose spiritual authenticity can be seen most clearly in the Protestant Church of the Reformation. Biblical preaching of the Reformers ushered in the golden age of the Puritans in the 17th century in Scotland and England, the home of my ancestors - John Owen, John Bunyan, Thomas Brooks, Jeremiah Burroughs, Stephen Charnock, and on it goes. The irresistible force of the gospel caused monarchs to tremble and literally change the course of the river of history. The 18th Century followed suit, according to Stephen Lawson, quote, "The Bible-saturated preaching of Jonathan Edwards, George Whitfield and the tenants, thundered through the early colonies. The Atlantic Seaboard was electrified with the proclamation of the gospel, and New England was taken by storm. The word was preached, souls were saved, and the kingdom expanded." He went on to say, "The fact is, the restoration of Biblical preaching has always been the leading factor in any revival of genuine Christianity. That is to say, every great revival in the church has been ushered in by a return to expository preaching." Dear friends, this was what was missing in the pulpit in Corinth. And this is what is missing in many pulpits today around the world. This was why Paul was so deeply concerned. He knew that Satan is far more deceptive than we are discerning. Therefore, we need the word and he was greatly distressed by their infatuation of these manipulative theatrics, of these charlatans that had come into the church, rather than being passionate about the transforming truths of the Word of God being preached. Many of you have been delivered from churches where the word has not been preached. And what the church needs today is the systematic, in-depth preaching, doctrinal preaching and teaching and application of the Word of God, expository preaching. Exposit, by the way, just means to expound or explain in a detailed manner. Therefore, expository preaching is the doctrinal proclamation of the Word of God that is derived from an exegetical process that is concerned only with the revelation of God, not the revelation of man, not man's wisdom. And therefore, it will carefully convey the God intended meaning of every passage of Scripture, which will inevitably be linked to other great passages, other great doctrines, other great theological truths. 

And then, after the word has been accurately explained, the preacher will passionately apply the meaning of the text to the contemporary issues of life. But like the showy, false apostles in Corinth who manipulated the naive, and the ignorant with their flowery rhetoric and their flesh enticing heresies, the evangelical church today is overrun with pastors that are more concerned with being trendy than they are being truthful. Doctrinal precision is not that big of a deal. What's important is pleasing the crowd, private revelations, psychobabble, political theory, anything but the accurate exposition of divine revelation. The same problems also surface in the church of Ephesus. 

And here I'm going to shift to some passages in First and Second Timothy. You will recall how Paul warned young Timothy as he came into that church as a young pastor. Timothy was afraid; had some pretty powerful people in that church. First Timothy one beginning in verse three, he warned them about those who "teach strange doctrines."  And he warned Timothy not to pay attention to "myths," referring to fictitious narratives; "myths and endless genealogies, which give rise to mere speculation, rather than furthering the administration of God which is by faith." He went on to describe these false teachers in First Timothy one six. "For some men, straying from these things, have turned aside to fruitless discussion, wanting to be teachers of the Law..." in other words, the word of God, "... even though they do not understand either what they are saying or the matters about which they make confident assertions." Then the subject of apostasy continues to be the major theme throughout Paul's epistle to Timothy. 

So we can ask, well, what's a preacher to do? How are we supposed to respond? And what should every congregation insist upon in their pastor? Well, thank you, Spirit of God, for giving Paul the answer to that and giving it to us. The answers begin in First Timothy 4:6, "In pointing out these things to the brethren..." in other words, the great truths of Scripture, "... you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following." Verse 10 and following, "For it is for this we labor and strive, because we have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers. Prescribe and teach these things. Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe. Until I come give attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching. Do not neglect the spiritual gift within you..." Timothy, "...which was bestowed on you through prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery. Take pains with these things; be absorbed in them, so that your progress will be evident to all. Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things. For as you do this, you will ensure salvation, both for yourself and for those who hear you." Pretty clear marching orders, right? First Timothy six, beginning in verse two, "Teach and preach these principles. If anyone advocates a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with with the doctrine conforming to godliness, he is conceited and understands nothing; but he has a morbid interest in controversial questions and disputes about words out of which arise envy, strife, abusive language, evil suspicions, and constant friction between men of depraved mind and deprived of the truth who suppose that godliness is a means of gain." In other words, men who use the preaching of the gospel and the pulpit and the church to make a buck. Second Timothy, he goes on, beginning in chapter one and verse 13, "Retain the standard of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which has been entrusted to you." And in chapter two, beginning in verse 15, he says, "Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth. But avoid worldly and empty chatter, for it will lead to further ungodliness." And then he says this, in chapter three and verse one, "But realize this, that in the last days, difficult times will come." And then what he goes on to describe our pastors and church leaders; ere's what's coming as leadership in the church,  "...men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power." And then he says this, "Avoid such men as these." The Greek grammar is active, aggressive. It means from such turn away, deliberately shun these type of people, don't have anything to do with them. It's like Titus 3:10 where Paul told Titus "reject a factious man..." - "hairetikos" - don't have anything to do with those kind of people. 

And he goes on in chapter three and verse six, "For among them are those who enter into..." literally, in the Greek, they creep into or they worm their way, "...into households and captivate weak women..." referring to childish, immature women susceptible to false teachers, "...women weighed down with sins." Carries the idea of being overwhelmed with past sins and present sins. They're, "...led on by various impulses." In other words, they're ruled by their emotions, ruled by their lust, controlled by their desires. And here's what happens, here's what happens to them, "...always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." He went on to describe these men who do this to people. These men also "...oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith." 

Then he adds this in chapter three, beginning in verse 13, "But evil men and impostors..." in other words, these false teachers who hold to a form of religion, a form of godliness, but it's just a pretense, "But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived." In other words, their deceptive teachings will increase and accumulate, over time they will become increasingly evil. "You, however, continue in the things you have learned, and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned to them, and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus." Then he adds this text that we're all familiar with, "All Scripture is inspired..." is breathed out by God, "...and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness' so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work." And then in chapter four and verse one, Paul gives this charge to Timothy and to every faithful shepherd. He says, "I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His Kingdom:..." and here's the charge, "...preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction..." and here's why, "...For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you..." young pastor, Timothy, and every pastor, "...be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry." Folks, this is so important. It's important for you to understand, not only on the basis of knowing what you need to look for in a pastor, but also to understand the power and the importance of the word. There are nine imperatives, nine commands that must rule a pastor's heart and life that Paul just mentioned. And by the way, none of these were characteristic of the false teachers. 

First of all, we're to preach, the word referring to the message and the teaching God revealed in Scripture. The word preach here, "kerysso" in the original language, means to proclaim aloud and publicly. You need to understand this. This isn't necessarily talking about a guy that stands behind a pulpit like I'm doing, even though it includes that. But in that day, what it referred to was the duty of the imperial herald who would speak with authority on behalf of his sovereign. This was the spokesman of the king, and he had a message, a public proclamation. And in this context, it is a public proclamation to repent and trust in Christ as Savior and serve him as Lord; preach the whole counsel of God revealed in scripture and in the Greek grammar, and even in the context, it reveals the idea that this is to be obeyed at once. That's why, when I preach, I don't have a conversation with you, I'm here to proclaim the message of my sovereign,

Kenneth Wuest said this, "This should be the pattern for the preacher today. His preachingshould be characterized by that dignity which comes from the consciousness of the fact that he is an official herald of the King of kings. It should be accompanied by that note of authority which will command the respect, careful attention and proper reaction of the listeners. There is no place for clowning around in the pulpit of Jesus Christ." Furthermore, Wuest went on to say, "The preacher, as a herald, cannot choose his message. He is given a message to proclaim by his sovereign. If he will not proclaim that let him step down from his exalted position." What a contrast to much of the preaching today, where the hipster preacher is more concerned about style than substance, concerned about being relevant and contemporary and innovative to somehow attract a crowd; more concerned about fitting in to secular culture and their fashions and their cultural values. By the way, all of those things are utterly contrary to the commands that we have in the New Testament. 

"Not only are you to preach the Word," he says, but he says, "Be ready." This is the second imperative, be ready. It carries the idea, in the Greek of being on hand, being alert. It has a sense of earnestness here; a sense of urgency. Don't be timid. Be ready in season and out of season. In other words, take every advantage to publicly and boldly proclaim the word of your sovereignty, whether it's popular or not. Don't try to remove any of its offense to make it culturally relevant. Don't contextualize it to eliminate any resistance. That's the work of the Spirit, not the work of the preacher. Then he goes on to say, "reprove." This means to expose erroneous thinking. It means to correct with all authority; tell people they're wrong and why they're wrong and what they're doing is wrong; not a very popular way to do preaching these days, right? 

He adds another word, we they are to "rebuke." In other words, after telling people what they're thinking and what they're doing is wrong, now the pastor is charged with telling them to stop. This is calling people to repentance; it carries the idea of denunciation or even a formal censure. You will recall in Titus one nine, an elder must quote, "hold fast the faithful word, which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he will be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict." In verse 13, he adds "this testimony is true, therefore rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the faith." You see, every faithful shepherd is going to love his sheep enough to warn them of the dangers that they are embracing, and then call them to repentance. 

Dave Harrell  

The fifth exhortation here - an imperative, another command - “...exhort with great patience and instruction." Exhort, it's interesting, it comes from a Greek word, "parakaleó,"which means to earnestly encourage a proper course of action. And it carries the idea of being consoling and comforting. In fact, the first time it is used in the New Testament is in Luke 2:25, it is in reference to Christ as the quote "consolation of Israel."  So the term is is related to "paraklétos," the name Jesus used to speak of the Holy Spirit that would come, the Comforter. And so when you exhort with great patience and instruction, you do so earnestly with a sense of encouragement, with a sense of love. You see, shepherds lead their sheep, they don't drive them. Pastors who are constantly scolding their congregation are like abusive fathers who try to beat their children into submission. You know, the beatings will continue until the attitude improves. I mean, that doesn't work very well. You're either going to produce a rigid conformist or a total rebel. Galatians six one. You don't have this on your screen. It comes to mind it. It speaks of how, if anyone is overtaken in some trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness. Paul goes on in Second Timothy 2:24, "The Lord's bond-servant," literally, the Lord's slave, "must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance, leading to the knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will." 

And why are all these commands so important for pastors to heed? He says, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires." In other words, be careful, Timothy, people in your church will want to dictate what you preach. Don't fall for that. They "...turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myth." In other words, they will embrace deceptions related to false teaching that are not true; things that are contrary to sound doctrine. 

And then again, he says, "But you..." and here's the sixth imperative, "...be sober in all things." Be sober in all things, it carries the idea of being alert, being watchful, balanced, self-controlled. If I can use the word circumspect. In other words, dear friends, preaching the word of God requires a deep concern for the dignity and the solemnity of what is taking place. The pulpit is no place for clowning around. I might even add that you will notice that there is a pulpit here in the center of the worship center, and the reason for that is to underscore the fact that the word of God is the center of what we do here. And it's also a pulpit that hides much of me, because you're not here to see me you're here to hear the word and see Christ. Whenever I'm asked to preach, I always tell them, I want a pulpit. I don't want some see through little glass, whatever thing, it's not like I'm trying to hide, but I'm trying to not be seen. I feel that I even need to dress with dignity, because I am the undeserving messenger of the Most High God who has called me and sent me to speak on his behalf. So I'm not going to parade around up here with a multi colored Mohawk, skinny jeans, all torn up, sandals and some t-shirt. I'm not here to tickle itching ears, but to proclaim the glories of Christ, because, dear friend, the eternal souls of men and women are at stake. 

The seventh imperative is to endure hardship. But boy, is it going to come. It has, it will continue. I hear that our brother up in Canada, now, that got let out of prison because they were still preaching, even though all the covid things - I hear now that they've put a fence around the church. We don't know what's going to happen here. We recently had an incident with people screaming vulgarities in the parking lot a few weeks ago. "Be sober in all things, endure hardship..." I think of chapter two and verse three, where Paul said, share in suffering, "as a good soldier of Christ Jesus." Folks, we're at war. You need to understand that. The good news is, our side wins, alright? 

And then he says, number eight, "...do the work of an evangelist." In other words, proclaim the gospel in all of its purity and all of its power, "fulfill your ministry." And here he just, that's the ninth imperative. He comes full circle, "fulfill your ministry." In other words, do all of these things I'm talking about, and you will fulfill your ministry. Oh Child of God, this is what you must look for in a New Testament Church. And if this is not there, you shouldn't be either. Obviously, the false teachers in Corinth, like so many preachers today, bore no resemblance to the clear divine imperatives that Paul mentions. And to be sure, the world doesn't want this kind of preaching, nor does it want to be a part of this kind of church. 

I remember an encounter, it's been a couple of years ago, in the airport here in, I think it was in Nashville. It might have been in another airport, I forget. But anyway, there was some hipster pastors there, and I got to talking with them and, long story short, when they heard about expository preaching - doctrinal preaching - in all that time, they were saying, Man, I don't know why you would do that. I mean, do people really want to hear that? I mean, our people don't want to hear that. I remember him saying, and this is a paraphrase, one of the lead guys, man, if I started to do expositional doctrinal preaching, my entire congregation would leave. Do you really expect me to do that? Remember him saying that, and my response is, doesn't matter what I expect, it's what God expects, and that's what God expects you to do. Your ministry is designed to please him, not to please man. So either you either do ministry God's way, or you do it your way. The choice is yours and the consequences are yours. 

Some have asked, "Why is there such a decline in true expository preaching?" And the answer is quite simple, it's because there is a loss in the belief of the authority of the inspired Word of God. That's why. A diminution in the belief that the Bible is indeed the inspired, inerrant, authoritative, infallible, all sufficient Word of the living God. And I would ask you, what is your spiritual authority? Is it what mama taught you when you were a child? Is it what your church taught you? Is it what you kind of think on your own? Is it man's wisdom, or is it God's wisdom?

Can you argue your beliefs on the basis of Scripture? Because dear friends, when preachers depart from this, they no longer preach the word, they preach their own opinions. And those opinions will inevitably appeal to the fallen flesh of men and women. And what happens is you get false gospels. When you move away from the preaching of the Word, you get woke churches and denominations, you get black liberation theology that believes that Jesus is a savior to liberate black people from the bondage of white people. So sad. You get evangelicals to support the blasphemous policies of of the Neo-Marxist groups that have taken over our country. You get charismatic chaos where charlatans claim that they get private messages from God; where truth claims are validated by subjective personal experience, rather than the objective truths of the Word of God. You get cultural Christianity. You get social club churches that believe you must become like the world in order to win it. You get effeminate girly man pastors prancing around stages trying to appeal to a culture with their innovation and with their humor. And you get man hating feminists sharing their personal encounters with God and pretending to be messengers of the Most High. You get a person by the name of J Mai. I've talked about this before, it came to my mind. J Mai is one of the was one of the featured speakers of at the Democratic National Convention. And this person identifies as a quote, "black, Vietnamese, transgender, non-binary, gender transcendent, mermaid queen/king who recently became," quote, "a licensed minister in the progressive National Baptist Church.' J Mai advocates abolishing the police, ICE and prisons and so forth. I read about this individual, J received their Bachelor's in sociology. See, you can't use "he" or "she." You've got to use "they" and "their." t's insane, absolutely insane. Jay received their Bachelor's in sociology and Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies at Wake Forest University, and is currently working towards a master's in Divinity at Wake Forest University, School of Divinity. That's what you get, folks. That's where we have come. Worse yet, there are millions of people who believe that this type of insanity is okay; nothing wrong with that. And what's worse is many of them claim to be evangelical Christians. This is what happens when depraved human beings reject the truth and the authority of divine revelation when false teachers are allowed to flourish and when pastors fail to preach the Word. 

You know, many preachers claim to be Bible expositors, but frankly, if they have people in their church who believe these kinds of things, I don't know what they are, but they're not Bible expositors, because the word will either harden or soften hearts. It will either separate or unite, and it's going to separate the sheep from the goats, not unite them. We're to be faithful stewards of the mysteries of God. We're not to be showman entertaining crowds, we're not to be politicians pushing some political agenda or entrepreneurs peddling the gospel for profit. And this is why Paul said in Second Corinthians 11 three, "But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." O Child of God don't let that happen to you. May we all share Paul's zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church. May we all share his fear that that we too might be vulnerable to a false gospel, and may we also be distressed even over our own fleshiness that still is within us, that we might fall for manipulative theatrics, rather than the transforming truths of the gospel. May we all, as Peter said, "like newborn babies, long for the sincere milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord." And I hope you have and if so, the word will transform you into the likeness of our precious Savior and our King. Let's pray. 

Father again, we thank you for your word and all that it has done to us and for us and in us, through us. We thank you for the power of your Spirit that dwells within every twice born saint. And I pray that we will all take heed to what we've heard today that we will do business with you where necessary, that we might truly be salt and light in this world. And Father, if there be one here that does not know you with that intimate knowledge of a personal Savior; if there's a person here that does not really truly desire to serve you, oh, won't you break their heart today, help them to see their sin and their need to repent and also see the mercy and the grace that is available to them in Christ that they too might be saved. We ask all of these things in the precious name of Jesus and for his sake, Amen.

Thank you, congregation. What a wonderful privilege it is to express the doxologies of our heart in song. Take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter 11; we are continuing to make our way verse by verse through this epistle. And this is actually the second of what I believe will be a three part series under the heading "Purity of Devotion to Christ." So once again, we return to the Apostle Paul's defense of his apostolic authority and his gospel message; a section of his epistle that is profoundly instructive to every believer. In fact, many Christians live in a fool's paradise because they have failed to heed the Spirit's warning contained herewith. So follow along as I read this passage once again, Second Corinthians 11, beginning in verse one. 

"I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness; but indeed you are bearing with me. 

For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin. 

But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. 

For if one comes and preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully. 

For I consider myself not in the least inferior to the most eminent apostles. 

But even if I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge; in fact, in every way, we have made this evident to you in all things." 

May I remind you that it was very distasteful for Paul to defend himself, and as we see throughout both First and Second Corinthians, he did so very reluctantly, but he had to do so for the sake of the Gospel - for the glory of Christ. And what follows are three reasons that they should bear with what he called his foolishness, his defense of himself. And you will recall we looked at the first one last week. Let me give all three of them to you, and we will look at the first one a little more this week, and number two, and then the next time we're together we'll look at number three. But he wanted them to bear with him, first of all, because of his zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church. Secondly, because of his fear of their vulnerability for a false gospel. And then finally, because of his distress over their love for manipulative theatrics over transforming truths. 

Now notice again, in verse two, he says, "For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin." You will recall that Paul saw himself as the spiritual father of these people, and the Corinthian church, therefore, he considered his spiritual daughter. And as such, they were betrothed to Christ, and not some false Christ, not some phony made up Jesus, like what the false apostles were preaching. And of course, it was always the father's duty to preserve the purity of his virgin daughter who was to be the wife of the man that she was engaged to. So the image of betrothal underscores the Corinthian's marriage to Christ, and by extension, all believers. We're all ultimately married to Christ. We're awaiting the consummation of that relationship when we are presented to him at his second coming. And as their spiritual father, once again, he must preserve his daughter's purity for her husband. So, he says in verse three, "But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." And so this brings us once again, to the first point in our little outline, he had a zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church. And it's crucial for each of us who know and love Christ to take this warning very seriously. We need to recognize the schemes of the devil and how they may be at work in our life and our family, certainly in our community. 

He uses the phrase, "led astray." It could be translated "corrupted." He's speaking of the corruption of the mind as a result of embracing false teaching that's contrary to Scripture, imbibing wrong views, especially concerning the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ and God's plan and purpose in redemption. It carries the idea of departing from the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints, as we read earlier in Jude three. Dear friends, there is nothing more deadly or damning than a mind that has been corrupted by satanic deceptions, what Paul calls doctrines of demons. This will inevitably lead you astray and ultimately move you towards apostasy - a defection from the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that alone can save and bring glory to God. It will lead you away from the true gospel, and you will begin to devote yourself to a false gospel that is pleasing to men. But a gospel that cannot save but will only condemn. 

I'm reminded of what Paul warned the saints at Galatia in Galatians one beginning in verse six, he says, "I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ for a different gospel; which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you have received, he is to be accursed! For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men. If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bond servant of Christ." And in chapter three and verse one, he says, "You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you....? That is the great danger. 

It's fascinating when you look back over history, even before the blood of Christ on the cross was dry, and the age of miraculous signs and wonders were still at work, defection was already happening. Christians were being seduced by false teachers, even as they were here in Corinth; false teachers that came in and preached a mixture of Jewish legalism as well as the super-secret knowledge of Greek Gnosticism. And this gave birth to monasticism, later on, and asceticism, and eventually the Roman Catholic Church, which is the oldest of all apostate religions that is still flourishing to this day. By the end of the first century, five of the seven churches mentioned in Revelation, two and three were already in various stages of apostasy, including the church at Ephesus, and like a wildfire on the prairie, deception was spreading across the plains of the church. The godly 19th century English evangelical Anglican bishop of Liverpool, J.C Ryle gives us a brief history, I'll read it to you. He wrote this in the late 1800s. He said, "False doctrine in the Middle Ages so completely overspread the church that the truth as it is in Jesus was well-nigh buffed or drowned. During the last three centuries before the Reformation, it is probable that very few Christians in Europe could have answered the question, 'What must I do to be saved?'" Sounds like today, doesn't it? He went on to say, "Popes and cardinals, abbots and priors, archbishops and bishops; priests and deacons, monks and nuns were, with a few rare exceptions, steeped in ignorance and superstition. They were sunk into a deep sleep from which they were only partially roused by the earthquake of the Reformation. Here again, was the corruption of men's minds." Referring to what Paul is saying here in our text. Ryle went on to say, "False doctrine since the days of the Reformation has continually been rising up again and marring the work which the Reformers began. Neologianism in some districts of Europe..." Which, by the way, is just the invention of new theologies, people just make stuff up. "Neologianism in some districts of Europe, Socinianism and others, Formalism and Indifferencianism, and others have withered blossoms which once promised to bear good fruit and made Protestantism a mere barren form. Here again, has been the corruption of the mind." By the way, Socinianism, if I can take you into history a little bit. It was a heresy first presented by Fausto Sozzini, in the mid 1500s. He denied the full deity of Christ, he denied predestination, he denied original sin, total inability, man's inability to convert himself. He denied the atonement, penal substitution, justification by faith alone. He affirmed a salvation by works that was really very much a part of Roman Catholicism then and today. So folks again, think about this. This is why the Apostle Paul was so concerned. This is why he had such a zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church. The Holy Spirit knew this was coming, and folks it is still here today. 

And this leads us to the second reason Paul wanted them to bear with his foolishness - his defense of himself, his apostolic authority, his gospel message, and that was because of his fear of their vulnerability for a false gospel. Notice verse four, there we read, "For if," it could be translated, "since,"  "one comes and preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received..." - and again, he's not referring to the Holy Spirit, but a demonic spirit - "....or a different gospel, which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully." He's using sarcasm here. It's like, I can't believe it, you welcome these charlatans, into your church and give them the pulpit with open arms; it's inconceivable, you allow them to ascend the sacred desk and preach deception, "you bear this beautifully." Can there be any greater evidence of their vulnerability, their lack of discernment than this? It's not at all uncommon to listen to preachers today, in many sectors of evangelicalism, and hear them preach things that are just twisted and distorted. Man is exalted, not Christ. So often, what is being said is a mixture of comedy and self-adulation disguised in a false humility. And many times, rank heresy. And so often, I think, how can anyone who loves Christ possibly sit and listen to that? I'm sure Paul thought the same thing when he realized what was happening in Corinth. 

Now, granted, he was only there for 18 months, but look what happened after he left. I've been here for 25 years, but I must confess, knowing how seductive the enemy is, I fear what might happen when I am gone. It will probably take a while, but if someone else doesn't full the pulpit and hold the line, we will go the same way. 

Now I'm compelled to warn you very specifically this morning, of at least five dominant false gospels that are prevalent in our culture today. By the way, a false gospel is one that causes a person to place their hope and their trust of being justified in the sight of God in something other than the finished work of Christ. If I can say that differently, false gospels would have us believe that that our acceptance and approval by God is found in something other than what Christ has done on our behalf. The first example that I would like to give you is the salvation by works gospel. This is a heresy that's prevalent today, and many times in subtle forms, but it basically says that Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross, just made salvation possible, but man must take the initiative and make it happen; that we somehow must cooperate with God in order to be saved and to stay saved. And of course, the Judaizers in the first century were notorious for this. Remember, they said, well, what Christ did isn't really enough, you also have to be circumcised, or you also have to obey the Old Testament, law, etc. Roman Catholics will teach a similar thing, that you obtain the grace of justification by actively working towards it. There are legalistic groups all over the place. You have certain rules that you have to obey, and it's always an endless list of them. And people that are caught up in these groups are always feeling guilty. They're always feeling frustrated, afraid that they're not going to make the cut, you know? And if you feel a little guilty, what do you do? Well, you come up with another rule, and legalism always gives you the illusion of spirituality. Salvation is not by grace alone, through faith alone, but rather, it is by grace plus works, faith plus works. 

According to a Pew Research Center survey, 52% of Protestants in the US say that, quote, "Both good deeds and faith are needed to get into heaven." A historically Catholic belief. By the way, no true believer would believe that. What a contrast to Galatians two and verse 16, where the apostle Paul said that a man, "...is not justified by the works of the Law, but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law, no flesh will be justified." And it's for this reason that the apostle Paul reminded the Corinthians in First Corinthians two, "That I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." When you look at these various false religious systems and the cults that preach these types of things, you will see a whole list of things that you must do to earn God's favor. I'll give you a few. You've got to donate money or tithes, participation in secret rituals, abstaining from certain foods or beverages, spending hours each month fundraising through literature, distribution or the selling of trinkets or flowers; recruitmentof new members, observing certain holy days, not observing certain holy days or holidays, obeying the 10 Commandments or/and other laws. Baptism by the organization, maintaining membership in the group, abstaining from medical treatments, purchasing the programs or literature needed for enlightenment; loyalty and obedience to superiors, limiting contact with former members or others outside the group, and on and on it goes, beloved, none of that will gain you favor with God. The only thing that gains favor with God is the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

Dear friends, please understand, as Paul said in Romans 8:1, "There is now no condemnation for those who are..." what? "...in Christ." His life alone satisfied the righteous demands of the law, not his life plus mine. This was consistent with Paul's desire, expressed in Philippians 3:9 to, "...be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith."

Beloved, if I could add this, the gospel offer of salvation is not a gift of grace that comes through Christ. It is Christ. You must understand, Christ is the gospel. Christ is not merely a means to an end, but he is the all sufficient and all glorious end in himself. None of the benefits of saving grace exist separately from him, but only in him. For this reason, we can rejoice with Paul and say, as he did in Ephesians one three, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus, Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ." 

A second false gospel that we're all familiar with is the prosperity gospel. This teaches that material blessings come to those who believe in Jesus. One heretic has written a book called your best life. Now, Jesus died to give us health and wealth and success and power, and if you have enough faith, you can manipulate God to hand out the goodies. That's how it works. CostiHinn, the nephew of the infamous faith healer Benny Hinn, has exposed his father's...or his uncle's fraud, and among other things, he explains how that these prosperity preachers twist three versions of biblical truth to support their heresy. Let me give them to you real briefly. First of all, they believe that Christ's atonement means abundant life now. They also believe secondly, God's covenant with Abraham means inheritance now. And then, faith is a force you can use to control God. And about a half a billion people worldwide are caught up in some form of prosperity gospel. Some of you have come out of that. Basically, it's a religious pyramid scheme. It's a con. John MacArthur said, quote, "The Gospel that is driving those surging numbers is not the true gospel, and the spirit behind them is not the Holy Spirit." End quote. Beloved God doesn't promise health and wealth. He promises forgiveness of sin. He promises us imputed righteousness. He promises that He will never leave us nor forsake us. He promises eternal life, but he also promises suffering and sorrow this side of glory, and he also promises us that the world is going to hate us, as it hates him. But aren't you thankful? As Paul said, "The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us." 

A third false gospel that is so common today, and sweeping evangelicalism is the social justice gospel. They would have us believe that God's Kingdom is advanced by working together to build an equal and just society, that is, according to how the world defines equality and justice. And they have no problem working with unbelievers to accomplish those ends. They see no problem with the fact that the term social justice is a communist term, and they have no problem embracing the values of secular culture that utterly undermines scripture in the areas of race and ethnicity and and manhood and womanhood, human sexuality and so forth. I grieve over some who, even in our own church, have been deceived by prominent evangelicals, people that are now caught up in the blasphemous deceptions of Neo Marxism - this whole woke movement, people that believe in systemic racism. They're all about reconciling sinful man to sinful man, but they don't give a hoot about reconciling sinful man to a righteous God through faith In Christ. And they embrace the gross immoralities of the LGBTQIA plus movement. They've got an I A plus in there now. 

And by the way, this is such a sad thing. I've worked with, and I know a number ofhomosexuals that have come to faith in Christ. And it's a glorious thing to behold, to see the transforming power of the gospel in their life, but so many people are still caught up in it. I had to look it up to make sure I understood what this means. It means lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex and asexual, and the plus allows the term to cover all different subsets, like allies, pansexual, androgynous and polyamorous. Polyamorous, by the way, means being romantically involved with more than one person at a time. Beloved any theology that misrepresents scripture and leads people away from the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ is a false gospel, especially a gospel that somehow mixes this poison in with the purity of the true gospel. You know, snake venom is 90% protein and it won't hurt you. It's that 10% that'll kill you. This is a gospel that embraces intersectionality, radical feminism and critical race theory. 

I've had several of you ask, "can you explain critical race theory in in a nutshell?" Critical race theory is rooted in what was called critical theory, a Neo-Marxist philosophy that is rooted in the Frankfurt Karl Marx school. Karl Marx is at the very core of it, along with Sigmund Freud. Critical race theory claims that institutional racism exists within every structure of society, and that these structures are intrinsically designed to protect and preserve white supremacy in our culture. And you know, what's truly remarkable but not surprising, is that those who adhere to this theory do so only on the basis of anecdotal evidence and personal experience. They cannot demonstrate the veracity of these claims through empirical, factual, statistical evidence. Yet many woke evangelicals not only embrace these fabricated and politically motivated myths, but worse yet, they insist that these things are a part of the gospel. I can't tell you how offensive that is to me, and I hope you are equally offended. I will have no fellowship with people who preach that, because that is dishonoring to Christ. Dear Christian, anytime you add to, or detract from the gospel, you pervert it into another gospel. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ, not the word of Christ plus the word of man. Of course, Satan knows all of this. This is why he deceived Eve, and this is why he employs false teachers to do the same today. A 

A fourth false gospel is what I would call the entertainment feel good gospel. Oh, this is a powerful one. You can pack stadiums with this one. It's the favorite among ear tickling heretics because it draws a crowd. But may I remind you that there's a big difference between a crowd and a church. They basically teach that Jesus loves everyone and just accepts everyone the way they are, and we should do the same. I call it kind of the smiley face Jesus, the Jesus that winks at sin, but oh, Jesus that hates those who preach doctrine because doctrine divides. Jesus hates those who preach about sin and righteousness and judgment. Which, by the way, were the very things that Jesus said the Holy Spirit would do when he came. If you listen to the music. It's kind of, Jesus is my lover, Jesus is my girlfriend music. Jesus is my BFF. Not the Son of God who deserves our utmost worship and praise and obedience. Their message is entertaining, it's funny, it's full of satire, as well as saccharin, kind of syrupy stories, sure to bring a tear to your eye. Preachers, both male and female, that preach this stuff, if you listen to them, you will quickly see that they are not only theologically illiterate, they are narcissistic to the core. They just make up stuff. I was listening to one of the most prominent female preachers of this day, just absolutely ludicrous. Ridiculous drama queen antics and comedy routines and false prophecies. I've listened to a number of these kind of people, and when you hear what they preach, I find myself being overwhelmed by the ingenious nature of the deceptions. And even though what they say is demonstrably false and can be refuted exegetically, you don't even know where to begin, it is all so twisted up. But boy, does it please the crowds. The true gospel is nowhere to be found. They look at a passage of scripture and the authorial intent of that passage is nowhere to be found. They use a passage to jump off into something they want to talk about that will ultimately draw attention to themselves. Christ is not exalted, the preacher is. And worse yet, the unfathomably glorious message of Christ, crucified, buried and raised again and coming again, is utterly eclipsed by the distorted theology and showmanship. It's nothing more than entertainment to make people feel good, to kind of feel spiritual, rather than to cause them to bow down and worship the living Christ. But everybody has a good time, lots of laughs, even some tears, and they all go home feeling good about themselves, until in the middle of the night, their conscience begins to eat away at them and the gnawing guilt of their sin and the reality that there is a God, and one day they're going to have to stand before him that begins to help them, I shouldn't say, help them, cause them to feel the alienation that is theirs because they are apart from Christ; their enmity with God, it assaults their conscience. And so what do they need? Oh, they need another fix. Let's go in and have somebody tell me how good I am. And on and on it goes. 

A fifth and the final one that I will give you today is one that I've talked about before, but I want to repeat it again, and I've written about this as well. I would call it the gospel of moralistic therapeutic deism. And this is perhaps one of the most graphic manifestations of how unregenerate pseudo-Christian people think, especially in the typical Christian teenager. And as you will see, this is a tragedy that dominates almost every acre of the landscape of Protestant evangelicalism. Christian Smith and his fellow researchers with the national study of youth and religion at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, observed the essence of this danger after conducting more than 3000 interviews with American adolescents to determine their religious beliefs. And they discovered this deception that they identified as, quote, "moralistic therapeutic deism." And according to these researchers, here's the thinking: number one, "People believe that a god exists who created and ordered the world and watches over human life on earth.... God wants people to be good, nice and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions." Thirdly, they believe, "The central goal of life is to be happy and feel good about oneself. "Number four, "God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life, except when God is needed to resolve a problem." Number five, "Good people go to heaven when they die." The researcher says, "That in some is the creed to which much adolescent faith can be reduced. When it came to the most crucial questions of faith and beliefs, many adolescents responded with a shrug and a 'whatever.'" He went on to say, "As a matter of fact, the researchers found that the American teenagers are incredibly inarticulate about their religious beliefs, and most are virtually unable to offer any serious theological understanding." And I might add that is also indicative of most people that are in evangelical churches today. He went on to say, "To the extent that the teens we interviewed did manage to articulate what they understood and believed religiously, it became clear that most religious teenagers either do not really comprehend what their own religious traditions say they are supposed to believe, or they do not understand it and simply do not care to believe it. Either way, it is apparent that most religiously affiliated US teens are not particularly interested in espousing and upholding the beliefs of their faith traditions, or that their communities of faith are failing in attempts to educate their youth, or both." Researchers explained, quote, "For most teens, nobody has to do anything in life, including anything to do with religion. 'Whatever' is just fine, if that's what a person wants." 

My how different that attitude is from the tax collector in Luke 18, who when confronted with his sin, was so overwhelmed with guilt and unworthiness, he said, the text says, that he was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, "God, be merciful to me, the sinner." Jesus said in Luke 16:16 that, "...the gospel of the kingdom of God is preached," and when it is, "...everyone is forcing his way into it." This denotes a a vigorous, forceful pressing into the kingdom. In fact, Jesus expanded upon this concept, this warning, in Matthew 11 and verse 12, he said that, "From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force." In other words, despite the relentless opposition to the kingdom of God, it will never be subdued by the wickedness of men or the power of Satan and those who see their sin and see the glory of the Savior will, by the power of the Holy Spirit, forcefully press their way into the kingdom, even if it cost them their life. Today in America, "One in four born again Christians embrace universalist beliefs when it comes to salvation," according to a Barna analysis of trend data. By the way, Barnadefined "universalism" as the belief that all human beings will eventually be saved after death. And that's pretty much what everybody believed today. Just go to the average funeral. It doesn't matter what a scoundrel the person was, oh, they're in a better place now. 25% of born-again Christians said, "All people are eventually saved or accepted by God." A similar proportion, 26% said, "A person's religion does not matter, because all faiths teach the same lessons." And an even higher proportion, 40% of quote, "born again Christians" said they believe Christians and Muslims worship the same God. By the way, once again, dear friends, no one who is truly born again would believe any of that stuff. A California based research and polling firm defines "born again Christians" as people who have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today, and who believe they will go to heaven after death because they confess their sins and accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior. Well, that all signs sounds fine and dandy, but dear friends, anyone that would believe those heresies is not born again, and they will one day learn otherwise. 

You see, what is missing in that profession of faith is a person who is humbly submissive and obedient to the Lordship of Christ. Jesus says, "If you love me, you will," what? "...keep My commandments." And Matthew seven and verse 21 we read the words of Jesus, who says, "'Not every everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord" will enter the kingdom, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.'" You see, genuine saving faith transforms a person so that they will, by desire - not out of duty - worship and serve and honor and obey the Lord Jesus Christ,

Beloved, this is how the enemy works, and this is why Paul was so concerned. And this is why we should be so concerned; even as Satan deceived Eve, he continues to deceive countless millions through false teachers, through false gospels that cannot save, false teachers influenced by demonic spirits, ancient spirits who serve Satan, the father of lies. And may I remind you that they have intelligence that is far superior to ours. That's why they are so exceedingly deceptive, so cunning; far more deceptive than we are discerning. And were it not for the Word of God, where would we be? This is why we are warned in Ephesians six beginning in verse 11, "Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against this the schemes of the devil." Schemes translates the Greek word "methodeia." We get our word "methods" from that. And there, it refers to doing something deceptive in a systematic way. It implies an orderly step by step arrangement of trickery; a well conceivedplan. And he goes on to say, "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." 

It's fascinating, there in that text, he gives us four different ranks of supernatural, demonic forces in Satan's kingdom of darkness from which every believer has been delivered. And what's fascinating is that every strata of evil has with it individual responsibilities relating to deception, all in an effort to thwart the purposes of God in redemption. And dear friends don't think they don't study you and your family. Don't think that they don't lay snares in the well-worn paths of your sinfulness, likewise in this church. "Therefore..." Paul says, "...take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day..." By the way, "resist" that's an important term. He did not say so that you can "rebuke." We don't rebuke Satan. He did not say so that you can "bind" Satan. But don't you wish you could do that, bind that rascal once and for all, it'd be over with. No, it doesn't say that. It does not say so that you can "exorcise" demonic forces through incantations and so forth, so that you will resist in the evil day, and having done everything to stand firm. That's why in James four, six, James says, "submit to God," there's the power, "submit to God." And then he says, "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." 

Beloved, our only weapon is the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God and prayer. Again, that's why, in Second Corinthians 10 four, Paul reminds us that, "...the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses." Now, I think it's fair to ask, my goodness with this kind of supernatural weaponry available to the saints, why are so many Christians deceived? Well, part of it is because most people who call themselves Christian are not Christian. But secondly, many Christians are ignorant of and indifferent towards the word and the will of God. Instead, they want to have their ears tickled rather than their hearts convicted, And as a result, they're easy prey for charlatans. I mean, just look at all of the foolish people that have voted to put the type of people that we now have in power in this country in the offices that they're in; they have voted their own destruction and they can't see it. Instead, they celebrate these people. First, John two and verse 18, John says, "...even now, many antichrists have appeared...." Chapter four and verse one, "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirit to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world." He went on to say, "...every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world." This is why, in Second Timothy 1:15 Paul lamented over the spiritual defection that he was experiencing, that he was witnessing. He said, "You are aware of the fact that all who are in Asia turned away from me, among whom are Phylegus and Hermogenes. And then again, at the end of the epistle in chapter four and verse 16, he mourned, saying, "At my first defense no one supported me, but all deserted me; may it not be counted against them." 

My, what a heartbreak it is to see people you love get sucked into some false theology, some false gospel. Paul warned the saints in Thessalonica in Second Thessalonians two and verse seven, he said, "For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work..." And my don't we see that lawlessness against God's righteous standard? It's already at work, and this was back in the first century - "...only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way."  In other words, until the Spirit of God steps aside, then that lawless one will be revealed. It's amazing, isn't it, at the very moment God has ordained an eternity past, Satan, who has been promoting the spirit of lawlessness, will indwell a man who is called the antichrist. He will be a counterfeit incarnation of Christ; a man who will be the very embodiment of evil. And he will come to do his father's will, even as Jesus came to do his Father's will. And that man may well be alive this very day. We don't know. But Paul went on to say, "...The Lord will slay this man with the breath of his mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish..." Why? "...Because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved." Instead, they preferred another gospel. 

Oh Child of God, please hear the word of the Lord here. The mystery of lawlessness is already at work, and it's at work in your life, your family's life, your community's life, your country's life. I've seen so many Christians who I thought were discerning be deceived. In Matthew 26 and verse 35 we read how Peter said to Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, "Even though all may fall away because of You, I will never fall away." Never say never right? "Jesus said to him, 'Truly, I say to you that this very night, before a rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.' Peter said to Jesus, 'Even if I have to die with You, I will not deny You.' And all the disciples said the same thing too." And then later in the garden, in verse 41, Jesus says to them, "'Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; he spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.'" And what happened when they came to arrest Jesus? Verse 56, "all the disciples left him and fled." Beloved, I would have been among them. You would have to. Are you watching and praying? 

Then later, we know that Peter denied the Lord three times verse 75, "And Peter remembered that the word which Jesus had said, 'Before a rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.' And he went out and wept bitterly." I mean, think about it, if Peter could deny the Lord after such intimate contact with him, could we not do the same? Beloved rather than being suspect of our spirituality, we tend to be smugly indifferent towards it, though we would never let on. Some of the signs of being led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion of Christ are, frankly, almost imperceptible. It's like the beginning stages of cancer when you can't tell what's going on, you can't see the abnormal cells dividing out of control, invading tissues, causing solid tumors to develop, spreading throughout your body. You don't know what's happening. You don't even know what's feeding it. 

Dear friends, such as the malignancy of sin, very often fueled by ignorance of the Word of God and stubbornness to obey it; the result of self-righteous pride, rather than humbly submitting to the Word of God and guarding our hearts against sin. We embrace these novel interpretations, these new, cool things that come up in our culture. We accumulate teachers, as Paul said, in accordance to our own desires, who tell us what we want to hear. And then gradually, as he said in Second Timothy 4:3, "we turn away our ears from the truth and turn aside unto myths." A low standard of holiness is sure to follow. I see it all the time, people that embrace the ungodly standards of the world; they embrace the culture. I see it in the women with immodest dress. See it with people with immoral lifestyles and infatuation with ungodly entertainment, crude language. Gradually, the people drift away from their Christian friends, they drift away from the church because, after all, the church is so judgmental. That's not the spirit of our age. We want to love people like Jesus loved them. We find new friends that accept us just the way we are, and then we begin to look like them. We begin to think like them. We begin to act like them. Adopt their values. We end up living in a fool's paradise. We quench the Spirit. We grieve the spirit. We begin to walk in the flesh, manifesting the fruits of the flesh rather than the Spirit. We forfeit blessing in our lives, and we begin to experience divine chastening, and we don't even realize it; such is the slippery slope of sin. 

Then people that claim their Christians become - and I've made a little list of what I've seen in the last year of people that I know in the last year - they become potheads, alcoholics, fornicators, sodomites, pedophiles, transgenders and apostates. Obviously, they do not worship and serve with us here at Calvary Bible Church because they're unregenerate. They leave the church. "They went out from us, but they were not really of us," First John 2:19. "For if they had been of us, they would have remained with us, but they went out so that it would be shown that they are all not of us." Dear friends, make sure that you're not being deceived, even as the serpent deceived Eve; make sure that you're not being led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. And by the way that devotion to Christ will cause you to become more conformed into his likeness. People will see you, and they will begin to see Christ, and you will enjoy more fully all of the blessings and joys that are yours in him. 

And I close with the words of the great Puritan, George Swinnick. I believe this is even in your bulletin. He said, quote, "The holiness and happiness of the rational creature consists in these two - His Holiness in conformity to God, his happiness in communion with Him. And these two have a dependence on each other. They only who are like Him can enjoy Him." and may this be the all-consuming passion of each of our lives. Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the clarity of your word. It's hard to hear because we all feel the sting of the lash on our backs. We're thankful for your grace, but o, how we need your help to live in such a way as to enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ. And Father, if there be one here today that has just played a religious game but does not truly know you, please take the blinders off of their eyes, help them to see the true gospel and be saved. We thank you and we praise you for all that you have done, are doing, and will do, in your redeemed. For it's in Christ's name that I pray, Amen.

Little taste of heaven, amen? Can you imagine what it will be like to sing in the accompany in the company of the redeemed with all of the angels? My, my, that day is coming. Will you take your Bibles and turn to Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians, Second Corinthians. We are now in chapter 11, and we will be examining verses one through six this morning, under the heading "Purity of Devotion to Christ."" Actually, this will be part one of what will at least be a two-partseries. It may be a three part we'll see how it goes. So follow along as I read this text second, Corinthians, 11, beginning in verse one. 

"I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness, but indeed you are bearing with me. 

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For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin. But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. 

For if one comes and preaches another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit, which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully. 

For I consider myself not in the least inferior to the most eminent apostles. 

But even if I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge; in fact, in every way. We have made this evident to you in all things. 

Every godly man who loves his wife, and his daughters, his granddaughters, will possess a sacred jealousy regarding them. Let some other man come and deceive them or seduce them or molest them, and they will quickly discover they have just poked a grizzly in the eye. Let some insane male pervert who identifies as a female go into the same restroom where my wife and daughters are, and they will quickly discover that they have enraged a lion that will do everything possible to protect his own. This is how Paul felt about the church at Corinth. This was his concern about the false apostles that had seduced the church that he had planted. And it's for this reason that he says, "For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy." I understand precisely what he's saying, I share that jealousy for you.  Spiritual seduction and defection are twin evils that every Christian should guard against; that every Christian should watch for, not only in their own life, but in the life of their family and certainly in their church. And this is the great burden of every faithful pastor. No shepherd wants to see his sheep be led astray. Yet seducing spirits have sway over an increasing number of so-called preachers and pastors that are proclaiming doctrines of demons. We see it all the time. They preach to phony Christians who will not, as Paul said in Second Corinthians or Second Timothy 4:3, "they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they have accumulated for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and have turned away their ears from the truth and turned aside to myths." 

\Dear friends. How else can you explain some of the false gospels that are out there, the false gospel of black liberation theology that has given rise to the domestic terrorist group known as Black Lives Matter. How else can you explain why ostensibly, evangelical churches are more concerned about the nebulous concept of social justice than they are about fulfilling the Great Commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel, to make disciples, to teach people whatsoever the Lord has commanded. How else can you explain the heretical commitment by so many churches to borrow the values of secular culture that undermine scripture in areas of race and ethnicity and maleness and femaleness and human sexuality. Every week we hear of another Christian college caving to the militant homosexual revolutionaries. 

I think of the term "hamartia" in the original language as one of the words for sin, and it means missing the mark; the idea that sin misses the mark of God's standard of righteousness. And any of you that know anything about sighting in a rifle or a pistol, you know that when you aim at the bullseye, if you miss the mark, you need to adjust your sights. But what the church has done is, rather than adjusting the sights, they just move the bullseye, and now the bullseye is somewhere way beyond where it's supposed to be. It's heartbreaking to watch this. Holiness and truth bears no resemblance to what it really is in Scripture. The defining spirit of our day in so many churches around the country is this new woke movement. For one to be woke, one must fully acknowledge the wickedness of white culture and having white skin. I mean, that is just utterly absurd. And yet churches buy into this. 

This is now infiltrated the Christian church, thanks to the influence of organizations like the Gospel Coalition and the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. The pastor of one such church, River City Church in Chicago, prayed this, and I'm going to give you just a sample of the prayer, "I confess that I carry a broken theology of repentance, one that can quickly repent of behaviors like lying, gossiping or envying, yet get stuck in the mud when trying to repent of complicity and complacency with white supremacy. I confess that I have spent too little time considering the ways my own sense of identity has been shaped by the ideology of white supremacy. I confess that as a white church, we have lost our ability to collectively tell the truth," and on it goes. 

Beloved, this is what happens when Christians are seduced by lying spirits and doctrines of demons, this is what happens when man rejects the truth of God's Word. God gives them over to a depraved mind. Today, increasing numbers of women are becoming pastors and preachers, a blatant violation of God's design for male/female role relationships in Scripture, and the trajectory of apostasy by women preachers that we have warned about, many of us have warned about for years, is certain proof that they were never called by God, and they operate in the flesh rather than the Spirit. Increasing numbers of, and this is hard to even say, homosexuals and transgendered people are being ordained as ministers. Incomprehensible. One church, and I use that in parentheses, in Arkansas. Arkansas is led by a transgender person who brags about how, quote, "Our church regularly gives chest binders and gender affirming clothes to trans youth." He went on to say how they helped pay for hormone treatments.

This is what happens when people wander away from the truth of the Word of God and preach a different gospel. This is why Paul was so concerned. This is why you need to be equally concerned. There is a bill coming up next week in the Tennessee legislature that mandates private insurance companies to cover infertility treatment so that any enrollee in the insurance plan can have a baby with, quote, "an individual covered under the enrollees plan of health insurance." Now, obviously homosexuals are celebrating this, and a number of so-called evangelical lawmakers are supporting it. My friend David Fowler with the family Action Council of Tennessee says this quote, "The state is asserting jurisdiction over human reproduction by regulating and requiring that private insurers pay for the creation of human life through technological means, divorced from the conjugal relation of husband and wife. In essence," he says, "the bill presupposes children are products for demand and purchase with the aid of infertility service providers. And the state of Tennessee would force insurance companies to pay the invoice, effectively meaning you and I pay for it through increased premiums." I'm reminded of what Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 9:3, "The hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives." 

Oh, dear Christian, never underestimate the ingenious strategies and seductive powers of Satan to deceive. This is why we must all, like the apostle Paul, have a sacred jealousy for his holy name. We just sang about. God is the thrice Holy God. Holiness being the all-encompassing attribute that portrays his consummate perfection, his majesty and his eternal glory. He is the great "I AM." Remember in Exodus, three, verse 14. The one who therefore has life intrinsic to himself and in himself. He is utterly self-existent and eternal and unchanging. He is untainted by sin. He cannot sin. He cannot tolerate sin. This is the God we serve. This is the God of the Bible. He is morally perfect in every conceivable way, in every thought, in every action and every decree and every verdict, in every judgment upon sin; everything that he does is perfect and just. And because of this, God says in Ezekiel, 39:25, "'I shall be jealous for My holy name.'" 

Beloved, are you jealous for God's holy name? Are you jealous for the truth, for your family, for your church, for your community, for your country? In fact, one of God's names is, quote, "jealous," Exodus 20 and verse five. Deuteronomy four, verse 24 describes the Lord as, quote, "...a consuming fire, a jealous God." In Exodus, 20 and verse three, the first commandment of the 10 Commandments is, "'...you will have no other gods before Me. Your God is a jealous God.'" Idolatry is far more than worshiping images made by hands. It includes worshiping substitutes for God. It includes distortions of God. Fundamentally, they are idols of the heart. They would include anything that captures our desires, anything that we find satisfaction in more than the true and the living God. Said differently, we become idolaters when our greatest joy is found in something other than God, and we habitually then yield ourselves to the idol, and that ends up defining our character. In fact, every man and every woman will eventually become like the idol he or she serves, which is a worthless rendering of who God really is. In fact, the Psalmist states, in Psalm 1:15, verse eight, "Those who make them," referring to idols, "will become like them; everyone who trusts in them." And for this reason, the Apostle John warns us in First John five and verse 21, "Little children," referring to Christians, "guard yourselves from idols." 

So to be sure, every faithful Christian, especially pastors, will have a passionate, sacred jealousy for their family and for their congregation, that they might not be led astray by anyone that would preach a different Jesus, that would portray a different god, that would somehow distort the Bible, that would deny the importance of living a self-denying, cross-bearing, holy life in obedience to Christ. And it is this godly jealousy that is at the very heart of Paul's epistles to the Corinthians. 

Now let me remind you of the context, because we've been going through the Corinthian epistles for, I don't know, it's been over a year. So let me take you back just a little bit. Remember that the church at Corinth was a new church. It was filled with, shall we say, baby Christians. In fact, as we will see, that's what Paul called them. Most of them were still enamored by the godless culture that they had been saved out of. And this not only contributed to worldliness in the church and immorality and sectarian rivalries and overall spiritual immaturity, but it also produced within that church unbridled emotionalism that dominated their worship services; that were that were chaotic. Pagan mystery religions had deceived their hearts. They were used to erotic religion, which the Greeks called Eros. In English, we get our word "erotic" from that. It's a desire for ecstasy, for the ultimate pleasures of subjective feelings. And prior to their conversion to Christianity, all they knew was this type of religious practice in the pagan mystery religions. You will recall in our study, in months past, that they believed in sexual "exstasia." We get our word ecstasy from that, where they would get worked up into an emotional frenzy. They would start speaking hypnotic chants, they would have ceremonies in this frenzy until they experience some kind of a semi-conscious euphoric feeling of oneness with the god or the goddess that they worshiped. And this typically would end up in drunken sexual orgies. This is what they were used to. 

They also practice "enthusiasmos" - we get our word enthusiasm, as you can tell, from that. That involved frenzied formulas, foretelling, divination, revelatory dreams and visions. And of course, out of this bizarre milieu of paganism, they perverted the true and miraculous gift of languages that we read about in Acts two; the ability to speak in a foreign language that one had not previously learned, so that they could proclaim the truths of the New Covenant to the early church, to the multiplicity of languages that were coming to Jerusalem and other places. And of course, that gift was accompanied by signs and wonders. This was a blessed gift that was given to the early church to establish the truth; a gift that has since ceased on its own, according to First Corinthians 13, eight. And many of the new converts of the church associated this true gift of languages with the pagan ecstasy that they were used to, that they were accustomed to. It was called "glossolalia" which means to speak in tongues. It was ecstatic, unintelligible gibberish. Worshipers would get all worked up into an erotic emotional frenzy, in a state of ecstasy, and they would spout this unintelligible gibberish. The term "ecstasy" literally means "to go out of oneself." And they would enter into an alternate state of consciousness. They would lose all control of themselves, which they believed was a way of communing with the gods, and on and on it went. 

Indeed, they were, as Paul said, "babes in Christ," remember in First Corinthians three verse one, Paul says, "And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now, you are not yet able, for you are still fleshly." And like every baby, every toddler, they lacked discernment; they were easily distracted and easily deceived. Like most churches today.

In fact, any church that is weak in proclaiming the solid food of Bible doctrine will become easy prey to charlatans, to ignoramuses, who many times, just make stuff up. Paul warned the elders, you will recall, in Ephesus in Acts 20, beginning in verse 29 he said, "I know that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. And from among your own selves, men will arise speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after them." And we know biblically that this is precisely what happened in Ephesus and in Corinth, and it continues to happen in churches all around the world today, and we must guard against it here at Calvary Bible Church. 

In Corinth, false apostles with phony credentials, therefore entered the church when Paul had left it, and they launched a full-scale attack on Paul's apostolic authority and his gospel message. They advanced a different gospel. It was a gospel that was a mixture of Jewish legalism and pagan mysticism. They claimed to have secret knowledge, superior knowledge, a more enlightened understanding than what Paul had. And of course, being vulnerable to seduction, almost all of the church swallowed their scurrilous lies hook, line and sinker. SoPaul, you will recall, left Ephesus and he went to Corinth to confront these men what he called "a sorrowful visit" in Second Corinthians two one. And that visit didn't go well. It ended up with at least one of these false apostles openly insulting him. There was a public confrontation, and shockingly, most of the church did not come to his defense. Heartbreaking. 

Then he went back to Ephesus, and he wrote what is known as "the severe letter." And he had Titus deliver it to them, and later on, he learned from Titus, that most of the people had repented of their rebellion. And so now we come to Second Corinthians. Paul is responding with joy. He is relieved to see what has happened. But he is also defending his apostleship, and he is confronting some of the false teachers and their sycophants who were undoubtedly still in the church. They didn't have another church to go to down the street, so they had to stick it out. So, as I say, there were still a few copperheads in the barn, and that's what Paul is dealing with. So in the text before us, he's basically addressing these false apostles and those who remain disloyal to him and loyal to them. 

Now, let's examine Paul's defense more closely. He says, "I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness; but indeed you are bearing with me." There's clearly a sense of irony in Paul's statement. He's basically saying, "Look, you have foolishly born the seductive lives of the self-appointed, demonic, false apostles who engaged in self-promoting fool-speech that has energized your mutiny against me and the truth of the gospel. So now, will you bear with me? Will you humor me a little bit with my own foolishness; allow me to play the fool with them and join with those braggarts and their foolish boasting." And ultimately, his motive is to help them grasp more fully the glory of the person and the work of Christ. And as we will later see in weeks to come, the rest of his entire letter describes his selfless suffering and exposes the foolishness of his boastful rivals. 

This is reminiscent of Proverbs 26 four and five. I love that text. It says, "Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will also be like him." In other words, don't engage in the same emotional tirade like a fool. Don't stoop to that level. Don't try to reason with the unreasonable. But he goes on to say, "Answer a fool as his folly deserves that he not be wise in his own eyes." In other words, respond to his senseless babbling with wise, appropriate, sharply decisive retorts, lest the fool really goes on and believes how wise he really is. 

So again, Paul says, "I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness. " Later on, in chapter 12 in verse 11, he says this, "I have become foolish; you yourselves compelled me. Actually I should have been commended by you, for in no respect was I inferior to the most imminent apostles, even though I am a nobody." And what he's saying there, as in other places, is that he was he was mortified to have to defend himself. It was very distasteful to him, and he only did so reluctantly. And because of this, he described his defense as "foolish" on numerous occasions in Second Corinthians. 

But, catch this, because the Corinthians wouldn't defend him, he had to defend himself for the sake of the truth, for the sake of the gospel. Now what follows are three reasons they should bear with his foolishness. Let me give them to you, and today we'll only be able to look at the first one, but here they are. Number one, his zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church. Number two, his fear of their vulnerability for a false gospel, and finally, his distress over their love for manipulative theatrics over transforming truths. 

So let's look first of all at his zeal for purity of Christ's bridal church. Notice verse two, "For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy..." Literally, the grammar in the original language can be translated "the jealousy of God." That's what he is feeling. That's what is driving him, and here's how he describes it, "...for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin." You see, the Apostle Paul saw himself as the spiritual father of the Corinthian church. He saw them as his daughter, and as such, they were betrothed to Christ, not to some false Christ, not to some phony Christ that the false apostles were preaching. 

Now we must understand the background here. The Spirit of God inspired his apostle to use the analogy of betrothal and marriage among the Jews to get his point across. And all of this is ultimately rooted in the Mosaic law, as we will see. Now, think about this, Jewish weddings really consisted of two elements. You had the betrothal or the engagement, and you had the nuptial, or we would call the actual ceremony. The betrothal, or the engagement, consisted of a formal wedding contract in which a young man would be pledged, or a young woman would be pledged to a young man, passing from her father's authority to the authority of her husband. And the the engagement typically lasted about a year. Sometimes marriages were arranged by parents when the children were young, but this is typically how it happened. The betrothal could only be dissolved by death or by a formal writ of divorcement. So the engagement was binding, just like a marriage was binding. In fact, if a betrothed woman's fiance died, she was considered a widow. 

Now, during the season of engagement, it would provide the young virgin an opportunity to prove her loyalty and her faithfulness to her husband by her sexual purity and vice versa with the young husband. In fact, sexual infidelity during this time was considered adultery. You remember the story of Mary and Joseph in Matthew one. During the interim between the betrothal and the ceremony, the husband would go and prepare a place for his bride where he would eventually take her, and they would live together. Many times, this was an extension of the father's home, or the father's estate. And Jesus uses this imagery, referring to us his bridal church, you will recall in John 14, beginning in verse one, he says, "'Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house, are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. or I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself that where I am there you may be also.'" I had the joy of actually witnessing this, to my surprise, in the old part of Jerusalem one morning, very early, I woke up in my hotel room, the window was open, and I hear all of the shouting and chanting and singing, and they were beating drums and blowing shofar horns. And I looked out and I saw this entourage of mainly males following a young husband-to-be, who was going to get his bride, great celebration. By the way, we read of this as well, in Jesus' Olivet Discourse, in Matthew 25, in his parable of the 10 virgins that he uses to describe his return one day to to get his bridal church. You will remember in Matthew 25 verse one, he says, "'Then the kingdom of heaven will be comparable to 10 virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom.'" And you will recall the story, some of them were prepared to meet him, and others were not. And then verse six says, "'And at midnight, there was a shout, "Behold the bridegroom. Come out to meet him."'" And then later on, he says in verse 13, "'Be on the alert then, for ye do not know the day, nor the hour.'" My How I long for him to come and take us unto himself to our heavenly home, don't you? By the way, are you ready? I hope you are, because Jesus is coming. 

Now, it's also important to note that during this engagement period, the father had a very important responsibility before God. His responsibility was to protect the virginity of his daughter, to keep her pure, to keep her chaste, because she was set apart to one man. You can read about this more, for example, in Deuteronomy 22 beginning in verse 13 and following; a powerful, powerful passage describing the importance of this and how a father had to prove his daughter's virginity before the elders at the city gate if her husband charged her of playing the harlot. It would have been a sin punishable by stoning. 

By the way, as a footnote, it's interesting, as we look at Scripture, we see how serious God is about sexual purity in marriage. And sadly, most Christians today are woefully indifferent about this, if not blatantly disobedient. I was reading a recent Pew Research poll that revealed that 57% of professing Christians believe that having sex outside of marriage is acceptable, a trend which will certainly grow as our culture continues in its free fall into the abyss of sexual immorality and celebrated deviancy. I might add that their definition of Christian is probably skewed, because most people, Jesus says, in Matthew seven, who claim to be Christians are not. Nevertheless, you get the idea. 

Well, the betrothal then led to the ceremony, and often it lasted a week, whereupon the marriage would be consummated. So the image of betrothal, dear friends, underscores the Corinthians marriage to Christ; a marriage that that awaits a consummation when they are presented to him in his "parousia." In his appearing, at his second coming. However, as we see here, as their spiritual father, the apostle Paul, feels this divine jealousy to preserve the purity of his bride for her husband. So he says in verse three, "But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. You see, dear friends, this is why he is defending his apostolic authority and his apostolic message, the true gospel in his epistle; he's afraid that Satan is going to deceive them through his agents, the false apostles, even as Satan deceived Eve in the garden in Genesis three. 

Let's turn there for a moment. You will recall how Satan beguiled Eve in that story, as he attempts, by the way, to do each of us. In Genesis three, and verse one we read, "Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made." If we took time, we could go to Ezekiel, chapter 28 verses 11 through 15, where we are provided with a possible description of Satan's alluring beauty being a supernatural spirit. What happened here is he possessed the body of a serpent - a serpent in its pre fall splendor - and he approached Eve alone. Removed from the protection and the authority of her husband. By the way, this is a common strategy that Satan uses to this day. He doesn't speak through serpents, but he speaks through false teachers. Paul speaks of this in Second Timothy 3:6, "For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses; always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." He goes on to refer to these predatory preachers as quote, "...men who oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith." And you will recall that, Second Corinthians 11:14, that Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. In other words, he masquerades as a heavenly, godly emissary, the very embodiment of of grace and of truth. This is how he gains access into a church; churches that are undiscerning. We can read in Jude four and his description of false teachers, how that there were certain persons that crept in "unnoticed." That's what they do. They creep in to a church secretly for the purpose of deception. 

Back to the text. In verse one, he went on, or we go on to read how he said to the woman, "Indeed has God said, you shall not eat from any tree of the garden." Let me pause here, folks. This is, the diabolical pattern of religious seduction. Cast doubt upon the meaning of what God has said, cast doubt upon the meaning of what God has said. Don't deny it, just twist it, just distort it. Give it a little spin, an alternative interpretation, a clever counterfeit; spin it so that it will say what you want it to say. 

Verse two, "The woman said to the serpent, 'From the fruit of the trees of the garden, we may eat but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said you shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.'" So she said, yeah, yeah, that's what God said. And of course, Satan knew this. She's celebrating the magnificent scope of the liberty that God has given them, that they could eat of all of the trees in the garden except one. Then notice verse four, "The serpent said to the woman, 'You surely shall not die.'" In other words, he's correcting her here. It's as if he's saying, no, no, no, dear, you're confused. I mean, what's die? Right? Have you ever seen anything die in the garden? No, no, you've got this all wrong. And why would God say that? I mean, think about it. There's nothing barred here in the garden. I mean, there, there's no prohibition. I think you misunderstood what God said. So let me tell you what, what he was saying, okay? Because obviously you don't have it right. Verse Five, "'For God knows that in the day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.'" 

By the way, Satan perfected this over the years in what is known as Gnosticism. The apostles had to fight this, especially in the latter part of the first century. Gnosticism, it's where people claim to have ascended knowledge -that's what was going on with the false apostles - only known to the initiated, to the special people, you will be like God. It reminds me of Mormonism. They teach that you will become little gods and little goddesses and own your own planet. By the way we see this today, in many other circles, I think of the health, wealth, word faith, heretics like Kenneth Hagen and Kenneth Copeland, Creflo Dollar, Joyce Meyer. One guy, Earl Paul, he said this quote, "Adam and Eve were placed in the world as the seed and expression of God." Okay, that's plausible, but now listen to the spin, "Just as dogs have puppies and cats have kittens, so God has little gods. We have trouble comprehending this truth until we comprehend that we are little gods, we cannot manifest the kingdom of God." Well, see how clever that is, but it's also heretical. I mean, think about it, people now come to Jesus so that they can be a little god and enjoy all the things that a little god gets to enjoy, rather than coming to Jesus for the salvation of their sins and worshiping him forever. You see the twist? False religions, cults, they're notorious for this; claiming new and special revelations, always given to some prophet or some prophetess, revelation beyond what is recorded in the canon of Scripture. Now, Eve had no idea she was being deceived. She had absolutely no fear of the talking serpent. I mean you....(audio is silent, no transcription available).

……"But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed. Dear friend, please understand the good news of the gospel. Very briefly, the good news depends upon your understanding first of the bad news. The bad news is that as sinners, we have violated God's holy law, and therefore we deserve his holy wrath. But God, in his infinite mercy, has provided a way for we, as sinners, to be reconciled to him as a holy God by providing for us his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Son of God, who came and died in the stead of sinners. And every person who places their faith in what he accomplished on the cross will be saved, will be transformed, and will ultimately enter into the presence of God. And those who reject that message will perish in their sins and be confined to the solitary confinement of an eternal hell. That is the gospel in a nutshell. John MacArthur said, quote, "Lack of discernment is a major problem for the church, because the spiritual battle is an ideological one. The church's willingness to tolerate error in the name of unity, coupled with a lack of biblical and doctrinal knowledge has crippled its ability to discern. As a result, it is too often easy prey for the ravenous, savage wolves of whom both Jesus and Paul warned, (audio breaks up - no transcription available). He went on to say, "The danger false teachers pose is that they shift the focus off Jesus Christ and onto rituals, ceremonies, good works, miracles, emotional experiences, psychology, entertainment, political and social causes and anything else that will distract people. Loyalty to the Lord Jesus Christ is non-negotiable in the Christian life, so much so, that Scripture declares in First Corinthians 16:22, 'If anyone does not love the Lord, he is to be accursed.'" 

Now back to Genesis three for a moment. Eve didn't know she was being duped. How many times have we all been duped? I mean, if you knew you were being duped, you wouldn't fall for it, right? She didn't know it. So verse six, "When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate." And as a result, the entire human race was plunged into sin. 

Well, I trust this helps you better understand what Paul is saying in Second Corinthians, 11, three. He was afraid that the same thing was happening to his precious daughter, the church at Corinth. But I'm afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds, it could be translated, your thoughts, will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. You see, he's concerned about an intellectual deception concerning the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, because if you get that wrong, it will lead to apostasy and eternal death. And that is largely where evangelicalism is today. And for the most part, discernment is all gone. Paul stated in Ephesians four, verse 14, as a result, the context here is of sound doctrinal instruction. "As a result of that, we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men by craftiness and deceitful scheming." 

Beloved, let me make it real practical to you, once you abandon the in depth, systematic, expository preaching, teaching and application of the Word of God, once you move away from that, biblical discernment will disappear. What will happen is a different gospel will replace the true gospel. It'll look almost the same, but it's got a little different twist on it, right? And then what happens is the counterfeit Christianity will replace authentic Christianity, and churches will become religious country clubs, rather than the pillar and the support of the truth. Churches will fill up with phony Christians; people that are self-deceived, people who are Christian in name only will populate these churches. This was Jesus' great warning in Matthew seven that "'..not everybody who calls me Lord will enter the kingdom, only those who do the will of the Father.'" Charles Spurgeon said quote, "A time will come when, instead of shepherds feeding the sheep, the church will have clowns entertaining the goats." And we see that so often today. And then you will have phony cultural Christians filling the church with zero biblical discernment, and they will fall for all of the silly stuff, the blasphemous stuff, some of which I've described to you this morning, because Paul says First Corinthians 2:14 that "...a natural man," an unsaved man, "does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot..." not, he will not, but, "he cannot understand them, because he is spiritually appraised." Jesus said, of unbelievers, "They are of their father, the devil,” John8:44, "...they want to do the desires of their father, who was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him." And Paul said in Ephesians four, beginning in verse 17, that unbelievers, now, mind you, unbelievers that can fill up churches and fill pulpits "...walk in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them; because of the hardness of their heart, and they have become callous, having given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." 

My is this not a perfect description of America today, and even a description of many evangelical churches. Sadly, many people today are imprisoned in the fortresses of deceptions that are opposed to the knowledge of God, as Paul said in Second Corinthians, 10. Scripture repeatedly warns of those who, quote, "...by their smooth and flattering speech, deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting," Romans 16:18. False teachers who, according to Second Peter two one, "...will secretly introduce destructive heresies." And they will distort the scriptures to their own destruction Second, Peter 3:16. What happens? They preach a false Jesus. They preach an idol of their own making, and for the most part, the Jesus today is the smiley face. Jesus, oh, he's just all loving. He's just tolerant of everything. He winks at sin, non- judgmental. And so churches preach this man-centered gospel filled with tolerance and inclusivity, but these people know nothing of the true gospel. That's why Paul, when he came to Corinth, said, 'For I determined to know nothing among you except Christ and Him crucified." And in First Corinthians, one eight, he says, "The word of the cross is to those who are perishing foolishness." And that's the way; no wonder you have so many professing Christians today that are absolutely indifferent to the militant unbelief of Cultural Marxism. It's staggering to me, they're indifferent towards gross immorality and the brutal dismemberment of unborn and inconvenient children, all of which is being promoted by the Democratic Party and big tech and the media and educators and Hollywood elites. But this is all part of Satan's strategy to thwart the redemptive purposes of God that will bring glory to his name. This is why Paul was so committed to the gospel. First Corinthians 1:23, "We preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block, and to Gentiles foolishness, but," and I'm so glad there's a but there, "but, to those who are the called, called by his grace alone, both Jews and Greeks." It is Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God, and this is why he had such a zeal for the purity of Christ's bridal church. 

I want to close with a story. When I was in Africa, once, I remember going on kind of a little Safari type of thing, where they take us out into the wilds, and we're able to see all of the beasts that you would normally not want to get close to. And I remember they showed me a video that happened in that area. And that video included, I forget exactly, but I think there were six lionesses that were on top of a water buffalo that they had killed, and they were in the process of gaining their nourishment from what God had provided for them. And then you begin to see these vile, vicious creatures called hyenas, beginning to come closer and closer. At first there were only three or four, and the lionesses would chase them off. And then there were five or six, and then there were, I don't know how many, a lot, and the lionesses began to get nervous, and you could see they began to relinquish their kill. And then suddenly, through the brush, over here on the side, you see a flash of something, and it is a male lion coming out to protect the lionesses, and it happened so fast. It was amazing. Literally, he killed three of those hyenas within probably two seconds, and they scattered like scalded dogs.  

Beloved, would that we be equally vigilant and ferocious and safeguarding the truth of the gospel, and the word of God for our families and for our church? Let's pray together. 

Father, we thank you for the eternal truths of your word. And I pray that what we have heard here today will penetrate our hearts in such a way as to transform us ever more into the likeness of our precious Savior. And for those who know nothing of the saving and transforming power of the gospel, O God, would that you move upon their hearts today in such a way as to cause them to run to the foot of the cross and plead for the mercy that you will so freely and quickly give to those who are genuinely humble of heart and repentant. Father, we thank you for the hope and the help that is ours in Christ. And we thank you for this time you have provided for us this morning, for it's in Christ's name that I pray, Amen.

What a joy it is to be able to come before you and minister the word of God to you. We have a fascinating passage to look at here this morning that I'm sure will encourage each of your hearts. It will stretch your faith and I'm sure it will be convicting to you as it has been to me. Will your take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter eight. We're going to bite off quite a few passages because they all kind of work together. And actually, we are returning to our verse by verse, study of Second Corinthians. And I've entitled my discourse to you "Harvest Blessings for Faithful Sowers." 

All true believers will have a desire to be obedient to the Word of God. That is the result of the new birth. That's what happens when we are born again. And John tells us in chapter two and verse 29, everyone, in First John 2:29, "everyone who practices righteousness has been born of Him." And he goes on to say in chapter three, that "No one who is born of God practices sin." And so the lives of a believer will be consistent with righteousness, they will have a personal pursuit of holiness; a resolve that is utterly foreign to those who do not know Christ, because they are slave to their old nature. But we all understand that we must walk by the Spirit in order to not carry out the desires of the flesh, right? Because they are contrary to one another. We read this in Galatians 5:17, where Paul exhorts believers to "walk by the Spirit." In other words, let your conduct be directed by the Spirit of God that dwells within you, so that you will live consistently with his word, that he is revealed. And then he says, "and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please." So this battle between the Spirit of God and our flesh is going to continue throughout our lives. But because of regeneration, we're no longer slaves to sin. And we rejoice in that, we have been liberated from the bondage of our flesh. And we are able tounderstand the word of God and live consistently with it. The problem is many times as Christians, we're poor theologians. Many times, we don't really know what the word says. And sometimes when we know what it says, we really don't want to deal with it. And unfortunately, what happens is we lack discernment, we are disobedient, we grieve the Spirit, and we forfeit blessing in our life. And this is especially true with many believer’s attitude toward money, and toward giving, which is what this whole passage is about. We end up forfeiting God's blessing. And we don't want to do that. 

I was reading some of the statistics just this week, on charitable giving in churches. 37% of evangelicals don't give money to their church. The average giving by adults who attend US Protestant churches is about $17 a week. Christians these days, they say, give 2.5% of their income, which is less than what they gave during the Great Depression. In the Great Depression, they gave 3.3%. Of families that make $75,000 or more, only 1% donate 1/10 of their income to the church. And people with a salary of less than $20,000 are eight times more likely to give than those who make $75,000 or more, fascinating. Now, mind you, how they defined "evangelical" is all over the place. Those statistics certainly are not true in this church. But we all need to examine our hearts in this most important area of worship. I'm reminded of what Jesus said in Mark four, remember in the parable of the soils, Jesus talks about seeds that are sown among the thorns. And he says "'These are the ones who have heard the Word, but the worries of the world and the deceitfulness of riches." In other words, those deceptive promises that we hear in the world, and we think in our own mind that somehow, having more money in material things can bring happiness; "the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke out the Word, and it becomes unfruitful." These things enter in, they don't rush in. The idea is they creep in. You don't realize it. And little by little, you get consumed with materialism rather than serving Christ, and advancing his kingdom. And the Word of God bears no fruit in your life. Beloved, you show me a man or a woman who spends all of his money on himself, or herself, who cares nothing about the expectations in Scripture to be generous, and sacrificial, and consistent, in you're giving, to voluntarily give to the Lord and His work, proportionate to your ability to give, you show me that kind of person that wants really nothing to do with that, and I'll show you a man or a woman whose desires for worldly things have choked out the word of God and its effectiveness in his or her life. A man or a woman who's ruled by his flesh, rather than the spirit, one who forfeits therefore, even the material blessings that the Lord has promised to give to a generous giver. And that's really at the heart of our text here this morning. 

Now, ultimately, I want to land on verse six of chapter nine, let me read that to you. "This, I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully, will also reap bountifully." And what we're going to see, and what many Christians fail to understand, is that God rewards those who give generously to ministry needs that advance the kingdom purposes of God, and He rewards them with material blessings, not just spiritual, but material blessings. Not that he makes us all rich; I mean, certainly Jesus and the apostles, many of his disciples, they were poor; some people are poor, some people are wealthy in the providence of God. But as we will see, God pays even financial dividends to those who give generously to his work. He doesn't pay those dividends so that we can spend it on ourselves, but rather, so that we can give to his kingdom purposes. If you come to God, and you think that you can give your 20 so that you can get a 50. I mean, that's the mindset of a hypocrite. That's the theology of these prosperity charlatans that are out there today. But rather, what we're going to see in this text is that God replenishes the material wealth of generous believers, both rich and poor, so that they can continue to meet the needs of others for God's glory. And here, Paul is going to describe four sequential harvest blessings, I call them, that God promises to give to faithful stewards. We're going to see that he will give a special outpouring of His love. Secondly, a replenishing of material wealth. Thirdly, the blessing of a proliferation of God glorifying praise. And finally, an expanding sphere of intimate fellowship. Folks, this is going to be exciting, it is going to be instructive, and it is going to be rewarding if you hear and heed what the Spirit of God has to say. 

Now, let me remind you of the context here. Paul is taking up a collection for the needy saints in Jerusalem. You will recall in Acts two that the first converts were Hellenistic Jews that had come to Jerusalem there at Pentecost. They had come from all over the Gentile world. They were pilgrims who were part of the Diaspora who came to celebrate the day of Pentecost and they witnessed this miracle of these Galileans speaking in their own language, and they were speaking about the gospel. They were speaking about Jesus. And 3000 souls were saved that day.

And then more were added, we read about that in Acts four. We read how the church grew to 5000, speaking of men; if you included the women and children, it would have been more than that. So they were utterly astounded with what they saw. And they longed to hear more of this teaching, they longed to worship the Lord. They were born again, you see. Now the problem was, they had no place to stay. So many were immediately homeless, and they wanted to stay. But where do you stay? And many of the people that had come to saving faith in Christ were Jewish people that were now ostracized by their family. And so these people are moving in with other Jewish believers in Jerusalem, who, by the way, were already poor, already living in poverty, due to heavy Roman taxation. And we know that as time went on, many of them were persecuted, they lost their jobs. Can you imagine that? So Paul takes up a collection. And he makes his first request in First Corinthians 16, verses one through four. He, by the way, alsoknew that for Gentiles to give to these Jewish people that had come to faith in Christ would unify the church, because of all of the frictions between Jews and Gentiles. 

But then you will recall the false apostles had come into the church at Corinth, turned people against Paul, and so the collection kind of got put on the back burner. And now in Second Corinthians, he addresses the situation once again. And that's what we find in chapter eight. Let me pick it up here in chapter eight, beginning in verse eight, I'm going to give you a brief commentary here as we go, because ultimately, we want to land in chapter nine. And it all fits together. So bear with me, chapter eight and verse eight, he says, "I give my opinion in this matter, for this is to your advantage, who were the first to begin a year ago not only to do this, but also to desire to do it." He's referring to this collection, taking up a collection. Now there's no manipulation here. There's no pressure, no stewardship campaigns that give an enormous amount of money to experts that come in and kind of manipulate all the families to give money, none of that type of thing. You see godly stewardship, that the Lord rewards is a kind of giving the flows naturally out of the heart of the redeem because of their love for God, and their sincere devotion to Christ. 

So, he goes on, he says, "But now finish doing it also.."  In other words, follow through, follow through with this giving, "...so that just as there was the readiness to desire it, so there may be also the completion of it, by your ability." Again, we see in the New Testament giving must be proportionate to what a person has, according to the resources and so on. And then he goes on, he says, "For if the readiness is present, it is acceptable according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have. For this is not for the ease of others and for your affliction." In other words, he's not trying to benefit the saints in Jerusalem as some of them might have thought, because after all, he was Jewish. He wasn't trying to make one group financially distressed so that the other group could have an abundance. Not at all, he goes on to say, "...but by way of equality." 

Now, by the way, he's not advocating equality of needs being met; he's not advocating for a Marxist, socialist form of egalitarianism that always ends in disaster. He goes on to say, "...at this present time, your abundance being a supply for their need." By the way, the Corinthians were very wealthy. They were very wealthy people. So he's saying here, "at this present time your abundance being a supply for their need, so that their abundance also may become a supply for your need" - and we're going to understand more of that in a moment - "that there may be equality; as it is written, 'HE WHO gathered MUCH DID NOT HAVE TOO MUCH, AND HE WHO gathered LITTLE HAD NO LACK.'" Here, Paul is using an Old Testament illustration, taking taking them back to Exodus 16, where during the wilderness wandering, you will recall, how the Lord chose, or told them, to take one of the head of each family to go out amongst the Israelites; the head of each family to gather manna, according to the needs of that family so that no one would suffer any lack of food, and no one would have a surplus. So here's a beautiful picture that he gives of sharing basic necessities to survive. 

Then he describes the pastoral oversight of this collection, verse 16. "But thanks be to God who puts the same earnestness on your behalf in the heart of Titus.  For he not only accepted our appeal, but being himself very earnest, he has gone to you of his own accord." So Titus now is going to help with this collection. He says, "We have sent along with him the brother whose fame in the things of the gospel has spread through all the churches; and not only this, but he has also been appointed by the churches to travel to travel with us in this gracious work, which is being administered by us for the glory of the Lord Himself, and to show our readiness, taking precaution so that no one will discredit us in our administration of this generous gift." In other words, we need accountability here. We don't want to fall into the snare of people saying, wow, there's no accountability here, you know that all Paul's doing is lining his pockets, because that's what the false teachers had accused him of. He says, "For we have regard for what is honorable, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men." 

Then he goes on to say, "We have sent with them our brother..." By the way, we have no idea who this guy is; one day we will meet Him in glory. But we don't know who he is. They probably did. But we have sent with Titus, "...our brother, whom we have often tested and found diligent in many things, but now even more diligent, because of his great confidence in you. As for Titus, he is my partner and fellow worker among you; as for our brethren, they are messengers of the churches, a glory to Christ. Therefore, openly before the churches, show them the proof of your love, and of our reason for boasting about you." 

And that takes us to Second Corinthians nine. Now really, there's no need to have a chapter break here, because this just continues the same line of thought. In verse one, he says, "For it is superfluous for me to write to you about this ministry to the saints; for I know your readiness, of which I boast about you to the Macedonians."  Remember, the Macedonians were the poor, poverty stricken believers in northern Greece, okay, who had already given and we're continuing to give. And then he says, "..namely, that Achaia.." In southern Greece is Achaia, where the province of Corinth was, so he's talking about them now. He says, "...namely that Achaia has been prepared since last year, and your zeal has stirred up most of them. But I have sent the brethren, in order that you're boasting about you that our boasting about you may not be made empty in this case, so that, as I was saying, you may be prepared." In other words, get your checkbooks out, we're going to finish this thing now. All right, so that you can be prepared. "Otherwise, if any Macedonians come with me, and find you unprepared, we--not to speak of you--will be put to shame by this confidence." So he had been telling them and others that, hey, Macedonians, the folks down in Corinth, they're gonna give too. And so he's reminding them of all this. "So," he says, "I thought it necessary to urge the brethren that they would go on ahead to you and arrange beforehand your previously promised bountiful gift, so that the same would be ready as a bountiful gift, and not affected by covetousness." 

Oh, my, that's a word you don't hear much. But it is a powerful word because it is a deadly sin. It's the sin of greed; an inordinate desire to have what other people have and to grasp for that, at any cost. This is a great obstacle for many believers. And by the way, this is at the very heart of Cultural Marxism that we see today. And critical race theory and democratic socialism, that's taking over our country. These people have learned to harness that aspect of human depravity that wants to blame everything on somebody else, and wear a big victim’s badge, and then walk around saying, "Hey, I'm oppressed." And then you have politicians who say, boy, you are oppressed. Let me tell you how oppressed you really are. And I'll tell you what, if you vote for me, then we'll get over here and make those people who are oppressing you, Christians and wealthy people, especially white people today, and we're going to take from them and give to you. And of course, that appeals to human depravity. I mean, we all see ourselves as victims rather than sinners. Right? We like to see ourselves as being oppressed, and so we shift responsibility. Again, we see ourselves as deprived rather than depraved. And many people today, that's how they think of themselves, so they're, I'm a victim. So I need social justice rather than I am a sinner, and I need saving grace; a huge difference. Micah two two "They covet fields and then seize them and houses and take them away. They rob a man and his house; a man and his inheritance." Beloved, that's what happens with covetousness. And so Paul's warning about this. In fact, in First Corinthians 5:11, he tells believers, quote, "Not to associate with any so-called brother if he is covetous." 

Now, back to our text. Paul then provides this amazing, awesome, amazing, profound axiom that frankly, goes against every principle that the world advances regarding financial soundness. He says in verse six, "Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully." Now, we understand this principle. I mean, farmers don't say, "oh my I don't want to sow too much of my seed. Because if I do, I won't have enough for next year." You don't say that? No. You sow it all. Why? Because the harvest is going to bring even more, right? That's the idea. And the point here that Paul is reminding the Corinthians is simply, folks, you can't outgive God. That's the idea. He doesn't reward generosity with poverty. That's not how he works. We see this in the Old Testament, for example, Proverbs 28:27, "He who gives to the poor will never want." And Jesus tells us in Luke 6:38, "Give and it will be given to you," right? "Give and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over for by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you in return." So Paul is encouraging the Corinthians, by reminding them that God rewards those who give generously to his kingdom purposes. And he rewards them with financial prosperity, so that they can give even more. 

Let me give you another passage in the Old Testament, Proverbs 11, beginning in verse 24, "There is one who scatters," the idea of sowing, "and yet increases all the more, and there is one who withholds what is justly due, and yet it results only in want. The generous man will be prosperous, and he who waters will himself be watered." We see the same principle in Proverbs 19 verse 17, "One who was gracious to a poor man lends to the Lord, and he referring to the Lord will repay him for his good deed. Folks, when we give to the Lord, out of a selfless heart that longs to benefit other people, for the glory of God, what we find happening is we literally invest in the kingdom, and God rewards us with material blessing, as well as spiritual dividends. This is why the Macedonians, you will recall, begged Paul to let them give to the Jewish saints in Jerusalem in this collection. Remember in Second Corinthians chapter eight and verse three, we read, "For I testify that according to their ability and beyond their ability," referring to the poor Macedonians, "they gave of their own accord, begging us with much urging for the favor of participation in the support of the saints and this, not as we had expected, but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God." 

And by the way, I see this all the time here at Calvary Bible Church, so many of you will say, Pastor let me know if there's anyone in need. Let me know if there's any need and my goodness when needs come up and we let it out, we have to say okay, folks, you know, we're good. That's wonderful, that shows your love for Christ. And how sad to see greedy, selfish Christians forfeit even material blessings and end up frankly impoverishing themselves. Now depraved unbelievers are, I mean, they have no concept of this whatsoever. I mean, they hoard, they embezzle, they steal, they cheat, they withhold wages, they oppress the poor and all of these types of things. But as we look at Scripture, we see that God would have us earn money by working hard, by investing wisely, by saving, avoiding excessive debt, but also, as we see here in this passage, by generous giving, rather than miserly hoarding. I love that word, miser. We don't hear that much anymore. It's a powerful word, and we can all fall into that trap. He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully"--"eulogia" in the original language, "bountifully." We get our word eulogy from that, it means blessing. So inherent in bountiful sowing is the harvest of bountiful blessing. That's what the Lord longs for us. And folks, I have to ask, Do you believe this? Do you trust God? Do you take him at his word? Do you believe what he has promised? Or do you just live consistently with your own sense of well, you know, I need to really be careful here with what I give, because, after all, if I give very much, I'm gonna just lose. 

By the way, this is all counterintuitive to Satan's kingdom on earth, right? The Earth, the people of the world, think this way, If I give something then I've lost it, right? But as believers, when we give to God's kingdom, we see that he replenishes what we give even more. We see this principle, all through the New Testament. Jesus said, "If you have found your life, you must lose it," right. And "if you lose your life for My sake, then you will find it." So we see the same principle in other passages. So our faith, as Paul said, in First Corinthians two, five, must "...not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God." 

And this brings us to the first of these four blessings, these four harvest blessings that are really sequential, that God promises to give to faithful stewards. Number one, he will give us a special outpouring of his love. Notice verse seven, will kind of go through this and you'll see this at the end of the verse. First, he says, "Each one must do just as he has purposed..." And we see this in other passages in the New Testament. The term "purpose" means as they have determined or decided or plan, in other words, our giving must be systematic, it must be purposeful; well thought out on the basis of whatever the need is, and our motivation for giving and so forth. "Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart..." So this is a private decision that you must make as to the amount and whether it needs to be something regular or a one-time gift, or however it works. And then he adds this, "...not grudgingly..." All right?  Not with an attitude, of boy, yeah, this is frustrating, but I know I need to give. Grudgingly carries the idea of sorrowfully. That's not how we are to give; reluctantly, with remorse, not really wanting to part with our money. And here he is, speaking of an inward attitude of the heart, you're not supposed to give that way. 

By the way, if you do, I mean, you just forfeit God's blessing. He's not going to reward that. He says, "...or under compulsion..." This isn't speaking about an inward heart issue, with respect to giving grudgingly, but outward pressure by others, there's no specified amount. We don't see that in Scripture, no authoritative shaming or coercion. By the way, I hope this is true. I think it is. We never do that here at Calvary Bible Church. We never pressure anybody; we will let you know what the issues are, what the needs are. But then you give as God has purposed in your heart. And the reason we do that is because we don't want you to give out of a sense of coercion, because what happens, you forfeit God's blessing. That type of attitude would cause you to lose your reward. You see, a person who gives out of duty rather than desire forfeits God's blessings. We don't want to do that. 

And then he says this, "...for God loves a cheerful giver." Obviously God loves all believers, but this is carrying the idea, there's a unique love that he lashes upon those who give for His glory. In fact, "cheerful" -- "hilaros" in the original language; we get our word "hilarious" from that. God loves a happy, joy filled giver. God has a special love for those that give in that way, because we're reflecting his magnanimous love for us. I think of Hebrews 13:16, "And do not neglect doing good and sharing, for with such sacrifices God is pleased. My, I want to be pleasing to the Lord. I want to enjoy the fullness of his love. And I know you do as well. So the first harvest blessing for generous giving is a special outpouring of God's love. 

Notice secondly, there will be a replenishing of material wealth. Notice verse eight. "And God is able." In the original language, it's the idea that that God has the power. "For God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance," to spend on yourselves. Oh, no, no, it doesn't say that. It does not say that sorry. So that, "you may have an abundance for every good deed." And he says in verse nine, As it is written," and here he quotes Psalm 112, verse nine, 'HE SCATTERED ABROAD, HE GAVE TO THE POOR, HIIS RIGHTEOUSNESS ENDURES FOREVER.'" Another translation would be "'He has given freely to the poor, His righteousness endures forever.'" 

And by the way, he doesn't say this here, but if you look up that Psalm, it goes on to say, "His horn will be exalted in honor."  Let me explain this to you. He's saying, "He has freely given." In other words, literally it can be translated, "He has spread around" or "He has distributed freely." And then when he says, "His horn will be exalted in honor." A horn in the Old Testament, is a metaphor of strength and power, which it represents here in verse nine of Psalm 112. And "exalt the horn" refers to prosperity, as well as victory. The same image imagery occurs in Psalm 89:17, "For Thou art, the glory of their strength," referring to the righteous, "and by Thy favor, our horn is exalted." In verse 24, "and My faithfulness and My loving kindness will be with him. And in My name, his horn will be exalted." Chapter 92, verse 10, "But Thou hast exalted my horn, like that of the wild ox." I wrote somebody recently, and at the end, I said to my brother, "I pray that your horn will be exalted."  Knowing that the first thing you do is look that up, to figure out what the world's he talking about. And that's what he did. And he wrote back to me, Oh, thank you, I understand what that means. 

Beloved, if you are a greedy person, that hoards your money and spends it all on yourself, and you're insensitive to the needs that God brings before you, let me put it this way, your horn will not be exalted. That's the idea. You will not prosper, and you will lack spiritual strength and power. But for the one who, as Paul reminds us here, the one who scatters abroad. In other words, the one who gives generously, to the poor and to the needs that the Lord brings before you, God will honor you. In fact, Charles Spurgeon put it this way, "God shall honor him, the universe of holy beings shall honor him, and even the wicked shall feel an unconscious reverence, that it be observed in summing up the qualities of the God-fearing man. That he is described not merely as righteous, but as one bearing the character of kindness, benevolence, and generosity. To be strictly just," Spurgeon says, "is not enough." For God is love, and we must love our neighbor as ourselves. To give everyone his due is not sufficient. We must act upon those same principles of grace which reign in the heart of God." And he says this, "The promises of establishment and prosperity are too bountiful souls who have proved their fitness to be stewards of the Lord by the right way in which they use their substance." Oh Child of God, never forget the promise that is made, here in verse six of chapter nine. God is going to reward generous sowing or giving. And he's going to do this by replenishing the finances of the sower, so that they continue; they can continue to give even more. 

Moreover, back to verse eight here, he says, that person will "...always have all sufficiency in everything." Now, the context here is material blessing, financial stability. After all, since the seed is referring to financial giving, obviously, it speaks of that. The harvest, any harvest, is always going to yield the nature of the seed that was planted. So verse eight is saying that God has the power to reward those who give generously, to prosper the cheerful giver, knowing that that person is going to continue to give more to the praise of his glory. Folks, we need to trust him in these matters. And I challenge you to examine your heart in light of this. Think of what Paul said in Philippians 4:19, "And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches, in glory in Christ Jesus."  Do you believe that? "He is able." I love that phrase, he is able. Beloved, he is able to do more than we can ever imagine. In fact, Paul said in Ephesians 3:20, "Now to Him who is able," to do what? "To do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us." Dear Christian, do you believe that? Do you live consistently with that in every area of your life, including your finances? 

We need to be like Abraham, don't we? Remember what Paul said in Romans four beginning in verse 20, "...with respect to the promise of God..." Abraham, "...did not waver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God and being..." catch this, "...fully assured that what God had promised He was able also to perform." Dear friends, God is looking for cheerful, faithful, generous givers. And he will reward that. I think of Second Chronicles 16:9, "For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He might strongly support those whose hearts are completely His. 

Now we see this amazing principle of God replenishing material wealth in other passages. We see it illustrated, for example, in Deuteronomy 15, beginning of verse 10, "You shall generously give to Him and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to Him, because," catch this now, "for this thing, the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in all your undertakings. For the poor will never cease to be in the land. Therefore I command you saying you shall freely open your hand to your brother, to your needy and poor in your land." So what we see is sowing is giving here in this passage, and sowing bountifully will result in a bountiful harvest, God will give back bountifully. So many passages, I think of the one in First Kings, little story, you will remember in the context there that God was a judging Israel. King Ahab was ruling and they were in to all of this Baal idolatry. And so God brought a famine and a drought upon the land. It's interesting, Baal was considered the God of, of the rains and the fertility. And so he's making a monkey out of this phony God, and for three years and six months, according to James 5:17, he brings this drought. And what's interesting is, we read in First King 17, beginning of verse eight, "Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah, saying, 'Arise, go to Zeraphath, which belongs to Sidon, and stay there; behold, I have commanded a widow there to provide for you.' So he arose and he went to Zarephath, and when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks; and he called her and said, 'Please get me a little water in a jar, that I may drink.'" And mind you, we got a famine going on here, these people are barely alive, and he asked this lady for a drink of water. "As she was going to get it, he called her and said, 'Please bring me a piece of bread in your hand.' But she said, 'As the LORD your God lives, I have no bread, only a handful of flour in the bowl and a little oil in the jar; and behold, I'm gathering a few sticks, that I may go in and prepare for me and my son, that we may eat it and die.'" I mean, they're on the verge of death here. And you want me to go, you know, get you some bread, you kidding? But, "Then Elijah said to her, 'Do not fear; go, do as you have said, but make me a little bread cake from it first and bring it out to me, and afterward you may make one for yourself and for your son.'" In other words, trust in what God may do. Then he goes on to say, "'For thus says the LORD God of Israel, 'The bowl of flour shall not be exhausted, nor shall the jar of oil be empty, until the day that the LORD sends rain on the face of the earth.'' So she went and did according to the word of Elijah, and she and he and her household ate for many days. The bowl of flour was not exhausted nor did the jar of oil become empty according to the word of the LORD, which He spoke through Elijah." 

Beloved, my point is simply this, God is able, trust him to do what He has promised. Again, remember Jesus words in Luke 6:38, "Give and it shall be given unto you, pressed down, shaken together, and running over." God's literally going to pour into your lap what they used to do is take this, take their garments, and hold it up to put their grain in, so you're putting the grain in the lap; it's just going to be so much, it's just going to be overflowing. That's how God rewards us. And again, you have to ask yourself, do I really believe this? Or do I believe that generous giving will only lead to the permanent depletion of my resources and ultimately lead to impoverishment? 

Well, Paul continues with this same theme, back to verse 10. He says, "Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness; you will be enriched in everything for all liberality..." And obviously, because of this, the people would contribute even more generously to the needs. And this brings us to the third harvest. And this is going to be a natural response. I mean, think about what he's saying here in the sequence. He's saying, first, if you live consistently with what I'm saying here and you give generously, as unto the Lord, not only are you going to experience, first of all, a special outpouring of his love, but a replenishing of your material wealth, which is going to lead to number three, a proliferation of God glorifying praise. 

Notice that in verse 11, "...you will be enriched in everything..." Everything would include everything--economically, financially, as well as spiritually; but you will be enriched in everything. And here's the purpose "...for all liberality." Beloved, we must understand that the purpose for God's beneficence; in other words, his charitable replenishing of the financial seed that we have sown, is not so that we can get rich and spend it on ourselves and somehow raise our standard of living. But rather, the purpose of contributing generously to future needs is ultimately so that we can bless others and bring glory to God and experience His love. By the way, God doesn't need our money. He doesn't need any of that. I mean, he owns everything. And everything that we have is his, were just stewards of it. He could meet all of those needs without taking up this collection. So why does he take up the collection? So he can lavish his love upon his people. So he can prove himself powerful on their behalf, so that their faith will be strengthened, so that ultimately through them, he can put his glory on display. That's what's going on here. 

The end of verse 11, "you will be enriched and everything for all liberality, which through us..." and by the way, here he's referring the "us" is speaking of Paul and Titus, and others in charge of the collection and the delivery of this generous gift to the saints in Jerusalem, “...which through us is producing thanksgiving to God." We all understand this, don't we? I mean, when Christian friends come to our aid, what do we do? We're filled with thanksgiving, not just to them, but ultimately to God. 

May remind you of a little story that I've told some of you in the past. A number of years ago, I was training pastors in Kenya. And when I first walked into the room of the seminary, I noticed there was a man back there who was shaking violently, just kind of doing this, I thought, Oh, my, what's going on? We had a physician with this. I contacted the physician. Let's find out what's going on with this brother. Well, he was burning up with fever because of malaria. And so we helped him, his name was Elijah Eroch. Most of you know him. Because of our experience with Elijah. We were able to help him, and by the way, others as well. And we found out a couple of days later that his daughter was dying. And they didn't have money to help the daughter. And I asked, well, how much money are we talking about? And it was, I recall, a little less than $400. Well, the saints at Calvary Bible Church had given me money to use at my discretion. And I said, we'll pay for that. And because of that, to make a long story short, you're giving saved that young lady's life. I just talked with her a few weeks ago through Skype. They are Sudanese refugees living in Kenya. And a couple of years later, they had a little boy, they were trying to figure out what to name the little boy, and the daughter said, named a little boy, David Harrell. So I have a little namesake, his name is David Harrell Eroch. And we have helped him over the years with his schooling. And it's gotten to a point where we can't afford all of that, so now, just recently, the deacons agreed to pay money to help him with his schooling. Sometime I'm going to try to get a video of them, thanking us but not too long ago, as well, Elijah contracted hepatitis B, he needed help or he was going to die. And I forget, you deacons would have to help here, but we gave a considerable sum to help with his medication, and he's doing fine now. And many people, when I was there and down through the years are praising God, for the way God has worked in his life and the lives of others as well. All of this produces praise to God, this is what God wants. And all of you are a part of that. I don't deserve to be named or anyone to have their name after me, I am uncomfortable with that. But hey, that's his name. And, and I have some special affinity to him because of that. But I hope you see the illustration here. Our giving, dear friends, produces thanksgiving to God. And the more we give the more God is praised. That's the idea. 

Sadly, unbelievers don't give thanks to God, I think of Romans 1:21, "For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened." But when impoverished, needy, sickly persecuted saints, become the recipients of God's favor, of his grace, through the generous gifts of other believers, it causes their hearts to soar with thanksgiving. Oh, dear Christian, hear me. Our generous giving, in helping the saints at Calvary Bible Church and around the world is an investment in God's kingdom that pays both temporal as well as eternal dividends. But more importantly, what it does, is it harnesses the collective voices of countless saints that will give full-throated praise to God and say with the 24, elders in Revelation, "For worthy are you our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power." That's what God is up to here, in all of this. 

Back to verse 12, "For the ministry of this service," in other words, your service to God by this generous contribution, "is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints, but is overflowing through many thanksgivings. God. By the way, the little phrase there "fully supplying", without getting technical, it is a doubly intensified word in the Greek language. I's the idea of saying, it is not only really, really supplying the needs of these impoverished saints, that's the idea, but it is also overflowing through many thanksgivings to God. Verse 13, "Because of the proof given by this ministry, they will glorify God for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ and for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all..."  Now folks, that's a significant statement. No doubt, Paul had told the saints in Corinth about how the Jews were real suspicious of them. After all, they didn't like Gentiles to begin with, and Gentiles didn't like Jews. They were convinced the Gentiles were beyond salvation, because they weren't part of God's covenant people in his plan. But now, God is telling Gentiles to help out these Jews in Jerusalem that have come to faith in Christ. Well, boy, that's a hard pill for the Gentiles to swallow, as well as for the Jews. So you see, that's what's going on here. And then to make them even more skeptical in Jerusalem, those people had undoubtedly already read First Corinthians, and they knew the type of chaos in the Corinthian church. They were marked by jealousy and strife, and they were trying to seek personal status, host of other sins--immorality, they would get drunk at love feasts; they had no respect for the poor, they were trying to outdo each other to see who could have the most sensational gift and making up all types of silly stuff; a general lack of order and chaos, and it was crazy. And all these things were public record. And so naturally, the already suspicious believers in Jerusalem, were even more suspicious of these Gentile converts. 

You will recall an Acts 11, beginning in verse one, "Now the apostles and the brethren who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God, and when Peter came up to Jerusalem, those who were circumcised took issue with him saying, 'You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them.'" And if you read on the rest of the passage, Peter has to defend the fact that he witnessed the power of the Spirit of God coming upon Cornelius and his household. And again, in Acts 15, at the Council of Jerusalem, Peter and Barnabas had to defend that, yes, God is saving Gentiles. He's come to them declaring how many miracles and wonders God has worked through them, among the Gentiles. So this was a huge issue. So for now, for these impoverished persecuted Jewish believers, to be rescued by these Gentile saints, oh my goodness. It proved that the Corinthian church and the Gentile believers were legitimate. It proved that their confession of the gospel was genuine. It proved that also, that they were doers of the Word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. 

By the way, folks, talk is cheap, put your money where your mouth is, right? I think we can see that in this text. Because after all, Ephesians 2:10, "We are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, so that we would walk in them."  And so that's why Paul was so excited here. So again, verse 13, "Because of the proof given by this ministry, they will glorify God for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ and for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all." So what we see here, is by giving to the Lord's work, they're experiencing this special outpouring of God's love, a replenishing of material wealth, a proliferation of God, glorifying praise. 

And finally, an expanding sphere of intimate fellowship. Beloved, this is such a precious thing. Don't miss this verse 14, "...while they also, by prayer on your behalf, yearn for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you." Can you imagine that now these Jewish saints are praying for these Corinthian believers that they once hated. Not only praying for them, they areyearning to be with them. Why? "...because of the surpassing grace of God in you."

Oh, what a glorious reward this is, never underestimate this. To have the reward of other saints praying on our behalf, and to have other believers, as we all do, all around the world that would give anything to have a cup of coffee with us right now; that would give anything if we could come and spend time with them. And by the way, I know places all around the world, that I've been, where if you went there, and you told them you were a part of Calvary Bible Church, they would embrace you, and you'd have a place to stay. That's the idea that we have here. 

Well, some of you might ask, "well, what happened? Did they ever take it up? Did it ever get to them?" Let me close with this. We know that sometime after writing Second Corinthians Paul visited Corinth again, for the third time, as he promised that he would do in chapter 12, verse 14, and chapter 13 and verse one. And if we go to Acts 20, we would read how that he stayed there about three months. And by the way, when he went back to them, during that three-month period, he wrote the epistle to the Romans. Let me remind you of what he said in Romans 15, verse 25. He told them, "I am going to Jerusalem serving the saints. For Macedonia and Acahai have been pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem. Yes, they were pleased to do so. And they are indebted to them. For if the Gentiles have shared in their spiritual blessings, they are indebted to minister to them also in material things. "And certainly we as Gentiles have been grafted into the root of Abrahamic covenant of blessings. That's why we even bring the gospel to the Jew first, and then to the Gentile. Well, obviously, the Corinthians came through, right? They joined the poor, impoverished saints in Macedonia, put their money in with them and bless these dear saints in Jerusalem. 

It causes Paul to say in verse 15, "Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift." Obviously, if it were not for God's gift of Christ, none of this would be made possible, right? So all of this moves us to worship. And even as God provides the grain for the sower to put into the soil, so that it can produce a harvest and multiplied grain, he also supplies our seed of generous giving when we give to those in need that the Lord brings to our attention. And think what an ultimate harvest that is going to yield, not only in this life, but in the life to come. Won't it be great someday in heaven, to see what God has done, because of what we have done on behalf of others, and also to realize what others had done in the past, to help us come to a place of saving faith. Amazing to think how it all works. Let's pray together. 

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. I pray that by the power of your Spirit, we will live them out with great joy, that ultimately, your name will be praised throughout the earth. We thank you, we give you praise for all things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Take your bible this morning and turn to Second Corinthians. We find ourselves in chapter 10. We're going to look at the first six verses this morning as we continue to make our way through this epistle verse by verse. Let me read the text to you; and I've entitled my discourse, "Supernatural Soldiering." And hopefully that will make perfect sense, as we understand this passage of Scripture. Second Corinthians 10, beginning in verse one, "Now I, Paul, myself urge you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ--I who am meek when face to face with you, but bold toward you when sent! I ask that when I am present I need not be bold with the confidence with which I propose to be courageous against some, who regard us as if we walked according to the flesh. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, and we are ready to punish all disobedience, whenever your obedience is complete." 

A cosmic battle has been raging between Satan and God from the very beginning of time. Satan opposes the kingdom of God, and he has done this since the first sin in the cosmos, committed by Satan himself. And soon after that, you have the sin of Adam and Eve, in their temptation in the garden. We read about in Genesis three. Satan, along with his demonic horde has been conducting a guerrilla warfare against the kingdom of God for millennia. And we are currently in that war. And it will continue until the Lord returns. Mankind's only hope is in God's redeeming grace. According to Colossians 1:13, "For He rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, that forgiveness of sin." And as a result of that, he causes us to turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God according to Acts 26:18. 

Dear friends, the anti-God world, system that God allows Satan to temporarily control consists of human beings, who are willing subjects of his rule. Men and women, who you might say, mediate his kingdom, Paul describes them in Ephesians 6:12 as "rulers,” “world forces," "this darkness," and the "spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." And Satan and his demons work through these people. And most of them are unwitting subjects to his rule. And history is replete with men and women who do his bidding. Jesus said of unbelievers, that they are "of their father the devil," and they want to do "the desires" of their father in John 8:44. He went on to say that this father, Satan, was "...a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him." Paul said in Ephesians, four beginning in verse 17, that these people "walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they have become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." 

And certainly, that is a perfect description of the nation in which we live. Our nation is characterized by lawlessness, by darkness, by spiritual death; in contrast with believers, who are characterized by righteousness and light and spiritual life, as Paul describes in Second Corinthians six. And frankly the rancid stench emitted by dead churches within evangelicalism, is now so revolting, that even undiscerning Christians are fleeing from them. Notwithstandingthis exodus, many more are attracted to these apostate churches like flies devouring roadkill on a hot summer day. One of the largest churches here in Nashville, a church called Grace Point, really typifies 1000s of other churches around the country. It typifies the satanic strongholds that masquerade as churches of Jesus Christ. Let me give you a little example on their website. They say, "here at Grace Point we think that faith is less about doctrines and dogmas demanding total agreement and more about life to be lived, enjoyed and shared with others. What unites us is a growing awareness that life is a gift, and love is the point. We want to learn how to love better and share that with the world. We welcome the entire human family regardless of race, age, creed, physical abilities, marital or economic status, gender identity or sexual orientation. Grace Point has led the way in full inclusiveness of the LGBTQ plus community. We are more than," quote, "welcoming."  "We affirm and celebrate. We go beyond," quote, "allowing LGBTQ plus individuals in membership and leadership. We love and depend on one another without any distinction. Many of our staff and community leadership are members of the LGBTQ plus community. Our conviction for inclusiveness is not based on specific loopholes or interpretations of ancient texts, but rather, through a fresh, humble and intellectually honest recognition of both our flawed history and our capacity to continually grow in our understanding of our world, of ourselves and of God." They go on to say, "As progressive Christians, we're open to the tensions and inconsistencies in the Bible. We know that it can't live up to impossible modern standards. We strive to more clearly articulate what Scripture is and isn't." And then they say, "The Bible isn't the Word of God. It's not self-interpreting. It's not a science book, an answer rulebook. It's not inerrant or infallible. But the Bible is," they say, "a product of community. A library of text, multi-vocal, a human response to God, living and dynamic." 

Well, dear friends, sadly, these people are imprisoned in a fortress of deception; opposed to the knowledge of God. And Scripture describes those that shepherd them, that lead them, as those who by "...their smooth and flattering speech they deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting." Romans 16:18. They are described as false teachers, who will, "...secretly introduce destructive heresies." Second Peter two one. Who distort the scripture "...to their own destruction." Second, Peter 3:16. Dear friends, churches like this, and again, there are 1000s of them, preach a false Jesus; a Jesus of their own making. They are idolaters. They preach a man-centered gospel that's all about tolerance and inclusivity. But they know nothing of the true gospel of Jesus Christ. Indeed, "...the word of the cross is to those who are perishing, foolishness." First Corinthians 1:18. They love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil. And they hate anyone who sheds the light of truth on the darkness, their darkness of deception. 

I find it interesting, for years liberal apostates who march under this banner today of progressive Christians, have tried to use the Bible to somehow support their heresies and refute those who contradict. And the problem that they have run into, down through the years, is that their positions are so easily refuted exegetically as to make them just ridiculously bogus. They lose all credibility in the eyes of reasonable, rational people who can read. So what have they done? Rather than using the Bible to support their heresies, and discredit the truth, they discredit the Bible altogether. And that's what is happening now. You must understand at a most fundamental level, Satan wants people to believe that there is no divine standard of righteousness. Therefore, there is no judgment. You're fine just the way you are. God loves you just the way you are. So therefore, you're immune to judgment. By the way, this is the same lie of the false prophets that we read about earlier in Jeremiah 23. Peace, peace, they would say, when there is no peace, Jeremiah 23, beginning of verse 16, we read, "Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you. They are leading you into futility; they speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the LORD. They keep saying to those who despise Me, 'The Lord has said, "You will have peace."'; And as for everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart, they say, 'Calamity will not come to you.' But who was stood in the counsel of the LORD, that he should see and hear His word? Who has given heed to His word and listened?  Behold, the storm of the LORD has gone forth and wrath, even a whirling tempest; it will swirl down on the head of the wicked. The anger of the LORD will not turn back until He has performed and carried out the purpose of His heart; in the last days, you will clearly understand it.'" 

Beloved, we are warned about apostates all through Scripture. And what's fascinating is that they are going to get worse and worse; there will be more and more of them, and their lies will become more and more appealing, and deceptive. Paul spoke of this in Second Timothy three, verse 13, "But evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived." And what is even more frightening is that God has abandoned these people, and their doom is sealed. We read this in Hebrews six beginning in verse four, "For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and had been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame." 

Now, if it's not bad enough that we have this going on in the so-called evangelical church, you add to this, the Cultural Marxism that is taking over our country; the gross immorality, the brutal dismemberment of unborn and inconvenient children; all of these things that are now being promoted in our country, especially through the Democratic Party, and the media, and the Hollywood elites, and people even in our public schools, and in our universities and in apostate seminaries. You add all of this together dear friends, and you can begin to understand why Biblical Christianity is so hated, and why it is now politically correct to somehow discredit Christianity; why we are becoming increasingly the target of the canceled culture. This is all part of Satan's strategy to thwart the redemptive purposes of God and bring glory to his name. 

Well, this raises the question, my goodness, how can we possibly fight such a formidable foe? Seems overwhelming, doesn't it? I mean, the deception is is clearly triumphing over truth in our age. It's obvious Satan is clearly winning the battle. Well, indeed he is. And he will continue to win, until Christ returns. However, as we will see, we are not left helpless, we are not defenseless. And by the way, Satan's days are numbered. I was thinking of this this week. Let me read you a passage in Revelation 20. "Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding the key of the abyss, and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who was the devil and Satan, and bound him for 1000 years; and he threw him into the abyss, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he would not deceive the nations any longer, until the 1000 years were completed; after these things, he must be released for a short time." And in verse seven, he goes on, "When the 1000 years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison, and he will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together for the war; the number of them is like the sand of the seashore. And they came up on the broad plane of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city and fire came down from heaven and devoured them. And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night, forever and ever." 

Well, this ancient war was something that the apostle Paul was very familiar with. Paul dealt with pagan idolatry, false religions, false teachers, charlatans, even within the church. And frankly, this will be the focus now, from chapters 10 through 13, where he is going to assert his apostolic authority and fight against these people, he is going to strongly confront the false teachers that have infiltrated the church at Corinth in his absence, as well as their sycophants, who gathered around them and remained in the church, even after the majority of the people had repented from their mutiny against the Apostle Paul and the truths that he preached. Not only were these people, this minority, that remained in the church, not only were they liars trying to distort, Paul, but they also espoused deviant philosophies and false doctrines that would appeal to worldly Christians, Christian in name only. It's interesting after a forest fire, the firefighters have to go and look very carefully for what they call invisible ash pits.  Holes, different little caves or whatever where animals had lived, where embers of the forest fire would remain. And if you're not careful, the wind could cause them to once again flare up. This is what we could liken this minority in the church of Corinth to; a small minority were there, and they still needed to be extinguished. And so this is really the focus now of the Apostle Paul. And in these six verses, we learn much about how we can effectively engage the enemy as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. And like Paul, we must manifest three important traits. Number one, patient endurance, number two courageous confidence, and number three, skilled swordsmanship. In other words, the ability to effectively wield the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God. 

Now, while Paul would never defend himself for his honor alone, he was willing to engage these people and confront these people, for the sake of the truth and the glory of Christ. So as we look at verse one, just stressing the intensely personal nature of his appeal, he begins by saying, "Now I, Paul, myself urge you by the meekness, and gentleness of Christ." Let's pause there for a second. Meekness can be translated gentleness. It's a term that refers to one who is gentle, who is mild, who is even tempered. A person who is patient, and who will humbly endure mistreatment; that's the apostle Paul. But also, he uses the word gentleness. It's a term that can be translated compassion, and it carries the idea of leniency toward offenders. And then he says something interesting, "I who am meek when face to face with you, but bold toward you when absent." This is a reference to a slanderous insult that he had heard, accusing him of being a cowardly person, in person. O, but he was bold on Facebook, right? You know how that works. 

Now remember the history here. Paul spent 20 months, founding the church in Corinth, and then he left the church, then he hears of problems, and so he responds with a letter that is not in the canon of Scripture to correct those problems. And then he hears of more problems. Sohe writes, First Corinthians--that we have here in the canon of Scripture. And then while he's still gone, the wolves arrive. And so he ends up writing what's called "a severe letter" confronting all of them. And that's, again, not recorded in Scripture. And fortunately, that severe letter caused many of them to repent, but not all of them. And so now he is writing Second Corinthians. And his enemies now are; he knows that they're still scornfully criticizing that sternly worded "severe letter." Yeah, let's see him come here and say that to our face. You know, that's the idea. However, what they did, was to misinterpret his gentle humility. They saw him as kind of a wimpy guy, kind of a weak guy, rather than seeing his demeanor as being one motivated out of love and patient endurance, strength under control. 

And this brings us to the very first characteristic: patient endurance. Again, his meek and gentle demeanor is well documented throughout the New Testament. For example, we read in First Corinthians two three, how he described his ministry to them as being quote, with "...weakness and in fear and in much trembling." Obviously, there are times when a shepherd must use his rod, but you don't begin there, and you use it sparingly and reluctantly. There are times to be forcefully assertive, you will remember in Galatians two, Paul withstood Peter to his face because of his hypocrisy, and it would appear that he did this in public. A true friend will love a brother or sister enough to confront them boldly when they see them walking in a direction that will forfeit God's blessing on their life and bring dishonor to the Lord. And a true shepherd will never cower before a wolf or even a pack of wolves. He will run them off. But Paul, who they marked as being meek, when face to face, was no wilting lily dear friends, not at all. He was no sissy-boy coward, shall we say? That was not Paul. I mean, he preached the gospel to hostile crowds. Think of all the beatings and the imprisonments that he endured. Imagine preaching the gospel to the Sanhedrin like he did. That would be like going before Congress and preaching the truth of the gospel. He boldly proclaimed the truth to Roman governors; remember even to King Herod Agrippa and his mocking entourage. Remember, I think it was Festus that said, "You're mad." You know? Even proclaim the truth to Caesar himself. So it would have been easy for him to to go and confront these false teachers and their weak minded sycophants there in Corinth. You know, as we would say, in our vernacular, you know, he ate guys like that for breakfast. I mean, it was just no big deal to him. 

To be sure, Paul knew that he was a divinely appointed and empowered apostle of Jesus Christ. He had the power and the authority of God himself. But what's interesting, like Christ, He was gentle and humble in heart, Matthew 11:29. Virtues, by the way, that did not match Israel's idea of a Messiah King. We would all do well to learn from this example. Remember, Jesus said, Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am what? I am gentle and humble of heart. You want to ask yourself, is that describing me? Or am I one of these loudmouth bullies that likes to intimidate other people when I don't get my way? You know, for a lot of people, conflict resolution is basically, he who yells the loudest and the longest wins. Well, that's not who Paul was. Paul was effective. He was like Jesus. In fact, Peter describes this in First Peter two describing our Lord. He says, "For this finds favor,” beginning of verse 19, "if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God. For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, WHO COMMITTED NO SIN, NOR WAS ANY DECEIT FOUND IN HIS MOUTH; and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept in trusting Himself to Him who judges righteously." So first, we see Paul, manifest patient endurance; something that we would all do well to remember and to manifest as well  when we are in some spiritual confrontation. 

But secondly, he manifested what I would call, courageous confidence. Notice verse two, he says, "I ask that when I am present I need not be bold with the confidence with which I propose to be courageous against some, who regard us as if we walked according to the flesh." In other words, Paul did not want to be forcefully confronted. He wanted them to repent. But he was not afraid of them. I mean, he had confidence in the power of the Spirit of God and again, he had the the authority of an apostle. Later on in chapter 13, verse 10, he says, "For this reason I am writing these things while absent, so that when present I need not use severity, in accordance with the authority which the Lord gave me for building up and not for tearing down." But again, he would not hesitate to be bold, even face to face, and confront them, if they remained recalcitrant, if they remained a threat to the truth of the gospel. He was ready, according to verse two, here to, "...be bold with the confidence with which I propose to be courageous against some..." And there he's referring to the false teachers, and those flattering toadies that surrounded him and that were all part of this mutiny. 

And then he says, what they said about him, "...who regard us as if we walked according to the flesh."  Evidently, this was one of the slanderous accusations that was made against them. Dear friends, for a man, or a woman, to walk according to the flesh, rather than the spirit, thatis a serious charge. Romans eight verse five, Paul says, "For those who are according to the flesh set their minds are the things of the flesh, but those according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit." Frankly, this is the life of an unbeliever. One whose life is dominated by their flesh; they're ruled by their flesh, by their fallen nature. They live under the authority of their flesh. You might say they are bound in their thoughts and their desires. Such as according to Galatians, 5:19, "...immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing and the things like these as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things, shall not inherit the kingdom of God." I mean, these are the people according to Ephesians chapter two, beginning in verse one who were "dead in their trespasses and sins." That's what they were accusing Paul of being; just being a phony. "Who walk according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. They live in the lusts of their flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature of children of wrath even as the rest." Even Peter describes in Second Peter two 10, as people who "indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires." And then Paul says in Philippians 3:19, they are those "whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things." I mean, my goodness, who would possibly want to trust a man like that? Well, obviously, no one. And that was their point. But Paul knew the truth, he even spoke of this in Second Corinthians 1:12. He said, "For our proud confidence is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, but in the grace of God, we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you."  By the way, that whole statement was specifically aimed at these false teachers who knew that they could not say the same thing. Second Corinthians 2:17, "For we are not like many, peddling the word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God." 

Over the years, I have had opportunities to encounter and talk with a number of charlatans, both male and female. And I don't say this, to my credit, but to God's credit, I can spot them a mile away. Within just a few minutes, probably not even more than a minute, I can tell what's going on with them. You know what it's like, if you're an expert in a certain field, and somebody says, Oh, that's what I do, too. And you get to talk and all of a sudden, you realize, my goodness, this person is clueless. You know, it's like a neurosurgeon talking to a guy that's only had first aid in high school. I mean, you can tell real quick, there's something going on here--men and women peddling the word of God. By the way, sometimes they're hard to spot. There's a very popular deceased apologist that's in the news lately, who has been exposed as a serial sexual predator. Tragic. Paul said in First Timothy 5:24, "The sins of some men are quite evident, going before them to judgment." In other words, with some people, you can spot them right off. But he says, "...for others, their sins follow after." But Paul had no secret life of sin, as his accusers were saying, Second Corinthians four, two, "...we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness, or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience, in the sight of God." 

Dear friends, I hope you can say the same thing. I hope that is your testimony. Because this is the man or the woman that God blesses. So Paul was well equipped and he was well trained to be a soldier of Christ, to engage in spiritual warfare. He was characterized by patient endurance, by courageous confidence in all that God was doing in him, and through the power of his word. But thirdly, he manifested what I would call skilled swordsmanship. Notice verse three, "For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh." By the way, thisis a play on words, this whole flesh deal that's going on here. Again, now they accused him of walking in the flesh, morally. And indeed, we all have some of those tendencies. We all have human limitations, but make no mistake, when it came to combating evil, when it came to spiritual warfare, Paul did not war according to the flesh. The term war, by the way, in the original language is a term used to describe a soldier that's waging war, a soldier in combat, engaging in combat. He says, I don't war according to the flesh. Again, let me remind you, there is a spiritual war going on. There are two opposing kingdoms--the kingdom of Satan, the kingdom of God, and then you add to that our flesh; even as believers that's at enmity with the Spirit. But we're not powerless. Notice what he says here. And this starts to get really exciting. 

Verse four, "...for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh..." In other words, what we have to do battle with is supernatural, it's not human, "...but divinely powerful" or supernatural, "...for the destruction of fortresses." The term fortresses in the original language is used to describe a fortified stronghold. Also to describe a prison, and even to describe a tomb, and frankly all three will illustrate Paul's point. Think about this--unbelievers absolutely hate the truth and when they hear it, they retreat into their fortified strongholds of satanic deception. Think how it works. For some people. It's just indifference. I mean, think of all the people you know that drive by Calvary Bible Church, they know we're here and they just think we're a bunch of weirdos. They don't care at all you know; I don't care what they teach, you know, let them do their thing. But then there are others who live in a different type of stronghold that of self-righteousness. Well, I you know, I'm not real sure about who God is, but I know I'm a good person and I'm sure I'll make the cut. Or there's the cultural Christian, they're Christian in name only. Hahaha, yeah, I just love Jesus. But it's this Jesus that they've made up. Or the stronghold, this fortress, of religious affiliation. Yeah, I belong to such and such denomination, so I'm good to go. Over they belong to some cult. And then of course, there are those who have erected these, these fortresses of proud intellectualism that scoff at the gospel. I have encountered many of them over the years in academia, universities, seminary professors, what Paul calls every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God. And dear friends, the sad thing is, unless these people repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they will remain in that fortress of deception. And God will judicially harden their heart and leave them incarcerated in that prison, which will become their eternal tomb. 

Now, how can we effectively fight all of this? These fortresses seem impregnable. Well, the answer in Scripture is we can fight these things, by the power of the Spirit and his Word. The weaponry that we have is the word of God and prayer. You will recall in Paul's great discourse on spiritual warfare in Ephesians, six, he describes this protective armor that we are to wear, but also, he described the two offensive weapons that we have, beginning in verse 17, "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." And then he goes on to say, "With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit." This is why Paul said in Romans one and verse 16, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel." Why? "For it, is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes." And he was a skilled swordsman, he knew how to parry the blows of the enemy with the word of God, and it is the word of God, empowered by God, that can blast through the fortresses of satanic deception. 

But I've heard this so many times, but Pastor, how can unbelievers discern truth from error? How do they know what to believe? I mean, after all, the message of Gracepoint and churches like that is far more appealing than the message of Calvary Bible Church. Well, yeah, they are two different gospels, talking about two different Jesus; one saves, one dams. So what causes a person to believe in the truth while the vast majority believe a lie? And beloved, the Scripture answers that very clearly. The answer is sovereign grace. Sovereign grace that imparts the gift of faith to the elect of God, and faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. That's the power. I love what Jesus said in John 10, beginning in verse 27, "'My sheep hear My voice, and I know them.'" By the way, by contrast, those who are not a sheep, don't hear his voice and he doesn't know them. Then he says, "'...and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.'" You see, dear friends God uses the supernatural truths of his word to destroy fortresses, these strongholds of satanic deception. 

And he goes on to say, "We are destroying speculations..." Speculations - "logismos" in the original language, which refers to logical conclusions or arguments, presuppositions arrived at by consideration and reasoning. The problem is, the logical considerations of the depraved mind pertaining to God and to salvation are always inherently flawed and faulty, because they're based upon deceptive presuppositions. So what do we do? Do we just give up? What did Paul do? You preach Christ, and Him crucified. There's the power. He said, First Corinthians 1:23, "...to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called," there's sovereign grace, "to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men." Oh, dear Christian, never underestimate the power of the truth of the word of God. Because that's what the Spirit of God uses to cause us to be born again. Yes, but most people think it's ridiculous. How many times have you heard that or maybe even felt that like, Oh, it's so frustrating. I'm talking to people that seem normal, but they believe spiritually that two plus two is five. I mean, what do you do with that? Well, yes, in the eyes of reason, it seems ridiculous. But dear friends, we cannot consult human reason to understand the supernatural. You must see this; reason can never set in judgment of divine revelation. Yes, but so much of what God has said in his word, it's just absurd to people. Well, yes, it is. I'm sure that's what the Israelites said when God told them to march around the fortress city of Jericho one time for six days. Remember in Joshua six? If you read that text, he says, I want seven priests to carry seven trumpets of ram's horns before the ark. Then on the seventh day, you shall march around the city seven times and the priest shall blow the trumpets. And it shall be that when they make a long blast with the ram's horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout, with a great shout, and the wall of the city will fall down flat. Now, I would submit to you that no reasonable, rational general would have ever come up with that strategy. Dear friends, reason must always yield to faith. Therein is the power of God. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved." That's ridiculous. Well, not for some, it broke through my heart didn't it yours. "The just shall live by faith." Oh, that is so stupid. I mean, no reasonable person would believe that. "He who believes in the Son as eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son," Jesus said, will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." Oh, that's silly. That's silly. All roads lead to Rome. We all worship the same God, if there even is one. 

O child of God, for the believer, you must understand that reason will always be instructed and corrected by faith. Because in our humaneness, we have no capacity to see or to understand God; we cannot figure that out. Human cogitation cannot come to a place where we understand God's saving grace and how we are to be redeemed. It's impossible. In fact, when you think about it, all Bible doctrines defy reason. All Bible doctrines defy reason. I mean, can you explain to me creation where God speaks things into existence? Reason tells me he can't do that. How about explain the Incarnation, or sovereign election and human responsibility? Or regeneration? How does God cause someone to be born again and give them a completely new nature? Or the doctrine of justification? Or the doctrine of sanctification? How about the mystery of the Trinity? Use your reason to figure that one out. How about the doctrine of the resurrection? You see reason scoffs at such absurdities, but faith embraces them. And these truths become the very nourishment of our souls. Think about the first work of grace that occurred in your heart when you came to Christ. Suddenly, we could see, what before, we could never see, what reason could never explain. We saw the glory of the cross and the horror of our sin. We suddenly understood the power, the supernatural power, of sovereign grace. Suddenly, all of our logical conclusions about God and salvation were forever destroyed. We came to saving faith like a little child, who just took God at his Word, despite what reason might say. We come to saving faith like a little child, don't we? Matthew 18 three, Jesus said, "'Truly I say to you, unless you are converted, and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.'" 

This reminded me of a situation that happened a few months ago, we were in our pickup truck, Nancy and me and little Pepper was in the back, my little granddaughter, who just recently turned six. And all of a sudden, she says, "Papa, how does Jesus get inside your heart?" Boy, that's a fair question. And by the way, isn't that how the little children begin to think, the spirit of God begins to bring these to mind, they begin to inquire Well, no human logic, no human reason, is going to be able to explain the great mysteries of regeneration and justification and sanctification.  So what must happen? Well, faith must eventually instruct reason. Faith will correct reason and cause a spiritual cadaver to be raised from spiritual death to spiritual life. And so I gave her, I forget some, some little something about, here's how that works. You know, I think I use the example of you know, how much mommy and daddy love you. And aren't they kind of in your heart? Well, yeah. And I said, so there's something that goes on there that we can't fully explain. But what's really amazing is that by the power of God, there's something supernatural that happens when we come to faith in Christ, and he begins to live in us and we live in him. And it was so precious. After I gave her that profound explanation, that defies reason. She said, "Oh, okay." And then she said, "Can we go to Chick fil A?" Is that how it works? That's what faith does, that's the power of God. That's the weaponry that we have with the truth. 

So again, notice what the inspired apostle says, "For though we walk in the flesh." In other words, though, we have these human limitations, "...we don't war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying..." and then he adds this, "...speculations and every lofty thing..." Those unbiblical and sometimes clever, even erudite, scholarly ideologies that people believe. We're destroying all of those things; all of the proud intellectualism of liberal apostates, all of those things raised up against the knowledge of God. Beloved, I want you to remember, although the world hates the truth, and suppresses it in unrighteousness, it also fears it. It fears the truth. That's why believers must be silenced. That's what fuels this cancel culture. That's what fuels authorities to somehow do everything they can to marginalize Christians. Because we have the supernatural weaponry available to us through the word of God and the power of the Spirit, to blast through all of those fortified prejudices, all of those lofty things, all of those speculations, all of those things raised up against the knowledge of God. John MacArthur said it so well quote, "A spiritual war cannot be successfully fought with fleshly weapons. Therefore the weapons in Paul's arsenal were not those of human ingenuity, human ideology or human methodology, human reason, wisdom, plans, strategies, organization, skill, eloquence, marketing, religious showmanship, philosophical or psychological speculation, ritualism pragmatism or mysticism, are all ineffective weapons," against quote, "the forces of the kingdom of darkness, the powers, world forces of this darkness and spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places (Ephesians 6:12). He went on to say, "They cannot rescue sinners from the," quote, 'domain of darkness.' (Colossians 1:13), or transform believers into Christ's likeness. Such weapons gain only superficial, temporary and deceptive victories at best. To successfully fight the spiritual war requires weapons from the heavenly arsenal." 

Well, Paul understood this, and he was a skilled swordsman. Notice how he closes the section, “...and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ..." The obedience of Christ is just a synonym for salvation. It's interesting, ancient monarchs would take captive prisoners back to their homeland away from, in other words, back to the conquering armies’homeland; take them out of the place where their prisoners once lived. And isn't that what God does with us? When we come to saving faith in Christ, he removes us from the realm of all ofthe lies that we believed. He rescues us from the domain of darkness and transfers us to the kingdom of his beloved Son. And there we begin to bask in the glory of the lover of our souls. We live in a different land, right? We're citizens of another kingdom. That's what Paul is saying here, "...we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ." Spurgeon put it this way, "Now, when the Lord captivates the thoughts of our mind, He leads them away, conducting them to another region altogether. The offspring of the mind, He guides him to the spiritual realm, wherein they delight in the Lord and bow themselves before Him. Let us see this procession of captives led away to grace, the triumph of the conqueror, and to settle them down in another region under another king, then they ever knew before. From the highest to the lowest, all the faculties of the soul are made to pass under the yoke." And then he says this, "He, who being made conscious of his sin, believes in Jesus Christ, submits all of the thoughts of his judgment and understanding to the obedience of Christ." And those of us who know, and love Christ can understand that even though it defies reason. 

And then Paul concludes, saying, "...and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, and we are ready to punish all disobedience, whenever your obedience is complete." In other words, he's wanting to give them time to repent, before he came and had to exert his apostolic authority. Now, of course, many people today will hear that and say, oh my goodness, how silly, how politically and religiously incorrect. How offensive to non-Christians; how irrational. But isn't that exactly the way we used to think before we came to Christ, before he led us captive to his obedience. When that happens, our thoughts are no longer captive to satanic lies. Those fortresses get torn down. Suddenly and increasingly, our thoughts are captive to the saving and transforming truths of Christ revealed in Scripture. Suddenly, reason begins to yield to supernatural truth revealed by God Himself, something that we could have never come up with on our own our own. Suddenly, we begin to understand and embrace the great doctrines of God causing our hearts to just absolutely soar with joy in the realm of his kingdom and causing us to longed to be in his presence. And dear friends, all of this happened, because of the divine weaponry available to the redeemed--the word of God, and the power of his Spirit. And the prayer of those, I long to see men and women and boys and girls come to saving faith in Christ. 

Well, I trust you are now better armed for combat. I pray that you are better prepared for supernatural soldiering, and I hope you will just examine your heart and say, really, as I look at my life, is it characterized by patient endurance? Or do I tend to be kind of this fly off the handle hothead type of a person? If so, that's not honoring to Christ, and the Lord can't use me, I need to deal with that. Is my life characterized with a courageous confidence, knowing that I belong to the King, knowing that I am indwelt by the Spirit of God, knowing that I have available, to me, all of the resources of Christ, to whom I am eternally united. Does that give me courage to face overwhelming odds, knowing that out of the 1000s of mockers, that may be spitting at me, when I preach the gospel, there will be--maybe one, maybe two--that the Spirit will convict, and they will believe? Do I believe that? Do I have that courageous confidence? 

And finally, am I a skilled swordsman? Do I have the ability to effectively wield the sword of the Spirit? Well, I trust that these are all virtues in your life, and that by the power of the Spirit, they will continue to grow so that we can be even more effective in the spiritual war, knowing that the victory has already been won, right? It was won at the cross, we're just waiting for the triumph. So folks, take heart and rejoice. Let's pray together. 

Father, thank You for the magnificent truths that you reveal to us, they are so practical. We can see ourselves; we can see the battle. We can see the divine weaponry that caused those fortresses in which we were incarcerated to come tumbling down. Lord, we thank you for those who have gone on before us, who prayed for our salvation and who gave us the gospel. Our grandparents, our parents, our mothers, our fathers. Lord, so many people, Sunday school teachers, whatever they were, Lord, thank you for saving us by your grace. Thank you for the confidence that is ours in Christ. For it's in his name I pray. Amen.

My what an amazing privilege it is to be able to express the doxologies of our heart through music, amen? And so let's come now and worship our thrice Holy God that we adore, by looking into his word. Will you take your Bibles and turn once again to Second Corinthians chapter 10; we've been making our way, verse by verse, through this epistle for many months now. And we find ourselves in verses seven through 18. And actually, we're going to look at really just verse 11, through 18 this morning, and I trust that you're here for the right reason. Let me just begin before we even look at the text. 

You know, so many people come to church, because it's kind of the cultural thing to do, they feel like they're kind of getting some brownie points in the sky, you know, and it kind of make some feel good, get around people that that they like, and so forth. A lot of people are looking for a religious country club. And if that's why you're here, you're in the wrong place. If you're here to be entertained, and to have your ego stroked, and your self-esteem boosted, you're in the wrong place. If you're here to claim a miracle, or to get rich, learn how to manipulate God to meet your felt needs, wrong place. Sorry. If you're here to figure out how we can right all ofthe injustices in the world. That's not why we're here. But if you're here to learn more about sin, and righteousness and judgment, and the glory of Christ, the gospel that saves sinners, then you're in the right place. In fact, that's the reason why the Father sent the Holy Spirit, right? Jesus prayed for that. In John 16 eight, we read, "'And He, when He comes...'" referring to the Holy Spirit, "'...will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment; concerning sin, because they do not believe in Me; and concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you no longer see Me; and concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.'"  That's why we're here, to speak of those glorious truths. 

You know, the New Testament church was devoted primarily to four things. And these four things are really the center of gravity around which our church and frankly, every New Testament Church orbit; we read about it in Acts 2:42, "They were continually devoting themselves to..." number one, "...the apostles teaching." That's the full counsel of God revealed in his Word, the Bible; and secondly, "...to fellowship..."  thirdly, "...to the breaking of bread..." and finally, "...to prayer." So if you're here today, to hear from God, as he speaks to you through his infallible, inerrant, inspired Word so that you can know and obey his will, then you're in the right place, because that's what we're all about. You know, if you don't know the word of God, you won't know the will of God. And if you don't know the will of God, you're certainly not going to obey the will of God. And even if you know it, if you refuse to obey it, you're in big trouble because the metastasizing corruption of sin will continue to eat away at you, your family, your community, and your nation. And we're seeing this right now in our country. I was reading an article the other day to describe how representative Greg's Steube, from Florida, was defending the difference between boys and girls, which seems amazing that you'd have to defend that; doing this before Congress and he said this, "When men or women claim to be able to choose their own sexual identity, they are making a statement that God did not know what He was doing when He created them" the congressman said. He went on to add, "The gender confusion that exists in our culture today is a clear rejection of God's good design." Boy, I hand it to the guy, to say this at Congress, right? He went on, "Whenever a nation's laws no longer reflect the standards of God, that nation is in rebellion against Him and will inevitably bear the consequences." Finally he said, "We are seeing the consequences of rejecting God here in our country today." End quote. And what was remarkable but not surprising, n a response to this New York Democratic Congressman Jerry Nadler made this telling statement, quote, "What any religious tradition describes as God's will is no concern of this Congress." End quote. 

Well, folks, this certainly doesn't surprise us to those of us who know and love the Lord and who follow any politics. But you know, what is surprising is how many evangelicals buy into these things. Man's felt needs and cultural mandates tend to trump God's will. I'm reminded of Proverbs one seven, "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; but fools despise wisdom and instruction." Certainly, the Republican representatives, Steube, learned well, what Proverbs 23:9 says, "Do not speak in the hearing of a fool for he will despise the wisdom of your words." 

Well, consistent with Acts 2:42, we are now going to turn to the apostles teaching, okay, as we look at this fascinating passage of Scripture, one that tends to be overlooked. And here we see the Apostle Paul continuing to defend his apostolic authority and his gospel message. Now, remember, we've got to keep the context in mind here; Jewish false teachers had infiltrated the church at Corinth in Paul's absence, and they had turned the people away from the Apostle Paul. They had undermined his authority. They had discredited his message, and in reality, they were charlatans that were very heavily influenced by their culture; a very libertine, antinomian grossly immoral culture. These were ungodly men that brought in a different gospel, the gospel that was a mixture of Jewish legalism and pagan mysticism. What the Apostle Paul described in verses four and five is ideological "fortresses" and "...speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God." So the Apostle Paul learned of this and he writes a severe letter to them - that we do not have recorded - and most of the people repented, but some resistance still remained in the church. As we would say, here in Tennessee, there were still some snakes in the barn. You know, Jesus warned, beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 

Dear friends, false teachers are demonic, and false doctrine is deadly. And certainly, we can see the effects of this, even as we witnessed the frivolous dribble that dominates many evangelical pulpits today, and the subtle distortions of truth that they promote. I mean, just think about it. There's the entertainment driven seeker sensitive movement that is all about accommodating the whims of those who hate Christ, preaching a syrupy sermonette with a theological depth of the glaze on a Krispy Kreme donut. And equally as unnourishing, if that's a word. Spurgeon said, "A time will come when instead of shepherds feeding the sheep, the church will have clowns entertaining the goats." And that's where we are today. And then there's the "I have a word from God" movement, the self-styled prophets who pretend to speak for God, leading people to believe and claim promises that God never made, making prophecies that don't come true. How many times did I hear some false teachers say, "Yes, God has told me, we're going to get rid of COVID." Guess what, that hasn't happened yet? Or "Trump's going to be reelected." How many times did you hear that? And then, of course, there's the woke, progressive Christianity movement that advances the junk science and Neo Marxist claims of critical race theory, preaching the nebulous and demonstrably false assertions of systemic racism and implicit bias or unconscious bias.

And as result of all of this we have a Christian church today that is irreverent; it's a counterfeit form of Christianity that has sold its gospel birthright for a bowl of social gospel porridge that cannot save. While some of the specific cultural dynamics of the first century are different than what we have today, the core issues are the same. What the real need was, is for man to see his need for salvation before a holy God, while at the same time understanding that only salvation is only through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. 

And so here in Second Corinthians 10, verses seven through 18, the Apostle Paul exposes the faults in a very curious way. He does this by highlighting the true, and as we began to look at, he reveals to us six evidences of godliness. We looked at the first three last week, we'll look at the last three today. You will recall the first three evidence is: number one, a life that imitates and draws others to Christ. Secondly, a life that builds up the church and thirdly, a life solely controlled by the true gospel. And now, what we will examine today, he goes on to tell us how godliness also consists of: number four, of a life of an unimpeachable integrity, a life of humility and contentment, and finally, a life devoted to the glory of Christ. So follow along as I read the text, Second Corinthians 10, beginning in verse 11. 

"Let's such a person consider this, that we are in word by letters when absent, such persons we are also in deed when present. 

For we are not bold to class or compare ourselves with some of those who come in themselves; but when they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are without understanding. 

But we will not boast beyond our measure, but within the measure of the sphere, which God apportioned to us as a measure, to reach even as far as you. 

We are not overextending ourselves, as if we did not reach to you, for we were the first to come even as far as you in the gospel of Christ;

not boasting beyond our measure, that is, in other men's labors, but with the hope that as your faith grows, we will be, within our sphere, enlarged even more by you, 

so as to preach the gospel even to the regions beyond you, and not to boast in what has been accomplished in the sphere of another. 

BUT HE WHO BOATS IIS TO BOAST IN THE LORD.

For it is not he who commends himself that is approved, but he whom the Lord commends. 

So let's put ourselves in the first century, alright? All of a sudden, we're probably in some big veranda, there's probably trees around, hard to know how many people, probably a little bit less than what we have in this sanctuary. So you're a part of this now and you're hearing this read, and you're one of two groups: the group that was duped, or the groups that was duped and has repented, okay? Now the inspired words of the Apostle are being read. I'm sure you could have heard a pin drop. An apostle, it means "a sent one." An apostle, biblically, is a divinely appointed ambassador of Christ, a representative, a messenger who speaks for God, and with the full authority of God. 

By the way, there were three qualifications for an apostle. Qualifications that the false apostles did not have. First of all, they had to be chosen directly by the Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly, they were to perform signs as an apostle, authenticating who they were and what they said - miraculous signs and wonders and mighty works. Second Corinthians 12:12. And then thirdly, they had to with their own eyes, see the resurrected Christ. And in First Corinthians 15 eight, Paul explicitly states that he was the last person to have met that third qualification. So the apostles now were Christ's authoritative, revelatory agents. And the writings were inspired; they carried the same weight as the Old Testament Scriptures. And now you're hearing this letter being read to your congregation. I can almost see it, can't you? The false apostles are probably seated back in a corner with their little group. All of their sycophants and their arms are folded and they got that scowl on their face. They're looking like they're having a gallbladder attack while the letter is being read. Elbows are being, you know, doing this type of thing. So that's what was going on. I mean, let's just face it. That's the dynamics. 

So now Paul, after explaining to them a life that imitates and draws others to Christ, a life that builds up the true Church, a life solely controlled by the pure gospel, he moves to the fourth evidence of godliness, and that is a life of unimpeachable integrity. Notice verse eleven, "Let such a person consider this, that what we are in word by letters when absent, such persons we are also indeed when present." Now, bear in mind, there were some false allegations going around about his character and conduct, lots of different things. And one of them had to do with the idea that Paul lacks consistency, he lacks integrity, that he's two faced, that there's really two Paul's; there's one that is fierce and frightening in his letters, but then there is another wimpy, weak little guy, when he's in person. That was the allegation. But Paul wanted them to understand that he was perfectly willing and able to deal aggressively, and forthrightly, with any of these people face to face. It kind of reminds me of a quiet, soft-spoken, long-suffering father dealing with a rebellious teenager, who finally looks over at him, points his finger and says, "Son, don't make me have to come over there." That's the dynamic that's going on here. 

So Paul assures them that he is the same man in person that he is when he's miles away communicating to them in writing. And he knew, and frankly all of these people knew, that the false teachers were the ones that were duplicitous, that were too faced. Their public persona did not reflect their private persona. I've witnessed this so many times over the years, having dealt with so many highly visible Christian leaders and music artists and so forth, lay persons as well. Oh, you'll hear these Bible verses just dripping off their tongue, just flowing like honey in public. But in private lookout, they'll treat their staff like slaves, and they'll cuss like sailors and drink like pirates. I've seen it. Paul was nothing like that. Moreover, Paul wasn't afraid to confront these people face to face, and they all knew that. Paul was not ruled by fear. Godly people are not ruled by the fear of man. They fear God but they don't fear man. He was not a people pleaser. I'm reminded of Proverbs 29:25, "The fear of man brings a snare, but he who trusts in the LORD will be exalted. Many seek the ruler's favor, but justice for man comes from the LORD. And unjust man is abominable to the righteous, and he who is upright in the way is abominable to the wicked." 

By the way, that's why the hypocritical false teachers hated Paul. They hate righteousness, they hate Christ. That's why we now live in a country that is that is bent on legalizing unrighteousness, and criminalizing righteousness; they can't stand it. That's why you have so much hypocrisy in government, for example, and in the church as well. Dear friends, like perhaps no other sin, hypocrisy is absolutely devastating to your testimony and your relationship with Christ because the Lord knows the truth. You're not fooling him. And if that is you, you need to repent and you need to guard your heart and know this, that your costume of pretense will eventually come off and the charade will be exposed.

Many times, the Lord uses his word to do that. Remember what the writer of Hebrews said in chapter four verse 12, and 13, "...the word of God...is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." So Paul was no hypocrite, and he was not afraid to confront these people if necessary. He had no desire to please men, and he was certainly not a bully. I think of what he wrote to the Thessalonian church in First Thessalonians two verse three and following. He said, "For our exhortation does not come from error, or impurity or by way of deceit; but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts. For we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed - God is witness - nor did we seek glory from men, either from you or from others, even though as apostles of Christ, we might have asserted our authority." So that gives you an idea once again of who he really was. 

So back to verse 11, "Let such persons consider this..." In other words, you people that say these terrible things about me being two faced, "...that what we are in word by letters when absent, such persons we are also in deed when present." By the way, he will go on to underscore the same issue in chapter 13, beginning in verse two, here's what he says, "I have previously said when present the second time, and though now absent I say in advance to those who have sinned in the past, and to all the rest as well, that if I come again, I will not spare anyone,..." There's my father's example, "Son, don't make me have to come over there." 

"...I will not spare anyone, since you are seeking for proof of the Christ who speaks in me, and who is not weak toward you, but mighty in you. For indeed He was crucified because of weakness, yet He lives because of the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, yet we live with Him because of the power of God directed toward you." 

Beloved, this is such an important evidence of godliness, to be a man or woman who is in public, what he or she is in private, and even to conduct yourself in writing the same way you would in person. I've seen a lot of things on Facebook that I dare say a person would never say to my face. Don't you know now people were squirming back there in the corner. Paul's not finished yet. 

He goes on to speak, fifthly, of how a godly life is one of humility and contentment. By the way, here in verse 12 and following is a lot of irony, a lot of sarcasm. Here's what he says in verse 12, "For we are not bold to class or compare ourselves with some of those who commend to themselves."  In other words, I'm not going to play your game, I'm not going to do the one upmanship thing by commending myself or comparing myself to others; I am not going to, in our vernacular, toot my own horn like you do. I'm not going to do that. Paul understood Proverbs 26 five, "Answer a fool as his folly deserves that he not be wise in his own eyes." That's how Paul was thinking. 

Now, let's just be honest with ourselves here. When we compare ourselves to others, we tend to pick people that we know are somehow beneath us, at least in our own mind, right? That's how it works. And we're hopelessly biased in our own favor. And by nature, we tend to exaggerate our accomplishments. We tend to even fish for compliments. We're all prone to self-promotion. You know, it's, I think about it, it starts when you're a toddler, you know, you, you look at the toddler, and, you know, the toddler says, Daddy, Daddy, watch this. And he jumps three times with both feet. And the daddy says, Oh, wow, look at you. You jump three times with both feet. Yeah. You know, you're gonna be an Olympic Hopper someday. You know, but we want that adoration. And even when we grow up, we still look for it. We're always commending ourselves. I mean, you see it on Facebook all the time. As I've said, you take away the comments and the likes on Facebook, the thing would fold up overnight. Occasionally, Nancy will snicker over their chair. She says honey, you gotta read this. And I know she's looking at something on Facebook. So I'll go over and read it. And so often it's the incoherent ramblings of a fool and I can't even get halfway through it. I feel, you know, I'm losing brain cells just reading the thing. But that's what false teachers do. You just read the stuff that they write, if you can tolerate it, or listen to them. And yet, they're always strutting around looking for praise. And so many of the things that they say are just are just ludicrous. 

Not to mention, some of the things they do are stupid. I was reading what was going on in a it's called Renewal Church of Chicago. And they recently hosted a speaker who said, quote, "The majority of white people have a mental disorder and don't even know it." Boy, he went on to say that we suffer from quote, "Post traumatic slave master disorder." I don't even know how to respond to that. I mean, that takes absurdity to... I mean that's just irrational. Folks, that snake oil medicine. But the problem is, people were buying this by the boatloads, by the truckloads. That's how Satan works. 

And I also noticed, you know, the My Pillow guy had some huge rally, I don't know, I don't know what all was going on there. But he was giving people prayer pillows. And he claims to be a believer, I hope he is. And I noticed on the stage, they're kneeling on these pillows. And they give everybody a prayer pillow when they leave. I mean, so many of the things. I mean, it's no wonder the world looks at Christians, and think, "my goodness, these people are nuts." Well, that's what false teachers do. 

Paul continues his defense, verse 12, he says, "...but when they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are without understanding." You know, Paul measured himself as we all should do, and again, this is an evidence of godliness. You don't measure yourself against other people, you measure yourself against Christ. What did Paul say? "Oh, wretched man that I am. Who will free me from the body of this death," referring to remaining sin that he still has strapped to him, so to speak. Thankfully, right after that, in Romans eight one he says, but there's, "no condemnation,” right, "for those who are in Christ." But folks, none of us have anything to brag about. Alright? I mean, even our righteousness are like filthy rags. We're all debtors to his Grace are only boast is in the Lord. I mean, to say that Paul was a bragger; think of what he told Timothy in First Timothy 1:13, he says, "I was formally a blasphemer, and a persecutor and a violent aggressor."  Can you imagine in the false teacher saying that? "Yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant with the faith and love, which are found in Christ Jesus." And he said this at First Corinthians two beginning in verse one, "I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching, were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit of power so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God." Well that doesn't sound like the words of an arrogant man. 

Second Corinthians 2:4, "For out of much affliction and anguish of heart, I wrote to you with many tears, not so that you would be made sorrowful, but that you might know the love which I have, especially for you." Then in chapter four, verse five, and also verse seven, he says, "For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord; and ourselves as your bond servants for Jesus' sake." And then he went on to say, "But we have this treasure in earthen vessels..." Earthen vessels, referring to a cheap, unattractive, fragile, expendable disposable clay pot. We have this treasure of the gospel in this clay pot, "...so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves."  Don't look at me, look at what's in the pot. That's the glory of the gospel. 

And notice what he goes on to say in verse 13 of Second Corinthians 10, "But we will not boast beyond our measure." This is so pointed. I mean, you read between the lines, what he's saying is, we will not boast beyond our measure like you false teachers do. Your exaggerated bogus claim of being an apostle. "But," Paul says, "within the measure of the sphere, which God apportion to us as a measure, to reach even as far as you." In other words, he would only point to the verifiable results of his ministry as it had been manifested there in Corinth and other places where God had called him. And it's beautiful to think about this; every ministry, no matter how seemingly insignificant, is important in God's eyes. As stewards we are to be found what? Faithful. Not successful in the eyes of the world, but faithful. Paul's humility was also therefore the key to his contentment. He was perfectly happy, blooming, where he was planted. Being a minister within the sphere of God's sovereignly, ordained boundaries for his ministry, for his life. 

I heard recently the story of a prominent theologian by the name of Norman Geisler. When he was a little boy, he was in an unsaved family, and somebody invited him to Vacation Bible School. So he went, as a little boy would do. And they said, Look, if you'd like to come to Sunday school, any of you children, we would be glad to bring you to Sunday school. We'll arrange a ride for you. And as the story goes, there was a bus driver in that church that drove Norman Geisler to Sunday school for eight years. They calculated about 400 times and never once during that time, did he ever make a profession of faith until the end of high school. And God, in his grace, radically saved him as he does all of us. And I was just thinking about how driving that bus was, as Paul said, "the measure of the sphere," which God apportioned to him. Folks, where are you driving the bus in your life? Doesn't have to be necessarily within the church, even though there's plenty of places to do that, but in your family and your work wherever it is. Where are you serving Christ, and joyfully, so? I thank God for godly grandmothers and grandfathers who prayed for me when I was a little boy; for parents that raised me in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. For Sunday school teachers, most of them little Swedish ladies, because we went to a Swedish Baptist Church in Moline, Illinois. I praise God for Boys Brigade leaders. That was our version of, I don't know what you have today, but it's kind of like a Christian boy scout, who every Thursday night, they would meet with us over at a gym, and we would play games, do all kinds of things. And then they would minister to us and disciple us. Many of those men who gave up a week of their vacation every year to take the boys up to the Boundary Waters of Minnesota for a canoe trip. I thank God for those people, men and women who served in obscurity, but they were faithful. They were humble, and they were content. 

Beloved, God has sovereignly measured a sphere of ministry for each one of you. And we can rejoice in that, as he says in verse 13, God has apportioned to us a measure of the sphere; that sphere of influence where he wants you to serve him for your good and his glory. And again, I would humbly ask you to examine your heart, where are you serving Christ? What's the sphere of influence that God has apportioned to you? Are you content with where God has you? You know, we're all part of the same body, we're all to serve one another and to put the glory of Christ on display. And I praise God for all the unseen workers here at Calvary Bible Church, especially the nursery workers. My goodness, that's got to be the toughest job in the church, you know? I mean, I'm just not good at changing diapers and screaming kids. I mean, a man's got to know his limitations, right? You know, I'm convinced that one of the most important ministries at Calvary Bible Church or any church, one that requires the greatest commitment to Christ and love for others is motherhood. That's just got to be the hardest job on Earth. Praise God for godly mothers. Dear friends, you will never be happy in your Christian life, unless you're serving him, joyfully with contentment and humility. Knowing that right now, and it may change in your life, but right now, in that sphere of influence that God has apportioned for you, that that is the place where God is blessing you and growing you and using you. 

Moreover, you're going to forfeit joy and effectiveness if you are jealous of other people, or if you're discontent with where God has stationed you. "But pastor, I'm not sure, I'm not sure what I need to be doing." Well then pray, ask the Spirit of God to show you. And believe me, he will. And just look around you and say, Lord, how can I be of help? 

So unlike the exaggerated boasting of the false apostles, who were looking to build a ministry empire, Paul was perfectly content with all of his suffering, all of his serving, within the sphere of ministry that God had apportioned to him. And then he adds this in verse 14, "For we're not overextending ourselves, as if we did not reach to you." In other words, it's no exaggeration for me to claim that I founded the church by God's grace in Corinth, that I came all the way, I mean, that's a, that's an indisputable fact. He goes on to say, "...For we were the first to come, even as far as you in the gospel of Christ; not boasting beyond our measure..." like you guys back there in the corner, that's the idea. "Not boasting beyond our measure, that is, in other men's labors." Well, that would have sucked the air right out of wherever they were right. That's a direct insult to those people. So often, false teachers and phony Christians in the church have no legitimate accomplishments of their own, but they merely put their name on the marquee of the buildings that others have erected. People ask me a lot of times, "Dave, how's your church going?" And I'm always quick to say, first of all, is not my church is the Lord's church. You know, I'm just happy to be there. But to answer your question, "He is doing great things in spite of me. Because he has placed me right in the midst of a group of godly people, godly service, with a multiplicity of gifts," and I'll kind of go on like this. And it's like, boy, I didn't ask for all of this, but okay, thank you. But it's important for us to realize that we all need each other. 

You know, I was thinking about this. Do you realize that roughly 20 years ago, seven families of this church and that was just about all there were, cosigned a note to the bank to build this building. Think about that. That's people that are dedicated, that's people that are committed. So again, Paul was not boasting beyond his measure that is in other men's labors. And he goes on in verse 15, to say, "...but with the hope that as your faith grows, we will be within our sphere, enlarged even more by you," verse 16, "so as to preach the gospel even to the regions beyond you..." In other words, our prayer is that as you grow in Christ, we will be able to assist others and you will co labor with us for the sake of the Gospel, in an ever-extending realm of ministry. I mean, that's what needs to happen in a church. 

And then he says in verse 16, "...and not to boast in what has been accomplished in the sphere of another." In other words, I'm not going to take credit for other men's labors. But then he says this, "BUT HE WHO BOASTS IS TO BOAST IN THE LORD." Verse 17, "For, it is not he who commends himself that is approved, but he whom the Lord commends."  And this, dear friends, is the final evidence of godliness; a life that is devoted to the glory of Christ. 

You see, all false teachers will end up boasting in themselves rather than giving the glory to God. Over the years I've been around a lot of Christian big shots, a lot of them that you would know, a lot of Christian artists. A lot of them that they will not fly and listen first class. They have to have five-star hotels, motels, whatever. They have to go to five-star restaurants, they will tell you this. Male and female prima donnas - a prima donna is a temperamental person, according to the dictionary, a person who takes adulation and privilege treatment as a right and reacts with petulance to criticism or inconvenience. Boy, does that describe a lot of people that I've known and know even to this day. They will give you a list of requirements of the kind of food and drinks that they want in a certain room before they go on stage, before they preach; they will have an entourage that will carry all their bags and wait on them hand and foot. Why do people do that? Because they're filled with pride. They're looking for self-glory, not the glory of the Lord. There's is a life to the glory, life that is dedicated to the glory of self, not the glory of Christ. I mean, folks compare that to the life and the sufferings of Christ and the apostles. I mean, self-commendation, is absolutely repulsive. 

Remember what the Lord spoke through his servant, Jeremiah in Jeremiah nine, beginning in verse 23, "Thus says the Lord, 'Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might; let not a rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boast, boast of this, that he understands and knows Me.  That I am the LORD who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness on Earth. For I delight in these things.' Declares the Lord." You want God to bless your life and use your life for his glory? Do you want him to delight in you? Then devote yourself to what we've just read, to understanding him, knowing him and exercising lovingkindness, justice, and righteousness on Earth. In other words, be a godly man or woman that is absolutely consumed and devoted to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Dear child of God, your life is to be all about God and his glory, not you and your glory. And if this is true for you, then you will enjoy the God's blessing. Romans 15:17, Paul said this, such an amazing passage, "Therefore, in Christ Jesus, I have found reason for boasting in things pertaining to God." What a great statement. And he goes on to say, "For I will not presume to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me, resulting in the obedience of the Gentiles by word and deed." Oh, what a magnificent reminder. 

And again, what he says here in verse 17, if Second Corinthians 10, "BUT HE WHO BOASTS IS TO BOAST IN THE LORD. For it is not he who commends himself that is approved, but he whom the Lord commends." And dear friends, that commendation in your life and in mind, will not ultimately come until we see him face to face. So don't be looking for it now. Oh, he will bless, he will encourage, he will strengthen, but the commendation ultimately comes when, as selfless servants, we stand before him, and we hear him say, "Well done, faithful slave. Enter into the joy of your master." You see, a life devoted to the glory of Christ is one that gives him praise for all of his or her accomplishments. Moreover, it will be a life that is lived with an eye towards heaven. Don't be looking at the temporal things. They will all disappear. It's the eternal things that will last. 

Well, there you have it, six evidences of godliness; a life that imitates and draws others to Christ. It will be a life that builds up the true Church, one that is solely controlled by the pure gospel, one of unimpeachable integrity, one of humility and contentment, and a life devoted to the glory of Christ. 

Let me close with just something real brief, real practical for you. You say I want to grow in godliness? Well, let me give you some practical ways to do that. Number one, listen to great Bible expositors, because you won't grow apart from the Word of God. Listen to men that will unpack the scriptures and help you understand and apply them. Peter described this in First Peter two one and following, "Therefore putting aside all malice, all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babes long for the pure milk of the word." In other words, the word, like milk for a baby, is going to be a matter of life and death. Crave it, so that, "by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord." 

Secondly, spend time around godly mature saints who manifest these six evidence of godliness, Not always, but in most cases, they're going to have gray hair. Because they've been around long enough to experience these things. First Corinthians 15:33 Paul says, "Do not be deceived, bad company corrupts good morals." Company in Greek, "homilia" - we get our word "homily" our English word homily from that, refers to communications or conversations, including lectures and sermons. But it also refers to things like associations or consorting with or joining in with others. Choose your friends wisely; spend your time around godly people. Don't listen to these deceptive sermons or associate with these people that are that are phony, they will corrupt good morals. Don't pay any attention to errant doctrine, to bad doctrine, it will corrupt you. These things are insidious; spend time around godly saints. 

Thirdly, do character studies in the Bible. Study great men and women of God. And I might add to that, read biographies of godly men and women, I love to do that. I probably, there's very seldom a week that goes by that I don't read church history and read about these godly people. My how you can learn from them. By the way, unless you read and study, you'll never really grow in Christ. Okay, you've got to read you've got to study. Paul said in First Timothy four, seven, "But have nothing to do with worldly fables fit for only for old women." By the way, Paul's describing the teachings of the Ephesian heretics, describe them as godless and just old wives tales, that which is religiously bankrupt. He says, "On the other hand," and I love this, "discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness." "Gymnazo" - we get our word gymnasium from that, discipline. By the way, it refers to physical exercise. If I can put it this way, work out for the purpose of godliness, alright? You're gonna have to, you're gonna have to discipline yourself, get a workout plan, and stick with it. Find out where you're weak and start building up. It's not going to happen just automatically, just by showing up at church. I mean, that's going to help, you're going to have to apply these things. Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness. 

Then he adds this, "for bodily discipline is only a little profit." By the way, it's at least a "little profit" so you need to be doing that too, alright? So don't think you're off the hook here. And you can just be a couch potato. It is a little profit, but it's only a little but he says, "...godliness is profitable for all things since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come." 

And then finally, please hear me. Pray for your growth and godliness. Okay? Make it a matter of prayer, that needs to be a priority. Jesus said in John 14:13, "'Whatever you ask in My name..." doesn't mean tacking on Jesus’ name under the end of your prayer. It means with a desire to bring glory to Christ, "'Whatever you ask in My name for My glory, that will I do so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in My name, I will do it. If you love me, you will keep My commandments.'" 

Let's pray together. Father, this is at the desire of our heart. We want more than anything else in the world to give you glory and all things. And we pray that you will help us to that end. Give us an ever-increasing passion, to know you more, to serve you more, to experience the joy of your presence within our soul. Help us to keep your commandments. Deliver us from evil. Lead us not into temptation and so many other things like that, that we know you would have us pray. Lord may this be the passion of every heart here at Calvary Bible Church. And, Lord, for those who may not know you as Savior, I pray that you will bring conviction, that you will break their heart over their sin and restore their heart by your saving grace as you cause them to be born again and give them the gift of faith, Lord, we plead on their behalf and to that end. For it's in Jesus' name that I pray. Amen.

Will you take your Bible and turn to Second Corinthians chapter 10. We continue to make our way verse by verse through this amazing epistle. And this morning, we're going to be looking at verses seven through 10, which, frankly, is a rather obscure passage of scripture. It's one that can easily be ignored, and certainly, if taken out of context can seem to be a passage that really, somewhat irrelevant, maybe meaningless in some way. But to be sure, the Spirit of God never wrote anything that is irrelevant, that we shouldn't dig into. And that's what we will do today. As you will see, this is a passage that is not only very relevant, but it is very instructive. 

Dave Harrell  

Let me remind you of the context, the Apostle Paul is defending his apostolic authority against the scurrilous attacks of false teachers that had entered into the church of Corinth, and had seduced frankly, most of the people. But Paul had written a severe letter, rebuking them and most of the people repented. But there were still some that had not, along with probably the false teachers. And so this is part of that rebuke, as well as a reminder of the things that they need to look for with respect to godliness; and that's why I've been titled, my discourse to you this morning "Evidence of Godliness." So let me read the passage we'll look at here this morning. Second Corinthians 10, beginning in verse seven, 

Dave Harrell  

"You are looking at things as they are outwardly. If anyone is confident in himself that he is Christ's, let him consider this again within himself, that just as he is Christ's, so also are we. 

Dave Harrell  

For even if I boast somewhat further about our authority, which the Lord gave for building you up, and not for destroying you, I will not be put to shame,

Dave Harrell  

for I do not wish to seem as if I would terrify you by my letters. 

Dave Harrell  

For they say, "His letters are weighty and strong, but his personal presence is unimpressive and his speech contemptible." 

Dave Harrell  

Now, today, and next week, we will examine this passage along with the rest of this section that goes through verse 18, where we will discover some very important principles with respect to discerning the difference between genuine godliness, and rank hypocrisy. And given the catastrophic failure of evangelical leadership in our country today, this is a subject of most importance. I was grieving over this again, this week. Our country, as you know hopefully, is in a moral freefall. And many ostensibly, evangelical churches have drank the Kool Aid. They've not only drank the Kool Aid, they're making it and passing it out. I was reading a Gallop poll that said that one in six Gen X, or Gen Z adults identify as LGBT. By the way, Gen Z is somebody born in the late 90s through 2010. One in six identify as LGBT, the highest percentage of any generation in history, the poll said, and that number is likely to increase according to the survey data released by Gallop. Frightening. And this trend, according to senior editor Jeffrey Jones, is going to increase because it's at a time when, as he says, "Americans are increasingly supportive of equal rights for gay, lesbian and transgender people. A growing percentage of Americans identify themselves as LGBT, with younger generations far more likely than older generations to consider themselves LGBT. That growth should continue." As he says Gallup notes that, "One of the most significant recent advances in LGBT rights was the legislation of same sex marriage nationwide in 2015. And in June 2020, you will recall the US Supreme Court also ruled that civil rights laws protect gay and transgender workers. 

Dave Harrell  

And now, undoubtedly the most vile threat to religious freedom in the history of our country has passed the House and is moving towards the Senate. It is called the Equality Act. And by the way, in my new book, Why America hates Biblical Christianity, I will deal with this more at length. But let's just pray that the Senate blocks it. But frankly, the fact that it would even pass the House tells us that our country has descended into an abyss of moral degeneracy from which it will never recover. However, folks, remember this, the King is coming, right? The King is coming, and probably very soon. If you're a young boy, and you identify as a female, guess what? You're going to get to use the restroom with my daughters and granddaughters. You will have the right to shower with young women. If you're a young woman and you identify as a male, you cannot be denied a job at a church or a Bible school on the basis of your gender identity. If you're a young person, and you decide that you want to have your body surgically mutilated, so that you can somehow approximate the other sex and take hormones so that you can be somewhat like this other sex, doctors and hospitals will be forced to comply. Insurance companies will be forced to pay. 

Dave Harrell  

Well, of course, none of this is a surprise to biblically discerning Christians because we know that this is all part of the wrath of divine abandonment described in Romans one. You will recall in verse 18, the Apostle Paul says, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness." And he goes on to say "...they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator." And then he goes on to say, "And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God..." here it is, "gave them over..." abandoned them "...to a depraved mind." But folks, what is really disturbing is the growing number, as I said earlier, of ostensibly evangelical churches, and pastors, who support these abominations, and many others like them, like the social justice gospel, and the woke heresies consistent with what is now called progressive Christianity; that promotes a toxic Marxist agenda, especially critical race theory; saying that these racist deceptions are inherent in the gospel of God, that they're part of the gospel. "I'm amazed..." as Paul said in Galatians, one and verse six, "...that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel; which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!"  

Dave Harrell  

I'm sure at least two to maybe five times a week, I receive an email or a call from various places, even around the world, where people are asking me to comment on certain preachers, certain authors, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? They're just horrified at some of the things they're reading and hearing. And of course, so many that are out there today are nothing more than entrepreneurs, or entertainers, or con artists, some of them witting some of them are unwitting; they're just ignorant. Men and women lacking in personal integrity. I mean, think about it, practically every month you hear of another evangelical leader who is being exposed for living a double life? Now the question is, how can such hypocrisy go unnoticed? How does that happen? How can one discern a true shepherd from a false shepherd? Think of this, how could the Corinthians be snickered by these false apostles that came into the church and abandoned Paul and what He taught? Again, remember, these guys infiltrated the church there in Corinth in Paul's absence, and they successfully undermined his authority by slandering him and his message. And they began to advance a different gospel. That's always Satan's agenda. And that different gospel was a combination of Jewish legalism and pagan mysticism. These guys would claim that they've got superior secret knowledge, that they were more enlightened than other people. And this was typical of that era of history. These were the ideological fortresses that Paul talked about in verses four and five, the "...speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God..." 

Dave Harrell  

Moreover, because the Greeks were so committed to sophistry and skilled oratory, the flowery rhetoric of worldly wise philosophers - which was really a form of entertainment for them - because of all of this, these false teachers came in and did the same thing. Wowed the people got them all worked up. And boy, you can do that if you do it right. Before you know it, everybody's quivering. They got a quiver in their liver. They're shouting, they're running around, and that's what happened. You read about that in First Corinthians. Moreover, the charlatans were heavily influenced by libertine theology, antinomianism, gross immorality, so there was no emphasis on personal holiness, or purity of life, purity of the church. So naturally, all these things were appealing to the flesh. So these people got snookered. Many abandoned the Apostle Paul and followed in behind these predators until the severe letter came, he rebuked them, many of them as I say, repented. But obviously many of the saints lacked discernment. And that's what we're seeing today. They were unable to detect predators in their pulpits. And we all know that counterfeits can be very hard to spot, any kind of a counterfeit. I mean, think of Judas Iscariot. I mean, the rest of the guys didn't even they didn't dream that he was who he was. But dear friends an evil heart will eventually manifest itself. Just a matter of time;  truth and time walk hand in hand, especially when a person is peddling the Word of God for profit or for self gratification, referring to candidates for the office of elder. In First Timothy 5:24, Paul says "The sins of some men are quite evident, going before them to judgment..." judgment, referring to the church's ability to discern who they really are, and their suitability to shepherd. But then he says this, "...for others, their sins follow after." It shows up later on, you can't see it at first. 

Dave Harrell  

Beloved, bad fruit does not grow on a good tree, but it grows, and it will eventually manifest itself. Jesus warned of this in Matthew seven verse 15, "'Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing..." It carries the idea of wearing the garb of a shepherd. In other words, you're not going to look like a real pastor. Be aware of them; "...but inwardly," he says, "are ravenous wolves." Then he says this, "You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes, nor figs from thistles are they? So every good tree bears good fruit but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.'"  Beloved, we are to be good fruit inspectors, right? We are to judge righteously. In fact, Jesus said in John 7:24, "'Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment.'" And certainly we're not to judge harshly, like the self righteous Pharisees who beat people to death with the club of legalism. That's why Jesus said in Matthew seven one, "'Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged...'" He's speaking specifically here to the Pharisees. "...And by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?'" 

Dave Harrell  

So indeed, we need to be discerning, but we need to judge with righteous judgment. Paul speaks of this as well in Romans 16, beginning of verse 70, "Now I urge you, brethren, keep your eye on those who cause dissensions and hindrances contrary to the teaching which you learned, and turn away from them. For such men are slaves, not of our Lord Christ but of their own appetites; and by their smooth and flattering speech they deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting." And you will recall that's what Paul did in the New Testament. He called them out by name. Remember, Hymenaeus and Philetus, whose has he said "empty chatter," led to "further ungodliness," whose wicked talk "spread like gangrene." Second Timothy two. You see faithful shepherds, and faithful saints, are always going to be discerning. And when they see deception, when they see error, when they see a wolf, they're going to deal with it, for the glory of Christ. The eternal destiny of men souls as a stake. These are false teachers who according to Second Peter two one, "...secretly introduce destructive heresies...", who distort the scriptures to their own destruction. 

Dave Harrell  

So we've got to judge with righteous judgment, but what is that standard of judgment that we need to use? Can you be more specific? Well, Jesus said, "you will know them by their fruits." Well, okay, but what will those fruits really look like? This is a very important subject. You will remember the Apostle Paul exhorted the elders in Ephesus, in Acts 20, beginning of verse 28, he said, "'Be on your guard..." elders, "Be on your guard for yourselves and for all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God, which He purchased with His own blood. I know that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them. Therefore be on the alert." So the question is, what do we need to look for? How can we be more discerning? To put it a little bit differently, what are some of the evidences of genuine godliness? The inspired apostle gives us insight into this matter here, in Second Corinthians 10, verses seven all the way through 18, we're just going to look at seven through 10 here this morning. And here what he does is most fascinating, he exposes the false by highlighting the true, and you will see this as we go on. 

Dave Harrell  

Today we're gonna look at three evidences, three evidences of godliness. First of all, you will see a life that imitates and draws others to Christ. Secondly, a life that builds up the true Church and finally, a life solely controlled by the gospel. 

Dave Harrell  

Now lets look at this closely, verse seven, "You are looking at things as they are outwardly." "You are looking" - the Greek term, term "blepo" means to take into consideration or, or to look at. Let me be technical for a moment because this is important. In Greek grammar, this is a verb that can be interpreted either as an indicative or as an imperative, it can go either way. You will remember, an indicative is just a statement of fact. So you could read this as it is here in the NASB, "You are looking at things as they are outwardly." But it can also be interpreted as an imperative. In other words, as a command. So it could be interpreted this way, "Look at things as they are outwardly." Look at what is before your eyes, look at the facts. Look at the facts in the face, you might say. And I believe frankly, the imperative is a better way of translating this, since this, by the way, is how Paul uses this verb elsewhere in the New Testament, and it fits so perfectly with the context I believe, it can be translated this way,  "Look at what is before your very eyes, you Corinthians. You have come to the wrong conclusion about me and my message. If you will just look at things as they are outwardly, you're going to have sufficient evidence of the power of God working through me for the glory of Christ, that will refute what these guys have been saying, and refute what some of you have been believing."  

Dave Harrell  

So this brings us to the first evidence of godliness. Number one, you will see a life that imitates and draws others to Christ. Again, verse seven, "Looking at things as they are outwardly." We might say it this way, the proof is in the pudding, right? Wake up and smell the coffee, I don't know, face the facts. That's the idea. And then he says this, "If anyone is confident in himself, that he is Christ's, let him consider this again within himself that just as he is Christ's, so also are we." And when he says, "If anyone is confident in himself..." he's basically; it can be translated this way, if anyone is to be convinced or to be successfully persuaded of something, namely, that he is in Christ, that he's a true Christian, well let him consider this again within himself. That just as he is Christ, well, so also are we. In other words, if you can make that claim, based on your own internal awareness of who you think you are, I mean, two can play that game. That's what he's saying. Said differently, if the only evidence you have to offer concerning your apostolic relationship with Christ, and your personal holiness is your own subjective opinion of yourself, without any objective confirmation, then I could make the same claim; two can play that game. Now, no doubt he was addressing, specifically the alpha member of the wolfpack, the ringleader of the false apostles. What Paul described as that messenger from Satan, that he considered his thorn in the flesh. But the claim that the guy had, or any of them had, or anyone has, is just in himself. I mean, anyone can claim to be a Christian, right? Anyone can claim to be a pastor. I mean, these days, if you can fog a mirror, you can be a pastor. Anybody can claim that they've got a message from God. But in Matthew seven again, Jesus warns that most people who call themselves Christians are just Christian in name only. They're self-deceived. Most Christians are self-deceived. That's why he said in Matthew 7:20, "'you will know them by their fruits. Not everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.'" There's the key. "'Many will say to Me on that day, "Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name, cast out demons in Your name performed many miracles?" And then I will declare to them, "I never knew you; DEPAART FROM ME, YOU WHO ARE PRACTICING LAWLESSNESS."'"

Dave Harrell  

Beloved, biblically, a mere profession of faith does not validate the genuineness of your faith. Not even here in this text, prophesying or casting out demons, or performing many miracles, None of that really proves anything. None of that validates genuine saving faith. By the way, all of those things can easily be counterfeited or produced by demons. Paul dealt with that in First Corinthians, especially chapters 12 through 14. You see dear friends, authentic Christianity will always be validated by the fruits of righteousness in a person's life. As Jesus says, He who does the will of the Father, the will of my Father, as you've heard me say before, if you say you're an apple tree, let's see your apples. Pretty simple. A true Christian is going to be one who loves Christ, who loves his world, his word and who resembles Christ. Jesus said, "'If you abide in My word...'" John 8:31, "'...then you are truly disciples of Mine...'" In other words, a true believer is going to surrender to the Lordship of Christ in his or her life. That person will will love the word of God, will obey the word of God and live it out even as Jesus did the will of his Father. I would ask you dear friend, does this describe you, or might you be self-deceived? Jesus said in John 14:21, "'He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.'" He went on to say in verse 23, "'If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father's who sent Me.'" And likewise, in First John two the apostle John says, "The one who says, 'I have come to know Him...'" verse four, "...and does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him, the love of God has truly been perfected. By this, we know that we are in Him." This is how, you know if you're truly a believer, "...the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked." As Jesus walked. You know, I've learned over the years when I ask a person if they're a Christian, not to ask, So are you a Christian? Because especially in our culture, I mean, everybody's a Christian around here, right? I mean, you, you've gone to a church, you know, you love NASCAR and country music. I mean, you're an American, of course, you're a Christian. I mean, it just covers all kinds of things. Anybody can say that. But it's altogether different to say, I'm curious, "Do you love, love and serve Christ?" Well, that puts a different spin on it. So Paul is saying, Look, folks, the real proof about who I am, and the message that I preach is right before your very eyes. To merely say this or that about yourself, without any evidence doesn't prove anything. That's what he's saying. He's saying I want you to examine my life. I want you to look at the evidence in my life; I mean, my goodness talk to Annanais is who was who was part of my dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus; talk to him. Interview my traveling companions, interview my ministry partners, talk with Barnabas and Silas and Luke and  Timothy; talk with those people that by God's grace, I've been able to lead to Christ and that I've discipled; many of you are that way. Talk with the saints and the other churches that I have founded, examine the evidence of my life, and the impact that I have had for the glory of Christ in others. O child of God, don't miss this. If you truly belong to Christ, if you're united to him in saving faith, your life will manifest the virtues of Christ, and others will be drawn to Christ for having been around you. That's the first evidence of godliness. Second Corinthians five, verse 14, Paul says, "the love of Christ controls us." Does the love of Christ control you? I hope it does. He goes on to say, "...so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf." In other words, the old self -entered life is over, a spiritual resurrection has taken place. We now walk in newness of life. And he goes on to say, "If any man is in Christ, he is..." a what? "...A new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." And guess what folks? Other people will see it. 

Dave Harrell  

Again, the apostle John says in First John 4:13, "By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit." And it's the Spirit that causes regeneration and sanctification. This is also at the heart of Paul's great doxology; remember recorded and Ephesians one three, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ." What an amazing statement. Beloved, we are in Christ and to be in Christ is an expression of interconnectedness, whereby we share a common spiritual life with Christ. It never ceases to amaze me when I think what happened when I became a Christian, when you you became a Christian; we were redeemed that God might inhabit us, and change us. And that change will be obvious to other people. We, "...have died..." and our "...life is hidden with Christ in God." Colossians three, three; he is "...our life..." verse four goes on to say. In Galatians 2:20 it says that he lives in us, absolutely astounding. So folks, when you examine other pastors and authors and other people, you know, this is where you need to begin, "Do I see Christ in this man, or this woman?" And, "Am I, and other people, drawn to Christ, because of that person's character, because of their conduct?" Not drawn to their church, not drawn to their doctrinal thinking, not drawn to tradition, or even their teaching, or even to that person, certainly not drawn to their political agenda, but am I drawn to Christ because of what I see in that person's life. 

Dave Harrell  

I know lots of Christians who never talk about Christ. It always amazes me. I know lots of Christians whose lives cannot be distinguished from unbelievers. You can't really tell the difference. You claim to be in Christ, and yet, you look just like everybody else that's at enmity with God; spiritually dead. People that have no love for his word, they have no burden for the lost, they have no passion for holiness in their life, for the glory of God. They're like chameleons. I'm fascinated with those little creatures. I know you're aware of them. They can blend in to any environment, you just sit there and watch them. And their colors begin to change. Why isn't it amazing how that evolved? Ha. Many Christians have an uncanny ability to blend in to the very world that God has redeemed us out of, to the very world that hates Christ. In Romans 12, it is, in verse two. We're told in the command there, "Do not be conformed to this world." Which literally means do not unwittingly allow the world to cause you to manifest, on the outside, some masquerade that is inconsistent with who you really are on the inside. Don't let that happen. Rather be "transformed by the renewing of your mind." Let a metamorphosis occur as a result of what the word of God does. That's the purpose of us being here this morning. 

Dave Harrell  

The apostle Paul was no chameleon. O, he imitated Christ. That's why he said in First Corinthians 11 one, "Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ." And beloved, as a result of that, others were drawn to Christ; not to him, but to Christ. That's why he said in First Corinthians two, two, "I determined to know nothing among you." Nothing among you pagans that believed all of this idolatrous garbage, all of this satanic deception, all of this immorality that was a part of your life and your culture. "I determined to know nothing among you except Christ, and Him crucified." No other agenda, no other a message. Just unleash the gospel. So the first evidence of genuine godliness is a life that imitates and draws others to Christ. 

Dave Harrell  

Secondly, a life that builds up the church. Notice verse eight, "For even if I boast somewhat further about our authority..." He's saying basically, if I say more than I'm normally comfortable saying about apostolic authority, that's the idea. In other words, he's uneasy with being forced into the situation whereby he has to boast at all. "For even if I boast somewhat further about our authority, which the Lord gave me for building you up, and not for destroying you. I will not be put to shame." "Oikodome" in Greek; it's the idea of edification, building you up; it carries the idea of bringing something closer to a place of completion. That's what Paul was all about. And his point is that it's abundantly clear if you look at my life, that that's what I'm all about. All you have to do is observe my life and my ministry. I'm all about building people up in Christ, not building a church. I mean, anybody can do that. There's a huge difference between a crowd and a church, but building people up so they become more like Christ. I mean, how else could you possibly explain how those people came to saving faith and how they began to grow in Christ? You see, it was an irrefutable fact that God had empowered Paul as an apostle to bring the Gospel to sinners. And so there was nothing in his ministry that would deny what God had done through him. 

Dave Harrell  

Beloved, true believers, especially true pastors, will naturally be devoted to building other people up in Christ. Never tearing them down. That's what false teachers do. That's what phony Christians do. There's nothing worse than having a wrecking ball in the church. They're divisive. They're factious, they're controlling. You end up causing a church to fall apart; people get confused, they get deceived, they get hurt. But false teachers, by the way, usually pastor false churches, but boy when they come into a true church, it's throwing the cat in amongst the pigeons. I was thinking about a profile of an apostate that we see in Jude's little epistle. Let me just give them to you, some of the things that he described. This is what you see in a false teacher: they are ungodly, morally perverted, they reject the Lordship of Christ, they defile the flesh. They have immoral lifestyles, reject authority, pretend to know what they do not know. They're ignorant dreamers they're corrupt grumblers, fault finders, self-seeking, arrogant, flatterers mockers; they cause division and they're worldly minded without the Spirit of God. But Paul's life was radically different than all of that. He was all about building up or edifying other believers. In fact, we read about this in Ephesians, four, in verse 11, he says, "And He gave some as apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers." It could be translated pastor/teacher; that's what I've been called to do. Why? "...for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up..."  there's the same Greek word - "...the building up of the body of Christ." Why? "...until we all attain to the unity of the faith..." By the way, this is not talking about some ecumenical, you know, let's hold hands and sing Kumbaya. This is talking about doctrinal unity; "...until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result..."  here's what will happen,  "...we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming, but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up and all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ." 

Dave Harrell  

Beloved, for a godly man or a woman, certainly a pastor, building other people up in the body of Christ will just come naturally. It's like my neighbor's little beagle dog when he lets him out, he just chases rabbits. He can't help it. It's like my bird dogs used to be. I mean, they're just made for that. They just do that. That's what true believers do; we can't help it. And isn't it a wonderful thing to be around people that build you up? Rather than tear you down? You're drawn to their love of Christ. And therefore you're drawn to Christ; people that encourage you and strengthen you. People that, if I can put it this way, they charge your battery rather than drain it. You know, the idea. I've encouraged people like that and they've encouraged me; what a joy that is. But I've also encountered over the years and counseled many charlatans, some of them you would know. And many phony Christians. And one thing that I can always say is when you talk with them, you get around them, especially very long, you'll see that there's nothing about their life that's imitating Christ and drawing you to him. There's nothing about their life that builds you up to want to know and serve Christ more fully. Oh, they'll build you up. You know, to think more highly of yourself. But they won't edify you so that you will see more clearly the glory of Christ and worship Him. You always feel like you're on duty around them. You know that feeling, you're on duty, you're kind of suspicious, you're not real comfortable around them. And that reminds me of a guy that was next to me at Moody Bible Institute in the next room. He was missionary's kid with Wycliffe translators from Peru. He had feet that no kid and they were about this wide, he had to have special shoes made because he had always gone barefoot. I mean, his toes look like gorilla toes. I mean, it was amazing. But he had two pet boa constrictors about six feet long in his room, and he loved to come into my room while I was studying and put one here and put one around my shoulders. And all of a sudden, I'm on duty. That's kind of how I feel when I'm around those kinds of people. It's like, I'm just not real comfortable with this whole thing. Maybe a silly analogy, but you get the idea. But when you're around a godly person, you're just drawn to them. You just feel at home. You can sense their love and their likeness to Christ. Their life will be a living example of Colossians 1:28 and nine, remember, the text says, "We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ. For this purpose, also..." catch this, "...I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me." In other words, like the apostle Paul said right there, a godly man or woman will have a life that will revolve around those three verbs, proclaim, admonish, and teach. You see, that's always God's method for building up the church. He brings us together so that we will proclaim, we will admonish, and we will teach. 

Dave Harrell  

By the way, the profile of an apostate, in Second Peter, is that they're driven by three things, but not these three things; they're driven by sex, money and power. Very, very different. And their false teaching is the means to attain those things. But think about this, a godly person will "proclaim." The term in the original language just speaks of any form of public declaration of truth; pointing people to Christ as their only hope of salvation that will be their proclamation. That's what you will hear, that will be the theme of their conversations. 

Dave Harrell  

Also "admonish" -  the term means to warn or to exhort, or even to encourage other people; even to correct. Acts 20 verse 31, Paul speaks again to the elders at Ephesus and he says, "...night and day for a period of three years, I did not cease to..." here it is, "...admonish each one with tears." And he exhorted the Colossians, saying in Colossians, 3:15, "Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you with all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another." 

Dave Harrell  

And then the term "teaching" carries many of the same implications but with an added emphasis of being able to articulate practical doctrinal truth and apply it to your life or to the life of others. That's why he says in Colossians, 1:28, "...with all wisdom..." teaching with all wisdom, "...so that we may present every man complete in Christ." By the way, I might add, while both admonishing and teaching are the responsibility of every mature believer - it's part of our great commission - It is the primary task of a faithful shepherd. That's what you will look for. In Titus chapter one, verse nine, Paul says, an overseer, an elder must be able to, quote, "...hold fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching..." the apostolic teaching. Why? "...that he may be able to both exhort in sound doctrine and refute those who contradict." 

Dave Harrell  

Well, this was inherent in Paul's clear expository preaching, remember, in First Timothy 4:13, he writes to Timothy and he says, "Until I come, give attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching." Read, explain and apply the word. That's what we do every Sunday morning, right? Read, explain and apply the word. And what happens? Saints are built up, they become more like Christ. 

Dave Harrell  

So the first evidence of godliness is a life that imitates and draws others to Christ. Secondly, a life that builds up the true Church and finally, a life solely controlled by the pure gospel. This is really interesting. He first says in verse nine, "...for I do not wish to seem as if I would terrify you by my letters." Undoubtedly he's speaking about the two letters that he sent, especially the severe letter; he's reassuring them of his deep love for them. I mean, after all, his desire is to build them up in Christ, not beat them up. And so he has compassion for them. He's not trying to bully them. Anytime you feel bullied by a pastor or anybody, you know, there's ungodliness going on. He's not there to manipulate or intimidate as he was being charged. By the way, it's always interesting how the false teachers end up being the very thing they're accusing others of being. 

Dave Harrell  

Verse 10, then he says "For they say, 'His letters are weighty and strong...'" The idea here is, no one's denying that his letters were weighty and strong. He was an inspired apostle of God. So no one denied the persuasive power of his writing, but they say, "...his personal presence..." Now by the way, this isn't referring to what he looked like physically, but rather his demeanor, how he projected himself, how he impacted other people with his presence and with his message. His, "...personal presence is unimpressive and his speech contemptible." Now, this is most fascinating. It's very instructive when we piece it together with other passages. Remember, now, when when he came to Corinth, he didn't come like everybody else would come. With all the flowery rhetoric, he came to them in humble weakness. He didn't come with the bombastic, arrogant, flowery rhetoric of the roving philosophers that entertained and wowed the people. Remember how he came, recorded in First Corinthians two, one, "And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you, except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness, and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching, were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit, and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God." You see, a godly person is going to operate by the power of the Spirit, not by the power of the flesh. He will have no desire to resort to all the methods of the world; the methods of men. Jesus said in Matthew 20 verse 25, "'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them.'" That's not how we should be. A godly man or woman knows that the power is in the message, not the method, and not the messenger. I like to put it this way, message determines method.

Dave Harrell  

You see, Paul knew that only the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile. And so what did he do? He came in quietly, and humbly. And he spoke forthrightly and accurately and compellingly and clearly, and compassionately, and he just unleashed the truth. You see, he had no desire to come into the culture and study the techniques and strategies of that culture. He had no desire to cultivate eloquence, or the art of persuasion, all the hand signals and all of the manners and all of the style that the people were used to. He was the very opposite of being seeker sensitive, you might say. He didn't say, you know, I need to study the culture here so that I can shape my delivery, and then align the content of my message with the spirit of the age, I must learn how to endear myself to the culture and creative ways. I need to learn how to begin to have a conversation with the people you know, find some common ground, and certainly rule out anything that might offend people. And then I can capture their attention. And once I capture their attention, then I can induce them to exercise their will and believe in Christ and make a decision for Christ. 

Dave Harrell  

No, he said, "I determined to know nothing among you, except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." You see, the point is this folks, Paul was so confident in the message and therefore the power of the gospel, that he reached, that it drove his philosophy of ministry. Which, according to everybody else, is counterintuitive. By the way, I'm accused of that all the time; this church is accused of that. This is counterintuitive. Are you kidding? Come in to listen to some guy open up the Word of God for almost an hour. I mean, where's the smoke? And where's the, you know, the band. And, of course, we've got a great band, but you know what I'm saying? I've seen people come in here before with no Bible. And while I'm praying, they're getting out. I mean, they just feel, you know, completely out of place. It's so sad. But what happened when he unleashed the Word of God in that counterintuitive way, depending solely upon the power of the Spirit, and the message preached to transform sinners, that's what happened. I mean, frankly, most hearts were hardened. But many hearts were softened. And that's what the Word of God will always do. That's why he said in First Corinthians 1:23, "...we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block the Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called both Jews and Greeks." That message is "...Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God, because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men." 

Dave Harrell  

Beloved, whenever you see a pastor, or a church, constantly adjusting its message, and its methods to accommodate the culture, you need to get out of there. They're operating in the flesh, not in the Spirit. You see, because Paul embraced a, shall we say, a biblical soteriology. His message was uncompromising, and his manner was unconventional. But look what God did. His strategies for church growth made no sense from the world's perspective. But look what God did. Look what he's done in your life and in my life. His was a life solely controlled by the pure gospel; what a great piece of evidence of godliness. Right? Spurgeon said this, "The power that is in the Gospel does not lie in the eloquence of the preacher. Otherwise men would be the converters of souls. Nor does it lie in the preachers learning, otherwise, it consists in the wisdom of men. We might preach until our tongues rotted, till we would exhaust our lungs and die, but never a soul would be converted, unless the Holy Spirit be with the Word of God, to give it the power to convert the soul." 

Dave Harrell  

Well, there's three evidences of godliness and may I summarize all of this by getting you to think this way. Once again, many times you ask people if they're a Christian, and they will say, "Well, yeah, yeah." Unless they completely deny it, but many that will claim to be a Christian will say, "Well, yeah, you know, I believe in Jesus. You know, I walked an aisle once upon a time, I even made a profession of faith, my goodness, I got baptized and I go to church." Or they'll say, "I used to go to church, I mean, I belong to the church, I may not go now, but you know, I still belong."  Okay. "My goodness, I love gospel music. I'm a good moral person, of course, I'm a Christian." But, dear friends, the real question is, does that person's life imitate Christ? You have to ask yourself that. I claim to be a Christian, but when other people see me, do they see Christ in me? Are they drawn not to me, but to Christ? And when they look at me, do they see a man that is passionate to see other people come to a saving knowledge of Christ and to grow into his likeness? Is that what they see? And is my life solely controlled by the pure, unadulterated gospel of Jesus Christ? Because, dear friends, if those things aren't there, chances are you're not really born again. Because when we're truly born again, there's this radical transformation that occurs. Our entire disposition changes. We're raised from spiritual death to spiritual life. As a result, the triune Godhead dwells within us and we begin to have a love for Christ that we've never had before. We begin to see and understand and learn his word, we submit to is Lordship. And when it comes to the gospel, we are all about defending it and obeying it, proclaiming it, living it, sharing it. We're willing to suffer for it. We're never ashamed of it. We're empowered by it. And as a result, we imitate Christ. Others are drawn to Christ because of what they see in us. 

Dave Harrell  

Folks, these are the evidences of true, genuine godliness, learn them well. And let's live them well for the glory of Christ. 

Dave Harrell  

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. Impress them upon our hearts in such a profound way that we will be forever changed for having heard them even today. We pray that you will use us mightily, as men and women and boys and girls, that know and love you; that many will come to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and enjoy the fullness of his blessings, even this side of glory, not to mention what awaits us in the realm of your glory and grace in heaven. We thank you and we give you praise in Jesus name. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter eight. We're going to look at verse nine s we continue our verse-by-verse examination of this epistle. We will do so under the heading of "From Riches to Poverty." Before we look at this text, I think it's appropriate for me to kind of put this in the context of where we're living here today. It's obvious to all of us who know and love Christ, that there is an ominous, dark cloud of oppression that is hovering over our nation. We see it not only in this pandemic, but also in the moral freefall of our country. We see it in the wickedness that is now taking over, basically all of the systems including our government systems, and educational systems in our country. To be sure, consistent with Romans chapter one, the wrath of divine abandonment is manifesting itself in our nation where God has given this people over to the consequences of their iniquity. The good news, as Christians, we can be confident that God is still in absolute control. We know that he is sovereign over all of his creation, and that he rules in unassailable majesty. And that ultimately, he is going to accomplish his good purposes, regardless of the wickedness that we see around us. And so our hope, as always, is in Christ. And if we're going to enjoy that reality, we need to spend much of our time focusing on the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what we're going to do here this morning, as we look at this text in Second Corinthians eight. 

So I hope this will be a time of encouragement, I hope you can come and warm yourselves around the fires of divine truth and fellowship, and not be depressed by all of the horrible things going on around us. The context here is Paul collecting a donation from the predominantly Gentile saints in Corinth, for the predominantly Jewish saints in Jerusalem, who were impoverished; those who had come to Pentecost to worship and do all that the Jews would do during that time--all of a sudden, they see what's happening at Pentecost, and 1000s of them are saved, and now they're staying there. And they're depleting the resources, or they've depleted the resources of other saints there in Jerusalem. And so now Paul is making this collection. And we read about this much here in Second Corinthians eight, but then in verse nine, there seems to be a bit of a non sequitur. It's like, where does this verse fit with all of this. And I think you will see it very quickly as we examine it. 

Notice what he says here in verse nine, "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich. "You see, Paul's reminder of the grace that they had in the Lord Jesus Christ was a powerful motivator for them to worship the Lord through their financial gifts, helping other believers in a time of need. And certainly, it's all of God's grace that we have anything. It is God's grace that has saved us, it is God's grace that is sanctifying us, and it is God's grace that will one day usher us into the bliss of heaven, where we will enjoy the riches of God's presence forevermore. And those who wholeheartedly embrace the magnificent glory of all of this will need no prodding to give financially to the Lord's work, especially to impoverished saints. And frankly, believers who have a shallow, or worse yet, an apathetic understanding, of the riches of God's grace in Christ will never be a cheerful, sacrificial, generous, regular giver. You see our attitude towards money and our habit in generous, sacrificial giving to the Lord, is one of the greatest barometers of our spiritual maturity, and our love for Christ. And it's within this context, that in an economy of words, the apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Spirit, pens one of the most profound statements in all of Scripture, concerning the person and the work of our precious Savior and Lord Jesus Christ. 

And certainly, given the pandemic that we're experiencing in our nation today, combined with the moral freefall of our country, and the corruption of government, and just the frightening wickedness of the new administration and Congress that have now seized power. It's all the more fitting for us to focus on the glory of Christ, and the hope that we have in him. It's for this reason that Paul said in Colossians three and verse one--and by the way, I find myself going to this passage over and over again. He says, "Therefore if,"--or it could be translated "since"--"you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God." Set your mind on the things above, not on the things of this earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory." What a magnificent promise. And this, dear friends, is what must occupy the hearts of the redeemed, especially in times such as this. Rather than having our conversations and our hearts always occupied with the ungodliness of our nation and the ungodly people that are ruling it and all of these things, be reminded that they will only wield the scepter of power for a short time. Then, unless they repent and believe in Christ, they will face their eternal doom. So we need to have hearts of pity on these people. 

I'm always reminded of Psalm two in light of these things. Remember there the psalmist says, "Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed, saying, 'Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!'" My if that is not a depiction of the United States, I don't know what is. But notice the next statement, "He who sits in the heavens laughs, The Lord scoffs at them. Then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in His fury saying, 'But as for Me, I have installed My King upon Zion, My holy mountain.'" And certainly, it is that King, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we exalt here today as we come together. 

Now, as we look at verse nine of Second Corinthians eight, we're going to do so under three very simple headings. We're going to look at riches forsaken, poverty chosen and riches given. And I trust dear friends that you will never be the same for having been here today. And hearing what the Spirit has to say, through his servant. Notice the very first phrase, he says, "For you know, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ." You Corinthians, you know, you know what he's done. The term "grace" refers to the utterly unmerited, inexhaustible goodness of God that was once animated by his uninfluenced love upon those that he said his love upon even in eternity past. A grace that was then demonstrated supremely through Christ's sacrifice for sinners. And Paul's point here is simply this--folks, given what Christ has done for unworthy sinners like you and me, given what he has done in the humiliation of his incarnation and his sacrifice for sins, surely, you can find it in your heart to give sacrificially to the needs of his people. And of course, the implication exceeds the bounds of that context and extends to all of us as believers, who, as we studied last week, are called upon by the mercies of God to present our bodies as a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. We need to ask ourselves, is this really an accurate depiction of my heart? Does that really describe who I am? If not, the question is, why not? The answer is quite simple. You have a very high view of self and a very low view of Christ. And this is really indicative of the post Christian culture in which we live. 

There was an article that I read back several months ago. It was entitled, quote, "All People are Holy." Right there you ought to go to be shocked when you read that all people are holy. And then it said, "The theology of Alexandria Ocasio Cortes." And of course, she is a radical leftist US representative for New York's 14th congressional ditrict. She is commonly known as AOC. You're probably familiar with her. And the author of the article is unfortunately a heretic by the name of Morgen Guyton. He is the director of the Nola Wesley Foundation, which is the United Methodist campus ministry at Tulane and Loyola University in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is also the author of "How Jesus Saves the World from Us: 12 antidotes to toxic Christianity." And in his commentary, he showed, or I should say he showered, praise on AOC and really affirmed her theology. And what he said I think really captures the type of blasphemy that is indicative of our post Christian religious culture in the United States. Here's what he said, "Alexandria Ocasio Cortez summarized one of my core religious convictions in a speech given on February 27, 2020. On a hearing about," quote, "religious freedom. She said, quote, I know and it is part of my faith that all people are holy and all people are sacred, unconditionally," end quote. He went on to say "It's the kind of theological declaration that I would have mocked as unserious pedestrian liberalism when I was an Evangelical. But the beauty of her sincere conviction utterly pierced my heart when I watched her speech. To say that all people are holy is the polar opposite of the core evangelical doctrine that all people are totally depraved by nature. And yet, I think it's an absolutely Christian thing to believe." He went on to say, "It's such a different Christianity when the first thing we say is 'all people are holy.' And instead of worrying about correcting other people, we decide to act as though God thinks they're gorgeously, fabulously exactly as they are. Honestly, I think that when I live with that conviction, I do a better job of correcting my own sin along the way. If Alexandria Ocasio Cortez's his faith is the future of American Christianity, then that's a faith worth fighting for." End quote. Well, dear friends, if all people are holy, than there's no need for a Savior, right? There's no need for the Lamb of God to come and to take away the sins of the world; there is no need to be justified and reconciled to a holy God if we're all just fine the way we are. 

As I have written elsewhere, quote, "AOC's theology is appealing to fallen humanity because it confirms what people already believe about themselves. Moreover, it is especially appealing to progressives because it is essential to their social agenda. People must be seen as the deprived, not depraved. For the Marxists, it's society, not a sinful nature, that causes people to do bad things. Therefore, it is society as a whole, not individuals that must change. And since people are inherently good, not evil, if they are given equal resources and opportunities and if all oppressive moral, economic and social constraints are removed, their natural goodness will flourish, and everyone will be happy. No need for a Christian savior. No worries about divine judgment, no need for police or prisons. Once everyone's essential needs are met, and it is universally agreed that whatever a person chooses to be or do is morally acceptable, and practically attainable, we will have utopia. Social justice at last."  Well, obviously, those who hold to those blasphemous beliefs of AOC, and so many others will want nothing to do with the Christ that we adore. And they will never experience the wonders of His saving grace. 

Will you notice again, what Paul says to the saints who redeemed by the blood of the Lamb in Corinth. He said, "For you know, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ." Oh Child of God, there is no greater privilege in all the world for a believer, than to contemplate the glory of the person and the work of the one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ. And by His grace, He accomplished our redemption, and made us joint heirs with Christ. And so look at this first from the perspective of the riches forsaken. Again, let me read part of this text, "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor." What is he referring to with respect to that term, "riches"? Well, we can never grasp the magnitude of Christ's self-impoverishment, until we grasp the magnanimity of his wealth. And you must understand that the concept of riches here has nothing to do with material or economic wealth. I mean, my goodness, he was the creator. He could create whatever he needed. But folks, it has everything to do with his preexistent eternal glory, as the Son of God. Iit speaks of the ultimate, infinite perfections of his attributes. I mean, the Lord Jesus Christ is the pre-existent, self-existent, uncreated Creator of the universe. According to Colossians, 2:9, "For in Him," referring to Jesus, "all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form. "The writer of Hebrews tells us in chapter one, verse three, Jesus is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his nature. That's how wealthy he was. Perhaps a silly little analogy will help. We're all familiar with earthworms. Especially when it rains, we see them coming up out of the ground. We love to dig them up. They're great fishing bait, slimy little creatures that slither around eating decaying plants and decaying animals and animal insect feces, fungi, algae, bacteria, and so forth. Not a very handsome creature. Imagine, if you love that worm so much, you decided to become like one to help it. You get the idea of the kind of riches you would leave to do such a thing. And of course, the disparity between the Lord Jesus Christ and us is infinitely greater than the one just described. In fact, we sang about that a little bit ago and the hymn that Isaac Watts wrote "At the Cross." Remember, he said, "Alas, and did my Savior bleed and did my Sovereign die? Would he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I."

Let me give you a little glimpse of the Lord Jesus Christ from another passage of scripture for just a moment. Let me take you to Isaiah six. In verse one, it says, "In the year of King Uzziah's death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple." Here, the veil that separates sinful man from the presence of a holy God, in the Holy of Holies, is suddenly withdrawn, suddenly opened up, so Isaiah could look in, and he was no priest. He was a mere man, and to dare to gaze upon the glory of God, much less enter into the Holy of Holies would have been certain death. But here, he is allowed to do this, and who does he see? He sees the Lord. "Adonai"-- Sovereign One, which is the supreme title of God found in the Old Testament. By the way, when Christ is called "Lord" in the New Testament, it is the equivalent of the Hebrew "Adonai." He is the Sovereign One, he is the Lord of Glory. In fact, John tells us in John 12:41, that the one upon whom Isaiah gazed was the Lord Jesus Christ; Isaiah sees him seated upon the throne. This is the pre-incarnate Son of God, the One who would later come as a babe and die in our stead and reconcile those who are separated from him due to sin; to reconcile us unto God. And then next Isaiah describes the highest of all the angels surrounding the throne, they're hovering like little helicopters, or like these little, I think they call them drones, that they now have, that they can fly all around and take pictures, some of you may own them. 

And as the scene unfolds, we see these magnificent creatures forming two opposite choirs in a semicircle. They're rendering what we would call "antiphonal worship”; they’re answering one another responsively. In verse two, it says, "Seraphim stood above Him."  The seraphim, the term in Hebrew means "the burning ones." We're not told how many, but the burning ones are standing above him. Now, this is not necessarily describing a posture of just standing, but rather it carries with it the idea of a position of perpetual attendance to God. They're hovering over him with these expanded wings. So the scene here, dear friends, is one of constant motion, they're always ready to do the Lord's bidding. And then we read, "...with two he covered his face." Isn't it interesting that even the most exalted of the angels were not allowed to see his face, perhaps to protect them from the unbearable effulgence of the glory of God, we don't know. He goes on to say "...with two he covered his feet. "This is probably symbolic of their unworthiness to serve Him as mere creatures that he has created, and perhaps, a symbolic disavowal of any intention to walk in a direction contrary to his will. "...and with two he flew. And one called out to another and said, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory.'" Oh child of God, this is the "trihagion"--the song of the thrice Holy God, the three times Holy God. By the way, this kind of repetition is a literary device in Hebrew, used to denote special emphasis. By the way, we do the same thing in English. For example, there are jets that are fast, and they are jets that are really fast. There are jets that are really, really fast. And then there are jets that are really, really, really fast. That's the point here. Nowhere else in Scripture is an attribute of God stated three times in succession, and thus elevated to the degree of the super superlative; only the holiness of God. God has never described as merciful, merciful, merciful; love, love, love; faithful, faithful. Even though he is all of those things. But the ultimate sum of all of his perfections, all of his attributes, is in the term holy. 

And notice the name of this thrice Holy God. He is the "LORD of hosts." You will notice that all caps, the word Lord denotes the sacred name of God, the name by which He revealed Himself to Moses as Yaweh. This is what the old theologians call the ineffable tetragrammaton. Ineffable means too wondrous to even utter from the lips, "tetra"--four, "grammaton"--letters. The two wondrous to utter from the lips, four letters, Yaweh. Y H W H. This is the sacred name of God and Isaiah sees the seraphim, now worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ, celebrating his Holiness, in antiphonal worship. And because of his infinite otherness, we read that "the whole earth is full of His glory." Indeed, we know that the heavens are declaring the glory of the Lord. Beloved, this is the one who became poor, that through his poverty, we might become rich. We read of a similar account, in Revelation four beginning in verse eight, where John witnesses something very, very similar. There we read, "And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within; and day and night, they do not cease to say, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, IS THE LORD GOD, THE ALMIGHT, WHO WAS AND WHO IS AND WHO IS TO COME.' And when the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne, to Him who lives forever and ever, the 24 elders will fall down before Him who sits on the thron, and will worship Him who lives forever and ever, and will cast their crowns before the throne saying, 'Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created.'" Dear Christian, the ineffable majesty of the perfections of God revealed here in the Lord Jesus Christ. You all know what it's like to contemplate the infinite perfections of the Lord and, and all that he is, and you start asking questions like, where did you come from? How did you come into being? And on and on and on? And isn't it interesting that our ability to conceive of these things, reaches a stopping point. And beloved, when the comprehensible is suddenly confronted with the infinite wonders of the incomprehensible, there is no place else to go, save one. And in a word, that place is worship. Breathless adoration. And that's how we need to view Christ. That's how we need to understand the riches that he forsook on our behalf. 

We move next to the poverty chosen. "...though He was rich, yet for your sake, He became poor." We read of this, for example, in Philippians, two, where the apostle Paul says beginning in verse six, "...although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." I mean, think about this. The eternal, self-existent, uncreated Creator of the universe set aside His glory, and took on the body of the very creature that he created. Worms like you and me, incomprehensible. I can't fathom it. All I can do is worship.

The one who spoke all things into existence, voluntarily set aside the unfathomable splendor and power of his attributes to cling to his mother's breast. The one who rules the universe in unassailable sovereignty and holiness, made himself of no reputation and he dined with sinners. The one before whom the seraphim veil their face, is that same one who girded himself as a slave and went over to the basin and took the towel and washed his disciples’feet...incomprehensible. The Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer, consummator of all that exists, became a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. He was despised and forsaken, rejected by men. He was brutally scourged and spat upon. He was mocked and stripped of every article of dignity. A crown of thorns was placed on his head, though he could have called 1000 angels to deliver him. Instead, he voluntarily went to the cross, and bore the sins of all whom the Fatherhad given him in his body. And O, Child of God, we cannot conceive of such agony. Nor can we grasp the infinite depths of such poverty. Let's make this even more personal, if I can put it this way. Think of the excruciating pain that he felt when he saw your face hanging on the cross and suffered in your stead. Think of the heart wrenching horror he experienced when the weight of your iniquities collapsed his sacred lungs; those lungs that had breathed in such hatred but had breathed out such love. Think of the piercing agony that tore through his unblemished flesh when he suffered the eternal hell that you deserve, that I deserve. And think of the dreadful thirst that caused his swollen tongue to say, "I thirst." Think of the cramps in his body that he endured as he thought about your sin. And why did he do all of this? So that we might partake of his eternal glory. Astounding. 

Second Corinthians 5:21, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." And apart from his righteousness, we could never enter into the presence of a holy God. In Ephesians, chapter four, there is another passage, verses eight through 10, that provides another example of the depths of Christ's impoverishment. When between his death and resurrection, He descended into the prison, where the most wicked of all of the fallen angels were imprisoned, and he proclaimed his triumph over the forces of Satan's kingdom. There we read, "Therefore, it says, WHEN HE ASCENDED ON HIGH, HE LED CAPTIVE A HOST OF CAPTIVES, AND HE GAVE GIFTS TO MEN. (Now this expression, 'He ascended,' what does it mean except that He also had descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is Himself also He who ascended far above all the heavens, so that He might fill all things.)" You get a little glimpse of the poverty that he took upon himself? 

The lyrics of another hymn captures the essence of this the title of the hymn is "Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne." And the lyrics go like this, "Thou didst leave Thy throne and thy kingly crown, without comest to Earth for me, but in Bethlehem is home was there found no room for thy holy nativity. Heavens arches rang when the angels saying, proclaiming the royal degree, but of lowly birth, didst thou come to earth, and in greatest humility." Oh beloved, what Christ forsook and endured on our behalf is beyond our ability to fathom. And the point here is simply this:  given that, is it really so hard to at least remotely impoverish yourself, to give financially to those who are in need in the church? 

Well, we've seen the riches forsaken and the poverty chosen. Finally, let's look at the riches given. "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich." Folks, think how poor you would be without Christ. Without Christ, a man has nothing. And we know apart from Christ, we can do nothing. You can have all of the riches in the world, but apart from Christ, you really have nothing. And one day, you will experience the horror of that. Charles Spurgeon put it this way, "If the Lord gives you temporal mercies, take heed that you do not set your heart upon them. Say concerning them, 'They are only toys lent me for a season, and they will have to be given up whenever they are claimed by him who lent them.'" I can hear his booming voice back in the 19th century in London. He went on to say, "Find not your riches, dear friend, in a world where Christ had none. But look for your treasure in the land where moth and rust do not corrupt, nor thieves break through and steal." Beloved again, the riches that we have in Christ exceeds the limits of language to express and the ability of the imagination to conceive. Think about it. 

Let me give you a few passages to remind you of what we have in Christ, Second Corinthians, Peter, I'm sorry, in Second Peter one, three through four. He says this, "...His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. And by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is all in the world by lust." In Romans chapter eight and verse 17, we read that we are "heirs of God" and "fellow heirs with Christ." Amazing. And as believers, we have been blessed with "every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ," Ephesians one three. And we know according to Ephesians, two seven that he is "conforming us into the very likeness of Christ." Paul says "so that in the ages to come, He might show the surpassing riches of His grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus." And then, of course, our minds always go to First Peter, chapter one beginning of verse four, where we are reminded that we have "an inheritance which is imperishable, and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice. Even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire may be found to result in praise and glory and honor, at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen Him you love Him, though you do not see Him now but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your soul."

I trust this causes all of you to long for heaven as it does me. In fact, as I was contemplating that passage this week, I was reminded of the testimony of a faithful Puritan pastor that suffered well for Christ, without compromise. A man who longed for heaven's reward, his name was John Bunyan. He's best remembered as the author of the Christian allegory, "The Pilgrims Progress." His testimony reads as follows, quote, "Christ's death for us was so virtuous, that, in the space of three days and nights He reconciled to God in His flesh, every one of God's elect. He presented himself to the justice of the law standing in the stead, place and room of all that He undertook for, and gave His life a ransom for many. Abolishing death, destroying him that had the power of death, taking away the sting of death, obtaining for us the gift of the Holy Spirit, and taking possession of heaven for us. This heaven who knows what it is. This glory, who knows what it is. It is called God's throne, God's house, God's habitation, Paradise, the Kingdom of God, the High and Holy place, Abraham's bosom and the place of heavenly pleasures. And this heaven is to be found the face of God forever. Immortality, the person of Christ, the prophets, angels, the revelation of all mysteries, the knowledge of all the elect and eternity. This heaven we possess already. We are in it; we are set down in it. And we partake already of the benefits through our head, the Lord Jesus. It is fit that we should believe this. Rejoice in this. Talk of this, tell one another of this and live in the expectation of our own personal enjoyment of it. And as we should do all this, so we should bless and praise the name of God, who was put over this house, this kingdom an inheritance into the hand of so faithful a friend, yea, a brother and blessed Savior. All these things are the fruit of His sufferings and His sufferings, the fruit of his love, which passes all knowledge. O, how we should bow the knee before Him and call him tender Father. Yea, how we should love and obey Him and devote ourselves unto this service and be willing to be also sufferers for His sake. To whom be glory and honor forever and ever." 

Oh, dear Christian, given Christ's self-impoverishment, surely, we will all be moved to serve him sacrificially with all that we have, which includes giving out of the abundance of our material wealth to those in need. John MacArthur said it well quote, "How can Christians receive all the riches Christ impoverished himself to give them, yet be unwilling to meet the needs of others? James wrote, 'If a brother or sister is without clothing, and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, "Go in peace be warmed to be filled." And yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body? What use is that?' The apostle John added, 'Whoever has the world's good and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?' Of course, by implication, the answer is, it doesn't." 

So, I would challenge you this morning, dear friends, make it a habit of contemplating the glory of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Allow your mind and your heart to reach the very end of comprehension. And then when the comprehension becomes incomprehensible, you will be left with nothing more than worship. And that's where we need to live. And when that is the attitude and expression of your heart, you will give not out of duty, but out of desire and not just of your material wealth, but you will be a living and holy sacrifice, which is acceptable to God. Let's pray together. 

Father, thank you for the truths that we have reflected upon here today from your word. I pray that you will cause them to deeply impact each of us. May we live them out to the praise of your glory, that we might experience the fullness of the blessings that are ours in Christ this side of heaven, but also that we might give out of our abundance to those who are in need, not just financially, but to give of ourselves to give people the gospel. And to give people our love, that they too might be saved in my worship the lover of our souls. And it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

May we never underestimate the privilege we have to sing, nor underestimate the miracle that God has performed in our hearts, to give us a song to sing, amen? We return once again to our verse-by-verse study of Second Corinthians. And so I would invite you to take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians, chapter eight, we're going to look at the first eight verses this morning under the heading "Marks of a Faithful Financial Steward." I must say that it is one of the great burdens of my heart, to see my precious church family grow in the grace and the knowledge of Christ. I have a profound sense of urgency, especially now given the persecution that I know is coming our way. And one of the things that we must do is understand the word of God first of all, and then live it. Otherwise, we forfeit blessing in our life. And so for this reason, this passage is of immense importance. Because we are all to be faithful financial stewards of what God has given us. 

Let me give you a little context here before I actually read the passage. The context here is the need to collect money for the impoverished saints in Jerusalem. You will remember that the first converts to Christianity were Hellenistic Jews that had come to Passover in Jerusalem. And they had been scattered from all over the Gentile world. Many different languages were spoken. So these were pilgrims, who were part of the Diaspora, who came to Jerusalem to celebrate the day of Pentecost. And of course, when they were there, you will recall, that they witnessed this amazing miracle of all of these Galileans speaking about God presenting the gospel in their own languages. In fact, we read about this in Acts two we read "'And how is it that we each hear them in our own language, to which we were born? Parthians and Medes, and Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea, and Capadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the districts of Libya around Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretens and Arabs--we hear them in our own tongues, speaking of the mighty deeds of God.' And they all continued in amazement and great perplexity saying to one another, 'What does this mean?'" And if we follow the historical narrative of that account, we read how Peter preaches this amazing sermon, calling them to repentance. Many of them came to repentance and were baptized that day. In fact, we read that 3000 souls were saved that day, and were baptized in the mikvehs that were all around the temple there, the cleansing waters that were available. And then more were added. Later on in Acts chapter four and verse four, we read how the church grew by 5000, more referring to the men, if you add the women, and maybe some of the kids we're talking a lot of people. And they were utterly astounded at what had happened. Moreover, they were blown away by the news of the gospel and who Jesus really was. And so naturally, when you come to Christ, what do you want? More teaching, more fellowship, more worship. The problem was, there was no place to stay. All of these people in Jerusalem and where do you stay? And many of them that were staying with their Jewish relatives, and now they're immediately ostracized. The inns there weren't like Motel Six. They were filthy. Very few of them, very expensive. So what did they do? Well, they moved in to the homes of other Jewish believers in Jerusalem. These people were already poor. They were already living in poverty due to Roman taxation at that time in history. And now many of them begin to experience persecution, they lose their jobs. Of course, Jesus promised this would happen in John 16 verse two, he said, "'They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God.'" If we go back to the narrative that describes what happened in the first century at Pentecost, we read this in Acts two beginning of verse 44, "...and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need. Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved." I mean, this was the Great Awakening in Jerusalem. chapter four, verse 32, "And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and not one of them claimed that anything belonging to him was his own but all things were common property to them." So you can just hear the heart of love and a willingness to do everything that they can to minister to their brothers and sisters in Christ. In verse 34, of chapter four, we read this, "For there was not a needy person among them, for all who were owners of land or houses would sell them and bring the proceeds of the sales and lay them at the apostles' feet, and they would be distributed to each as any had need." So that's the context. 

The problem is, eventually the resources ran out. Now, what are you going to do? So Paul, takes up a collection. In fact, we first read about this collection in First Corinthians 16, we studied that. And then because of the false teachers in Corinth, he wasn't able to deal with this. And now he's coming back to it once again and addressing that situation in his second letter. And that brings us to our passage here in chapter eight, beginning in verse one. Let me read this to you. "Now, brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God, which has been given in the churches of Macedonia, that in a great ordeal of affliction, their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality. For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord, begging us with much urging for the favor of participation in the support of the saints, and this, not as we had expected, but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God. So we urged Titus that, as he had previously made a beginning, so he would also complete in you this gracious work as well. But just as you abound in everything, in faith and utterance and knowledge and in all earnestness, and in the love we inspired in you, see that you are bound in this gracious work also. I'm not speaking this is a command, but as proving through the earnestness of others, that sincerity of your love also." 

Paul also knew that, by virtue of the fact that these Gentiles and Macedonia were giving so sacrificially to these Jews in Jerusalem, this would help unite the church because they had been enemies in the past. But we must understand that this was also a test to the Corinthian believers, and frankly, to all believers. You see, one of the greatest measures of spiritual maturity, in a Christian is our attitude toward money and material things, and our devotion to generous, sacrificial, faithful and consistent giving to the Lord's work. Jesus said, “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” And how we spend our time and how we spend our money betrays the treasure of our heart, does it not? Christians with no habit of prayer, Christians who have no desire to have an intimate communion with the Lord and secret devotion to Him, who have no appetite for his word, who have no burden for the lost, who just kind of live for themselves, will know nothing of this kind of stewardship. Instead, their appetite will be for entertainment, and material things and the pleasures that those things can afford. You show me a stingy Christian, one that lacks discipline when it comes to money, one that is impulsive, and lazy, and self-indulgent and abuses credit. And I'll show you a selfish Christian who is bereft of holiness and power and discernment and blessing. I'll show you a worldly, cultural Christian, whose life bears little resemblance to the transcendent holiness of Christ. Too many believers today love money more than they love God. I was reminded of Solomon's testimony, the wealthiest man that ever lived. He said this in Ecclesiastes 5:10. "He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves abundance with its income." I was reading the other day, that his name is Elon Musk, the Tesla guy, is worth $185 billion dollars. For 10 years, back in the 80s, I counseled primarily wealthy people, down in Brentwood. Most of them were Christians, lots in the music industry, Christian music industry, a lot of athletes and people like that. Most of them were fabulously wealthy. I remember one lady had a $2,500 a month budget just for her clothes; had a guy who would want to meet Nancy and me at the airport in the evening to jump on his jet to fly to Florida to eat dinner. Which by the way, I never did do. But you know what? These people were miserable. Most people who come into a lot of money end up being destitute eventually. In fact, I was reading that 70% of lottery winners go bankrupt. 1/3 go bankrupt within the first three to five years. And then their lives are marked by depression and drug and alcohol abuse and estrangement from family and friends and on and on it goes. 

And many Christians today unfortunately, trust in the riches more than Christ. They know nothing of what it means to lay up for themselves treasures in heaven. They spend all of their money on themselves. Therefore, they hold to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power. Now remember, biblically, and we're going to see more of this as we go on for a few minutes here this morning, God honoring giving isn't necessarily determined by the amount you give, but by your attitudes. It should be seen as a joyful privilege, not an obligation, an act of worship, an act of love, an act of devotion to Christ. And it should always be sacrificial, it should be generous; proportionate to your ability to give. It should be voluntary; it should be regular and so forth. And biblically, our first priority is to support our local church, and those who lead within the church and serve within the church. We read about this in First Corinthians nine six through 14 and First Timothy 5:17 and other passages. And then the second priority is to meet the needs of the poor primarily within the church. But you know, our flesh can find 1000 reasons to spend our money on ourselves, right? I mean, we are hopelessly biased in our own favor, let's just all admit it. And as a result, we forfeit power. We forfeit God's blessing. But beloved, you can never outgive God. Jesus said in Luke 6:38, "Give and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure pressed down shaken together and running over, for by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you in return." And Paul said in Second Corinthians nine verse six, "He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must do just as he is purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able tomake all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed.'" And certainly, this is my heart's desire for each of you. 

So, as we come to chapter eight, we learn much about the proper attitudes we should have and the actions of a faithful steward. We must remember that all we have belongs to the Lord. We're merely stewards of it. In fact, we read of this and Deuteronomy 10:14, "Behold to the LORD your God belong heaven and the highest heavens, the earth and all that is in it." So as we look at this text, I want to do so under three real basic categories, three marks of a faithful financial steward, we're going to see number one, that generous giving is a joyful act of selfless love, regardless of circumstances. Secondly, we will see that generous giving is a voluntary act of worship proportionate to one's ability. And then thirdly, generous giving is a privileged act of worship, that reveals one's devotion to Christ and others. So let's look at this first little point in the simple outline: generous giving as a joyful act of selfless love, regardless of circumstances. Notice verse one. Paul says to the Corinthians here, "Now, brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God." In other words, the divine enablement that moved the people in Macedonia, as we're going to see, to give so sacrificially--"...we wish to make known to you the grace of God, which has been given in the churches of Macedonia." By the way, Macedonia was the former realm of Alexander the Great, it was now in ruins; the Romans had plundered to that area, the people were living in extreme poverty. That area would have included the churches of Thessalonica, the church at Philippi, the church at Berea. 

And he goes on to say in verse two, "...that in a great ordeal of affliction,"--ordeal can be translated great trial, a great test of affliction. Affliction, referring to a state of extreme adversity and distress--"...in a great ordeal of affliction their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality." In other words, the gift of God's grace had impacted them so profoundly that they had an overwhelming sense of love for Christ, to see him glorified, and to love other people in need, their brothers and sisters in Christ. And that's what empowered them to give the way they did. That is what Paul is saying, they imitated Christ who dwelled within them. By the way, generous, sacrificial giving is always a manifestation of a transformed heart. It is generated, and it is sustained by the internal workings of God's grace. Their treasure was in heaven, not on Earth. They were, they were fixated on eternal things, rather than temporal things. They look beyond their own needs. They were motivated out of selfless love, not selfish greed. Think about it, for yourself, when you get your paycheck or when you get, as we did yesterday, another check. Well, I don't know what it's called some kind of check from the government. You know, I think we all we got $1,200, I guess that's what you all get. It amazes me, we're what $17 trillion in debt. And, you know, I wish I had one of those printing machines, right? We're 20 something million in debt, 27 trillion, okay--well see, I've lost count. But anyway, when you get your money like that, what do you say to yourself? Do you say, "Oh, thank you, Lord. I'm humbled by the resources that you have given me, and I realized that I have a stewardship responsibility. Help me to wisely spend my money to use it, ultimately, for your glory. Yes, I've got basic needs. But Lord help me to know how to invest my money for your kingdom purposes. I want to lay up my treasures in heaven. I want to give generously as a joyful act of selfless love. Regardless of my circumstances."  Is that your attitude? Or is it rather, "Good now I can get..." fill in the blank. And you're already what? $100,000 in debt $200,000 in debt. What's your mortgage? What's your credit card?

Well, this was the heart of the impoverished and persecuted Macedonians. You read about it for example, in Philippians 1:29. We read, "For it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake." They were suffering. You remember in Acts 17 that the Jews whipped up a mob to run Paul and Silas out of Thessalonica. Again, Macedonia. In First Thessalonians, Paul described the kind of affliction, they were enduring. We read in chapter one, verse six, "You also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia." By the way, I hope we will be an example to the persecuted saints in America and around the world in days to come. Also, in First Thessalonians two, verse 14, we read, "For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea, for you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out. They are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men." So, Paul was using them as an example, they gave out of their abundance. The term could literally be translated "over abundance," a state of being more than full, a surplus of what? Of money? No, they didn't have a lot of money, a surplus of joy. And their deep poverty. It could literally be translated "according to the depth of their poverty." "Overflowed," it says, "in the wealth of their liberality." "Wealth" is interesting--"ploutos" in the original language. It's often translated "riches"-- a term that typically, in the New Testament, denotes spiritual resources, not so much money. Too often people think, well, if I give God a 20, he's going to give me a 50. It didn't work that way. In Ephesians one seven, Paul speaks of the "riches of His grace." Verse 18, "the riches of the glory of our inheritance."  Chapter two, verse seven, "The surpassing riches of His grace, and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus." In chapter three and verse eight, Paul was called to preach to the Gentiles, "the unfathomable riches of Christ." And in Ephesians, chapter three, beginning of verse 16, Paul prays that he would grant you, you saints in Ephesus and by implication, all of us, that he would grant you according to the, here it is, the word, "riches, the wealth of His glory, to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith." Folks, money can't buy that. That's what we need far more than money. "And that you being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth, and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. Unto Him was able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us." 

So again, these beggars, in Macedonia, they had virtually no money. But in their deep poverty, they had so much more. The unfathomable riches of Christ. So in other words, it was out of that surplus, the spiritual wealth that was in their souls, that they gave. Verse two again, "in the wealth of their liberality." Liberality means the sincerity of their heart. Now bear in mind, some of these people were slaves in Macedonia. Most of them lived in poverty. Yet they gave sacrificially, they gave generously, which is always a mark of an unselfish heart, devoted to Christ. Their love for Christ and their brothers and sisters in Christ exceeded their love for themselves. They rejoiced in the opportunity they had to bless others to honor Christ, to invest in the kingdom. They knew that it is more blessed to give than to receive; they understood that. They knew that God would reward the reward them infar greater measure than the amount of money that they gave, which was probably not a whole lot. But it was sacrificial, and oh, that honors the Lord. And they knew that God would supply all of their needs according to His riches and glory in Christ Jesus. I trust this is the attitude of your heart. 

So generous giving is a joyful act of selfless love, regardless of circumstances. Secondly, generous giving is a voluntary act of worship, proportionate to one's ability. Notice verse three. "For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord." I want you to understand they were not commanded to give a tithe of 10%. By the way, that is fine to do. That's a good benchmark. I think for most of us, that doesn't come close to being sacrificial. And certainly, we can do that. But you must understand that is not a New Testament commandment. Christian giving is always voluntary. Nowhere in the New Testament is a fixed amount or a percentage required. People will say wait, wait, wait, wait, tithing was commanded in the Mosaic Law, and even before the law existed. And unfortunately, that reasoning is flawed. There is no God given command to give a specific amount prior to the Mosaic law, not one. All offerings in the period before Moses were voluntary, including by the way the tithes that Abraham gave to Melchizedek, and the tithes that Jacob gave. In fact, Abraham didn't give a 10th of everything he owned to Melchizedek. It says in Hebrews seven four that he gave a 10th of the spoils he had taken in battle. Now there did exist, some required giving. Prior to the Mosaic Law, we know that Pharaoh, for example, in the days of Joseph, levied a 20% tax on his people during the years of abundance, to store up food. But what we see is tithing is basically taxation. And it was a requirement under the Mosaic Law, necessary to support the theocracy, just like we pay taxes to support our government. From the book of Genesis, to the giving of the Law, all the way through the days of Jesus and beyond, in the New Testament, Scripture only reveals two types of giving. Number one, required giving, which is taxation, or tithes given to the government. And then secondly, free will giving. 

Let me give you a little background. In the Old Testament, there was taxation under the Mosaic law for the theocracy, as I mentioned, that was required giving. And there were essentially three kinds of tithes that amounted to about 23% of what you had, in addition to some other taxes. First of all, 10% was to be given to support the priests and the Levites, in charge of the religious life of Israel and the government. And then secondly, there was another 10% that was required to support the social and religious life of the nation, including the rituals and the funding of the feasts in Jerusalem and so forth. And then third, there was a tithe every third year for their social services or their welfare system, like we have in our country. And then there were other various forms of taxation, like they had a land, a Sabbath tax or Sabbath rest tax. They had a a special tax, that was a profit sharing for people that where they would not harvest the corners of their field, they would leave that for the poor and so forth. But you must understand that tithing wasn't considered giving under the Mosaic law. It was taxation; it was a required gift because the tithe didn't belong to the people, it belonged to the Lord. Repeatedly in the Old Testament, we read "the tithe is the Lord's." So you can't give what already belongs to someone else, right? In fact, if you failed to give back to the Lord that which was due Him, you're robbing God. We read about this in Malachi three, "Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say how have we robbed You?" And He answers "in tithes and offerings. You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing Me, the whole nation of you. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house. And test Me now in this," says, the Lord of hosts, if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows."

So that was consistent with the taxation under the theocracy. And when the people failed to pay their  taxes, their tithes, not only did it violate God's law, but it disrupted the entire religious system of the nation that would ultimately bring glory to God. If you didn't have a tithe, the priests would have had no means of support to do all that they did. They would have had to have abandon their priestly functions and take up farming just to survive and so forth. Moreover, the poor and the strangers would suffer severely. Because you see, the tithe included portions of their crops, as I mentioned. And by the way, it also included certain portions of their animals that would be brought to the temple treasury. And this was crucial to supply all of the needs of the temple ministry, which by the way, provided assistance to the poor and to strangers. So tithing, that is taxation under the Mosaic law, should not be confused with the freewill giving the people gave out of the goodness of their heart, as an expression of their love to God. And even in the Old Testament, free will offerings were always spontaneous. They were always proportional. They were always voluntary and sacrificial. And there was never any frequency or specific amount stipulated. 

So you must understand the New Testament teaches the same thing. There's two kinds of giving. There's required giving which is taxation. And we render unto Caesar what is Caesar's. And then there's free will giving. First Corinthians 16 two, "Put aside and save as he may prosper." Second Corinthians eight three, "Give according to your ability and beyond ability they gave of their own accord." That's where we're at today. Second Corinthians nine seven "Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart." And as I said, as Jesus put it, in Mark 12:17, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's."  And in Romans 13 one we read, "Let every person be in subjection to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God and those which exist are established by God." Verse four, "For it is a minister of God to you for good." Verse six, "For because of this, you also pay taxes. For rulers are servants of God, devoting themselves to this very thing. Render to all what is due them, tax to whom is taxes due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor." So bottom line he's saying, don't cheat on your taxes. Sowe've got to be careful that we don't arbitrarily transport certain aspects of Old Covenant law into the New Covenant. Don't place yourself back under the law that Jesus came to fulfill, if I can put it that way. Romans 6:14 through 15 tells us how we're no longer under the law. By the way, it's interesting, the Mormons are required to give 10% of their gross income, and they look at your tax records to make sure you do so. Well, that makes sense because they're a cult. They're trying to earn their way to heaven. That's one of the ways you do it. By the way, again, to give 10%, or whatever percentage you come up with it, you know, that it's good to have something like that. But for the most part, when people talk about, well, you need to give your tithe, you need to give your 10%. I don't know about you, but that's not very sacrificial, for me, probably not for you either. 

Alright, so how much should we give? Well, how much do you love the Lord? How much do you think you should give? The answer, by the way, is in verse three, "For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord." Now, some will say, well, now wait a minute, in Mark 12, in the story of the widow's mite, she gave everything she had. Well, come on, folks. I mean, surely that isn't what God expects, right? Of course not. That's foolish. By the way, be very careful. That text has nothing to do with financial stewardship, nothing to do with giving. While that's common, that is an interpretation that is completely foreign to the narrative. Let me digress for a moment. 

In that context, the whole passage, is warning about judgment upon the corrupt religious leaders of Israel, who were even deceiving widows with these false promises of Jewish legalism. And part of that included this idea that the more you give, the more God will give to you. It was their variation of the same old prosperity gospel that is being preached today, the same type of thing. There's no indication in Jesus' story, that that woman even loved him, that she was a believer. No indication of what her heart was really like, no mention of that, no commendation for the amount she gave; no mention of any principle of giving in the whole story. But what is clear is that she, like many others, was a woman that was completely duped by these greedy religionists that God condemned with the harshest of warnings. They were religious predators, just like we have today. Greedy phonies that cause people to claim promises that God never made for their own ends. So don't use the story of the widow's mite as a lesson in stewardship. 

So how much should we give? Well, you need to discern that. Discern the will of God in your own family, give in proportion to what you have, out of your love for him; your desire to invest in the kingdom. Notice how this attitude manifested itself with the Macedonians. Again, verse three, four, "I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability, they gave of their own accord, begging us.." I love that, "...begging us with much urging for the favor of participation in the support of the saints and this, not as we had expected, but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God." So here we see the third principle, and that is, that generous giving is a privileged act of worship that reveals one's devotion to Christ, and to others. I'm always so encouraged along with the rest of the elders, and the deacons, and deaconesses, henever there's a need in this church, all we have to do is put out a phone call. And all you'd have to do is make one phone call, you know how the great mind works at Calvary Bible Church--within about 30 minutes the whole church knows, and we just, we've got plenty, we've got enough, thank you for meeting this need. That's really a real testimony of God's grace in the lives of the folks at Calvary Bible Church, certainly proven devotion to your love for Christ. What a privilege it is to give. 

But you see, first, you must give of yourself there has to be an intimate relationship, a passionate love for Christ, otherwise, you're not going to give that way. I mean, think about our children and our grandchildren. When they have a need do we begrudgingly say, oh, okay, I guess here you go. No, we want to lavish blessing upon them. If you're giving is stingy, if it is sporadic, or if you give no thought to the privilege that you have to worship the Lord in you're giving, folks your heart is not right. Let me take you to Romans 12 verse one for a moment. Paul there says, "Therefore I urge you brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship." You see, our total surrender to God must not be seen as some onerous obligation, but a joyful, willing sacrifice, motivated out of a neverending sense of gratitude that we have for what he has done. 

By the way, that imagery would have been so powerful--this idea of a living in a holy sacrifice. These people were used to seeing sacrifices, even to the pagan gods. It was bloody, and they would burn up the animals and the aroma would ascend to the pagan gods and all of this type of thing. So they knew that Paul was referring to something here far greater than just a casualrelationship with God. Paul was calling on the people, by the mercies of God, to present everything that they had. In fact, when he used the word "present," it is a term that was often used in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, a technical term describing a priest placing a sacrifice on the altar. Well, what are we to present? He says, "your bodies." In other words, the totality of who you are as a person, the sum of your humaneness. You see, worship has always included sacrifice. But it's really interesting, isn't it? The form of the sacrifice is different. In the Old Covenant, the offering was of dead things. All right? Dead sacrifices in the new covenant. The offerings are living sacrifices. In the Old Covenant, you make a sacrifice, in the New Covenant, you are the sacrifice. You see the difference? So we are to be a living sacrifice; living carries the idea of just this voluntary nature, the voluntary nature of the act; acontinual, decisive, habitual commitment to give all that we are to Christ, to surrender everything to him. But it's not only to be living, it's to be a holy sacrifice. In this context, it means to be set apart from the world. Set apart from all of our dreams and ambitions, to put our agenda over here, make Christ the agenda; a voluntary surrender of all we are. 

But even as in the Old Testament, the sacrifices were to be without spot and blemish. That's how we are to be as we come before the Lord. This is the kind of sacrifice that is acceptable to God, that is pleasing to Him. Beloved, if I can put it this way. If you are not giving the total sum of your being to God in your life, you're just not being pleasing to Him. And you're certainly not going to have a godly predisposition to be the kind of steward that would honor him and bring blessing and power into your life. You see, he's not interested in some external religion. He wants all of you. He wants you to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul with all your mind. Well, this is what Paul witnessed among the Macedonians. And that's what he was telling the Corinthians, guys, men, women, look what they did. This is how we need to be. 

Verse six, "So we urged Titus that as he had previously made a beginning, so he would also complete in you this gracious work as well." Verse seven, "But as you are bound in everything, in faith and utterance..." By the way, utterance here is "logos," it refers to doctrinal truth, as you are bound in faith and doctrinal truth, the word "logos," the word is the truth in knowledge, which carries the idea of being able to apply the truth to your life, to live it out. So again, "But just as you are bound in everything, and faith and utterance and knowledge, and in all earnestness and in the love we inspired in you, see that you are bound in this gracious work also. I am not speaking this as a command." See, again, he's not commanding them to give a tithe that or a specific amount or whatever. No, "but as proving through the earnestness of others..." that'sreferring to the model of the Macedonians, "proving through the earnestness of others, the sincerity of your love also." 

Beloved, these are the marks of a faithful financial steward. Learn these lessons well. And in closing, may I challenge you to examine your heart in this, knowing full well, that because of your flesh, you are going to be hopelessly biased in your own favor. Just admit that, confess that, and ask the Spirit to help you to get beyond that. And then examine your finances. How you give, talk with your spouse about it, let's be honest, let's talk with our kids about it. Let's make sure that we are honoring the Lord in this way, not out of duty, but out of desire so that we won't forfeit blessing. And my goodness, with everything happening in our country, dear friends, there is no telling what type of persecution, we're going to experience. We're trying to build a war chest here, to be able to continue to help people as we have. And as we do that are in need. We don't know what's coming down the pike. Some of us may lose our jobs. Some of us may end up in jail. We don't know. But we're going to need to come together as the first century saints did. And we do so with joy, to watch God prove himself powerful on our behalf. So let's take these things very, very serious. Okay. Let's pray. 

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. Help us to not only grasp them intellectually, but Lord, help us to make them the priority of our heart so that we can honor you in this very important aspect of our lives. I pray in Jesus’ name and for his sake. Amen.

It's my great joy to be able to minister the word of God to you once again this morning. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter seven. We find ourselves now looking at verses five through 16, under the heading of "Restoring Broken Relationships." Restoring broken relationships, a very practical passage of Scripture, to those of us who know and love Christ and are a part of his church. Follow along as I read Second Corinthians seven beginning in verse five. "For even when we came into Macedonia, our flesh had no rest, we were afflicted on every side: conflicts without, fears within. But God, who comforts the depressed, comforted us by the coming of Titus; and not only by his coming but also by the comfort with which he was comforted in you, as he reported to us your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me; so that I rejoiced even more. For though I caused you sorrow by my letter, I do not regret it; though I did regret it--for I see that the letter caused you sorrow, though only for a while--I  now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful, according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death. For behold what earnestness this very thing, this godly sorrow has produced in you: what vindication of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what avenging of wrong! In everything you demonstrated yourselves to be innocent in the matter. So although I wrote to you, it was not for the sake of the offender nor for the sake of the one offended, but that your earnestness on our behalf might be made known to you in the sight of God. For this reason, we have been comforted. And besides our comfort, we rejoiced even much more for the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all. For if in anything I have boasted to him about you, I was not put to shame; but as we spoke all things to you in truth, so also our boasting before Titus proved to be the truth. His affection abounds all the more toward you, as he remembers the obedience of you all, how you received him with fear and trembling. I rejoice that in everything I have confidence in you." 

As image bearers, we were made for relationship: relationship with God, relationship with one another. We were made to love him, and to love one another, and we all long for devoted relationships. We all long to be loved, to be wanted, to be accepted. But given the dynamics of this fallen world, relationships tend to not work real well, sometimes. In fact, many times, most of them don't work very well. Even those we love can reject us, can betray us, malign us, even abandon us. And when this happens, the pain is unbearable, especially when it's the result of someone leaving us who we thought loved us and who we loved. This is why marital infidelity and divorce are considered to be among the most painful of all trials. We've all been hurt by people we love. Now, I'm not talking about feeling hurt because somebody didn't meet your expectation, or somebody didn't agree with your personal preference, and you're going to take your ball and go home. That's not what we're talking about here. Not talking about wounded pride, not talking about self pity. And by the way, you know you have that because your heart is filled with revenge and retaliation, rather than a deep desire for restoration, and reconciliation. What I'm talking about here is the heartbreak of betrayal; the heartbreak of disloyalty, of abandonment, of even abuse in a relationship. That's what Paul was dealing with. 

You will remember the context here; after investing almost two years of his life in Corinth, leading these people to saving faith in Christ, establishing this church, loving these people. discipling these people, watching them grow in Christ. And then after he leaves, he finds out that there's false teachers that come in to the congregation begin to lead them astray. Begin to turn people against him and against his message of the gospel, teaching them a false gospel that is now so pervasive in evangelicalism today. And so the people turned against him. One even attacked him verbally. During his, quote, "sorrowful visit", and the sad thing is, the majority of the congregation didn't defend him. It's inconceivable, it's heart wrenching. The pain of unrequited love is among the greatest of all sorrows. 

Now, you will recall in chapter one, he described the severity of what he experienced, the external pressures he talks about. The afflictions: suffering so brutal that he said he despaired even of life and had the sentence of death within him. He needed to be delivered from so great a peril of death. That's how severe it was. It was heartbreaking for him. So folks, it wasn't his pride that was wounded, it was his heart. And perhaps you have been there. He wasn't filled with self pity and resentment and anger and desire for revenge. He didn't engage in slanderous gossip, he didn't just take his ball and go home so to speak, he had a desire for restoration, not for retaliation, not for revenge. So while in Ephesus, Paul wrote a very strongly worded letter, confronting them, and calling them to repentance that they might be reconciled to God and to him. So he drafted it out of love, and out of a desire to preserve the truth of the gospel there in that church, to protect them from being further deceived by these false teachers. Chapter two, verse four, he says, "For out of much affliction and anguish of heart, I wrote to you with many tears." By the way, those letters are hard. I've written many of them. Perhaps you've had to write them. Perhaps you've read some of them, maybe even some that I've written, I'm not sure, but it's tough. Then Paul gave that letter to his beloved son in the faith, Titus, to go back to Corinth and to hand deliver it to them, and then to return with their response. Obviously, Paul was deeply concerned about how they would receive Titus and his letter. And more often than not, those situations don't turn out very well. Fortunately, this one did, as we will see. 

So being overwhelmed with sorrow and longing to know of their reaction, Paul left Ephesus and traveled to the sea port city of Troas, to somehow intercept Titus returning from Corinth. And while in Troas, we read how a door of ministry was opened to Paul but he was so distressed, so depressed, so concerned about all of this, that he couldn't minister, couldn't go through the door. In chapter two, beginning in verse 12, we read now when I came to Troas for the gospel of Christ and when a door was opened for me in the Lord, I had no rest for my spirit, not finding Titus, my brother; but taking my leave of them, I went on to Macedonia." 

By the way, as a footnote, the passage I just read, stops and Paul has a lengthy digression concerning his ministry that he talks about. And then he returns to that narrative in verse five of chapter seven where we're at here today. So, because he had no rest in his spirit, in other words, because he was so depressed, we read how he leaves Troas and travels to Macedonia in search of Titus. That brings us to verse five. But he says, "Even when we came into Macedonia, our flesh had no rest, but we were afflicted on every side: conflicts without, fears within." In other words, all of the strife that he knew was going on, and that he experienced, caused him to fear that they might lose their trust in Him, and their trust in the true message of the gospel. But he also knew that many of those believers would therefore forfeit blessing in their life, and some that weren't truly born again, would never come to saving faith. So that's how serious it was. 

So, the question before us, as we look at this text is simply this: how do we restore broken relationships? And there's much to be learned in this passage of Scripture. I mean, we know according to Romans 12 and verse 18, "So far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men." So, you do all you can. But ultimately, we see that we are so dependent upon the Lord for restoration to truly happen. In fact, it is impossible to restore broken relationships apart from divine resources. You will recall what Jesus says, "Apart from me, you can do nothing." Well, as we look at this text, I would submit to you that we must be supplied with five divine resources. Five resources we must number one, we need a God sent friend to comfort us. Secondly, we need a God glorifying desire for reconciliation. Thirdly, we need a God empowered boldness to confront sin. Number four, we need a God given discernment to detect a genuine repentance. And finally, we need a God imitating love to forgive. If you're in need of restoring broken relationships today, I strongly encourage you to pray for these most important provisions, for they will truly bring comfort to your soul. 

By the way, the term "comfort" is a recurring theme that we see in this passage of Scripture. It's mentioned six times in these verses, and the word "joy" and "rejoicing" five times. So this is a passage about comfort, and about joy that comes as a result of restoration. And certainly, there are a few things in life more discomforting, then unreciprocated love, in the form of betrayal. So what must God provide in order to restore a broken relationship? Well, number one, a God sent friend to comfort you. Notice in verse six, he says, "But God, who comforts the depressed, comforted us by the coming of Titus." Oh, dear friends, what a blessed provision this is. To have God send some friend into your life in the midst of this kind of pain. How often have we said that "so and so was a godsend," right? That's what Titus was. And God is so gracious here to do this. He is the God of all comfort, who knows how desperately we need a godly friend to speak truth into our life, a tangible expression of his grace and his mercy and his love. And dear friends, as persecution mounts in our country, as it absolutely will, under the Biden administration, you're going to need this kind of friend, you're going to need many of them, and you're going to need to be this kind of friend. Christian fellowship is a tonic to a grieving soul. It is a cool refreshing drink of water to a thirsty traveler; it is a glowing fire on a cold and dark night. Do you have people in your life that can bring comfort to your soul? I hope you do. If not, you need to be cultivating them. And I might also add, are you such a friend that others can depend upon? 

So, God "who comforts the depressed, comforted us by the coming of Titus." Verse seven, "and not only by his coming, but also by the comfort with which he was comforted in you, as he reported to us your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me; so that I rejoiced even more." It's really fascinating when you think about it, can you imagine going into hostile territory with a letter of confrontation like this? Don't you know Titus was a bit apprehensive? He probably came in and handed it to him and then took out; didn't want to be there when it was read. But look what God did. We read how he moved upon the hearts of the majority of the saints in Corinth, to respond to Titus' coming and in his message in such a way that it animated within them, humble repentance and a desire for restoration. And so God even used them to comfort Titus, as we read. Folks, this is the power of humility. This is the work of grace in the life of a believer. 

But here we see another great provision in Paul's life, he was given number two: a god glorifying desire for reconciliation. I mean, apart from this, it's certainly not going to happen. We see this in his response to the good news that Titus brought him; the news he had prayed for and longed for. We read how Paul was not only comforted by the coming of Titus, as he says, but also by his report of notice these three words in verse seven, "their longing, their mourning, and zeal" for him "so that I rejoiced even more." You see, Paul wanted reconciliation, more than anything. That's what he prayed for. He wasn't looking for revenge because of their disloyalty. Vengeance is mine says the Lord, I will repay, let the Lord handle those things. No, he had the mind of Christ. He was ruled by the Spirit, not by his flesh, and he gave the same grace that he had been given. And in celebration of God's grace, Paul reminds us in Second Corinthians chapter nine, and verse eight, that "God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed." And then as if he couldn't contain himself, he declares in verse 15, "Thanks be to God, for His indescribable gift!" All who are debtors to God's grace will testify to the reality of his presence and power in their life in these times. You all know what it's like when your heart is failing, and you find yourself drowning in a sea of sorrow. What's fascinating is God doesn't just see your desperate need and throw you a lifeline of his grace--no, no, no, no, he dives in. And he rescues you with his omnipotent arm, and he brings you safely to shore. These deliverances are not at all like the rescue of a paid lifeguard, saving a stranger on some public beach. No, no, no, no. Rather, it's like a loving father, who will gladly give his life to save his precious child. We read in Micah seven and verse 18, that God "delights in unchanging love." That's what brings joy to him; his unchanging love towards us. 

For this reason, Jesus described himself in Matthew 11 and verse 29, as being "gentle and lowly," and able to provide "rest for our souls." We should all be eternally grateful knowing that he is rich in mercy. Ephesians, two four, he's "rich in mercy." Indeed, he is the wellspring of compassion. He is the fountainhead of infinite kindness towards us, as we are towards our children and grandchildren. All that we ever need in times of trouble will flow naturally from him. In fact, the very core of God's being is always ready to burst forth in tender expressions of his grace. To act with tender compassion is the natural response of the God of glory, the God of all comfort. And the Apostle Paul knew this. He had experienced it before, and now he's experiencing it again and is rejoicing because of it. This is what motivated them, and therefore he possessed a god given desire for reconciliation. 

By the way, if you don't have that--maybe you're in a broken relationship right now--if you don't have that, there is something deficient in your view of God's mercy and grace towards you. And if you don't deal with this, that kind of bitterness will consume you and drive you away into greater sorrow. I mean, nobody likes to be around an old curmudgeon, right? I like that word. It just kind of sounds like what it means. An old curmudgeon, or who wants to be around some old, cranky feminazis woman you know who is as toxic is battery acid because she's still mad about what so and so did, you know, 30 years ago or whatever? Well, we all need a God sent friend to comfort us, a god glorifying desire for reconciliation. 

But thirdly, we need a God empowered boldness to confront sin. Ah, here's where the cat is thrown in amongst the pigeons, right? Verse eight, "For though I caused you sorrow by my letter, I do not regret it; though I did regret it--for I see that the letter caused you sorrow the only for a while--." You see, Paul understood that reconciliation could never take place apart from repentance. And genuine repentance requires sorrow over sin. In fact, repentance is literally a term that is used to describe a radical change of heart that abandons former character traits, a regret over past attitudes and behaviors, a turning from sin to holiness. But this is never going to happen until we're first confronted with our sin or till we confront someone else with their sin. By the way, that's why the gospel message begins with a violated law and unless a person sees who they are, before a holy God, they will never repent, come to saving faith in Christ. People will say "But pastor, confrontation just makes things worse." Yeah, you know, that's what evangelical pragmatism is all about, right? Let's just be real careful that we don't offend anybody with the truth of the gospel. Let's don't make anybody feel uncomfortable and talk about their sin and the hell that awaits them, lest they repent. No, no, no, no, no. Let's be careful here. Let's make people feel comfortable where they are, that you're just fine. You just need to accept Jesus into your heart--whatever that means. Folks, the result is when there is no repentance, there is no reconciliation with God. It's as simple as that. When there's no repentance, there is no regeneration. Meaning, a person will never be raised from spiritual death to spiritual life. And apart from regeneration, there is no salvation. How many times I've dealt with marriages that are absolute disasters. Many times, it's an abusive husband, the wife is absolutely terrified, doesn't know what to do, knows that if she confronts the husband, things are going to get so much worse. And so, she chooses to do nothing. And things get much worse. Even in the church, we read, for example, in Titus 3:10, that we are to "Reject a factious man after a first and second warning, knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning, being self-condemned." So important. Dear friend, true love for God and for others, and faith in his power in our life, will motivate us to love other people enough to gently, to patiently, to lovingly speak the truth into their life. That they might not only be reconciled to you, but to God. In Matthew 18 verse 15, we read, "'If your brother sins,’” Jesus says, "'Go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother.'" In Galatians six and verse one we read, "Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one and a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, so that you too will not be tempted." Then he makes this amazing statement, "Bear one another's burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ." Sometimes people miss apply this, this isn't necessarily talking about bearing other people's burdens of difficulties in their life. This is talking about moving into their life and helping them bear the burden of their sin that they have just been confronted with, to help get underneath that burden, and help them deal with it in a way that brings true reconciliation and repentance. 

Well, Paul was reluctant to confront, he was reluctant to confront but he knew he must it gave him great sorrow, but his love for Christ and His love for the truth and his love for these people, moved him beyond his own fears. I mean, what father fails to discipline his child, right? I'll tell you what type of father fails to discipline his child, a father that doesn't love his child. Hebrews 12 verse 11, "All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful but sorrowful. Yet to those who have been trained by it afterwards, it yields the peaceful fruit of repentance." 

So what we've seen thus far is restoring broken relationships requires a God sent friend to comfort us, a god glorifying desire for reconciliation, a God empowered boldness to confront sin. And then number four, a God given discernment to detect genuine repentance. This is so practical, so important. Listen carefully. Notice what he says in verse nine, "I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God so that you might not suffer loss and anything through us. For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death." So here we must understand there's a huge difference between a worldly sorrow and a godly sorrow. Verse 11, "For behold what earnestness this very thing, this godly sorrow, has produced in you: what vindication of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what avenging of wrong! In everything you demonstrated yourselves to be innocent in the matter." Now again, we know that apart from repentance, genuine repentance, there is no salvation. No matter what you believe about God, about Christ, about the gospel or whatever, there is no salvation, unless there is genuine repentance--to change your mind and your purpose and to be broken over how you have offended, a holy God. Now, bear in mind, repentance is not reformation. It's not some resolution in your heart to do better, to kind of turn over a new leaf, that's not repentance. Nor is it contrition; just merely feeling sorry about what you have done, especially in light of the fact that you've gotten caught and now your life is a mess because of it. No, dear friends, true repentance is a god induced hatred for your sin. It is a god-induced turning from sin, and turning unto God, it is a Spirit empowered forsaking of sin that produces holiness, and power in your life. The same is true here in the realm of relationships. How often have we all been guilty of being confronted about some sin in our life? And we say, Well, hey, I'm really sorry, I won't ever do it again. Have we all said that, you know, 317,000 times, right? That's the worldly sorrow. And then some measure of reconciliation takes place, spouses kiss and make up. People in the church kind of shake hands and hug and after a while, the same patterns resurface. Here we go again. 

Or perhaps you have some besetting sin, some life dominating sin and you've repented of it 1000 times, but you're still held captive by it. And you know, in your heart, you still secretly love it. Godly sorrow has never occurred. Genuine repentance has never occurred. And many timespeople are to undiscerning to recognize genuine repentance but that's what we see here in this passage. Notice in verse nine, he says, "I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful." In other words, theirs was not merely some superficial regret over being caught or whatever. Or they weren't just embarrassed, nor were they resentment over doing something stupid or something wrong. It's not mere disappointment or self-pity. But rather, he says, "but you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance." To a place where you made a radical choice to move in a different direction. And notice what else in verse nine, "For you were made sorrowful, according to the will of God." In other words, God wants this and God is in this to produce this. And then verse 10, "For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces repentance without regret, leading to salvation." In other words, it proved, your repentance proved, that you are among the redeemed; that you live within the realm of saving grace. 

In verse 10, he goes on, "But the sorrow of the world produces death." Indeed, it produces guilt and disillusionment, and slowly it kills people with depression and alcohol and drugs and suicide and all of those things. But I want you to notice seven marks of genuine repentance. They're very obvious. The first element of genuine repentance is just let me give you the word, earnestness. Earnestness to repent, to pursue holiness. Verse 11, "For behold," he said, look at this, "what earnestness this very thing, this godly sorrow has produced in you." The earnestness speaks of just a solemn sincerity, about true repentance. It speaks of an eager, aggressive seriousness about making things right, and restoring the fellowship that had been broken. That's what you look for. Is there an earnestness in my heart? Is there an earnestness in the heart of the person that I'm dealing with? Psalm 51, verse one, we read the plaintiff confession of David, he says, "Be gracious to me, O God, according to the loving kindness according to Your greatness of Thy compassion...blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly for my iniquity and cleanse me from my sins. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against Thee only I have sinned, and done what is evil in Thy sight, so that Thou art justified when Thou does speak and blameless when Thou does judge." That's true confession. "When we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins." Confession in the original language, "homologeó," it's a compound word. "Homo" means the same "logeó" means to speak. It means to say the same thing about your sin that God says. That's true confession. And that's what we see here, in this earnestness. 

The second mark is a desire for vindication; vindication of reputation. You want to look for this in your own heart. He says in verse 11, "what vindication." This is a desire to go back and to make things right. This is a desire to prove yourself trustworthy; to remove the stigma of your sin; to make a new name for yourself that glorifies God. 

Thirdly, you look for indignation. This is a reference to being outrage over your sin, not outraged over being caught or confronted with it, but being outraged over your sin. He says"what indignation." Beloved, this speaks of a loathing over your sin, a resentment over your rebellion against God. Just a hatred of your sin; an anger that swells up within you because you have offended a holy God, in your heart and in your behavior you brought reproach upon yourself. You've brought reproach upon your family. You've hurt other people. That is the indignation that we must look for. 

Number four, we look for fear. This is a fear of divine chastening, a fear of judgment. He says, "what fear?" Certainly a fear of God here, just a profound reverential awe of the lover of their soul and a desire to honor and to worship Him. Knowing that if they do not, they will continue to live under a cloud of divine chastening. And I've worked with so many people over the years that have lived under that cloud and are still there. Maybe this speaks to your heart. It's the type of person who bears very little fruit in their life. The fruits of the Spirit are just really notthere. They're miserable. Their marriage is not good. Their kids are not good. They're, justeverything is just kind of sour. They have no intimate communion with the Lord. They have no desire to spend time with him in prayer, they have no appetite for the Word, they have no burden for the lost.. They have no desire to minister to other people, they just kind of live for themselves, waiting for the next television program, waiting for the next game that they can watch. No, no. Not for a person in genuine repentance. They fear that and they deal with it, that they might be restored under God.  

In fact, number five is the word longing. You're also going to see that he says, "what longing" this is what he sees in them. This is a longing for restoration. We see this in verse seven as well. This is just a passionate yearning to enjoy sweet fellowship when you know that you do not deserve it. Yes, I have offended you, I have offended God, and I long to be restored to you and I know I don't deserve it. That's what real repentance is. 

Number six, zeal. This is a zeal for holiness, "what zeal" he says. This is the commitment to deny yourself in order to please God at all cost. I like what John MacArthur said, quote, "Zeal is a combination of two equally strong emotions, love and hate. It produces a strong love that hates anything that would harm its object." That's what you look for in real repentance, in your own heart and in the heart of one that you might be confronting in love. 

And then number seven, you look for avenging of wrong, "what avenging of wrong," he says. This is a commitment to make things right. This is a commitment to be reconciled with those you have sinned against. Dear friends, this is the stuff of genuine repentance. And I would humbly ask you, does this describe your life? You know, there's really two reasons why people refuse to repent, number one, they love their sin. And number two, they don't see it. And by God's grace, we are to be instruments of righteousness through His Word, by the power of his Spirit, to bring those things to light. This was Paul's motivation. And by the way, God wants us to be instruments of righteousness in such a way that we are gentle in our confrontation, that we are patient, that we are kind, but we're also forthright. By the way, if that's not there, then you're operating in the flesh and not the Spirit. This was Paul's motivation. Verse 12, "So although I wrote to you, it was not for the sake of the offender." In other words, I didn't write that letter just to confront this guy that had verbally assaulted me, nor for the sake of the one offended. In other words, I didn't write the letter in order to get my pound of flesh. That's not my motivation. "But that your earnestness on our behalf might be made known to you in the sight of God." In other words, that God might see the passion of your heart, the motivation of your heart, to repent, and to be reconciled not only to me, but to him. That's what motivated my letter.

Then notice what he says in verse 13, "For this reason, we have been comforted." There's that word again. We've been comforted. And besides our comfort, we rejoice even much more for the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all. Oh, dear friends, the joy of restored fellowship. You know, we're all part of the body of Christ, right? We're all members of that. We're all here to serve one another to ultimately exalt Christ. Just like the human body, my goodness, if the kidney and the liver and the bowels are fighting amongst each other, body's not going to function very well. We're going to be in a world of hurt. In fact, as I talk about that, that sounds like what happens to me many times after too much Mexican food, but you get the idea. But oh dear friends when they all work together, what a blessed thing it is. 

So we need a God sent friend to comfort us, a God glorifying desire for reconciliation, a God empowered boldness to confront sin, and a God given discernment to detect a genuine repentance. And finally, we need a God imitating love to forgive. And we see this all through what Paul is saying here. By the way, this is this is how it's supposed to work. Once again, I think of Matthew 18, verse 15, Jesus says, "If your brother sins," once again, not if he hurts your feelings, not if he doesn't agree with your preferences, not if he somehow fails to meet your expectations, but if your brother sins, because again, bear in mind, Matthew 18, the whole context here is confronting someone over sin that is so life dominating and so egregious, that it justifies excommunication, alright. But if your brother sins go, it doesn't say, pray that he will come to you. No, you go, you take the initiative, and show him his fault in private if he listens to you, you have won your brother. Oh, what a blessed thing right? To experience the joy of restored brotherhood, restored sisterhood. Oh, dear Christian, let's not fight amongst ourselves. And If problems do arise because of sin, let's deal with them. 

By the way, what Jesus said there's a counterpart to the shepherds finding of the lost, the one lost sheep that had been led astray, that he had described just two verses earlier in verse 13, "If it turns out that he finds it truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the 99 which has not gone astray." Well, I have been party to this so many times, to see wonderful restoration take place. By the way, the majority of the Corinthians eventually confronted the man that attacked Paul, we read about that in chapter two and verse six. Paul says, "Sufficient for such a one is this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority, so that on the contrary, you should rather forgive and comfort him, otherwise such a one might be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. Wherefore I urge you to reaffirm your love for him." So here we see just this need for God-imitating love to forgive. Beloved, we are most like God when we forgive. 

We see this as well in his response to their repentance. Notice verse 14, "For if anything I have boasted to him about you, I was not put to shame; but as we spoke all things to you in truth, so also our boasting before Titus proved to be the truth." In other words, real, authentic, true believers are going to repent when confronted with their sin, because they love Christ. They're empowered by the Spirit of God and they want to obey the commands of scriptures.  Hypocrites will not. I have learned over the years and when I confront people who are in obvious sin--I mean, it's not like it's questionable, I mean, you could play the video, well, there it is, everybody knows it; this is what's going on. And they're not broken over that sin; they have no desire to deal with it. Chances are, they don't know Christ. And Paul's confidence in the genuineness of their faith was validated by their humbled repentance, and their loving reception of Titus. He says, verse 15, "His affection abounds all the more toward you, as he remembers the obedience of you all, how you received him with fear and trembling. I rejoice that in everything I have confidence in you." 

Now in closing this morning, I want to give you four very important principles very quickly, that I trust you will take to heart when you endure the pain of some broken relationship. Maybe you're there right now. Let me give them to you quickly. First of all, I want you to understand that God uses relational pain, to humble us and drive us to his throne of grace. Never forget that. God wants us to experience the power of his grace and many times in order to do that he will allow these things to come into our life. Moving ahead to second Corinthians 12, you will recall how Paul says, "there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me to keep me from exalting myself." A reference to one of the key false teachers that was given him such a hard time. So, what did Paul do according to verse eight, he "implored the Lord three times that it might leave me." He goes to the Lord, please, get rid of this guy, do something. But what's fascinating is how God used a thorn to drive him to his throne. A lesson we would all do well to learn. Beloved, no matter how difficult the trial, know this--that an infinite heaven of grace awaits all of us who will run to him for it. God grants grace, to give us wisdom, give us endurance, discernment, power, joy, all of those things. In fact, in Second Corinthians nine eight, Paul said, "God is able to make all grace of bound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed," as I read earlier. 

But secondly, I want you to know that God is more concerned about us persevering in the power of his all-sufficient grace than being rescued from our troubles. You know, typically, we prefer relief more than blessing, don't we? Paul did at first, I don't blame him. But each time Paul came before the Lord to ask that thorn to be removed, the Lord says, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Folks, think about what would have happened if that thorn had been removed from Paul. He would have eliminated the need for a greater measure of grace. He would have been deprived of the increased power and presence of the living Christ to endure it. Had his prayer been answered, according to his wishes, he would have forfeited far more than he had gained. And we must remember that even in the midst of our own difficulties. 

And number three, God's power is perfected in our weakness, not in our strength. We see this clearly in the Lord's repeated response. Three times Paul implored to have the thorn removed. And three times we see "My grace is sufficient for you, or power is perfected in weakness." Folks, God's all sufficient grace is the conduit of his inexhaustible power in our life. That's where we find strength in the midst of weakness. Even as the Spirit empowered Christ to endure the sufferings of all whom the Father had given him, according to John 6:36, through 40. So too, is the Spirit's all sufficient power, that same power that helped Christ. The power that united us to him, that is the same power that can help us endure even the greatest afflictions. Rather than removing the thorn, as Paul requested, he just said, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." 

Well, I trust this is your response. You remember Paul's final response? He said, most gladly. Therefore, "Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses." Why? "So that the power of Christ may dwell in me." That's what's important, the power of Christ. "Therefore, I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions with difficulties for Christ's sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong." I trust this will be your response. And I trust you will remember these five provisions that are so necessary to heal a broken relationship and restore it. You need a God sent friend to comfort you. Pray for a God glorifying desire for reconciliation. Pray for a God empowered boldness to confront sin. Pray for that God given discernment to be able to detect genuine repentance and then pray for a God imitating love to forgive. And then with the psalmist, we can say, "Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers, to dwell in unity." 

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for practical truths that speak so directly to each of our lives. I pray that we might understand them and that we might put them into practice when necessary. That the world will see our love for one another in our desire to walk before you in faith, and in humble obedience. And Lord, if there be one here today, that knows nothing of what it means to be in relationship with the living Christ, they've never been born again, they might have some religious ideas, maybe even have some religious affiliation that they belongto, but maybe they've even made some profession of faith, but Lord, they really don't know you. And they know it in their heart. Oh God, I would just cry out to you that by the power of your Spirit, you will help them to see the horror of their sin and help them to see the power of the gospel. That if they will but repent and cry out to the Lord Jesus Christ to save them, the one who bore their sin in his body that they might not have to enter an eternal hell. Lord, I pray that you will help them to see these things and to ask you to save them this day. That today they might experience the miracle of the new birth. We thank you; we give you praise in all things for Jesus sake. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 16. We will be looking at the very last portion of Mark's gospel under the heading, "The Preservation of Divine Revelation." And I'm sure you will agree with me that given the depraved world in which we live, as we look at all of the blasphemous ideologies, like the whole woke system and so forth, as we look at all of that, isn't it wonderful that we can find refuge in the Word of God and to allow our Lord to speak to us and encourage our hearts.

Mark stated that the purpose of his gospel, in chapter one and verse one, is this, "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus, Christ, the Son of God." And ultimately this is what he proves throughout his gospel. And he does this in a very unique, succinct, staccato style. And ultimately what he tells us, with such clarity under the inspiration of the Scripture, is that indeed Jesus of Nazareth was the promised Messiah of Old Testament prophecy; that he was indeed the suffering Savior, that he was the Son of God and his resurrection, which was witnessed by numerous eyewitnesses, puts a capstone on that glorious reality. The response of his followers was one of wonder, one of awe, one of worship, and that should be our response as well, and we see this in the final verse of Mark's gospel, where he describes the reaction of the women when they saw the empty tomb.

Notice verse eight of chapter 16, "They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." Indeed, they were overwhelmed by what they had just witnessed. But I would submit to you that verse eight is, in fact, the last verse of Mark's gospel, even though in your Bibles, you will see verses nine through 20 continuing on. And you will notice that they are in brackets. And what we are going to see is that this is what scholars called the longer ending of Mark. And there is almost universal agreement that this was not part of the original divinely inspired text, but this was added at a later date. I might add that the same can be said of John seven, verses 53 through verse 11 of chapter eight. You will recall that's the story of of the woman caught in adultery, and Jesus stoops and he writes something in the sand, "He is who is without sin, cast the first stone." That also is highly unlikely that that was part of the original inspired text.

But you will notice brackets at the beginning of this last section in verses nine through 20. Unless you have a King James version or a New King James Version, then you will have no distinction between verse eight and verse nine, because those translations are based on a medieval text, a later text. But since then, since they were translated earlier manuscripts, in other words, more ancient manuscripts have been discovered. So the 20th century NAS, or the NAS update, or the 21st century ESV, NIV, etc, are all based on those earlier manuscripts that omit verses nine through 20, and some late manuscripts even contain a shorter ending. You may see that in italics at the very end of verse 20, but some translations even will put that at the end of verse eight. Nevertheless, let me read this to you, and I want to explain these things and give you great encouragement that the Bible that you have in your hand is an accurate translation of the original autographs. Let me read the passage now.

"[After He had risen early on the first day of the week, He first appeared to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had cast out seven demons. She went and reported to those who had been with Him, while they were mourning and weeping. When they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they refused to believe it. After that, He appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking along on their way to the country. They went away and reported it to others, but they did not believe them either. Afterward, He appeared to the 11 themselves as they were reclining at the table, and He reproached them for their unbelief and hardness of heart because they had not believed. Those who had seen Him after He had risen, and He said to them, 'Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned. These signs will accompany those who have believed in my name. They will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.' So then, when the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God, and they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the word by the signs that followed.] And then you will notice even another ending that was added, [And they promptly reported all these instructions to Peter and his companions. And after that, Jesus himself sent out through them, from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.]

I recently heard a critic of the Bible, and there are many, who essentially said, and this is a bit of a paraphrase, there is no evidence that Mark's gospel is authentic. Even conservative scholars agree that verses nine through 20 of chapter 16 were written by some unknown scribe. So how can you trust your Bible? It's a good question. I want you to be able to answer that very clearly by the end of this time this morning. It's a great question, and today, I will give you reasons to know with absolute certainty that the Bible you have is indeed an accurate translation of the original autographs, assuming it is a reputable translation based on formal equivalency, which is an actual translation, not a paraphrase. Formal equivalence is something that is a term that scholars use. It speaks of a word for word rendering of the original language and whatever language the reader needs, it's translated into that. And so every effort is made to make sure that both the word order and the sentence structure are consistent with the original Hebrew and the Greek. I will also explain to you why verses nine through 20 is believed to be a later addition and not the original ending of the gospel of Mark and should therefore never be used as a basis for doctrine or for practice, as unfortunately, some people do.

But more importantly, than all of this technical textual criticism stuff that you are about to hear, and I hope I won't make it too boring for you, because it is important, most importantly, I want to stir your affections for the word of God, and the God of the word. You know, what we have in our hands and what I preach from every Sunday morning is the greatest treasure we have on Earth. It is the Word of the living God. Do you realize it's banned in 52 countries around the world, and it's increasingly mocked here in the United States, because what is contained in the Word of God is contrary to the Neo-Marxist socialist agenda that's being perpetrated upon our culture. In fact, in North Korea, Afghanistan and Somalia, if you own a Bible, you can be killed. I remember when I was training pastors in Siberia, I got to know them. In fact, one of them and his dear wife were in my home a few weeks ago. They were able to come over and visit. I remember them talking about how precious it is to have the Bible. In fact, in that culture, you will never set your Bible on the floor, and it will always be on top of every stack of books. That's how they treasure it. And every church that I went to to minister had people, in fact, the majority of the people who had had grandparents that were killed by the communists because they owned a Bible and because they were Christians.

In fact, I remember on a number of occasions we'd be driving along in the van, and they would stop, and they would say, you see that block wall out there in the woods, and you could see through the trees, yeah, and see a block wall. And in most cases, they were about 20 feet long and about seven or eight feet high. And they said, that's where they would stand Christians up and shoot them, and they would describe family members that they knew that were killed there because of their faith. This is a treasure dear friends of inestimable worth. When the moderator of the Church of Scotland handed a Bible to the new monarch in Britain's coronation service, he said, "The Bible is the most valuable thing that this world affords. Here is wisdom. This is the royal law. These are the lively oracles of God." In the words, those same words are echoed in by the King James translators many years ago, who wrote this in 1611 they said, quote, "God's sacred word is that inestimable treasure that excelth all the riches of the earth."

Now, sadly, in one study by the state of theology, it's called a state of theology study in 2022 they said that "For the first time in history, a majority of Americans, 53%, say the Bible, like all sacred writings, contains helpful accounts of ancient myths, but is not literally true. And 40%, the highest percentage yet, say modern science disproves the Bible." The study goes on to say that "A growing percentage, up to a high of 32%, says God is unconcerned with their day-to-day decisions, and three in five, or 60%, say religious belief is a matter of personal opinion, not objective truth." Is it any wonder we are enduring the things that we see in our culture today? Because, dear friends, once you deny the objective truth of Scripture, you're on a slippery slope to deny all objective truth. And we see that even in the objective truth of biological gender, which is now produced as transgender insanity, most people couldn't care less what God's Word says. Frankly, even many people that go to church every Sunday really don't care what it says. They really don't know what it says. It has no impact on how they live. And sadly for those people, unless they repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they will perish in their sins and in the solitary confinement of an eternal hell, they will blaspheme the God that is judging them as a consequence of their arrogant dismissal and rejection of Christ and His Word.

Now many people are offended even with the phrase "the word of God." I remember in my doctoral studies, one of the things we would have to do is write position papers, and then we would have to present them in a group of our peers and a panel of professors in the back, and I remember being raked over the coals by one professor from University of Aberdeen, because I said on several occasions the phrase "the Word of God." He says, "You can't use that in scholarly papers. You don't know that that's the word of God. How do you know that's the word of God?" And we talked about that a little bit, but I could tell I was going nowhere with him. And he said, "You can call it the sacred writings, you can call it the Holy Scriptures, you can call it the Bible, but you can't call it the word of God, or you will lose all credibility." And obviously I have disregarded his advice. Folks, I don't care about person credibility in the eyes of man, what I do care about is personal integrity in the eyes of the Lord, because I am his spokesperson. I have nothing to say other than what he has said in his word. And my mind always goes back to Second Timothy three, beginning in verse 16, "All Scripture is inspired..." literally breathed out, "...by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His Kingdom, preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."

Dear friends, I hope you join me in treasuring this book. I believe with all of my heart that it is indeed the inspired, inerrant, infallible, authoritative, all sufficient word of the living God. Otherwise I would have not dedicated my life to studying it, to learning it and explaining it and applying it to you and others, most of my adult life. Like no other document, God has revealed himself and his plan of redemption in his word. And what's fascinating is that he has done this by using 40 authors who wrote over a course of 1500 years from three different continents in three different languages, primarily Hebrew and Greek. There's only two passages in Aramaic. And as a result of this, we have a collection of 66 documents gathered into two testaments, 39 books in the Old, 27 in the New. And it contains 63,779 cross references; references that speak of similar themes or words or events or or people. And there's varying numbers here, but some say there are 1817 prophecies in the Bible, and about 800 of them have been fulfilled. Precisely no other book can even come close to making that claim. In fact, over 300 of them were fulfilled at Christ's first coming. There are five recurring motifs that are constantly emphasized in Scripture, and you can see these if you have a MacArthur Study Bible. At the very beginning of that particular Bible, you will see: the revelation of the character of God, the revelation of the divine judgment for sin and disobedience, the revelation of divine blessing for faith and obedience, the revelation of the Lord's savior and sacrifice for sin, and the revelation of the kingdom and glory of the Lord's savior. And you will see these themes emphasized over and over again, overlapping in virtually every passage of scripture. We have the canon of Scripture, and the way we received that, there were really three tests of canonicity. The first test was that the passage that would be, or the book that would be included in the canon, had to have been written by a recognized prophet or apostle or one of their close associates. Secondly, what was written could not disagree or contradict previous scripture. And then, thirdly, there had to be a general consensus by the church that it was an inspired book, and there were councils of theologians that would meet to determine this. But what is really fascinating, and what I want to dwell on much of our time this morning, is the miracle of God's preservation of his divine revelation down through the ages.

Now remember, prior to the invention of the printing press, which was about 1450 ad, biblical manuscripts were meticulously hand copied by scribes, and of course, that made the remote possibility, but certainly the possibility of error or alterations possible or additions. And it is believed that this particular section of scripture is a scribal addition to compensate for Mark's rather abrupt ending in verse eight. Now, scribes originally copied the original autographs by hand. Imagine that. And they wrote them on a papyrus scroll - papyrus was basically ancient paper made from a plant. And it's fascinating, historians tell us that the scribes that copied the Hebrew Old Testament would write one letter and then go take a bath, and then they would come back and write another letter and take a bath. And they would do this until every letter of divine revelation had been copied. They would even clean their writing instrument and wash their entire body when writing the most holy name of God, Yahweh. They would do this every time they wrote it. So you get an idea of the sacred nature of the holy scriptures and how they perceived what they had what they were copying, that this was the word of the living God. They treated it with utmost reverence, profound importance. You know, I have to tell you that I think of this every time I study the word of God, especially when I'm in the original languages; every time I exposit it. Second Timothy 21:5 says that we are to, "Be diligent to present ourselves approved by God as a workman that does not need to be ashamed accurately handling the word of truth."

Now, with respect to the preservation of these ancient manuscripts, I want you to understand that there is no other, there are no other manuscripts that even come close to what we have in terms of ancient manuscripts of the Bible. Some manuscripts that we have are only 25 to 50 years removed from the original autographs. There are 5600 ancient Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, including everything from small fragments of papyri to complete codices containing all 27 books. Codices - a codex - was a later on was a bound leather volume, okay? Some manuscripts date back to the second into the third century. One fragment, for example, from a papyrus codex of the Gospel of John - it's called P 52; it's about the size of a credit card, I've seen it in pictures. I haven't been there to actually witness it, but it's got a like a plexiglass, and you can see on either side of it, but it contains parts of seven lines of John 18:31 through 32 on one side, and parts of seven lines of verses, 37 through 38 on the back. And it's dated about AD 100 maybe to 150. Think about that, I mean, the apostle John wrote the book of Revelation somewhere between 94 and 96 ad. There are numerous other papyri manuscripts containing verses in books of the New Testament that have been collected, some as far back as 175 ad. There are over 350 copies of the Bible in Syriac, dating back to the two hundreds. There are 8000 copies of the New Testament in Latin - that's called the Vulgate - and they date back to 382 to about 405 ad. And it's astounding to think that 1000s, all of these 1000s of copies of the original autographs survived the vicious persecution of Christians during the Second and the Third centuries. Two of the most prominent codices are Codex Sinaiticus. It was written about 350 ad. It's probably the earliest known manuscript of the Bible. And then Codex Vaticanus, that contains the Greek Old Testament, the Greek New Testament, it's probably written, they believe, around 325 ad. And by the way, both of those end Mark's gospel with chapter eight. Nine through 20 are not there. And you will recall when Constantine came into power, along with his mother, who came into power, Helena, who, by the way, was responsible for the construction and the beautification of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, a number of us had been there before, as well as the church of Ileana on the Mount of Olives, which were basically the site of Christ's birth and Christ's ascension, respectively. But during that time, Constantine obviously allowed Christianity to flourish, rather than it being outlawed. And in 331 he commissioned 50 bibles to be written and prepared by Eusebius of Caesarea, and they were made for the use of the Bishop of Constantinople. And the growing number of churches that were popping up in that new city Constantinople, it's Istanbul today, and I was just there not too long ago, a city of 25 million. A number of you with me, but it is certainly not a Christian country anymore. It's very Muslim. But it is believed that Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus are possible surviving examples of these Bibles, and because of Constantine, 1000s more manuscripts were copied and written and disseminated. And Constantine, you may recall, called for a council of Christian theologians. He called them together to refute different heresies, especially Arianism in that day, and establish orthodox doctrines. And they did this in a place called Nicaea. You've heard of the Council of Nicaea. This was in 325, ad. Nicaea is a town in northwestern Turkey, today it's called Iznik. It's just a kind of southeast of Constantinople or Istanbul today. And those pastors and theologians came together in this council, and they were called ante, maybe you've heard of ante-Nicene fathers. Ante, "A N, T E dash Nicene" fathers, meaning they were church fathers who lived before the Council of Nicaea. So these were men who lived in the two and 300 era. And today we can read much of what they have written. There are Commentaries that contain approximately 32,000 quotes from the New Testament, enough to reconstruct the entire New Testament. And surprise, surprise, everything they wrote is consistent. There are over 19,000 quotes from the gospels that we can read from early church fathers, and they are all consistent. So whether they had Greek manuscripts, Syriac Bible, a Latin Vulgate, all of them are identical translations. And again, folks, no other ancient document even comes close to enjoying this kind of preservation. The next closest, well established ancient work is Homer's Iliad. It was written in the eighth century BC. Remember, it was an epic poem, I believe, in 24 books. It describes the Trojan War and the Greek warrior Achilles and all of that. There are only 643 surviving copies that exist today, and the oldest one is from the 13th century AD. You compare this to the some 25,000 ancient biblical manuscripts, which would also include the Latin and the Ethiopic translations, and you can see that nothing even comes close to what God has done in preserving his word.

And then we can add to that now, much more recently, the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls; the Old Testament manuscripts there that further validate the accuracy of the other ancient manuscripts of the Old Testament. These were discovered over about a 10-year period, from 1946 to 56 at the Qumran Caves on the northern shore of the Dead Sea. A number of us have been there. It's a fascinating place. And they are approximately 2000 years old, dating all the way back to the third century BC to the first century. And guess what? They all say the same thing. I mean, God has gone to supernatural lengths to preserve his word.

Now through the science of what's called "textual criticism" that analyzes and compares ancient biblical manuscripts to determine if they are indeed part of the original autographs, scholars are able to detect possible scribal errors or embellishments, and this final section of Mark's gospel is missing from the most reliable manuscripts. In fact, early church fathers like Clement of Alexandria, who lived between 150 and 250 AD and Origen who lived between 185 and 253, they were not aware of this ending. And the church historian, Eusebius of Caesarea, who lived from 265 to 340, and the Bible translator, Jerome, that lived from 347 to 420, both say that almost all of the Greek manuscripts available in their day omitted verses nine through 20.

So the question comes up, well, why was it added? Who did it? When did he do it, or whatever? We can't answer that completely, but it is assumed that because verse eight appears to be an abrupt ending to Mark's gospel, unlike the other gospels, it must be incomplete. And so when you study all of the science with textual criticism, you see that sometime in the early to mid-second century, some scribe or scribes had to have come to that conclusion, and they wanted it to read more like other gospels. Because when we look closely at verses nine through 20, we see that, and we do a comparison, verse by verse comparison from the other gospels, you will see that there are undeniable parallels. Now I'm not going to bore you with all of this, but for example, if you look at verses nine through 10 of Mark 16, undeniable that they parallel John 20 and verse one, Luke eight and verse two, and John 20, verses 17 and 18. Mark 16:11, parallels Luke 24:10 through 11. Mark, 16:12 and 13, parallels Luke 24:13 and 35. So you can see that they took these verses and kind of cut and paste, shall we say, to make a little bit nicer ending.

Even the vocabulary, the style, the structure of this ending is inconsistent with what we see in the rest of Mark's gospel. For example, there's a transition here between verse eight and verse nine that seems to be a non sequitur. In other words, it doesn't fit, it doesn't logically flow from the previous statement. Let me read it for you. Verse eight says, "They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. Now, after He had risen early on the first day of the week, He first appeared to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had cast out seven demons." You can tell it just doesn't fit. In fact, if you look at, in the original language, the Greek conjunction, the word "now" implies continuity with the previous statement, but verse nine shifts the narrative to talking about Mary Magdalene. And even introducing her as if she's she's kind of a new character, a new person in this whole drama. But in fact, she was previously mentioned three times in the same context, in Mark 15:40, also in verse 47 and then in chapter 16 and verse one. You could add to this, the whole issue of diction. When you look at the diction used in these verses, you discover that there are 14 words that are used that are not found in any previous portion of Mark's gospel. You know how it is when it's like when I help my grandchildren write a paper, okay? And I want to make sure they're saying the right thing. I got to make sure I don't use language that I would use right? Otherwise the teacher going to, now, you didn't, you didn't....you don't even know what the word ubiquitous means, you know, or whatever. And so it's the same type of thing here. And there are also words that are used in ways that are totally different, and phrases that are oddly different.

And then you look at the insertion of being able to pick up venomous serpents or drink any deadly poison. I mean, that clearly lacks biblical support. I mean, where are you going to go? What's that talking about? And this basically means, dear friends, that no doctrine or Christian practice should be founded upon this section that languishes in such serious dispute. As I have said before, for example, snake handling is a bad doctrine that will always come back to bite you.

Now, concerning this added edition, John MacArthur says, quote, "Careful students who have made a serious study of the transmission of the biblical text would virtually all agree that verses nine through 20 are a gloss; that is a later uninspired scribal edition appended to the original inspired text. Indeed, those last 12 verses bear the hallmarks of an attempt to cover up a perceived imperfection. That section does not fit the style and structure of the rest of Mark, and this is also the conclusion of the church fathers in the first four centuries." Now, it would take a long time to give you all of the external and internal evidence that would discredit the authenticity of this section, I've probably already bored you to death, but if you want more of the technical information, please see me and I will give you enough to keep you busy for the next three months, okay?

Now I hope you can see beloved that the supernatural preservation of divine revelation is supernatural. I mean, it's a miracle in and of itself. No other document comes close to this, and the reason is because no other document has this value, right? I mean, who wants to preserve Homer's Iliad, right? And so many of the other things that are out there. And so I hope you can understand that you can have confidence in the veracity of Scripture because of the enormous care that went into copying the original autographs and the scholarly science of textual criticism. I have friends that are brilliant scholars, and they have devoted their life to these types of things. They can analyze and compare ancient documents to determine if the contents are of the original autographs and so on and so forth. And so all of this should bolster your confidence in the veracity of the Bible, and it's for this reason that we can say to the critic that the Bible does prove itself to be what it says to be - the inspired Word of the living God. I love Spurgeon's quote, you've probably heard it before, he put it this way, he said, "The Word of God can take care of itself and will do so if we preach it and cease defending it. See you that lion? They have caged him for his preservation. Shut him up behind iron bars to secure him from his foes. See how a band of armed men have gathered together to protect the lion. What a clatter they make with their swords and spears. These mighty men are intent upon defending a lion. O fools and slow of heart, open that door. Let the Lord of the forest come forth free. Who will dare to encounter him? What does he want with your guardian care. Let the pure gospel go forth in all its lion like majesty. And it will soon clear its own way and ease itself of its adversaries." End quote.

Folks, just think what the Word of God has done to you, how it has absolutely transformed your heart to a point that you would absolutely die for the truths of the word of God. Because through the word of God, you have come to know the God of the word.

Now let's close this morning by focusing on Mark's ending. Go back to verse eight. "They went out and fled from the tomb..." these dear women, "for trembling and astonishment had gripped them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." This beloved, is the text the Holy Spirit inspired; this is the text that he has preserved down through the ages, and I think it is a very fitting closing after making his case that Jesus was indeed the Son of God, validated by his resurrection from the dead. What else can be said, but what he has said? It's just complete astonishment that this has happened. And like the women who fled from that tomb, trembling, overwhelmed with emotion, awestruck, amazed, trembling at the power of God, shouldn't we have the same response when we see what God has done in the resurrection from the dead? Let me ask you, what amazes you? What causes you to be just overwhelmed with a sense of awe? You know the feeling when you see things like a tornado or lightning or thunder, right? The Northern Lights, if you've been there, or if you've been in parts of the world where there's no light pollution, like I've been and up in the northern reaches of Canada and the Arctic Circle, Siberia, Africa, those places you look up in the sky. And folks, I tell you, it doesn't look anything at all like what we see. There are so many stars. It will just practically take your breath away. Now, those are things that can bring awe. Let me ask you, does the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead cause you to have that same reaction? Does it cause you to react the way those dear ladies did? Let me put it to you differently. If there is anything on earth that exceeds your awe of the death and the burial and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, there is something terribly wrong with your heart.

You know, I think of this, the resurrection, every time I'm in the presence of a corpse; we've all been there. I've been there when loved ones died, especially I remember with my sister as I held her hand as she took her last breath. I've been around other corpses many times where you touch that body, and it's cold and stiff. It is lifeless. And whenever I do that, I'm reminded of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and what that means for me and all who belong to him. I think of this every time I think of my departed loved ones that I miss so desperately. Don't we all have those? I think of this every time I think of my own departure; that there's going to be a resurrection. You know, the Bible teaches that at death the soul vacates the body. And for believers, according to First Corinthians, five, "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord," right? What an amazing thought. And we await that time, according to Philippians, 3:21, when Christ will, "transform our lowly body" and conform it into his glorious body that produces within me a sense of awe that excels the Northern Lights. In Acts 20 and verse 15, we read that there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust. Every human being that has ever lived is going to have a resurrection. There will be two groups resurrected, the "just" meaning those that have been justified or declared righteous by faith in Christ. They are just, and therefore they will enter into eternal glory, where there is fullness of joy forevermore. And then there will be the resurrection of the "unjust," those who place their faith in themselves or some false religious system. They will also be outfitted with a resurrected body that will withstand the torments of hell. And for those who have placed their faith in Christ, we can rejoice. And such has been the promised hope of God's people down through the ages; a hope based upon the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In fact, Jesus said in John 14, "'Because I live, you shall live also.'" Because of his resurrection, the great terror of all terrors, that of death, has been forever vanquished for the believer. We have been released from its grip. We can actually look forward to it. I don't look forward to those things that will precede it, none of us want that, but boy, when we pass through the veil, oh my. Of course, we won't receive that resurrected body until Christ returns, but when that happens, our glorification will be complete. And that's the hope that we have in Christ. That's why Paul would say in Philippians, 1:21 "For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." First Corinthians 15, "O death where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" I hope you anticipate the full completion of the glory that awaits you because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And I hope that stirs your heart with holy affections for all that God has given us through Christ. And when you do nothing else in life will really matter. Nothing else in life will really matter, except knowing and loving and enjoying and worshiping and serving Christ.

There's been a video that goes around, I've seen it a couple times from various people, and I didn't write it down, but it impacted me, because it was so exceedingly sad. Maybe you've seen it, it's and this is kind of a summary of what it says, life is so short that that we need to live it up. And it's essentially saying life is short, we live it and then we disappear. And it talks about how you know, after a couple of generations, no one will know that you ever even existed. They asked the question, "What do you know about your great grandfather's grandfather." Well, it's a good point. Talks about how all the things that you spend your life trying to achieve or acquire, that new car, that fancy home, that prestigious reputation, all of that will vanish at your death. And the point is, because life is short and essentially meaningless, and because you will soon vanish into the empty universe of forgotten people, you need to slow down and smell the roses. You need to essentially eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. Because no one's going to ever remember you anyway. I'm so glad that is not what I have to tell you this morning. But you know, that's where most people live. No wonder we have such a drug problem, such an alcohol problem, such a pornography problem, and on and on it goes. "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain."

Our life dear friends, as believers, has a purpose, and that purpose is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. Beloved the only thing that matters in your life is what you do for God and his glory. Yes, the world will forget. If the Lord tarries, in three generations, certainly in four, no one will ever know any of us existed, but the Lord does, and the Lord will reward. And because of this, our heart longs for the perfection of God; of God manifested in us when we enter into his presence. And therefore we can live with that exhilarating joy of knowing what awaits us, that one day we will actually partake in the glory of God. And this will be the attitude that that rare man will have who is truly looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave himself for us. O the hope of seeing and sharing and the glory of Christ, all because of the resurrection. This is what should fill our hearts with praise, and this is why Paul would say at the close of his life, prior to his martyrdom in Romans five and verse two, "...exult in hope of the glory of God." And I pray that this will be the desire of your heart. And I pray that you will be exhilarated knowing that you will eventually stand in the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy, Amen?

May I challenge you, treasure your Bible. Treasure it more than perhaps you ever have. I'll give you kind of a corny story, but I laughed about it later on. Number of years ago, I was sitting in my office at my house. It used to be in the garage, and I had a window, and I could see out to the west, and I could tell the weather was getting extremely bad and suddenly there started to be a lot of hail. And I could hear it beating on the house, and it started to get darker and darker, and I could look out and I could see a big tornado coming my way. Nancy wasn't home, and I thought, "This is bad." And it kept getting darker. I thought the window was going to blow out, and right behind me is a little opening that you could just barely get, maybe you might squeeze two people in there, but it was a thing in the fireplace where the bricks are at a little wooden door, and that's where you could put wood for the fireplace. And I thought, I'm just going to get in there. And I had my two blue heelers at the time that many of you have been bitten by. I grabbed the dogs, and I grabbed my Bible, and I got in the little hole, and I could hear, you know, the train noise going up over me. I thought the house was gone, but it lifted up over me, and it went down, and unfortunately, it landed over in Coopertown, further and took out a number of homes. But after it was over, I thought, you know, that was just my knee jerk response, to grab my Bible.

Folks, let it be the most precious possession that you have, and may I challenge you to read it every day, even if it's a small portion. I challenge you get a good study Bible. I love The MacArthur Study Bible; I think it's the best out. Read the word of God, even if it's just a little bit every day. Meditate on it, memorize it, talk about it, and you will see how the Lord will use it to nourish your soul. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word, and my, how you have preserved your word down through the ages, so that the very things that we would say today were those things that the apostle Paul would have said, that John would have said, that Timothy would have said, that Jude would have said, that the Lord Jesus would have said. Thank you for your word. May we cherish it as we should, and for those that know nothing of what it is to be in fellowship with the living God, having been reconciled to him through saving faith in Christ, will you bring that conviction to bear upon his or her soul, that today they will repent and be saved. We thank you. We give you praise in the name of Jesus, our Savior and coming King, amen.

We find ourselves once again in Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn there, we will be looking and in Mark 16, the first eight verses. And I've entitled my discourse to you this morning, "Resurrection: The Messianic pronouncement." And I'm sure before the hour is over, you will understand that more fully and be as excited about it as I am. Charles Spurgeon once said, "There is no sin killer like the word of God. Wherever it comes, it comes as a sword and inflicts death upon evil." And that's exactly why Satan hates it so. That's why he tries to counterfeit it, distort it, deny it, and that's why we must study it. We must preach it. We must meditate upon it. We must memorize it. We must defend it and treasure it and obey it, because it is the only truth that saves and sanctifies. And those who are weak in the Scriptures will be weak in their faith, they will be shallow in their worship. They will be worldly in their life. They will be undiscerning in their thoughts, and they will be vulnerable to the schemes of the devil. So therefore, once again, this morning, we will unsheath the sword, which is the word of God, and unleash its power to accomplish his purposes in the redeemed. So let me read the passage to you, Mark chapter 16, beginning in verse one.

"When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary, the mother of James, and Salome, bought spices, so that they might come and anoint Him.

Very early on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen.

They were saying to one another, 'Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?'

Looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away, although it was extremely large.

Entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting at the right, wearing a white robe; and they were amazed.

And he said to them, 'Do not be amazed; you are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who has been crucified. He has risen; He is not here; behold, here is the place where they laid Him.

But go, tell His disciples and Peter, 'He is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see Him, just as He told you.'

They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid."

My friends, the physical resurrection from the dead, of the Lord Jesus Christ is the most important and foundational truth of biblical true, genuine Christianity; only God himself can give life, only God can conquer death, and the evidences of the resurrection are undeniable to any reasonable, unbiased person. Which I might add, is extremely rare. This was a day of Messianic pronouncement. The reason, I would say this is recorded in Romans, chapter one, verse four, where we read Jesus Christ, "...was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead” The word "declared" in the original language is "horizō," We get our word "horizon" from that. And it carries with it the basic meaning of marking off a boundary or a limit. So it carries this idea of that which determines, that which distinguishes or defines. And the point is, Jesus' resurrection from the dead, declared, determined, defined, the fact that he was indeed the Son of God. His resurrection is therefore a messianic pronouncement. And I might add that anyone who denies the deity of Christ, anyone who denies his atoning work on the cross, his death, his burial and his resurrection, will perish in their sin.

Now, the implications of the resurrection and the glorification of Jesus Christ exceed the importance, and I might even add the power of all other events in history. Only the actual creation of the universe rivals it, because you must understand, within the resurrection body of the Lord Jesus Christ, existed the supernatural power source of eternal life and God's everlasting kingdom. And it's for this reason that Paul prayed for the Ephesians in Ephesians, one beginning in verse 19, that they would know, quote, "...what is the immeasurable greatness of His power in us who believe...according to the working of His might, which He accomplished in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and made Him sit at His right hand in the heavenly places..." You see, contained within the resurrection body of the Lord Jesus was the supernatural seed of resurrection glory for all of the redeemed, for all whom the Father had given him - the power source, you might say - of the universe. And that's why Paul would rejoice in Colossians, 1:27, and speak of, "...Christ in you, the hope of.." what? "..the hope of glory." We have been supernaturally united to the creator and sustainer of God's everlasting kingdom. And think how this relates to us as we've just read in our scripture passage a minute ago, First Corinthians 15 verse 20, "..Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ, shall all be made alive." You see, in Christ, we have been given a new existence. Remember, his human body was made perfect. It was no longer subject to weakness or to death, but to live eternally. And as we read in First Corinthians, 15:42, and following that he put on immortality, therefore, like his resurrection body, ours will also be raised imperishable. It will be raised in glory, in power, a spiritual body. It's hard to even begin to imagine this, but we will be given a body like Christ's, a body that is fit for heaven, no longer subject to weakness or to death or to shame because of sin. Can you imagine an existence where there is no more frailty to temptation? Can you imagine living in an existence when there are no limits to time or to space, a time/ space fear like we currently live in.

And within the resurrection body of Christ was the infinite power of the self-existent, pre-existent, uncreated, Creator of the universe who spoke all things into existence, the one who upholds all things by the word of His power; a force infinitely more powerful than anything man could ever create or even conceive. And we have been united to him. To think that one day we will behold him right? Dwelling in a body that will in many ways look like ours, yet from his body, the effulgence of his celestial majesty, the resplendent light of his glory, will blaze forth, more brilliant than the sun.

Moreover, Christ is the quote "first fruits." In other words, he is a precise sample of a coming harvest, which means our resurrection body will be much like his, minus the incommunicable attributes that are his alone. Oh, dear friends, the wonder of being united to the living Christ, the source of eternal life for all who believe in the crucified and resurrected Son of God; I hope you will remember this in the midst of your trials. I hope you will find encouragement in this great reality. I pray that when the world mocks you and persecutes you, your mind will go to this.

Now this morning, we're going to examine Mark's account of the resurrection along with some of the other gospel writers, and I want to have a special emphasis on the evidences that prove the resurrection, as well as, I want to fan the embers of our faith into a roaring flame of excitement knowing that because he lives, we too shall live. As I read earlier, in First Corinthians 15, "If Christ has not been raised, and our preaching is in vain, your faith also is vain." Moreover, we are even found to be "false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom he did not raise, if, in fact, the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless. You are still in your sins. Then those who have also fallen asleep in Christ have perished, if we have hoped in Christ, in this life only. We are, of all men, most to be pitied."

Now I want to back up. I want to make sure you have the big picture of the Passion Week of Christ. There are five key events that occurred during that time, and together, they help us grasp the staggering implications and significance of the death and resurrection of Christ. First, you will recall what I would describe as his messianic presentation. Remember that occurred at his triumphal entry, which would have been on Monday. Luke 19:38 tells us, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of our Lord, peace in heaven and glory in the highest." And if we go back to Daniel nine and verse 25 we have a prophecy given some 600 years earlier that tells us the very day of our Lord's messianic presentation. It was predicted by the Holy Spirit through the prophet Daniel.

And then secondly, we see his messianic proclamation. We see that early Tuesday morning, Jesus and the 12 approached the city of Jerusalem. And on the way, you will recall in Matthew 21 and verse 19, he cursed the barren fig tree. He said, "'No longer shall there ever be any fruit from you." And at once the fig tree withered." And of course, that was symbolic of the judgment that was coming upon Israel. For they, like the leafy tree that gave a pretense of being fruitful, were in fact barren.

And then we go on to read how he enters the temple, he cleanses the temple, and for two days he rules in its precincts. He claimed possession of it as the mighty sovereign. And during that time, he appealed to David in Psalm 110, to prove again, his claim of Messiah. And in his first, I should say his last, public discourse at that time, he denounced the scribes and Pharisees in a series of woes recorded in Matthew 23.

And then on Wednesday night, they ascended together once again on the Mount of Olives, making their way back home to the home of Lazarus in Bethany. And there he gives his famous Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24 and 25; the longest of all answers concerning future things, including the destruction of Jerusalem that would come, his second coming, and specifically the conditions and the signs that would precede his coming in power and great glory to establish his kingdom.

And then Thursday afternoon, Jesus and the 12 reenter the city. And there we see number three: his messianic preparation. Preparation was made for the Passover meal in a private room that they had obtained earlier what would become the Last Supper. And during that time, Jesus exposed Judas as his betrayer. The final drama of Jesus' death was then set into motion. He was then later arrested, the early dawn on Friday. He was formerly condemned by the Sanhedrin and taken immediately to the Roman Procurator and that procurator, Pilate, interrogated him. He said that "I find no fault in him." But ultimately to keep peace with the outraged Jews, he capitulated to their demands, and he released Barabbas in exchange for Jesus. Then he had Jesus scourged, hoping that would satisfy the Jews. But of course, it did not. So he reluctantly turned Jesus over to be crucified as a rival king.

And between the hours of six and nine on Friday morning, the Roman soldiers made sport of him. They mocked him as they escorted him to Golgotha, and there the Lord Jesus, Christ, the Son of God, was crucified between two thieves. And then there, at this point, is the fourth key event that I would call, his messianic propitiation. You will recall in First John four and verse 10, we read, "In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." To propitiate - "hilasmos" -  in the original language, it means to appease or to placate or to satisfy. And so his death appeased, it placated, it satisfied the just wrath of God against sin. And of course, this was pictured all throughout the Old Testament. Remember the golden lid that was on top of the Ark of the Covenant stationed in the Holy of Holies, and that golden lid separated the violated law beneath with the Shekinah glory in the presence of God above, his holy presence that hovered there, and that lid was called the mercy seat. In fact, the Septuagint translates it the hilasterion, the place of propitiation. That was the place where the just wrath of God was symbolically propitiated; his anger was symbolically satisfied; his vengeance was symbolically placated. For on that lid, divine justice and grace came together symbolically when the high priest on Yom Kippur would sprinkle the blood of the animal to make atonement for the sins of Israel.  But you see, what was once symbolized, was finally realized in the cross; realized in the Messianic propitiation.

So Jesus was buried then sometime before sundown on Friday, and there his body laid all of Saturday, which was the Jewish Sabbath. And then just before dawn on Sunday, he was resurrected from the dead.

Dave Harrell  

And so we move finally from the Messianic propitiation, which was finished, to where we are today in the Messianic pronouncement. Again, Romans one four, Jesus Christ was, "...declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead..." I might add that there are many other New Testament proofs of his resurrection. We're going to look at some of them today, but I'm reminded of what Luke tells us in Acts chapter one, verse three, "To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of 40 days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God."

Now Luke writes in a very succinct way, and he doesn't cover all of the details, so we will look at some of the other gospel writers, but we see three convincing proofs that emerge from Mark's account. We will see them in these three categories that I've given to you, that I hope will be helpful. We will see the convincing proof concerning the amazement of the women; secondly, the appearance of the angels, and finally, the astonishment of the disciples. My if only we could have been there, right? You know, I try to put myself in that place, if only I could have been there and seen that, but something better awaits us, we're going to see him face to face in all of his glory soon.

So with that, we come to the text. He begins by saying, "When the Sabbath was over..." Very important. That means it's after 6pm on Saturday, therefore all of the shops, all of the bazaars, are open, and the loyal, loving group of Galilean women that have been with him through all of this have, and the ones that are mentioned, I might add, in chapter 15, have purchased spices from those shops to anoint Jesus body; an act of honor and love, but also one to help cover the odor of decomposition. But I might also add, the phrase, "the Sabbath was over" speaks to a broader and more important subject than just the mere time of day. You will recall that the Sabbath was the sign of the Mosaic Covenant. Mosaic Covenant was the law that God gave Israel through Moses to govern their life and conduct when they went into the promised land of Canaan. And Israel repeatedly violated the Mosaic Covenant, but God promised that that covenant would be superseded by a better New Covenant. You read about that in Jeremiah 31:31 through 32. And the death of Jesus meant, therefore, the end of the Mosaic Covenant as a rule of life. Indeed, he fulfilled the demands of the covenant and established the new covenant in his blood, Luke 22:20. In fact, Paul says in Romans 10 verse four, "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes."

And I might add that as Christians, we are no longer under the Mosaic covenant. We have been released from the law to serve in the new way of the Holy Spirit. Paul says in First Corinthians, 9:20 through 21, "We are now under the law of Christ" and the Sabbath was therefore replaced by the Lord's day that commemorated his resurrection every first day of the week, First Corinthians 16, verse two. I might also add at that at that time, Jesus fulfilled the Passover and instituted the Lord's Supper as the new memorial feast commemorating his death, as we read in Mark 14.

Now, little bit of context here is helpful. A lot has gone on before these ladies arrive at the tomb, and the last time they saw the tomb was on Friday night, and they did not know that the Sanhedrenists had already had the tomb sealed shut, nor were they aware of a detachment of Roman soldiers that had been stationed to guard it. In fact, Matthew 28 beginning in verse one, says, "Now after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave." It's important here, it can get a little confusing, according to John's account, Mary Magdalene arrived at the tomb first, probably walking ahead by a number of minutes from her companions, because John 20 and verse one says she arrived "... while it was still dark." And so the others come along a little bit later at dawn.

And here we see the first of three convincing proofs. We see the amazement of the women. Again, Mark 16 verse one, "When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James and Salome, bought spices, so that they might come and anoint Him. Again, he's summarizing a lot of what's going on, not getting into the details of exactly who, what and when. Now it's obvious that in their distress, they had not taken seriously the Lord's claim that he was going to rise again from the dead three days later, because they're going to prepare his body. So we read in verse two, "Very early on the first day of the week," that would be Sunday, "they came to the tomb when the sun had risen." Then he says, "They," which would be referring to the women trailing behind Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, "They were saying to one another, 'Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?' Looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away, although it was extremely large." Now, what they didn't realize that had occurred is recorded in Matthew 28 beginning in verse two. There we read, "And behold, a severe earthquake had occurred."

By the way, let me pause here for a moment. You will recall the earthquake at the death of Jesus that opened up the tombs of many of the saints. And now this is matched again with another earthquake that reveals the resurrection of our Lord. And so we read, "...for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it." I might also add that in John 20 and verse 12, we read that there were two angels, not just one. Perhaps to fulfill the biblical requirement of multiple witnesses to verify a testimony. You wonder, why didn't Mark and Matthew record two? Well, probably they were just focusing on the one that spoke. So we see convincing proofs here, just the amazement of the women, what they saw in the empty tomb. But secondly, we see the proof of the appearance of the angels. Now this is where it gets even more fascinating, if that's even possible.

I want to give you a note here. Angels, we know biblically, are not bound by physical space. Sothey can travel from heaven to earth instantaneously. They have unimaginable power, as you read in Scripture, they can they can blind people, they can rescue people, they can destroy cities. But here we see they are able to cause a localized earthquake. Additionally, I might add, that angels are spirit beings without gender, but when they do appear in what we would call an angelophany, they always look like men. They never look like women. That, by the way, is the only proof I can find to be able to say that my wife is truly human and not angelic. She wanted me to say that. But it is amazing when we think of angels in the scriptures. We see that they are ministering spirits. We know that they rejoice at the salvation of a believer. We know that they provide protection. They're constantly doing battle with demons in the invisible world. I'm sure that there are angelic beings here. Hi guys. They protect our families, our church.

By the way, I would add that I'm in constant prayer, and I hope you are too, that God will protect us from the godlessness that is so pervasive these days. Somebody sent me a clip just this morning, a video of look like a young teenage girl crawling around out in the grass in front of a restaurant she identifies as an animal, and the parents come into the place, and this individual saw it all, and parents got their meal, and then when they were done, they went out and got their pet and got in the car and drove off. It's unbelievable what Satan is producing, and to know that God has given his angels, as well as his church, through the power of the Spirit and his Word and his people to restrain and to protect. And we pray for that.

So again, as we come to the text in Matthew 28 beginning in verse two, we read, "And behold, a severe earthquake had occurred, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. And his appearance was like lightning, and his clothing as white as snow." And then we read, "The guards shook for fear of him and became like dead men." The original gives us the idea that they just passed out. It was just overwhelming to them, and I might even add, this isn't in the text, but it's certainly true of these types of situations, that they probably soiled themselves, because we know that this kind of severe trigger can activate the sympathetic nervous system, which manages the bladder muscles, and can cause it to restrict, and so this was a horrifying thing to them, and by now they have run off out of fright.

You know, I also pause for a moment. I've encountered people who are demon possessed, and it is a terrifying thing to experience. The Lord sustains you in the midst of it, but it is a terrifying thing. And I might add, it's for that reason that I would never, ever, ever watch a horror movie. That is more wicked than pornography, because it exalts evil.

Dave Harrell  

But folks to see a holy angel , looking like lightning, causing an earthquake; I can't even imagine that. A brief insertion here in the flow of the historical narrative, the Roman soldiers knew the tomb was empty, alright? They knew what happened to them. And you know that was never in dispute by anyone during that day; they knew what really happened. And that's why we read in Matthew 28 beginning in verse 11, "Now, while they were on their way, some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all that had happened. And when they had assembled with the elders and consulted together"...they fell on their faces, seeking mercy, and worship their Messiah, whom they had crucified. No,  that's not what it says.

Isn't that sad? It says, "...they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers and said, 'You are to say, "His disciples came by night and stole Him away while we were asleep." And if this should come to the governor's ears, we will win him over and keep you out of trouble.' And they took the money and did as they had been instructed; and this story was widely spread among the Jews and is to this day." We all know that it is the habit of corrupt labor leaders to bribe witnesses and to use an equally corrupt media to disseminate deceptive propaganda to somehow preserve their own power and prestige. You know, we see that today in our country just constantly. We're gaslighted with so many things. And I hear people sometimes say, "Well, you know, we can trust the American people to see right through all of these things." No, we can't. Most people are dumb sheep; they're blinded by Satan. And for the most part the job of politicians is to get people to believe that which is false, knowing that that is what people want to believe with all of their heart. The Jewish leaders, the Jewish people, did not want to believe that they had crucified their Messiah, so we have got to cover this up. I don't know if I've ever quoted Mark Twain from the pulpit, but I'm about to I read this on a person's wall an office that I visited last week. He said this, "It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble, it's what you know for sure that just ain't so." Most people today know for sure that Jesus was not God. They know for absolute certain that he did not rise from the dead. They absolutely know for sure that he's not coming again, and he is not going to judge the living and the dead, but that just ain't so.

Back to Matthew 28 verse five, "The angel said to the women, 'Do not be afraid; for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. He is not here, He has risen just as he said. Come, see the place where He was lying.'" What an amazing account, a record of eyewitnesses.

Now back to Mark 16, verse five, "Entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting at the right, wearing a white robe; and they were amazed." The original language carries the idea of using a term that means they were just completely overwhelmed with emotion, as any of us would be. But the angel immediately comforted them verse six, and he said to them, "'Do not be amazed; you are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who has been crucified. He has risen; He is not here; behold, here is the place where they had laid Him.'" Now, a little technical point that I hope will be of encouragement to you, grammatically, the Greek verb "egeirō," which is translated here "has risen,"-  "He has risen” is in what is called the aorist passive, and can therefore be translated, "he has been raised," or "he has been resurrected."

And it's fascinating to understand that indeed, all three members of the triune godhead were involved in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus said in John 10:18, I have authority to lay down my life, and I have authority to take it up again. But we also see in Romans 6:4 that the Father was involved. There we read, "...Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father..." And in Galatians, one one, we read that God the Father "raised Him from the dead." But then we also see the Holy Spirit's involvement in Romans, chapter eight and verse 11, where the apostle Paul says, "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead, will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you."

So again, back to the text. In verse six, the angel said to the ladies, "'Do not be amazed; you are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who has been crucified. He has risen; He is not here; behold here is the place where they laid Him." Luke adds this in Luke 24 five, the angel also asked the women, "'Why do you seek the living One among the dead?'" That's kind of a gentle rebuke, is it not? Why are you looking, don't you remember he said he was going to rise again, three days later. And by the way, that caused them to remember, as we read later on in verse eight of Luke 24.

So we've seen the convincing proofs of the resurrection from the amazement of the women and the appearance of the angels. Finally, the astonishment of the disciples. And I love this section here. In verse seven, "'But go tell His disciples and Peter, "He is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see Him, just as He told you."'" Let me pause here. This is such a precious, precious passage. Here's why. Notice he says, "'But go, tell His disciples and Peter...'" Now think about that. The one who had denied him three times. You know what it feels like? I certainly do; when because of your own sin and stupidity, you just feel lower than an earthworm. You're just so ashamed of yourself, you're so frustrated, you feel defeated, you hate yourself, you feel useless, you feel abandoned. Don't you know Peter felt that way. And don't you know, when he got this news, he said, "wait a minute, are you saying that the angel said that this is what the Lord wanted you to say, Go tell his disciples and me? Isn't that encouraging? Don't you know that would have been encouraging to him. Oh, my.

Folks, Jesus wants to restore the damaged. He wants to salvage the useless, revive the brokenhearted. He wants to rebuild the weak. He wants to encourage the downtrodden, make priceless what the world deems worthless. Oh, what a compassionate Savior. I'm thankful for the words in Isaiah, 42, three, "A bruised reed He will not break, and a dimly burning wick He will not extinguish."

So we read in verse eight, "They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." And according to John's account in John 20, beginning in verse one, we read how Mary Magdalene ran to tell Peter and John. The text says this, "'They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid Him. So Peter and the other disciples went forth, and they were going to the tomb. The two were running together; and the other disciple ran ahead faster than Peter, and came to the tomb first; and stooping and looking in, he saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. And so Simon Peter also came, following him and entered the tomb; and he saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on His head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself."

By the way, that's something grave robbers would certainly not do, right? What another evidence of the resurrection that somehow, in a way that we cannot fathom, the Lord's body just passed through those wrappings, and whether he or an angel, or whatever, folded those things up, these are eyewitness accounts of historical facts, and you're going to tell me that it's all foolishness? The other women that arrived later, according to Matthew 28 and verse eight, "...left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to report it to His disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and greeted them. And they came up and took hold of His feet and worshiped Him. Then Jesus said to them, 'Do not be afraid; go and take word to My brethren to leave for Galilee, and there they will see Me.'"

Now we know, according to Scripture, that before he met his disciples in Galilee, he appeared to two disciples that were traveling to Emmaus, remember? And he opened up the Scriptures from the Old Testament; that's all they had. He opened up the scriptures and explained the doctrine of the death and the resurrection of the Promised Messiah that were delineated in the Old Testament scriptures. We know then that he met with 10 apostles in the Upper Room. And then eight days later, all 11 were there, including Thomas. And then on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, remember, he appeared to seven of them; they were out fishing, weren't catching anything; throw the the net over on the other side, and they caught all of the fish. And Peter realizes it's his Lord, and he takes off his garments, and he jumps in the water, swims about 100 yards, falls at Jesus' feet. And there Jesus had made breakfast for them.

He then appeared to more than 500 people in one gathering on a mountain, First, Corinthians 15 six, that we read earlier. And there he gave the Great Commission that's recorded in Matthew 28:16 and 17. And it was probably around this time that he met with his half-brother, James - First Corinthians 15 seven - and probably with his other half-brothers, probably including Jude. And it was probably at that point that they were genuinely converted. And then in Luke 24:44 through nine, we read how he gave instructions to the assembled disciples to tarry in Jerusalem until the promise of the Spirit is fulfilled. That would be a promise relating to the Old Testament, prophecies of the new covenant that's recorded in Ezekiel 36 and Jeremiah 33 and to later prophecies spoken by John the Baptist in John one. And likewise, according to Acts one and following, he appeared to the 11 apostles on the Mount of Olives and told them, quote, "'You will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.'" He went on to add, "'You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be My witnesses, both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the remotest part of the earth.'" And beloved that is continuing to this very day. We are seeing people come to faith in Christ all over this globe. I can't wait to hear the accounts of our dear church family members that just got back from Uganda.

And over the course of these appearances, Luke tells us that he met with his apostles on other undesignated occasions and times. And again, in Acts one, beginning in verse two, he did this, "...until the day when He was taken up to heaven, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen. To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of 40 days, and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom." And then later, in verse nine, we read this, "And after He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And as they were gazing intently into the sky while He was going, behold, two men in white clothing stood beside them. They also said, 'Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go in to heaven.'" Oh, the glory of our resurrected Savior. And to think because he lives, we too shall live.

Moreover, the implications of His resurrection on the redeemed are just mind boggling. Let me give you just a little sample of it in closing this morning, and Lord willing, I'll elaborate it on it more next week. But in Romans six and verse three, we read, "Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? And here, the term baptized - baptizō in Greek, which literally means to immerse - has nothing to do with water baptism. It's used metaphorically to describe the believer’s immersion into Christ at salvation. You see, when we are genuinely born again, we are mystically united to him by grace, through faith, which the ritual of baptism merely symbolizes. And the practical implications of this are absolutely staggering. What he is saying is that our immersion into Christ included an immersion into his death. Do you realize when he died, we died, and when he was raised, we too were raised. When he died in some unfathomable way, we also died. In fact, our spiritual baptism united us to Christ in his death, as well as his burial and resurrection. And at that point, the old man of sin that once defined our very nature is now dead, he no longer reigns. His dominion over us has ceased. And therefore, in verse four we read, "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life." The term newness - "kairos," in the original language - is newness in quality with the implication of superiority. We have a radically different disposition from our formal former self.

And then later on, in verse 11, he says, "Even so, consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. And the context there is the certainty of holy living for those who have truly been born again; have truly been immersed into Christ's death and resurrection; and what a amazing thing it is to witness a person who is truly born again and to hear their testimony.

I'm sure you've been deeply moved by Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone's testimony; the gold medal winner of the women's 400 meters hurdle. Maybe you've seen that and heard about that. By the way, she and her husband Andre attend Grace Community Church, and her husband is studying at The Master Seminary. But she said this quote, "I would take my relationship with Christ over a gold medal any day." That a great statement. She said, "I credit all that I do to God." She said this in a press conference. "He's given me a gift. He's given me a drive to just want to continue to improve upon myself. And I have a platform, and I want to use it to glorify Him. So whenever I step on the track, it's always the prayer, of quote, 'God, let me be the vessel in which you're glorified, whatever the result is; how I conduct myself, how I carry myself, not just how I perform.' So it's just freedom in knowing that regardless of what happens, He's going to get the praise through me. That's why I do what I do." Folks, this is the power of the resurrection in a believer. This is the hope that we have in Christ.

Oh Child of God, the implications of the resurrection in the life of a believer exceeds anything that we can even begin to imagine. So I ask you, how can we be silent about this? How can we not preach the great truths of the gospel? How can we be so easily distracted by these little screens and big screens and bigger screens, so that we become apathetic to the most important truths in the world that determine the destiny of the souls of men and women. Parents, are you teaching these things to your children? Have you sat down with your children and explained to them the death and the burial and the resurrection of Christ and what that means? Fathers, is this the burden of your heart for your children? Is this the priority of your time and effort and energy in your family. Mothers, is it the passion of your heart to teach these things, to raise your children in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord that they might be saved, that they might be sanctified? Young people, is this the type of thing that you put on social media? Let me give you a post, okay? You young people, listen up. Here's a post for you. You can look it up, copy and paste, I guess. I don't know how you do those things, but Romans 10, nine and 10, "If you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart, the person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth, he confesses, resulting in salvation." Put that on social media.

Unleash the gospel on social media and watch what the Spirit of God will do. Oh yes, 99.9% of the people will hear it, will mock you, will ridicule you, but you know what? The Spirit of God will use his word to either harden or soften a heart, and you never know how many people will read that and be saved. May we all get serious about evangelism and discipleship, and may we as believers rejoice in all that this means for us, for Christ is risen from the dead, and he is returning as he said, Amen?

Dave Harrell  

Let's pray together, Father, thank you for the magnificent truths of your word that penetrate our heart with such clarity and such conviction. Lord, I pray that what we've examined here today will be the seeds of truth that germinate in such a way as to bear much fruit, to the praise of your glory and to the joy of your saints and Father, for those that may not know or love Christ, I pray that somehow, through your convicting work, you will overwhelm them with conviction, help them to see the horror of their sin and the glory of the cross that they too might be saved. So we commit all of these things to you for the glory of Christ and His Kingdom. Amen.

We find ourselves once again in Mark's gospel as we continue to make our journey through it verse by verse, we will be looking at Mark 15, beginning in verse 42, and going through verse 47. So while you're turning there, may I just remind you why we're here? Why I'm doing what I'm doing, in opening up the word to you. It's because we know from scripture, for example, in Second Corinthians 31:8, that the more we behold the glory of Christ, the more we become like him. And the Spirit of God helps us see the glory of Christ, all of his infinite perfections through his word, and certainly through his people, his church as well, and even in creation, but ultimately through His Word. The point is, you will simply not grow in Christ, apart from the systematic in-depth, teaching, preaching and application of the Word of God. That is my responsibility: to exposit the Scripture so that you will know what it says, clearly. And it's your job to learn these things, and to apply them to your heart, and thus avail yourself of how the Spirit of God accomplishes this divine operation of sanctification.

So, with that, let me remind you of the context here before I read the passage, you will recall that Jesus has voluntarily poured out his life on the cross as the prophet Isaiah, as prophesied in Isaiah 53, in verse 12. And Jesus said that no one has taken it away from me. So now the work of redemption is accomplished. Atonement has been made. The work the Father had given him is now over. He has now given his life as a ransom for many. So therefore, all of the sins of those whom the Father had given him in eternity past, are paid. That's why he said, at about 3pm, "'It is finished.'" "Tetelestai" - it is finished, which literally means the debt has been paid, the victory has been won, the judgment has been served. Then he said to the Father "'Into Your hands, I commit My spirit.'" And so now, in this unfathomable drama, we see Christ hanging on the cross, his body remaining on the cross, though his spirit is now in paradise.

And with this, we come to Mark 15, beginning in verse 42.

"When evening had already come, because it was the preparation day, that is, the day before the Sabbath,

Joseph of Arimathea came, a prominent member of the council, who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God; and he gathered up courage and went in before Pilate, and asked for the body of Jesus.

Pilate wondered if He was dead by this time, and summoning the centurion, he asked him as to whether He was already dead.

And ascertaining this from the centurion, he granted the body to Joseph.

Joseph bought a linen cloth, took Him down, wrapped Him in the linen cloth and laid Him in a tomb which had been hewn out in the rock; and he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb.

Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of Joses, were looking on to see where He was laid.

It's fascinating as we look at the gospel record, we see that every gospel writer gives great detail with respect to the death, the burial and the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what's fascinating, as you look at all of this is, once again, you see the miracle of divine providence operating, superintending all of these things to accomplish the purposes of God that were ordained in eternity past, and were prophesied in the scriptures. Do you realize that you are here today because of divine providence? It's not by accident that you just stumbled in here. But rather God has orchestrated the events in your life, to bring you here, to hear whatever he has for you, to ultimately bring glory to himself. Do you realize that God has sovereignly ordained to allow even wickedness in this world so that he can dramatically display the glory of his attributes? While our holy God is never the cause of evil, we know that he does bring it about indirectly through the willing, voluntary actions of moral creatures. Indeed, he has ordained to allow everything from the corruption and buffoonery that we see in government, to what the drag queen and transgender perverts grooming children in our country. He has ordained to allow all of these things. And ultimately, we see that this is providing for us a stark contrast between light and darkness, between good and evil, between the kingdom of Satan and the kingdom of God.

We know that currently, God has ordained to allow, according to First John 5:19, "...the whole world to lie in the power of the evil one." That's part of his purpose today. We know for example, that the world is being prepared for the rule of the Antichrist, the second coming of Christ. And we look at the constellation of prophetic signs, and we believe that that could be very, very soon; we see, for example, the Coalition of Muslim nations and Russia, coming against Israel, that's consistent with the prophecies in Ezekiel 38, and 39, and so forth. And every event in past history, including the death and the burial, and the resurrection of Christ, and all the things that come about in the future, all of those things are under the control the governance of a sovereign God, and he operates all of these things through the agency of his providence.

May I just remind you that biblically, we see essentially two different basic categories of providence. One is general providence, where he is in control of the whole universe through the laws of nature. For example, in Psalm 103, verse 19, we read, "The Lord has established His throne in the heavens and His sovereignty rules over all..." Aren't you glad to know that? Colossians 1:17, we read, "In Christ, all things hold together”; Acts 17:28, "In Him, we live and move and have our being"; Ephesians 1:11, "He works all things after the counsel of His will." So we see this in general providence, but also there is what we would call special or sometimes it's referred to as specific providence, where he super-intends, not only the details of the universe, but also the details of history, even the details of the lives of every individual person, especially the elect. Ephesians one beginning of verse four, "...He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world..." Why? ".... That we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will..." He went on to say in verse 11, "...we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose, who works all things after the counsel of His will..." I trust dear friends, that you will be comforted by these great truths, never forget them. Remember that we serve a sovereign God, not a contingent god, that's trying to figure out what to do because of all the craziness that's going on in the world. He has ordained the end from the beginning to bring glory to himself, and to bring eternal joy to the redeemed.

My prayer this morning, is that each one of you will be deeply encouraged by these truths as you see them played out in the context of Christ's burial. And that you will also see the majesty of Christ; and that majesty being a fulfillment of the prophetic Scriptures. Now, as we examine the Gospel accounts, we're going to look at Mark, but certainly the Gospel of John as well. Here we're going to see the providence of God superintending three groups of people, Okay? Number one, the corrupt Sanhedrinists. Number two, the calloused soldiers, and number three, the compassionate saints. The point here is that at every turn, God was at work accomplishing his purposes, even as he is doing right now in your life and in mine.

We know that he causes most things to work together for good right? No, I think it's all things, thank you. He causes all things to work together for good to those who love God and to those who are called according to his purpose. I think of Proverbs 19:21, "Many plans are in man's heart, but the counsel of the LORD will stand."

So, with this in mind, we come to our text. Let me read those first three verses once again and then give you John's additional insight; beginning in verse 42, "When evening had already come, because it was the preparation day, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea came, a prominent member of the Council, who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God; he had gathered up courage and went in before Pilate, and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate wondered if He was dead by this time, and summoning the centurion, he questioned him as to whether he was already dead." Now John gives us further insight in John 19, beginning in verse 31, "Then the Jews, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies would not remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day), asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away."

Now bear in mind, by Jewish reckoning, the Sabbath, that is Saturday, began at sundown on Friday evening. This means that Jesus was crucified on Friday, the day before the preparation of the Sabbath, which on that occasion was a special Sabbath, because it was, it occurred during the the Passover feast. And because the second, what would be called the Paschal day, according to Leviticus 23:11, because that fell on the Sabbath. This was a day devoted to a very important offering with the Jews, which would include according to Leviticus 23 and verse 12, the offering of, "... a male lamb a year old without blemish, as a burnt offering to the LORD." Now, obviously, it is by no accident, that all of this is occurring at this precise time in history. The unblemished lamb of God is offering himself up as a sacrifice, at this precise time, and occasion.

So first, what I want you to look at, is the providence of God superintending, number one, the corrupt Sanhedrinists, alright? Now, it was the custom of the Jews according to the Mosaic law, to never allow a person to remain hanging on a gibbet, or a gallows, or a cross, overnight after an execution; lest that body, cursed by God, defile the land. Alright? So you got to get them off of there; you don't want that body to defile the land because that person was cursed by God. So being the self-righteous, law keepers that they were, they asked Pilate to have the legs of Jesus broken so that he would die quickly, and they could dispose of him quickly, in order to honor God. I mean, hypocrisy knows no bounds, right? It's amazing. Now normally, the Romans would leave a crucified man or woman on the cross until they died, which would often take several days. And then as a final disgrace, and a final warning to any other insurrectionists or criminals, they would just leave the decaying body on the cross to be devoured by the vultures. But if they needed to hasten the death, what they would do is they would break the legs of the victims with an iron bar, or sometimes they would use a heavy mallet. And it was a practice called the "crurifragium." And suddenly, that excruciating pain and loss of blood, combined with the victim's inability to hold himself up any longer, would cause the person to collapse and the air in their lungs would cause them to suffocate and they would die very, very quickly. So to be good law keepers, and not jeopardize their righteous standing before God, they wanted to make sure that they didn't violate their high Sabbath. So they go to Pilate and they ask him to make sure that the legs of Jesus are broken, so that they can take him away.

Now, if we go to John 19, beginning of verse 32, we pick up on what happened. "So the soldiers came, and broke the legs of the first man and of the other, who was crucified with Him; but coming to Jesus, when they saw that He was already dead, they did not break His legs." Now, we know as we examine the gospel record, that Jesus hung upon the cross from the third hour, that was 9am, according to Mark 15:25, and he died in the evening hour, it would be called, which would be 3pm. We would call that the afternoon; that would be their evening, they had also a second evening hour that began at six. So, Jesus was on the cross for a total of six hours before he voluntarily gave up his life, as he said he would. And this is a point you must understand. This is a point that John wants to make abundantly clear. That's why he said in John 10, beginning verse 17, that Jesus declared, "'I lay down My life, so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.'"

So, it's a relatively short period of time before Jesus gave up his life. However, bear in mind because of the earlier beatings that he had endured, and the loss of blood, even from the crown of thorns that were penetrating all around his head, the unimaginable torture, of the flogging, that would have exposed all of the muscles and bones and some of the entrails in his back. And because of all of that unimaginable suffering, not to mention, drinking, to the very dregs, the cup of divine wrath on our behalf. All of these things contributed to an early death. And you will remember, however, as we would read in John 19:30, that he gave a final shout - "tetelestai", it is finished. And to think that he still had the strength to cry out, as he did, reveals to us that he was not totally drained of life. In fact, when Joseph of Arimathea came to Pilate to ask him for Jesus body, you will remember, Pilate didn't even think that he was dead yet. So he had to check on that; he had to summon the centurion for confirmation. And at the end of John 19, and verse 30, John says that Jesus, "...bowed His head and gave up His spirit." "Gave up" in the original language could be translated, "handed over," he handed over his spirit. So no one took his life from him, he gave it up on his own authority.

But here we see the providence of God at work, which again, just points to the glory and the majesty of Christ, the Son of God. Jesus had predicted that he would be killed and the third day he would rise again, Luke 18:33. And for this to be fulfilled, he had to be buried on the same day he died. Now this is really fascinating to see how God used wicked men to execute orders that he had made in eternity past. Think about that. Yet another testimony to the fact that Jesus is who he said, he is - the Son of God, the Messiah of Israel.

So we move to our second point, and that's the sovereignty of God superintending, the calloused soldiers. They break the legs of the two men on either side of Jesus, but they see that Jesus is already dead, so they did not break his legs. And according to John 19:34, "But one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out." Now, you must understand, culturally, that the ancients believed that the body was made up of blood and water. And so this proved that Jesus was indeed physically dead. And this was a fact that John wants to underscore very clearly, given the popularity of a heresy known as Docetism. It comes from a Greek, "dokeó," which means "it seems." And the Docetist believed that Jesus never really took on human flesh, it just seemed like he did. And he only appeared to be human. Likewise, they would say, well, he only seemed to be dead, but he wasn't dead. And like all heretics that want nothing to do with Christ, they will come up with the most incredible, ridiculous heresies. And they will embrace them, every demonic doctrine they possibly can to somehow discredit Christ. And John knew this. And so John was aware of this satanic heresy, and he's going to refute it head on. And that's why, as an eyewitness, he adds in verse 35 of John 19, "And he who has seen has testified, and his testimony is true; and he knows that he is telling the truth, so that you also may believe." So he saw, the spear, the blood, the water, so forth.

Now, the blood and water that flowed from Jesus side, may also be symbolic of both life and cleansing that flowed from Jesus' death. Some have suggested that the blood of Jesus, that is his sacrificial and redemptive death, is the basis of eternal life in the believer; and we know that from scripture, and it purifies us from every sin, and while, water we know is symbolic of cleansing; it can also be symbolic of life and the Holy Spirit. And these astounding blessings are all conditioned by the death of the Lamb of God, and they flow from the lifting up of the Son. Different theologians would argue this; and I think there's some real merit to this. And I might also add that it was from this verse and these themes, that Fanny Crosby derives her inspiration for the first verse of her hymn, "Near the Cross," that we heard a little bit ago. "Jesus keeps me near the Cross, there a precious fountain; Free to all a healing stream flows from Calvary mountain."

While others would suggest that it is also possible, but not certain, that John the Evangelist is alluding to Exodus 17, especially verse six that says, "'...Strike the rock, and water will come out of it, for the people to drink.'" There's maybe some merit to that as well. We know that John has already used water to refer to the Holy Spirit in his Gospel, apparently, alluding to the too water from the rock episodes and Exodus 17, and I believe Numbers 20. And we also know that the long suffering Yaweh is described as the "rock of His people" in Psalms 18:31, also in verse 46, and chapter 95 nd verse one. He even discloses himself, in his words, saying that he is stricken for his people, that they may receive the promised spirit. And it is from these theological concepts, that we have the great hymn written by Augustus Toplady, who lived from 1740 to 1778, "Rock of ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee; Let the water and the blood from the wounded side which flowed; be of sin the double cure; cleanse me from its guilt and power."

So back to the text, in the providence of God, the soldiers pierced Jesus' side, and they spare him of the crurifragium; they did not break his legs. And in verse 36, we read, "For these things came to pass to fulfill the scripture," quote, "'NOT A BONE OF HIM SHALL BE BROKEN.'" That comes out of Psalm 34 and verse 20; prophecy written some 1000 years earlier. I might also add that that Psalm, and those concepts, are rooted in God's instructions concerning the Passover lamb. You will recall in Exodus 12 and verse 46, "'It is to be eaten in a single house; you are not to bring forth any of the flesh outside of the house, nor are you to break any bone of it.'" My what a coincidence how all these things just seem to fit together, right?

Back to John 19, verse 37, he says, "And again another Scripture says, 'THEY SHALL LOOK ON HIM WHO THEY PIERCED.'" And this comes from Zechariah's prophecy in Zechariah 12 and verse 10, written about 520 BCE; a prophecy that actually speaks to a future repentant remnant of Israel that will confess Jesus as Messiah when he returns in glory. And there we read, "'I will pour out on the house of David on on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only so, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the better weeping over a firstborn.'" Yet another prophecy, my friends, that affirms the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, which John proves over and over in his Gospel.

Now I want to move to the providence of God and the compassionate saints; such an amazing story. Let's go back to Mark's gospel and chapter 15, verse 43, "Joseph of Arimathea came, a prominent member of the Council, who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God; and he gathered up courage and went in before Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus." And John says this in John 19:38, "After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but a secret one for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus; and Pilate granted permission. So he came and took away His body. Now we know from the synoptic gospel writers that Joseph was a member of the Sanhedrin; we know that he was a very wealthy man; he was looking for the kingdom of God. We know that he was one that did not agree with the decision to condemn Jesus. A good and righteous man, who both Matthew and John state that was, that was a "disciple of Jesus, but a secret one for fear of the Jews." Let me camp on that for a moment.

As I was thinking about that statement, cancel culture is nothing new, right? I mean, this has been going on for millennia. This is how Satan advances his agenda. Let me let me give you an example. You will recall in John nine, the Jewish leaders are all upset because Jesus now healed this man born blind. And they're all upset about this and so they question the parents. And in John 9:19, and following we read what they say, "'Is this your son, who you say was born blind? Then how does he now see?' His parents answered them and said, 'We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but how he now sees, we do not know; or who opened his eyes, we do not know. Ask him; he is of age, he will speak for himself.'" And then we read this, "His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone confessed Him to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue. For this reason, his parents said, 'He is of age; ask him.'' Cancel culture in the first century.

Likewise, in John 12, verse 42, we read that, "many, even of the rulers believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they were not confessing Him..." and here's why, "...for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God." I might add that I know from my friends, and contacts in Israel in particular, that there are a number of Jewish rabbis even this day, Orthodox Jewish rabbis, that secretly believe in Jesus as Messiah. And there's an increasing number of them that are enrolled in online Bible studies in order to understand the New Testament truths. Now sadly, often we fear man more than God; aren't we all guilty of that, somehow it just crops up in us and we decide, I'm just not going to go there. It's a hard lesson to learn. But I was reminded of what Jesus said in Luke 14, verse 27, "'Whoever does not carry his own cross, and come after Me cannot be My disciple.'"

Folks, you want to ask yourself, "Am I ashamed of the gospel? Am I ashamed of Christ? When an opportunity arises to stand up for him, do I start looking away and looking for something else to do so that I don't get in trouble?" Are you afraid to take a stand that might cost you dearly? Beloved, let me remind you of something that I had to learn early on in my ministry, you cannot be faithful and popular. You will be one, or you will be the other, and you must choose.

I might add that Nicodemus, and we're going to see this in a few minutes in verse 39; you remember, he came and also cared for Jesus body. Remember how he came to to Jesus at night and wanted to know how you can get into the kingdom, remember John three? But we know that according to tradition that Nicodemus actually defended Jesus at his trial before Pilate. And tradition tells us that Nicodemus was baptized by Peter and John. And he was like the leading teacher. And his profession of faith, and love for Christ, we know cost him his office, cost him his position as a teacher, it cost him his entire fortune, cost him all of his property, all of his possessions and he was banished along with his family, to live outside of Jerusalem; banished by the Sanhedrin that he had served, he along with his entire family were to live outside of the city in abject poverty. O the high cost, but infinite value, of following Christ.

We also know according to tradition, one story tells us how his daughter was so hungry, that she had to pick through dung piles for pieces of grain to find nourishment to keep from starving. And a rabbi saw her and felt compassion on her and said, "Who are you?" And she said, "I am the daughter of Nicodemus." And the rabbi said to her, "Whatever happened to your father?" And she said, "He came to be a follower of Jesus and was banished." And at that, the rabbi refused to help her. Folks, we never know what the cost might be following Jesus, but we do know what the reward will be right? Glory of an eternal heaven.

I'm reminded of the lyrics of that song that we sing, "You can have all this world, but give me Jesus." You know, the victory of the wicked will always be short lived, but their punishment will be for eternity. And as you think of the Christ mockers that live around us today, we hear them on television all the time, you probably work with some of them. So sad to know that one day they will stand before the one they mock. And he will be their judge and executioner. And they will have an opportunity, then to blaspheme him forever in the torments of hell. Today, we see persecution mounting in the United States and I'm reminded of what the Apostle Paul said in Second Corinthians four the universe, beginning of verse 17, "For momentary, light, affliction." Whenever I think about that, and I think, all that he went through and he called that "momentary, light affliction." What I endure is momentary light affliction. But all of that, he said, "...is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison." Then he went on to say, "While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things that are unseen are eternal." And that must be the focus of our gaze.

Now back to our text. Maybe it was out of shame, out of guilt, probably a mixture of all of that, and his love for Christ, Joseph asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. No doubt because of his rank, Pilate agreed to that. And Mark says in verse 43, of chapter 15, that, "... he gathered up courage and went in before Pilate..." No doubt he had seen enough of all the wickedness, enough of all the lies, all the hypocrisy of his fellow Sanhedrinists, and he was probably convicted over his timidity. But once again, what I want you to see here is the unseen hand of divine providence at work in all of this. None of this is catching God by surprise. He is orchestrating all of these events to fulfill his decrees that were made in eternity past. Here's why I would say that. We know that under Roman law, no man crucified for sedition would ever be taken down from a cross; they would be left there to essentially rot and be eaten by the vultures, every shred of flesh would be picked away. And only then would the body be taken down and buried with other criminals. And the Jews would only bury criminals outside the walls of Jerusalem. But what John wants us to see is that this was no ordinary man. This was the Son of God, whose death, and now burial, was for ordained, and it was predicted in the Old Testament prophecies, especially Isaiah 53, verse nine. There the Prophet declared that through Messiah's quote, that though Messiah's, "...grave was assigned with wicked men, yet he was with a rich man in His death, because He had done no violence, nor was there any deceit in His mouth." And it's at this stage then that John goes on to introduce another member of the Sanhedrin that was also a secret disciple of Jesus that joined Joseph and that was, of course Nicodemus. We see this in verse 39, "Nicodemus, who had first come to Him by night, also bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about 100 pounds weight." Now, let me give you a sense of what's going on here. You see, the Jews did not embalm people, corpses like the Egyptians did, but they use fragrant spices to partially cover up the stench of putrefaction. And this is what's going on here. Nicodemus brings 100 pounds, he must have had some servants with him. That's a lot 100 pounds of this mixture. These spices would be in powder form and they would layer them with cloths; layer upon layer, multiple layers. And obviously, neither Joseph of Arimathea, nor Nicodemus, nor I might add, the other women who were around watching all of this; they weren't expecting Jesus to literally rise from the dead. So they were preparing him.

In John 19, verse 40, we pick it up. "So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen wrappings with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews. Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden, a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. Therefore, because of the Jewish day of preparation, since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there." Not outside the city, but right there. And little did Joseph and Nicodemus know that by burying Jesus while it was Friday, before the Sabbath, they were fulfilling God's eternal plan that had been prophesied earlier in Matthew 12, in verse 40, by Jesus himself when he said, "'For just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IIN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

So, as we look at it, Jesus is buried before sundown on Friday, and he rose again on Saturday, I mean on Sunday, and according to Jewish reckoning, a part of a day was considered the whole day. So Jesus was in the tomb three days he was there part of Friday afternoon, he was there Saturday and a part of Sunday morning. It's also interesting that the writer of Hebrews explains that this was a picture that was seen when Isaac was delivered from the altar, and he had been given up to death three days before. And we read about this in Hebrews 11, verse 19, Abraham "... considered that God is able to raise men even from the dead, from which he also received him," referring to Isaac, "back as a type." Isn't amazing how the Word of God all fits together in such a profound way?

So Mark summarizes this, back to Mark's gospel, Mark 15:43. Joseph of Arimathea comes, he's a prominent member, he asked for the body of Jesus. And all of this happens in verse 45, "And ascertaining this from the centurion, he granted the body to Joseph. Joseph bought a linen cloth, took Him down, wrapped him in the linen cloth and laid Him in a tomb, which had been hewn out in the rock, and he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb." Think about this, were it not for the compassion, and the bravery of these two brothers in Christ, Jesus' body, doubtless, would have been buried in just a common sepulcher because of the ignominious death that he suffered. But that was not God's plan. And that would have been a violation of Isaiah 53 and verse nine that we read earlier.

Now, back to the corrupt Sanhedrinists for a moment. The hypocritical Jewish leaders are aware of Jesus' predictions, alright? That he would rise from the dead. And of course, in whatever culture, like we have in our culture, whenever you have a ruling political class, they're going to use any means necessary to stay in power, alright? We're very familiar with that in our culture. And so we read this and Matthew's account in Matthew 27 beginning in verse 62. "Now on the next day, the day after the preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered together with Pilate, and said, 'Sir, we remember that when He was still alive, that deceiver said, "After three days, I am to rise again." Therefore, give orders for the grave to be made secure until the third day, otherwise, His disciples may come and steal Him away and say to the people, "He has risen from the dead," and the last deception will be worse than the first.'" We can't have that. They're trying to prevent a hoax. But unwittingly, what they are doing, is actually accomplishing the purposes of God. Because you see, the security that they were demanding, the security that they wanted to be implemented to somehow seal the tomb, and station Roman guards around it, would later thoroughly refute this ridiculous claim that the disciples came and stowed the body away. I mean, who's going to believe that? People that are blinded by Satan, right? I mean, who's gonna believe a lot of the stuff that we hear today? I mean, we're just gaslighted all the time.

Them, "Pilate said to them, 'You have a guard; go, make it as secure as you know how.' And they went and made the grave secure, and along with the guard, they set a seal on the stone." So again, we see the marvel of divine providence in all of these things. And I also find it fascinating, think about this, isn't it amazing to think that Yahweh delivered his covenant people from the Egyptians in parting the Red Sea, and he did this three days after the slaying of the Passover lamb? My, what a coincidence. And here we have another picture of our deliverance from the penalty, the power, and one day, the very presence of sin through Christ, in whom we have died and have been raised again with him. And folks, I would submit to you that only the most calloused heart could possibly see and hear all of these things from these eyewitness accounts, and say that somehow it was all a fraud, and to say that somehow Jesus was not indeed who he says he was. And he is, namely the Son of God.

Well finally Mark says this in verse 47, such a precious statement, "Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of Joses were looking on to see where He was laid." It's a fascinating statement to me. I mean, these were some of the faithful women that were mentioned earlier in verse 40. And they're going to be mentioned again in chapter 16 and verse one, as witnesses of the empty tomb. Bear in mind, they're mention here is not incidental. The Spirit of God isn't just trying to, you know, fill up some space here. I mean, this demonstrates that there were eyewitnesses that saw all of this; eyewitnesses of the death, and the burial and the resurrection of Christ; thus ruling out any suggestions that might come up later that well, he wasn't buried. He wasn't really dead. Or they got the location of the tomb wrong; that wasn't where they put his body, it wasn't empty, I mean, you know how people are, it refutes all of that. And I also have to say, praise God, for faithful women. They stood when the men ran, right? They maintained a vigil during these hours. Think about this, during the hours of darkness, during the earthquake, they saw Jesus hanging there; they come and they see the burial. They're watching all of this. They will be the first to see the empty tomb.

Folks, God's governance encompasses all of history, all of his works, past, present and future, I want you to be comforted with these truths. In fact, he is over even the most minute and mundane things. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 10, and I was thinking about this this morning, when I was walking in my prayer time early; there were some sparrows that that lived there. He knows all about the sparrows that fall. I know it sounds stupid, but there was one that was watching me there. And I just started talking to him, that, you know, he made you, he made me and he knows all about you, like he knows all about me. I'm sure if my neighbors saw that they're wondering what's wrong with this guy? But seriously I'd happened this morning.

And Jesus went on to say that he knows all the hairs of our head. And I think that includes the random hair growth now in my ears and my nose. You know, as I get older, he knows all of these things. He superintends things that many times we might consider is random chance. Proverbs 16, verse 33, "The lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is from the LORD." He's over all the acts of men both good and evil. Philippians 2:13, "For, it is God who is at work in you both to will and to work for His good pleasure." And he has ultimate authority over all of the earth; we read about that earlier in our scripture reading. Contrary to the opinions of many of the narcissistic politicians that we have, that have always existed, Psalm 47, beginning in verse one, "O clap your hands, all peoples, shout to God with the voice of joy, for the Lord Most High is to be feared a great king over all the earth. He subdues peoples under us and nations under our feet."

Well, in closing, may I challenge each of you to examine your opinion of who God is. Is he who he says he is? The Creator, the sustainer, the Redeemer, the sovereign ruler over all things. Indeed, the consummate or of all things. Is that who you see him to be? Or is he something far less in your mind? I want you to hear me folks, your view of God will determine the eternal destiny of your soul. He is either the thrice Holy God that will cause you to bow down before him in humble desperation, seeking his mercy, or he will be something else that you have made up. If you have a high view of God, you will have a proper view of yourself. If you have a high view of God, you will see yourself as lower than the amoeba on a worm’s belly. And because of this, you will celebrate his grace all the more to know that he would love us as he does. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the infinite wonders of your grace. Thank you for the glory of your providence that we have even examined here today. May these things encourage our hearts as we endeavor to live to the praise of your glory. And Father, if there be one that does never come to a place of genuine saving faith, where they've been so overwhelmed by their sin that they've cried out to you and desperation, Lord, have mercy on me a sinner, Lord, please convict them so greatly that they will have no rest on their pillow until they bow before you in repentant faith. We thank you, we give you praise, and we ask Lord Jesus that you will come quickly, for it's in your name that we pray. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark's gospel? We have now come to Mark chapter 15. And we will be examining verses 33 through 41, under the heading "When Hell Came to Calvary." Follow along as I read the text beginning with verse 33 of Mark 15.

 When the sixth hour came, darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour.

At the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, 'ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?'  which is translated, 'MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?'

When some of the bystanders heard it, they began saying, 'Behold, He is calling for Elijah.'

Someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave Him a drink, saying, 'Let us see whether Elijah will come to take Him down.'

And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed His last.

And the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.  

When the centurion, who was standing right in front of Him, saw the way He breathed His last, he said, 'Truly this man was the Son of God!'

There were also some women looking on from the distance, among whom were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less and Joses, and Salome.

When He was in Galilee, they used to follow Him and minister to Him; and there were many other women who came up with Him to Jerusalem."

 From the outset, let me ask you a question, how much do you hate your sin? How badly do you hate the fact that you simply do not love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength? That you fail miserably when it comes to loving your neighbor as yourself? How much do you hate the fact that many times you are selfish? You are proud, you're drawn to the things of this world; you're lazy. Do you hate your sin enough to confess the following statement? That I deserve what Christ suffered on the cross on my behalf. The unimaginable agony that Jesus suffered is our substitute is beyond anything that we can imagine. And it really shows us how much God hates sin. And I might add, it will reveal to us how much we love it, in comparison.

The wrath of God that he bore on our behalf is described in that great summary text of the gospel in Second Corinthians 5:21, that "He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." That's what happened at the cross; he took my place on the cross. I like to think of it this way, he took my place on the cross, as if he had lived my life of sin. And I took his place for eternity, as if I had lived his life of perfect righteousness. And when we reflect upon the horrors Christ endured, in our place, we get some sense of how unfathomably wicked sin really is and therefore why God abhors it so, and why he punishes it with the full fury of His wrath. Do you see your sin for what it really is? Can you describe some of your sin in specific terms? How do you respond to your sins when God reveals them to you through His Word, or through some other brother or sister in Christ? Through your wife, or your children. Do you respond with humble conviction and confession and repentance? Or do you get defensive, angry, you justify, rationalize, blame shift. My we're great at seeing the speck in our brother's eye, but we can't see the log in our own right. I want you to understand dear friends, that sin deserves our utmost contempt, even as it animates God's utmost wrath. And of course, sin is man's inability to conform to the moral character and desires of God. The Bible says that sin is lawlessness, it is rebellion against the Most High. Much of it we are even unable to see. Sin is a state or a disposition of the soul that corrupts every aspect of who we are. It blinds men and women to the gospel. We look at what's going on in our country today as the consequences of sin. Mexican and Chinese criminal drug gangs human sex trafficking, fitness fentanyl pouring across our borders can be killing over 100,000 a year. The brutal killing of unwanted infants the vile sexual perversions of the LGBTQ mafia. It is sin that would cause there to be a drag queen parody of Leonardo da Vinci's rendition of the Last Supper during the opening ceremonies of the 2024 Paris Olympics. And dear friends it is sin that will destroy your life, and your testimony, and your marriage, and your family. Unless you deal with it as if it is a cancer that will destroy you. And fortunately, it was dealt with at the cross. That's the good news of the gospel of grace.

 In 1887, one of the most compelling and powerful descriptions of sin that I've ever read, was published let me read it to you. Quote, "It is a debt a burden, a thief, a sickness, a leprosy, a plague, poison, a serpent a sting. Everything that man hates it is; a load of curses and calamities beneath whose crushing most intolerable pressure, the whole creation growneth. Who is the hoary sexton that digs man a grave? Who is the painted temptress that steals his virtue? Who is the murderous that destroys his life? Who is the sorceress that first deceives and then dams his soul? Sin. Who with icy breath, blights the fair blossoms of youth, who breaks the hearts of parents, who brings old men's gray hairs with sorrow to the grave? Sin. Who by a more hideous metamorphosis than Ovid ever fancied, changes gentle children into vipers, tender mothers into monsters and their fathers into worse than Herods; the murderers have their own innocence? Sin. Who cast the apple of discord on household hearts? Who lights the torch of war and bears it blazing over trembling lands? Who by divisions in the church rends Christ's seamless robe? Sin. Who is this Delilah that sings the Nazirite asleep, and delivers up the strength of God into the hands of the uncircumcised? Who, with winning smiles on her face; honey, flattery on her tongue stands in the door to offer the sacred rites of hospitality and when suspicion sleeps, treacherously pierces our temples with a nail? What fair siren is this, who seated on a rock by the deadly pool, smiles to deceive, sings to lure, kisses to betray and flings her arm around our neck to leap with us into perdition? Sin. Who turns the soft and gentle is hard to stone? Who hurls reason from her lofty throne and impells sinners, mad as Gadarene swine down the precipice into a lake of fire? Sin."

Dear friends, because God is infinitely holy, he hates, not only sin, but the sinners who commits it. Often you hear the phrase, "God hates the sin but loves the sinner." It's not a biblical concept. It's not the sin that will be sent to hell, it will be the sinner. But we see biblically is that "The wrath of God," Jesus said, "abides upon the unbeliever," John 3:36. We see in Psalm five, five, "You hate all who do iniquity." Psalm 11, verse five, and following, "The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence, His soul hate. Upon the wicked, He will rain snares; fire and brimstone and burning wind will be the portion of their cup. For the LORD is righteous, He loves righteousness; the upright will behold His face." You see, this is why all sin must be punished either by the sinner or by a substitute. And my goal this morning is to make you hate your sin, more than ever, and frankly, to make you hate your sin, more than you hate the sins of others. Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor and spirit," right? Those who recognize the depths of their depravity who realize that they are utterly destitute, that they have no resources whatsoever to somehow merit God's grace, that they are totally dependent upon his grace. That's the attitude we must have. He also said, "Blessed are those who mourn." The idea of mourning over our sin, broken over our innate rebellion; that godly sorrow that results in repentance that leads to salvation. And he said, "Blessed are those who hunger and who thirst for righteousness." A righteousness that is foreign to ourselves. Those who long for that foreign righteousness that can never be achieved, but can only be received as a gift from God. And as we see Christ hanging on the cross, not only must we see the suffering of our Savior and his great love for us, but we must see the horrible reality of sin. I hope that you will all say with the psalmist in Psalm 139:23, and following, "Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me and know my anxious thoughts; and see if there be any hurtful way in me and lead me in the way everlasting."

So I want to this morning, cause you to hate your sin, more than ever, but secondly, to make you love the Savior more than ever. As Peter said, In First Peter, one eight, "...though you have not seen Him, you love Him. And though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory obtaining as the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls."

As we look at this text this morning - the crucifixion of our Lord and Savior - I want us to focus on three primary categories that I hope will be of benefit to you first, we will see the miraculous signs. Secondly, we will focus on the heart wrenching cry. Thirdly, the voluntary surrender and finally the awestruck reaction. So let's dive into the text. Beginning in verse 33, of Mark 15, "When the sixth hour came..." that would be 12 noon, "...darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour." And this brings us to point one, and that's the issue of the miraculous signs. Now bear in mind that by this time Jesus has been on the cross for three hours, and he has made three statements thus far. First, he has said "'Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.'" That was probably stated when he was being nailed to the cross. And secondly, he said to the penitent thief, "'Truly, I say to you, today you shall be with Me in paradise'" Luke 23:43. And then, finally, he will say, in John 19 beginning in verse 26, "'Jesus then saw His mother and the disciple whom He loved..."referring to John the Apostle, "...standing nearby, He said to His mother, "'Woman, behold your son!' Then He said to the disciple, "Behold your mother!'  From that hour, the disciple took her into his own household." Indeed, it wasn't his mother, but he wanted him to treat her as such; he had compassion for his widowed mother, and he did not commit her into the care of her half brothers, because at this point, they still did not believe in him. That didn't happen until after the resurrection.

But now as we look at this text, we see that at noon time, when the sun is at its zenith, when it is the brightest, God, the Father, appears in the darkness. And this symbolizes his judgment, as we see all through Scripture. This was an ominous sign from God. The text says, "....darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth." Now "land" here can refer to the whole earth; we don't know if it covered the whole earth, text doesn't say, perhaps it was regional. Some of the early church fathers like Tertullian, and Origin report that the darkness extended at least across the borders of Israel and encompassed the entire Roman Empire. So we don't know its ultimate scope, but we do know from scripture that the divine presence would often materialize itself. And sometimes the Shekinah glory of bright light, that dazzling light; and sometimes in clouds of smoke, in ominous darkness, like you would see, for example, in Exodus 19, at Mount Sinai.

And sometimes, we see it mentioned in the context of eschatological judgment, for an example in Amos five verse 20, "Will not the day of the LORD be darkness instead of light, even gloom with no brightness in it?" Joel chapter two beginning of verse 30, "'I will display wonders in the sky and on the earth, blood, fire and columns of smoke. The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.'" Jesus spoke of the same thing in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 29. There we read, "'But immediately after the tribulation of those days, THE SUN WILL BE DARKENED, AND THE MOON WILL NOT GIVE ITS LIGHT, AND THE STARS WILL FALL fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then the sign of the SON OF MAN COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF THE SKY with power and great glory.'" And friends at the cross, we see a harbinger of this coming day of judgment. We see the terrifying darkness of God the Father descending in judgment, pouring out his wrath on the incarnate Son.

Later we know at the time of the death of Jesus, and we'll discuss this more in a moment, but the veil of the temple, the veil that separated the holy place from the Holy of Holies was rent and to from top to bottom. Furthermore, in Matthew 27, beginning of verse 51, at that same time, we read that, "...the earth shook and the rocks were split, the tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many." Now can you imagine witnessing all of this? The effect of this is recorded, for example, in Matthew 27, verse 54, "Now the centurion, and those who were with him, keeping guard over Jesus, when they saw the earthquake, and the things that were happening, became very frightened and said, 'Truly, this was the Son of God.'" But it was out of the terrifying darkness of the Father's presence, that he poured out His infinite and just wrath upon the infinite and just sin bearer. The one who knew no sin, endure an eternity of punishment, while hanging on that cross; something that we can't even begin to comprehend. This dear friends is when hell came to Calvary. And there on that cross when he was drinking to the very deepest dregs the cup of humiliation and bitterness, we hear a heart wrenching cry.

This brings us to our second division. And we read about it in verse 34, "At the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, 'ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?' which is translated, MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?'" That I might add, is the Aramaic version of Psalm 22 one. If you look at Matthew's account in Matthew 27, verse 46, he changes the Aramaic to the Hebrew, "'ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?'" But what we see here, beloved, is that out of the judicial darkness of the Father's presence, and out of the unfathomable sufferings of his wrath that Jesus was enduring, the Son of God cries out in agonizing despair. There he experienced that horrifying separation and abandonment that he had never experienced before; that he had never known, and frankly, anabandonment that we will never know if we've been united to faith; united to Christ in faith. You see the fury of divine wrath, combined with the absence of the divine presence, really describe the torment of hell. This is what Jesus dreaded more than all else. This is what caused him to sweat drops of blood in the guard. Can't you hear that heart wrenching cry? The 20th century British preacher and author G. Campbell Morgan said this, "The logical, irresistible, irrevocable issue of sin is to be God- forsaken. Sin in its genesis was rebellion against God. Sin and its harvest is to be God-abandoned. Man sinned when he dethroned God and enthroned himself. He reaps the utter harvest of his sin, when he has lost God altogether. That is the issue of all sin... Now listen solemnly, and from that Cross here the cry, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" That is hell. No other human being has ever been God-forsaken in this life. Man by his own act alienated himself from God, but God never left him... What explanation can there be of this cry from the lips of Jesus? None other is needed than that declared by His herald three years before... "Behold, the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world!" He has taken hold upon the sin. He has made it His own... On that cross, He was made sin, and therein He passed to the uttermost limit of sin's outworking. He was God-forsakem. He knew no sin. He was made sin. He was forsaken of God."

Can I personalize this? As we look at, for example, Isaiah 53 and verse five. Read it this way, He was pierced through for my transgressions. He was crushed for my iniquities, the chastening for my well being fell upon him. And Peter describes this in First Peter 2:24, He Himself bore my sins and his body on the cross, so that I might die to sin and live to righteousness, for by His wounds, I am healed. But oh, what wonderful news. The forgiveness, the cleansing, the redemption, the reconciliation, the blessing, the unspeakable joy of being in Christ eternal life, all because of the cross. As we read in Isaiah one and verse 18, "Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they will be like wool." Beloved, do you remember that day when the Spirit of God moved upon your heart and open your eyes to behold the Savior's love for you? I remember it, and the many days hence. One that would cause me, and I'm sure you, to sing great lyrics of Isaac Watts, "Alas, and did my Savior bleed and did my sovereign die? Would he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I? Was it for crimes that I had done He groaned upon the tree? Amazing pity, grace unknown and love beyond degree. At the cross, at the cross, where I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away. It was there by faith, I received my sight. And now I am happy all the day."

Now, as we see Jesus upon the cross, in the midst of his agony to further fan the flames of his suffering, some of the derisive onlookers misinterpreted what he said, perhaps deliberately so, Notice verse 35, "When some of the bystanders heard it, they began saying, 'Behold, He is calling for Elijah.'" And certainly "Eloi, Eloi," it could sound like Elijah, especially when you are severely dehydrated. My father told me that when he was shipwrecked in the Pacific, in those days and nights, he said the dehydration was so bad that his tongue swelled. And the men weren't able to hardly communicate with one another because their tongues were so swelled. And so it could be that Jesus' speech was no doubt slurred at this point. And this would not be an unusual assumption for the people who had gathered there, even if they intended to inflict further humiliation, because the prophet Malachi's prediction of the Messiah's returned, included the promise that Elijah or an Elijah like Prophet - we know later on from the New Testament it was a reference to John the Baptist - but an Elijah would somehow herald the Messiah's return. For example, in Malachi four five, "'Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord.'" So perhaps they're thinking to themselves, all right, given this ominous darkness, obviously, God is up to something here; maybe this is the day of the Lord. So if this Jesus is what he says he is, if he truly is the Messiah, perhaps he is summoning Elijah to help him, et's see what happens.

It was also during this hour, that Jesus said in John 19, verse 28, "'I thirst.'"  "'I thirst.'" Then in another cruel act of mockery, we read in Mark 15:36, "Someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed, and gave Him a drink, saying, 'Let us see whether Elijah will come to take Him down.'" There's absolutely no bounds to the wickedness of man.

Mark then describes the end of our Savior sufferings; verse 37, "And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed His last." And John tells us that it was at this point, according to John 19 and verse 30, that Jesus shouted, "'It is finished!'"  "Tetelestai" - to be fully accomplished, to be perfected, as in the completion of a transaction of, or the payment of a debt in full. Martin Luther said this, "In this word, "It is finished!" will I find comfort myself. I am forced to confess that all my finishing of the will of God is imperfect, piecemeal work. While yet the law urges on me that not so much as one tittle of it must remain unaccomplished. But Christ is the end of the law. What it requires, Christ has performed." And because of this, we can echo that great doxology of the apostle Paul record in Colossians two beginning of verse 14, Christ has "...canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross." What a magnificent reality. It is finished. And Luke records his final prayer in Luke 23:46, "'Father into Your hands I commit My spirit.'" Dwight Pentecost, many years ago said this, quote, "Christ did not die because life slowly ebbed from His veins. His life was not taken from Him. Christ died because of an act of His will. He dismissed His soul from His body. Christ was sovereign over His death as He was sovereign over His resurrection."

We come thirdly then to the voluntary surrender. And here we witness the fulfillment of Bible prophecy, and certainly the veracity of the authority of Jesus words, because we must understand, his was a voluntary sacrifice. For example, in Isaiah 53:12, again, we read, "He poured out Himself to death." And Jesus promised in John 10 and verse 18, "'No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative, I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.'" And Luke tells us in Luke 23:46, "'FATHER, INTO YOUR HANDS I COMMIT MY SPIRIT.' Having said this, He breathed His last." As I see this, in my mind's eye, I realize that at that point, the work of redemption was accomplished. Atonement was made for those chosen by God, those whose names had been written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world, the elect of God, Christ's bridal church. The work the Father had given him, was now accomplished. He has now given his life as a ransom for many; the sins of all whom the Father had given him, in eternity past were now paid in full. And Jesus said in John 6:37, "'All that the Father gives Me will come to Me and the one who comes to Me, I will certainly not cast out.'" And all of this was based upon Christ's atoning work.

And for this reason, we can go to Paul's words in First Corinthians one beginning in verse 23. Where he says, "...we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block to Gentiles foolishness." And my, isn't that the truth? You tell people today about the crucifixion of Christ and what happened at the cross, they laugh at you like you've got two heads. "...But to those who are the called..." who are the called  -the elect of God, those chosen by God - "...both Jews and Greeks," christ crucified is "...the power of God, and the wisdom of God." Paul goes on to say, "For consider your calling..." and I thought about this a lot this week as I was meditating on these passages. Consider my calling, that efficacious call of God, when, by the power of his Spirit, he drew me unto himself in the miracle of regeneration. "Consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are..." What we see in this passage is, God has chosen those whom he will call, those whom he will irresistibly compell; again that efficacious call to saving faith. Why would he do that? To shame the wise of the world. And, notice what the text says, "...so that no man may boast before God." I do not share in the glory of my salvation. It's all of grace. And he goes on to say, in verse 26, and following, "But by His doing, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, so that just as it is written, 'LET HIM WHO BOASTS, BOAST IN THE LORD.'"

We must bear in mind here that only those whom God has chosen will believe. Why? Well, according to First Corinthians 2:14, that, "...natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised."  Therefore, God must do something. And think about this, while the Lamb of God was on the cross, something was being done. We read about this, for example, in Second Corinthians 5:19, "...God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself..." The "world" here, referring to every ethnic group without distinction, the entire sphere of mankind, not the world without exception; he didn't pay the sins for the whole world, otherwise, no one would go to hell. But he's speaking here of the world without distinction. Then he says, "...not counting..."  or it could be translated, "reckoning," "...their trespasses against them..." So who are those in the world whom God has reconciled to himself through Christ? All those whose trespasses are not counted, are not reckoned, against them. Therefore, all those whom God has declared righteous, because of the imputed righteousness of Christ, the elect of God for whom Christ died. And Paul speaks of this as well in Romans 8: 30, "Those whom He predestined, He also called; and those whom He called, He also justified, and these whom He justified, He also glorified." My, what a magnificent, unfathomably glorious work of grace that occurred on the cross. And at the end of Second Corinthians 5:19, we read, "...and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation." And my, what a magnificent privilege that is, and responsibility that is, to preach the gospel, in all of it's clarity, and all of its offense.

As we return to Mark 15, verse 37, again, "And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed His last." Verse 38, "And the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom." Now, this veil separated the holy place from the Holy of Holies. And it was a perpetual reminder that sinful man cannot enter into the presence of a holy God apart from the shedding of innocent blood. The supernatural ripping would have occurred at 3pm. And that would have been the time when many of the priests were there in the temple, busy making sacrifices. God's timing is always perfect, right? Imagine the shock. You're a priest working in the temple, you're basically covered with blood. There's been three hours of darkness and all of a sudden you look and the veil is ripped from top to bottom. They're horrified because suddenly, they can see into the Holy of Holies. Not only that, at the same time, according to Matthew 27, verse 51, "the earth shook and the rocks were split. The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many." Now, the Jewish people, in particular, certainly the priests, were aware that the presence of God was often associated with darkness, as well as with earthquakes. There's many examples of this throughout scripture. But for a moment, I would like to take you into the temple so you can see with your own eyes through the words of eyewitnesses, what it looks like. And here I quote, Josephus, a first century Roman historian, Jewish historian as well. I'm just going to quote a little bit of it. "The entire house was divided into two parts within, it was only the first part of it that was open to our view. Its height extended, all along to 90 cubits in height."  By the way, that's 135 feet. "And its length was 50 cubits." That's 75 feet. "And its breadth 20. But that gate, which was at the end of the first part of the house, was, as we've already observed, all covered with gold, as was its whole wall about it. It had also golden vines above it, from which clusters of grapes hung as tall as a man's height. But then this house, as it was divided into two parts, the inner part was lower than the appearance of the outer and had golden doors 55 cubits altitude." These are golden doors now that are 81 feet high. "And 16 in breadth." They're 16 feet wide. "And before these doors, there was a veil of equal largeness with the doors. It was a Babylonian curtain embroidered with blue and fine linen, and scarlet and purple and of contexture that was truly wonderful. Nor was this mixture of colors without its mystical interpretation, but it was a kind of image of the universe. For by the scarlet there seemed to be enigmatically signified fire,by the fine flax; the earth by the blue the air, and by the purple, the sea. Two of them having their colors the foundation of this resemblance, but the fine flax and the purple have their own origin for that foundation, the earth producing the one in the sea the other. This curtain had also embroidered upon it all that was mystical in the heavens, accepting that of the 12 signs representing living creatures." End quote. Another Jewish scholar and historian, Edersheim, says this quote, "The veils before the most holy place, were 40 cubits," that's 60 feet long, alright,  60 feet long, "and 20 cubits" that's 30 feet wide. So we're not talking about a little curtain here, all right?  "And they were of the thickness of the palm of the hand, and wrought in 72 squares, which were joined together. And these veils were so heavy, that in the exaggerated language of the time, it needed 300 priests to manipulate each. If the veil was at all such as described in the Talmud, it could have not been rent in twain by a mere earthquake of the fall of the lintel. Although its composition in squares fastened together might explain how the rent might be as described in the Gospel." Amazing, it was rent from top to bottom. Some would like to say because of the earthquake it fell and then it tore into it's not at all what the text says. Another scholar said this, by the name of Shepherd, "Matthew connects the phenomena directly with the death of Jesus, calling attention to the fact that it was rent from top to bottom by God's hand, throwing open thus the Most Holy Place to all men. Previously, only the high priest entered the holy place. And that, once a year on the Day of Atonement, to offer on behalf of himself and the people. Early evangelical tradition held to this supernatural interpretation, which is confirmed for us by the Hebrew epistle. This significant portent was doubtless the explanation for the fact that a great number of priests became Christians in early apostolic time. The way is open now for all men to come boldly to the throne of grace, through the atoning death." End quote.

 And this, of course, is what we read in Hebrews 10, beginning in verse 19, "Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place, by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way..." Originally that language meant freshly slain, but it's its derivative, meaning is fresh and recent. The idea here is that the way of access is the result of the atoning work of Christ, "...by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh, and since we have a great high priest, over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water." You see, because of what happened there, access into the presence of God is now available to all who trust in Christ as Savior. We do not need a priest, we do not need a mediator, to come into the presence of God. There is only one mediator between God and man, it's the man Christ Jesus. No more sacrifices, no more ritual ceremonies that look forward prophetically to that which was fulfilled in Christ.

Moreover, as we read in Hebrews four, beginning in verse 15, "...we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need."

Now, you must understand that all of this was utterly inconceivable to the Jewish people. They knew that because God is holy, he is utterly transcendent, he is completely distant, unapproachable. And his dealings with his people, under the Old Covenant,were primarily indirect, not intimately personal. But all of this changed because of what Christ did at the cross. Beloved, if I can make this very practical to you, I know that some of you right here today, some of you, within the sound of my voice, are struggling deeply with issues in your life. Some of you, some of you are struggling with heartbreaking realities. And one of the things that you need right now more than anything else in the world, is God's mercy. And what we're told here is that because of what Christ has done, you have a sympathetic high priest, that can feel what you feel. So often, when people are hurting, others will say, "Boy, I know what you're feeling." No, you don't. I can't know what you feel, I might have some idea, I have something to compare it to. But I don't know what you're feeling. But Jesus does. We have a sympathetic high priest that understands all that we feel. And because of what he did, we can enter into the presence of the living God. And we can enjoy sweet communion with him and experience the fullness of his mercy. This is the priesthood of the believer. Bear in mind, unlike Israel, who collectively had to stand outside the veil and only the high priest would enter into the Holy of Holies once a year and then he would disappear from their view, and he would go into the presence of God and they would all be left outside - we see something radically different now. Because of Jesus, we see that Jesus, yes, he has disappeared in his ascension;  he went into the presence of God the Father, he currently intercedes on our behalf, and one day he is going to reappear in all of his glory; but in the meantime, because he entered into the veil - because his flesh was the veil - and we can come into the presence of God and because we are united to him, we have access into the divine presence right now, if you have trusted in Christ as your Savior.

Finally, will you notice the awestruck reactions? In verse 39, "When the centurion, who was standing right in front of Him, saw the way He breathed his last, he said, 'Truly this man was the Son of God!'" Can you imagine witnessing all of this and standing right there, in front of Jesus? Luke 23:47 and following, "Now when the centurion saw what had happened, he began praising God, saying, 'Certainly this man was innocent.'" And then we read this, "And all the crowds who came together for this spectacle, when they observed what had happened, began to return, beating their breasts." Now, what was the motivation for that? Well, certainly in their culture, that was a sign of intense grief. Many times, it was just a superficial response. Maybe some of them were genuinely concerned, because what they had witnessed with the darkness, the earthquake. Certainly they must have been saying, "what has just happened here?" The centurion, along with other soldiers, and many onlookers were fully aware of Jesus' innocence. But now to experience all of this? Remember, Mark's primary audience in his Gospel, would be the Gentiles, primarily Roman believers. And what is happening now is he is setting the stage for what's going to occur at Pentecost, after Christ's resurrection, when many of them will hear the truth summarized in Peter's great sermon, recorded in Acts two beginning in verse 22. I'll read you a portion of it. There he said, "'Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus, the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know - this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men, and put Him to death. But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power.'" And as you read on in Acts two and following, you read the rest of the story, many 1000s came to faith in Christ, and it continues on and on today, as Christ builds his church.

Back to Mark 15, verse 40, "There were also some women looking at on from a distance, among whom were Mary Magdalene..." Remember Mary Magdalene was the one that had the seven demons that Jesus cast out; my what a testimony. Won't it be great to speak with her someday and hear her extol the glories of Christ? "...Also Mary the mother of James the Less..." He was one of the 12, "...and Joses and Salome." That was the wife of Zebedee, the mother of James and John, and also the sister of Jesus' mother, Mary. These were obviously women that loved Jesus deeply.

Verse 41, "When He was in Galilee, they used to follow Him and ministered to Him; and there were many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem. "You know, every time I think of this passage, I thank God for faithful, godly, loving women in my life. And this church is filled with them. And in that I rejoice. Little did these women understand that in just a little bit, they would see an empty tomb. Oh what a joy must have filled their heart on that resurrection day. And you know, that's the joy that awaits all of us who know and love Christ.

Indeed dear friends, hell came to Calvary, but it will never come to anyone who has put their faith in Christ as Savior. But it will be the eternal abode of those who don't. And so I plead with you as a minister of the gospel, get serious about your relationship to the living God. Have you truly been broken over your sin and come to him and cried out for the mercy that he will grant you, all because of what Christ has done on the cross, or will you continue to live for yourself, and one day hear him say to you "depart from me you worker of iniquity, I never knew you." Hallelujah what a Savior, amen? Hallelujah what a Savior. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the magnificent truths that we have just read, and as we as we contemplate them, our hearts are just overwhelmed with a sense of sorrow and grief, knowing what you endured; especially knowing that you endured those things on our behalf. And when we think of the implications of this, for our life and for eternity, all we can say is thank you, Lord Jesus. And come quickly. And we pray this in the name of Jesus and for his sake. Amen.

Our verse-by-verse journey through Mark's gospel now brings us to Mark chapter 15. We will be looking at verses 16 through 32 as we examine the crucifixion of our Lord. Next week, we will continue beyond the text today in examining the same. Let me read the text to you. Mark 15, beginning in verse 16.

"The soldiers took Him away into the palace (that is the Praetorium), and they called together the whole Roman cohort.

They dressed Him up in purple, and after twisting a crown of thorns, they put it on Him; and they began to acclaim Him, 'Hail, King of the Jews!'

They kept beating His head with a reed, and spitting on Him, and kneeling and bowing before Him.

After they had mocked Him, they took the purple robe off Him and put His own garments on Him. And they led Him out to crucify Him.

They pressed into service a passer-by coming from the country, Simon of Cyrene, (the father of Alexander and Rufus), to bear His cross.

Then they brought Him to the place Golgotha, which is translated, Place of a Skull.

They tried to give Him wine mixed with myrrh; but He did not take it.

And they crucified Him, and divided up His garments among themselves, casting lots for them to decide what each man should take.

It was the third hour when they crucified Him.

The inscription of the charge against Him read,

'THE KING OF THE JEWS.'

They crucified two robbers with Him, one on His right and one on His left.

[And the scripture was fulfilled which says, 'And He was numbered with transgressors.']

Those passing by were hurling abuse at Him, wagging their heads, and saying, 'Ha, You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days,

save Yourself and come down from the cross!'

In the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes, were mocking Him among themselves and saying, 'He saved others; He cannot save Himself.

Let this Christ, the King of Israel, now come down from the cross, so that we may see and believe!' Those who were crucified with Him, were also insulting Him."

I'm sure you join me in saying that I recoil at such savage cruelty that can only flow from the poisoned well of human depravity and the power of Satan. You think about it, no animal would dare do something like this to others and their species. This is of wickedness that is supernatural. And it's sad that there are people today that would still enjoy doing these kinds of things, especially to Christians. From the outside, I would like to ask you a question, why did Jesus suffer and die on the cross? And how you answer this question will really determine two things: one, how much real and lasting joy you will experience over the course of your life? But secondly, it will determine the destiny of your soul for eternity. And I wish to answer this question from the outset. For only then will you be able to somehow grasp and internalize the horrific cruelty that Jesus willingly endured on behalf of all who would trust in Him for salvation.

Why did Jesus suffer and die on the cross? The answer is to be a substitutionary sacrifice in which he would bear the penalty of sin in his own body for sinners; that they might be forgiven; that they might be reconciled to a holy God. The apostle Paul puts it this way in Second Corinthians 5:21, "He made Him, who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." The crucifixion pictures, dear friends, what we deserve but what Christ endured on our behalf. It is at the very heart of the concept of the atonement. In the atonement, justice and mercy come together. Atonement really is characterized by four truths referenced throughout Scripture: there must be a sacrifice, to remove the guilt and penalty of sin; there must be propitiation to remove the wrath incurred by sin; and there must be reconciliation, to remove the alienation and enmity caused by sin. And then finally, there must be redemption; redemption from the bondage of sin and the curse of the law upon us. This is what we witness in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And I asked you, is your faith anchored in the finished work of Christ on the cross? Is he your substitute? Or are you content to ignore all of that, and pay for your own sins throughout eternity? My goal this morning is to help sinners see their need for the Savior, but also to help saints contemplate the glory of Christ and his infinite love for us. And in so doing, challenge each of us to learn to love and serve him more. And I must say that central to all of this is knowing the reality, the fact that Jesus knew you from all eternity, so that when he went to the cross, you were on his heart and mind. The Psalmist tells us in Psalm 139, beginning in verse 16, "Your eyes have seen my unformed substance, and in Your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them. How precious also are Your thoughts to me, Oh, God, how vast is the sum of them." You must remember, dear friends, that Jesus suffered on the cross with the full knowledge of who you were and what you would one day be. As your Creator, he was aware of the color of your eyes, the color of your hair, the shape of your face, the color of your skin, the sound of your voice, and the sins that you would commit against him. And as we see in Scripture, the redeemed were basically a love gift from the Father to the Son, his bridal church, because everyone that comes to faith in Christ had their name written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world. It was for you that he suffered and died. It was your sin that he bore in his body on the cross. His was an actual, not a potential atonement. He did not die to merely make salvation possible for those who might believe. No, he died to actually save those who were predestined to believe. He died for those whom the Father had given him, the elect of God. In Isaiah 53 verse five we read that, "He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed." It does not say that we were made healable; if we meet certain conditions, that would somehow activate a hypothetically universal atonement. "By his wounds you were healed." Peter says the same thing in First Peter 2:24.

Let me remind you that in scripture we read, that in eternity past, God set his love upon certain individuals, solely because of his good pleasure. He chose them to be saved from sin and damnation and to inherit the blessings of eternal life through the mediatorial work of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, we read in Ephesians, one beginning in verse four, "...He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world." He goes on to say, "In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Christ, Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will..." He went on to add, "In Him, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us." You see, the Father gave specific individuals to the Son, that He might accomplish their redemption. And he would be a substitutionary sacrifice for a particular people and his atoning work would be efficacious for all those who the Father had given him. John six, beginning in verse 37, Jesus said, "'All that the Father gives Me will come to Me.'" He went on to add, "'...I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. And this is the will of Him who sent Me that I should lose nothing, of all that He has given Me.'" In John 17, in the garden, as he poured out his heart before the Father, preparing to go to the cross on our behalf, we read beginning in verse one, lifting up his eyes to heaven, He said, "'Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You, even as You gave Him authority over all flesh, that to all whom You have given Him, He may give eternal life.'" And he went on to add in verse 24, "'Father, I desire that also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved me before the foundation of the world.'"

So as we reflect upon the hideous cruelty of the cross, I trust that this will cause us all to bow down with utmost humility and behold, the Son of God accomplishing the redemption of all whom the Father had given him in eternity past. And again, I say that this was an actual, definite atonement. Now, some will say, for example, in First John two two, it says, "He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for our sins only, but also for those of the whole world." The Universalist will say that what Jesus did on the cross paid the penalty for everybody, so everyone goes to heaven. That cannot be the case and Scripture refutes that everywhere. What he's referring to there is that the world speaks of all those without distinction, not all without exception. I might add that the context of that text is that John was confronting false teachers, promoting perfectionism and Gnosticism; that somehow only the Gnostics had the secret knowledge to gain spiritual victory. And so John repudiates those errors of exclusivism saying, essentially, that Christ is not the propitiation for our sins only, not just for Jews or just for Gentiles, for Gnostics, and not Christians, or believers in Asia Minor rather than the rest of the world. No, no, no, no. He is the propitiation for the sins of God's people that are scattered throughout the entire world. John 11, I believe verse 51, and following speaks of the same wonder of wonders, dear friends. Jesus said that I came to save people from their sins, Matthew 1:21, not to make them saveable. He did not make a provisional atonement, but an actual atonement. That's why on the cross, he said "'It is finished.'" Not, "It is possible." Redemption was accomplished. Our great high priest actually made purification for sins and with his work completed, he sat down; Hebrews one three. He gave "'...His life as a ransom for many'"; not for all, but for many, Matthew 20:28. And Paul says in Romans five, beginning in verse eight, we have, "...been justified by His blood..." Went on to say, "...while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His son."

Now, from the outset, I'm rehearsing some of this great theology to impress upon you the astounding reality of the sovereign grace and love of God, and the infinite love that he lavished upon you, at the cross, and continues to do so. As I was reflecting upon this, my mind went to an old hymn by Augustus Toplady. I found the verse, it was verse two, "A fountain of never ceasing grace." There was a phrase in there that I remembered from years ago. And the lyrics go like this, "In Thee we have a righteousness by God Himself approved; our rock, our shore foundation, this which never can be moved. Our ransom by the death was paid for all Thy people given; the law, now perfectly obeyed, that they might enter heaven." So dear friends, if you've trusted in Christ, as your Savior today, know that it was for you that he suffered and died.

Now to examine the text this morning, I want to do so under four categories that I hope will be helpful for you. We're going to first of all, look at the calloused comedy, then the cruel cross. Thirdly, the contemptuous charge and finally the celebrated conversions. Now remember the context, Jesus has been mocked, he has been beaten, he's been spat upon, he has been abandoned. And though he was found in innocent, Pilate yielded to the Jewish outcry to avoid an insurrection and get himself in trouble once again with Caesar. So he had Jesus scourged an unimaginably painful torture that typically killed most people. So by now, Jesus' back was shredded, literally to the bone. And with that in mind, we come to verse 16.

"The soldiers took Him away into the palace (that is the Praetorium), and they call together the whole Roman cohort." There will be an audience now of about 600 men. "They dressed Him up in purple, and after twisting a crown of thorns, they put it on Him; and they began to acclaim Him, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' They kept beating His head with a reed and spitting on Him and kneeling and bowing before Him." This brings us to the first point, and that is the calloused comedy. Again, here we witness the depths of human depravity do we not? These satanically inspired haters of God. You know, to take pleasure in torturing an innocent victim; to somehow delight in inflicting pain on someone; to revel over the unimaginable sufferings of a helpless individual is the lowest level of humanity. It is the most vile manifestation of human wickedness. I mean, these people were literally depraved sociopaths. And sadly, our world is filled with them today. They even exist in our government. And yet Jesus suffered all of this for you. And for me; those who the Father had given him.

Verse 20, "After they had mocked Him, they took the purple robe off Him and put His own garments on Him." So here is this mock coronation, if you will, of the King of kings. Inconceivable. And sadly, this is how many people view the Lord Jesus Christ today. He's just a joke. You tell people today that he is the King of kings and Lord of lords, that he's returning again, and they laugh at you. They laugh at him. Now, none of this caught Jesus by surprise. He predicted this, as you may recall, in Mark 10 verse 34, where he said, "'They will mock Him and spit on Him and scourge Him and kill Him, and three days later, He will rise again.'" We read a similar prophecy, given many, many years earlier in Isaiah 50, beginning in verse six, "I gave My back to those who strike Me and My cheeks to those who pluck out the beard; I did not cover My face from humiliation and spitting. For the Lord GOD helps Me; therefore I am not disgraced; therefore, I have set My face like flint, and I know that I will not be ashamed."

John gives us further insight in John 19, beginning in verse one. There we read, "Pilate then took Jesus and scourged Him. And the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on His head and put a purple robe on Him. And they began to come up to Him and say, 'Hail, Oh, King of the Jews!' and to give Him slaps in the face.'" Unimaginable cruelty. Verse 4, "Pilate came out again and said to them, 'Behold, I am bringing Him out to you so that you may know that I find no guilt in Him.' Jesus then came out wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, 'Behold, the Man!'" He was in hopes that somehow the Jews would see this pathetic creature and have mercy on him and be satisfied to allow him to let him go. But instead, verse six, we read, "When the chief priests and the officers saw Him, they cried out saying, 'Crucify, crucify!' Pilate said to them, 'Take Him yourselves and crucify Him, for I find no fault, no guilt in Him.'"

Now back to Mark 15, the end of verse 20, "And they lead Him out to crucify Him." The word "out" is important here. We know according to Numbers, 15, verse 35, that executions were always done outside the city. But the writer of Hebrews gives us additional insight in Hebrews 13, beginning with verse 11, we read "For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the holy place by the high priest as an offering for sin, are burned outside the camp." You see, it was outside the camp of the Israelites where refuse was burned. It was the garbage dump where dangerous, wild animals roam. Those who lived outside the camp were the diseased. That's where the lepers lived; those considered unclean. It was a place of disgrace. A place of abandonment, of humiliation. It's where blasphemers and Sabbath breakers were executed. And the same was true outside the gate of Jerusalem. That's where the poorest of the poor live; the outcast, the harlots, the lepers. These are people that lived essentially in perpetual despair. People that were shunned by their family. It would have been heartbreaking to live there, especially for the lepers, who would walk around lamenting, saying, "unclean, unclean, unclean," so that no one would get near them. It was a place for people who don't want to go on living but are afraid to die. It was a place where people had no hope, no joy, no life. No faith because they had no Christ. How sad. What a picture of sinners for whom Christ died, right? He died for us "outside the camp."

Verse 12, of Hebrews 13 goes on to say, "Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate." You see, even as the remains of the sin sacrifices that were offered on the holy place were burned outside the camp, so too Jesus was sacrificed "outside the gate."

Verse 13, goes on to add, "So, let us go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach." By the way, this carries the idea of, let's separate ourselves from any religious or worldly ideology in opposition to Christ. Especially in that context, that would include the Levitical system; live outside the camp of the old covenant of Israel. You want to ask yourself, "Do I live outside the camp where grace abounds? Do I choose rather to stay inside the camp where law condemns."

So after mocking Jesus with their callous comedy, Mark simply says at the end of verse 20, "And they led Him out to crucify Him." This brings us now to the second point, and that is the cruel cross. John adds this in John 19:17, "They took Jesus, therefore, and He went out, bearing His own cross." Now, this would have been the horizontal cross beam, that one would bear upon their back. And imagine now, Jesus' skin and muscles and tendons and ligaments were ripped and exposed. And he had to bear this burden. He obviously couldn't do it for long.

Verse 21, "They pressed into service..." this is from Mark 15, "They pressed into service a passer-by coming from the country, Simon of Cyrene.." That would have been Northern Africa, which is essentially Libya today. And then in parentheses, it says, "(the father of Alexander and Rufus), to bear His cross." Now, while this would have been a random selection, it was indeed a providential appointment. It would appear because of the way Mark wrote this, that these names were familiar to the church there in Rome. Mark's audience must have been familiar with them. In fact, we read in Romans 16, verse 13, the Apostle Paul says, "Greet Rufus, a choice man in the Lord, also his mother." And so Simon and his wife, and perhaps the whole family, came to faith in Christ.

Verse 22, of Mark 15, "Then they brought Him to the place Golgotha, which is translated, Place of a Skull." Now, this was no doubt a common place for crucifixions. A place where the holes had already been dug. It would have been a place of high visibility because the Romans like to crucify people where everybody would gather or walk by, to see what would happen if you somehow cross Rome. The word "skull" in the Latin is "calvaria," we get our word "calvary" from that. And this was outside Jerusalem's northern wall near the Damascus Gate. There's a rocky hill there that resembles a skull, we don't know for sure why it was called the Place of the Skull. Much of that is speculation. scripture doesn't really say.

Verse 23, goes on to say, "They tried to give Him wine mixed with myrrh, but He did not take it." Now, bear in mind that the disciples have abandoned him. But there was a great multitude of people, we know, that we're following him. In fact, in Luke 23, verse 27, we read, "And following Him was a large crowd of the people, and of women who were mourning and lamenting Him." Now, this doesn't mean that they were disciples of Jesus; there probably worse some, but it was their custom to pay women to mourn when someone was going to the cross, or to mourn at a funeral. And probably someone, or several of them in that company, offered him the painkiller, and it was common for the Jews to offer myrrh to these poor victims going to crucifixion because it was an an analgesic, a narcotic. He also used it for anointing oil and for perfume and for other things. And they were used to doing this because historically by this time, Rome had already crucified about 30,000 people in Israel alone. And after the fall of Jerusalem and ad 70, the Romans ran out of wood to make crosses, they crucified so many people.

And I'm deeply moved by the fact that though Jesus was offered something to reduce the pain, he refused to do anything that would alleviate the agony of his suffering on our behalf. But rather, he would drink to the bitter dregs the full cup of divine wrath that the Father had given him, all because of his obedience to the Father and his love for all whom the Father had given him.

As a footnote, Jesus's response to the mourning women is quite remarkable. We read about it in Luke 23, verse 28, and following, "But Jesus turning to them said, 'Daughters of Jerusalem, stop weeping for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming, when they will say, "blessed are the barren, and the wombs that have never bore, and the breasts that have never nursed, then they will begin TO SAY TO THE MOUNTAINS, 'FALL ON US,' AND TO THE HILLS, 'COVER US.'" for if they do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?'" That was probably a common proverb; the green wood would be a reference to the young and the strong, the source of life, pointing to Jesus. And the dry wood would speak of the old and the barren and ready to be burned wood; ready to be burned and judgment, focusing primarily on the Jewish nation.

You realize that this would have been Jesus last sermon, a warning. A warning concerning the coming slaughter that would be a few years later, when the Romans came in, and destroyed Jerusalem. But it was also a prophecy that covered a much wider spectrum concerning the judgment upon all, who in their blasphemous unbelief, reject Christ and indulge themselves in the fleeting pleasures of this world over a Savior. Think about this, to pause, to focus in the midst of all of his pain, to break his long silence while enduring such unspeakable agony, and then out of love for them, to give them that sober warning. For indeed, as promised, a day is coming when according to Revelation 19, beginning in verse 15, "From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh, he has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.'"

So Mark simply says, and "And they crucified Him..." According to verse 25, we know that this is nine o'clock in the morning. Jesus has been up all night he's gone through all of those trials, all of the scourging all of this wickedness. As I began to put some thoughts down to describe crucifixion, I found that I could not improve upon John MacArthur's description. Let me read it to you. "Crucifixion was a prolonged form of dying designed to induce maximum suffering and pain. When the condemned criminal arrived at the place of execution, he was forced onto his back and nailed to the cross as it lay on the ground. The nails measuring five to seven inches long and resembling modern railroad spikes, were driven through the wrists rather than the palms of the hand in order to support the full weight of the victims slumping body. The victim's feet were then secured with a single spike, with the knees bent so that he could push himself up in order to breathe. The nails would tear through the nerves and the wrists and feet, causing severe bolts of pain throughout the victims impaled arms and legs. The cross was then slowly raised until it was vertical. The foot of the cross was subsequently dropped into place in a deep posthole, landing with a reverberating thud that sent excruciating pain jolting through the victim's body. Thought the wounds from the nails caused severe agony they were not intended to be fatal. The normal cause of death was slow suffocation. The hanging position of the body constricted the diaphragm which made it impossible to breathe. In order to get air the victim had to push himself up, placing his weight on the nail wounds in his feet and wrists, and rubbing his lacerated back against the rough wood of the cross. As the victim grew tired, experienced muscle spasms, and became overwhelmed by the pain, his ability to breathe was increasingly hindered. As a result, carbon dioxide would build up in his bloodstream, and he would eventually suffocate to death. If needed, soldiers could hasten asphyxiation by breaking the victim's legs." End court quote.

Once again, to think to dear friends, that he specifically, really, not hypothetically, not potentially, but actually bore my sins and your sins on that tree. I never stopped marveling at so great a salvation. As I think about it, mankind has never devised a more brutal form of torture. The invention of this instrument of death could only be inspired by Satan, who was a murderer from the beginning and what delight he must have had at the sight. But his delight will only add to the eternal torment that awaits him and awaits all who would mock the Lord Jesus.

Verse 24, "And they crucified Him and divided up His garments among themselves, casting lots for them to decide what each man should take." We read this prophesied in Psalm 22:18, "They divide My garments among them, and for My clothing, they cast lots." You can just see this little group of soldiers doing this; granite indifference towards what's really going on. This was just another day at the office for them. Certain soldiers had that particular duty.

And verse 25, says, "It was the third hour of which they crucified Him." That would have been 9am. The Jews would count hours of the day beginning at six. So this is the third hour. And again, bear in mind, dear friends that just the night before, Jesus was celebrating Passover with his disciples, and now he is the Passover lamb. I marvel at the Savior's love in his heart of forgiveness, even for those inflicting such unspeakable pain upon him. It's amazing how his heart was still filled with love and forgiveness, not condemnation or revenge. Luke tells us in Luke 9:56, that "'... the Son of Man did not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them.'" And we read in Luke 23, verse 34, how he prayed for forgiveness for his tormentors. He said, "'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.'" I'm not exactly sure in the sequence when he said this. I think JC Ryle probably has it right. Here's what he said, quote, "These words, 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing,' were probably spoken while our Lord was being nailed to the cross, or as soon as the cross was reared up on end. It is worthy of remark that as soon as the blood of the great sacrifice began to flow, the great high priest began to intercede. Do you see the glory of that?" He says, "Although Christ is the sovereign, eternal, omnipotent god, he did not threaten he did not condemn. He did not pronounce doom on his crucifiers. Instead of lashing out against him, he prayed for them." Amazing. He willingly submitted to this kind of indignity, and injustice, and torture. He willingly surrendered his life without resistance, without retaliation, all the while, praying that the Father would be merciful to them and forgive them.

My mind goes to what God says in Isaiah 55. The context here is, the infinite mercy and grace and love of God is beyond anything we can comprehend. There we read beginning in verse eight of Isaiah 55, "'For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,' declares the Lord. 'For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts then your thoughts.'"

Well, we've seen the catalyst comedy and the cruel cross, thirdly, notice the contemptuous charge. It's the inscription mentioned in verse 26, "The inscription of the charge against Him read, 'THE KING OF THE JEWS.' John gives us some additional insights here, this very helpful to tell us really what was going on and the reaction of the Jewish leaders. John 19, verse 19, we read, "Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It was written, 'JESUS THE NAZARENE, THE KING OF THE JEWS.' Therefore, many of the Jews read this inscription, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Latin and in Greek. So the chief priests of the Jews were saying to Pilate, 'Do not write the King of the Jews;’ but that He said, "I am King of the Jews."' Pilate answered, 'What I have written I have written.'" In other words, this was a deliberate insult to the Jews. He knew that this would be extremely offensive to them, it would be a mockery of them; this would be his way of gaining revenge against them for the way that they blackmailed him and essentially forced him to kill an innocent man so that they could maintain their power and their prestige. But isn't it interesting, the inscription was, in fact true.

And Mark says, "They crucified..." verse 27, "...two robbers with Him, one on His right and one on His left." We'll talk about that more probably next week. And then in verse 28, it says, "[And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, 'And he was numbered with transgressors."] Now, just as a note, here, there is insufficient textual support for this particular verse, it may not even be in some of your translations. It's not found in the earliest manuscripts, and it was therefore, probably not part of Mark's original gospel. So some translations leave it out completely. Others will bracket it. That said, the statement does reflect Isaiah’s prophecy in Isaiah 53, verse 12, where we read, "He was numbered with the transgressors; yet He Himself bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors."

Back to verse 29, of Mark 15, "Those passing by, were hurling abuse at Him, wagging their heads, and saying, 'Ha! You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save Yourself and come down from the cross!' In the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes, were mocking Him among themselves and saying, 'He saved others; He cannot save Himself. Let this Christ, the King of Israel, now come down from the cross, so that we may see and believe!' Those who were crucified with Him were also insulting Him."

It's important to note that this was predicted in Psalm 22. That was a psalm, that is a psalm of lament, A psalm of thanksgiving. But it's often called a psalm of the cross. In fact, all four gospels appeal to its imagery describing Christ's crucifixion. We understand it first in the context of David describing his suffering, but ultimately it pointed to David's greater son, greater King, the Lord Jesus Christ. In Psalm 22, verse seven we read, "'All who see me sneer at me; they separate with the lip.." That was an idiom for sneering. "...They separate with the lip, they wag the head..." --which signifies rejection and astonishment; these are all gestures of contempt-- "...saying, commit yourself to the LORD; let Him deliver Him, let Him rescue him, because He delights in him.'" You know, I find myself again just wanting to turn away from the horror of the scene in my mind. Somehow the cruelty of this kind of derisive gloating just exceeds all others, given his very real experience later on, when he was forsaken by the Father. I mean, Satan knows exactly where to aim his arrows, does he not? He knows exactly how to inflict the greatest wounds that have doubt and discouragement--"I wonder if God is really who he says he is." "I wonder if I can survive all of this." Some of you are probably in that situation today. That's what the enemy would have you to believe. Charles Spurgeon said, "Here the talk is cruelly aimed at the sufferer’s faith; faith in God, which is the tenderest point in a good man soul. The very apple of his eye. They must have learned the diabolical art from Satan himself, for they made rare proficiency in it. According to Matthew 27:39 through 44, there were five forms of taunt hurled at the Lord Jesus. This special piece of mockery is probably mentioned in this psalm, because it is the most bitter of the whole." Spurgeon adds, "It was a biting, sarcastic irony in it, which gives it a bit peculiar venom. It must have stung the man of sorrows to the quick. When we are tormented in the same manner, let us remember Him who endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, and we shall be comforted."

And again, I think, Oh my, how fully did the Savior divest himself of his glory while on the cross. And we come back again, and we say, my, why would the Lord suffer such infinite scorn and pain? Dear friends, the reason is because he bore our sin. And it's because sin is worthy of utmost contempt, and infinite scorn. Beloved, we would all do well to reevaluate the reproach we deserve because of the sins we love. And we will complain far less of the ridicule that we receive knowing what the Savior endured on our behalf. You know, even if Jesus had performed some miracle like they were wanting; even if he had come down off of the cross, they still wouldn't have believed. You know, they wanted a sign. They got one three days later, did they not? When he rose from the dead, and what did they do? They didn't fall down and worship Him. They bribed soldiers to tell a lie and say that the disciples stole his body. Beloved, the only power that can save a sinner, that can cause a person to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ is the miracle of regeneration. A Spirit wrought miracle in the soul of a person, causing them to be born again, through the agency of the Holy Spirit, through His Word. And like all unbelievers, the mocking chief priests and scribes, willfully chose not to believe in spite of all of the miracles that they even witnessed.

In fact, Jesus said in Luke 16:31, "'If they did not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.'" The same is true today. That's why the only thing that will change a person's heart is the gospel. In all of its fullness, and all of its purity, in all of its power--that's what the Spirit of God uses to either hardened hearts or soften hearts. That is his prerogative. So we unleash the gospel and let God do what only He can do.

Well, finally in closing, we look at the celebrated conversions. And I'm amazed by all of the saving grace that's occurring even in the midst of this tragedy. We read, for example, in Luke 23, verse 39, and following, "One of the criminals who were hanged there was hurling abuse at Him saying, 'Are You not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!' But the other answered, and rebuking him said, 'Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.' And he was saying, 'Jesus, remember me when You come in Your kingdom!' Jesus said to him, 'Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.'" A celebrated conversion.

Likewise, later on, we know that the Spirit of God moved upon the heart of a centurion, probably a number of the soldiers, we don't know. But it is recorded in Mark 15:39, "When the centurion, who was standing right in front of Him, saw the way He breathed His last, he said, 'Truly, this man was the Son of God!'"

And then we know 50 days later, after the resurrection, was Pentecost--the birth of the church--and we read how 3000 souls were added to the church that day, according to Acts two. And then we go into Acts four, and we read about 5000 more, and it just keeps going and going and going. And you know, many of those who were saved, for example, at Pentecost would have been the same ones that had been mocking him at his crucifixion. And later, we know of a violent Pharisee, who on the road to Damascus, was confronted with the glory of the living Christ. The apostle Paul—later became the Apostle Paul, and there he was radically saved and remember what he told Timothy, and First Timothy one, in verse 12. And by the way, this could be my testimony, and I'm sure yours, "I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord, who has strengthened me, because He considered me faithful, putting me into service, even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor. Yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief; and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant, with the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus. It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners among whom I am foremost of all. Yet for this reason, I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience, as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life."

Friends, I would ask you, what have you done with Jesus? Have you embraced Him as your Savior and Lord, acknowledging your sin, coming to him in repentant faith? Or do you mock Him with your mouth? Or perhaps mock him with your indifference? If that is the case, I plead with you today, to examine your heart and cry out for God to save you by his grace. For all of us, may I remind you again. Why did Jesus suffer and die on the cross? To be a substitutionary sacrifice in which he would bear the penalty of the sin of sinners in his body, that they might be forgiven and reconciled to a holy God, all those whom the Father had given him in eternity past. I pray this is true of you. If not, I plead with you to come to faith in Christ. And then with all the saints you could sing that great refrain, "Jesus paid it all. All to Him I owe. Sin it left a crimson stain, He washed it, white as snow."

Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for the glory of the cross and what that means to us. And I pray that by the power of your Spirit, you will speak to each heart and do that work of grace that only you can do. And we will be careful that in all things Christ will have the preeminence as we await that day, when we see him face to face and his name I pray, Amen.

I've entitled my discourse to you this morning, "Satanic Jurisprudence" and hopefully that title will make more sense, as we see it manifested in the text before us, which is in Mark chapter 15; Mark chapter 15, as we continue to go through Mark's gospel verse by verse. Let me read the passage, beginning in verse one and going through verse 15.

"Early in the morning, the chief priests with the elders and scribes and the whole Council, immediately held a consultation; and binding Jesus, they led Him away and delivered Him to Pilate.

Pilate questioned him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?' And He answered him, 'It is, as you say.'

The chief priests began to accuse Him harshly.

Then Pilate questioned Him again saying, 'Do You not answer? See how many charges they bring against You?'

But Jesus made no further answer; so Pilate was amazed.

Now at the feast he used to release for them any one prisoner whom they requested.

The man named Barabbas had been imprisoned with the insurrectionists, who had committed murder and the insurrection.

The crowd went up and began asking him to do as he had been accustomed to do for them.

Pilate answered them, saying, 'Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?'

For he was aware that the chief priest had handed Him over because of envy.

But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to ask him to release Barabbas for them instead.

Answering again, Pilate said to them, 'Then what shall I do with Him whom you call the King of the Jews?'

They shouted back, 'Crucify Him!'

But Pilate said to them, 'Why, what evil has He done?' But they shouted all the more, 'Crucify Him!'

Wishing to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas for them, and after having Jesus scourged, he handed Him over to be crucified."

According to First John five and verse 19, we are told that, "We know that we are of God, and that the whole world is in the power of the evil one." The world, the cosmos; in this context, the orderly system of satanic control, the sphere, the domain of his influence; where he does everything, he possibly can, to thwart the purposes of God in redemption to ultimately bring glory to God. He is indeed the evil one, Satan, the devil. Jesus referred to him as "the ruler of this world" in John 14. And speaking of unbelievers, Jesus declared in John eight, verse 44, and following, "You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies."

There are only two kinds of people that exist in the world. Those who love the world and are therefore the willing slaves of Satan, even though perhaps unwitting, and those who hate the things of this world, and are therefore by God's grace, the willing slaves of God himself. In First John two beginning in verse 15, we are told his believers, "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world." In other words, all of the places and things and people that are in this world, that surround us, that influence us; those things that appeal to our sinful flesh and draw us away from an intimate knowledge and fellowship and service of the living God, all of those things are going to disappear. But those are the things of the world that you must avoid. And thankfully, according to what we are told in Colossians, one and verse 13, God has "rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son."

Friends, what we see in our passage here today, in this historical narrative, is a clash between these two domains--the domain of Satan, the kingdom of Satan that is in this world, and the kingdom of Christ that is not in this world. As we examine the details of this horrific injustice, we will not only see the many parallels in our own culture, and our own country, but we will also see remnants of our own unredeemed flesh. In fact, may I remind you, never examine this historical narrative in isolation, as if it is just some ancient chronicle of antiquity or whatever. But rather, be quick to see the infinite perfections of Christ portrayed in it, and how those things relate to your life in union with Him. If you cannot see yourself in the characters of this narrative, you will never accurately see Christ.

Now I wish to expose it this passage under three progressive characteristics of depravity that not only emerge from the text, as we will see, but also emerge from the depraved machinations of human beings. First, we will see in phase one, mocking sarcasm of Christ. That will move to phase two, depraved humiliation of Christ. And then in phase three, we will see the physical torture of Christ. Both scripture and history give testimony to this progressive, satanic wickedness that was inflicted upon Christ and all who belong to Him. In fact, the Lord tells us in Matthew 10, and verse 22, "you will be hated by all because of My name." And as believers, we see that being manifested more and more in our culture. But also in John 15, beginning in verse 18, Jesus said, "'If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world. Because of this, the world hates you.'" And as we will see, that hatred will move through this kind of progression. From mocking to disdain to violence; this has always been Satan's strategy.

Now, let me remind you of the context here. Jesus, of course, has been arrested, the disciples have fled. Three ecclesiastical trials have been conducted the first one with Annas, the former high priest, but the one who frankly wielded the sacerdotal influence amongst the Jews of that day; the power of the Sanhedrin. And he was an aged, tyrannical, worldly, Sadducee, that enjoyed prominence and enjoyed all of the influence that went with his title. And he was also friends with the Herod’s and the Roman pro creators and so forth. He was like the mafia Don, and he was the one that held the greatest malice against Jesus, because Jesus interrupted his illicit commercial enterprise in the temple precincts with all of the money changing, and so forth.

In fact, I might also add that as we look at history, most of the people detested Annas and his family. And certainly, they despise the Romans that supported them. Jesus has also had a hearing before Caiaphas, that was Annas; son in law, the current high priest who also benefited from the greedy gains of his father-in-law. And Caiaphas feared that Jesus might stir up the populace and stirred them up against the Sanhedrin and against the Romans and therefore threaten their position. And then finally, they have had the trial with Jesus--illegal trial--that was convened in the Sanhedrin early in the morning. And as we have examined, those proceedings were undoubtedly the greatest miscarriage of justice in the history of civilization. This, dear friends, is the example of satanic jurisprudence, the phony and false indictment against the Son of God, resulting in the sham trials, the false accusations of witnesses that lead ultimately to the predetermined sentence of death.

Now also bear in mind that during this whole time of these three trials with Jesus, Peter has been exposed and he has denied knowing Jesus or knowing anything about Jesus, three times. And then the Lord gazed at him and caused him to be overwhelmed with guilt and he has now felt the shame and the sorrow that he needed to feel, and he has repented. So, Jesus now has been humiliated. He has been hooded, he has been beaten, he has been mocked, he has been spat upon. And bear in mind now he's been up all night long. And he has also sweat drops of blood in the garden. According to John 18, verse 28, we read that shortly after dawn, the Sanhedrinists quote, "led Jesus from Caiaphas into the Praetorium, and it was early; and they themselves did not enter the Praetorium so that they would not be defiled but might eat the Passover." Oh, the deceptive power of religious hypocrisy. Astounding, isn't it? They abhorred ceremonial defilement that might prevent them from being able to eat the Passover meal that night, but they cared nothing about shedding innocent blood.

You know, self-serving false religionists, as well as politicians, for the most part, care only for themselves, not for the truth, not for the people; only their own power and prestige. So with this, now we come to our text in verse one of Mark 15, "Early in the morning, the chief priests with the elders and scribes and the whole Council, immediately held a consultation; and binding Jesus, they led Him away and delivered Him to Pilate." Now they had to deliver Him to Pilate, before the people in the city began to stir, it's still early in the morning. Bear in mind that Jesus's hands would have been tied behind his back, they would have had a rope around his neck and they would have had to have traveled from what was called the Hall of Meeting, where they would have met over a large bridge spanning the Valley of Tyropoeon, which is also called the Central Valley, it ran along the eastern wall of the Temple Mount. And so this would have been a horrible spectacle for anybody to behold, but especially if there was a large crowd of people. So they hurry now, and they take him to Pilate.

Moreover, bear in mind, and this again exposes their hypocrisy, they needed the crucifixion to be over by the beginning of the Sabbath, which commenced at sundown on Friday. In fact, we read about this in John 19, verse 31, "Then the Jews, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies would not remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for the Sabbath was a high day), asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away." I mean, once again, more evidence of the depths of this kind of depraved, fanatical hypocrisy. So with the seared conscience of a demonized sociopath, they could somehow justify the torturous murder of an innocent man, the Son of God, but his crucified body had to be removed before the Sabbath, so as not to violate the Sabbath and somehow fall into sin. So they led Jesus from Caiaphas into the Praetorium, and in John 18, verse 29, we read, "Therefore Pilate went out to them and said, 'What accusation do you bring against this Man?' They answered and said to him, 'If this Man were not an evil doer, we would not have delivered Him to you.' So Pilate said to them, 'Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law." The Jews said to him, 'We are not permitted to put anyone to death.' And then John adds this, '...to fulfill the word of Jesus which He spoke, signifying by what kind of death He was about to die."

So back to Mark 15, verse two, "Pilate questioned Him, 'Are you the King of the Jews?' And He answered him, 'It is as you say.'' Here we come to the first phase that I would call: mocking sarcasm of Christ. Bear in mind your friends, Jesus, the Son of God, the Messiah, the Lord of hosts, is standing before this petty little tyrant Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, appointed by Emperor Tiberius in ad 26. His face is bruised and swollen and bloodied, like his garments. And yet there he stands, the man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, all alone, to be judged by a creature that he created. It's an astounding thought, is it not? And with mocking sarcasm, Pilate question him, "'Are you the king of the Jews?'" In the original, the pronoun "you" is placed at the beginning of the phrase, as if Pilate were saying, "You're the king of the Jews?" "You are the king of the Jews?" Really what a joke. Dear friends, they mocked him then as they mock him now.

Let me give you a little historical background on Pilate, so that you understand what would have been going on in his mind. Pilate hated the Jews, but he also feared them because he didn't want another insurrection. In fact, Philo of Alexandria, he was a Jewish philosopher and Hellenistic theologian of that era. He described Pilate's character by quoting a letter from Agrippa the First to Caligula were Agrippa called him quote, "inflexible, merciless and obstinate." Not the kind of guy you want to be judging you right? Now Pilate's haughty violence against the Jews had gotten him into hot water with Caesar before in the past. For example, soon after he was installed as the procurator, he instructed his Roman soldiers to bring the Silver Eagles and other insignia of the Legions from Caesarea into Jerusalem, and to sneak them in by cover of darkness. And he defiled the temple by putting these golden shields inscribed with the images and the names of Roman deities in the temple. Well, obviously, when the Jews found out they were apoplectic, absolutely enraged. This was idolatry. This was profaning the temple. And history tells us that for five days and nights, they surrounded Pilate's residence in Caesarea, often lying prostate on the bare ground and threatening to storm the residence. And on the sixth day, the soldiers surrounded them, and Pilate threatened to massacre all of them, but they would not desist and so he thought, you know, I better back off or I'm gonna get in trouble here. But this just fueled his already existing abhorrence for the Jews.

On another occasion, Pilate used some of the same money that was used in the sacred treasury of the temple to build an aqueduct. Well, this enflamed, the Jews and 1000s protested. And when the mob refused to disperse, he instructed many of his soldiers to dress as if they were part of the mob, as if they were Jews, and to infiltrate the crowd, and to use daggers and kill the ringleaders and also use staves, or like billy clubs to beat many of them and many died in that milieu. Many were beaten, many were crushed by the fleeing mob. And on yet another occasion he hung some shields dedicated to Tiberius in the Herodian palace at Jerusalem [cough..."excuse me"] where he stayed during the festivals. And the Jewish leaders wrote a letter of complaint to Tiberius himself because they were so offended. And when Tiberius got this complaint, he's like oh, here we go again. This guy Pilate, he's causing trouble, and so, in order to avoid an insurrection, we read how Tiberius reprimanded Pilate, had the shields taken down and transferred from Jerusalem to the Temple of Augustus at Caesarea. I might add as a footnote, eventually, the act that led to Pilate's removal from office was when he had his calvary attack and kill many Jews who were following some false prophet as they were ascending Mount Gerizim to find some sacred vessels that they believe Moses had hidden up there. And Pilate was eventually then banished to Gaul, which would have been Western Europe, especially France, in that day, and he died of suicide. And now he's in hell.

So a little background, and the point with all of this is to say, Pilate hated the Jews. But he lived in constant dread of an insurrection, which did eventually cost him his position. So back to verse two, "Pilate questioned Him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?' And He answered him, 'It is as you say.' The chief priests began to accuse Him harshly." Now, bear in mind, the Jewish leaders were hoping the Pilate would just rubber stamp their sentence of death for blasphemy, a sentence that they couldn't carry out. But they also knew that the Romans would laugh at this idea, well, he blaspheme God. They didn't believe in any of that anyway. So they needed to come up with something else that would somehow cause the Romans to charge him. They needed to demonstrate how Jesus was basically a revolutionary that he was an insurrectionist, and thus a threat to Imperial Rome. Which, by the way, Jesus never ever advocated civil disobedience. You never see him protesting. He never marched around with the disciples holding banners that said, "Jews lives matter," or whatever. You didn't see any of that kind of they never promoted rebellion. Now, as we will see, Pilate did not see Jesus as a political threat, as the Sanhedrin alleged. This was laughably absurd. I mean, here's this guy standing there in front of him looking like he's basically close to death. He knew this whole thing was a charade, just to keep the Jewish leaders in power; typical of politicians, and how they will use the courts and so forth to keep themselves in power. In fact, in verse 10 of chapter 15, we read that, "...he was aware that the chief priests had handed Him over because of envy." So Pilate didn't see Jesus as a threat. But what Pilate didn't know is that God required Rome's involvement to fulfill many Old Testament prophecies regarding how Jesus would be killed, namely crucifixion, which the Jews did not do. They abhorred that form of violence against a person of capital punishment, they stoned people.

Now, I want you to notice John's account of this first phase now; this is the first phase of three Roman tribunals before Jesus is crucified. In John 18, verse 33, "Therefore Pilate entered again into the Praetorium, and summoned Jesus and said to Him, 'Are you the King of the Jews?' Jesus answered, 'Are you saying this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about Me?' Pilate answered, 'I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests delivered You to me; what have You done?' Jesus answered, 'My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm.' Therefore Pilate said to Him, 'So You are a king?' Jesus answered, 'You say correctly, that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.' Pilate said to Him, 'What is truth?' And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews and said to them, 'I find no fault in Him.'" Of course, this verdict enraged the Jews. This isn't what they wanted to hear. So, as we read in Luke 23, beginning of verse five, "they kept on insisting, saying, 'He stirs up the people, teaching all over Judea, starting from Galilee, even as far as this place.'" Now, who knows all of the satanically inspired claims against Jesus that were spoken, but it is fascinating as I did some research; in Sanhedrin 107 B of the Talmud, we read how Jesus was a student of Yehoshua Ben Pariah, but Jesus sinned by bringing magic from Egypt and seduced the people, so he was excommunicated for 400 days. I bet you didn't know that did you? Also, quote, "Jesus stood a brick upright to serve as an idol, and he bowed to it. Yehoshua Ben Pariah, then said to Jesus, 'Repent.' Jesus said to him, 'This is the tradition that I received from you.'" And later we read, "And the master says, Jesus performed sorcery, incited Jews to engage in idolatry and led Israel astray." End quote.

Well, of course, this is all utterly false. These are Satanic lies, but sadly, many people believe them; believe them to this day. Back to Mark 15, verse four, "Then Pilate questioned Him again, 'Do You not answer? See how many charges they bring against You!' But Jesus made no further answer; so Pilate was amazed." It's interesting, too, that Jesus' silence here, fulfilled biblical prophecy, right? Isaiah 42, the first 12 verses, and especially in Isaiah 53, verse seven, where we read, "He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth. Like a lamb that is led to slaughter and like a sheep that is silent before it shears, so He did not open his mouth." Now, what Luke tells us at this juncture is very important. We read about this in Luke 23, in verse five and following, "But they kept on insisting, saying, 'He stirs up the people, teaching all over Judea, starting from Galilee, even as far as this place.'" Now catch this, "When Pilate heard it, he asked whether the man was a Galilean. And when he learned that He belonged to Herod's jurisdiction, he sent Him to Herod, who himself also was in Jerusalem at that time." Oh, you're a Galilean, okay, well, you need to go see Herod. You know, he's in charge of that over there.

Now, Herod Antipas was the exceedingly evil son of Herod the Great, you will recall how he illegally divorced his wife and took the wife of his half-brother, Herod Philip the First, a lady named Herodias; he married her. Who, by the way, was also his niece. And then John the Baptist comes along and confronts them and he gets imprisoned and then Herodias' daughter does this lewd dance in front of the king and bunch of other guys, and he gets all excited, and the king offers her up to half of his kingdom and she doesn't know really what to ask him for. And so she talks with her mother, and the mother wanted the head of John the Baptist. Okay, so that's the background. That's who this dude is.

Now, according to Mark six, when the disciples were preaching, and casting out demons and working miracles of healing, we read in verse 14, "King Herod heard of it, for His name..." referring to Jesus, "had become well known; and people were saying, 'John the Baptist has risen from the dead and that is why these miraculous powers are at work in Him.'" So you see, Herod's conscience was eating at him. He was superstitious. Always fascinating to me how pagans will be superstitious, and they will believe in ghosts, but they will not believe in God. Right? So this is what's going on here. So Pilate hands Jesus off to this perverted, vile, irrational tyrant, so that he can interrogate him.

And this brings us now to phase two that I would call depraved humiliation of Christ. We pick this up in Luke 23, beginning in verse eight, "Now Herod was very glad when he saw Jesus; for he had wanted to see Him for a long time, because he had been hearing about Him and was hoping to see some sign performed by Him. And he questioned Him at some length; but He answered him nothing. And the chief priests and the scribes were standing there, accusing Him vehemently. And Herod with his soldiers, after treating Him with contempt and mocking Him, dressed him in a gorgeous robe and send him back to Pilate. Now Herod and Pilate became friends with one another that very day; for before they had been enemies with each other." It's always fascinating to watch how wicked people will form alliances with other wicked people. What's the old saying? The enemy of my enemy is my friend, type of thing. So he's unable to get a word out of Jesus. But imagine the kind of vulgarity that is being hurled at Jesus. While this pompous king is looking on with amusement. What humiliation of the King of kings and the Lord of lords, the one who will one day be their judge, and their executioner at the Great White Throne. So Jesus says nothing and unable to find any fault worthy of death, Herod treats the whole spectacle as if it's a big joke, puts the robe on him, sends him back to Pilate. Again, Herod had no interest in justice, his only concern was his own power and pleasure, which I might add, are the common preoccupations of fallen man, especially those who are in power over others.

So we move from mocking sarcasm, to depraved humiliation, and finally to the third phase, the physical torture of Christ. This is the third and final phase of the Roman tribunal and I might add, that this is the most disturbing, the most demonic; it is very hard for me to even reflect upon this, much less speak about it. Pilate knew Jesus was innocent. And that was confirmed by Herod's dismissal. But he also knew that he had to do everything possible to prevent another Jewish uprising. And the Jews knew this as well. So they had him, you might say, over a barrel. John 19, verse 12, we read that, "...the Jews cried out saying, 'If you release this Man, you are no friend of Caesar; everyone who makes himself out to be a king opposes Caesar.'" Well, this must have caused Pilate's heart to tremble in fear, when he thought, Oh, my word. If Caesar gets wind of this, I'm dead meat, right? And sadly, like so many, he feared man more than God. And he sought earthly pleasure rather than eternal life. As I was just meditating on this passage, trying to put myself there and think what was going on? My mind went to what Jesus said in Matthew 16, verse 26, "'For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? What will a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and WILL THEN REPAY EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS.'" So Pilate is in a real dilemma here. He has to come up with some kind of a plan, and he thinks that he has one here, one that he thinks will appease the Jews, but also protect him from killing an innocent man.

And so we read about this, Mark 15 verse six and following, "Now at the feast he used to release for them any one prisoner whom they requested. The man named Barabbas had been imprisoned with the insurrectionists who had committed murder in the insurrection." Isn't an interesting, an actual insurrectionists now is going to be exchanged for one who is being accused of being an insurrectionists but is absolutely not. Verse eight, "The crowd went up and began asking him to do as he had been accustomed to do for them. Pilate answered them, saying, 'Do you want me to release for you, the King of the Jews?'" Obviously, you can see how he is at some level mocking them. And then again, verse 10, "For he was aware that the chief priests had handed Him over because of envy." They didn't hand him over because he was guilty, but because they were envious.

I want to give you an important note here that is injected into the historical narrative that we see in the Gospels. Something fascinating happens at this point. And it's recorded in Matthew 27, beginning in verse 19. While Pilate was "...sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent him a message saying, 'Have nothing to do with that righteous Man; for last night, I suffered greatly in a dream because of Him.' But the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to put Jesus to death." So, Pilate's greatly conflicted here; all of this is going on in his mind. And it's also interesting to note that while Pilate is deliberating on all of this, the leaven of the Pharisees is leavening the whole lump outside, okay? And this is what we read in verse 11, of Mark 15, "But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to ask him to release Barabbas for them instead." You know, it's kind of like, you know, at those political rallies or different things, they'll raise a sign applause and all well, this is kind of what's going on here. Come on you all let's root for Barabbas.

Verse 12, "Answering again, Pilate said to them, 'Then what shall I do with Him whom you call the King of the Jews?' They shouted back, 'Crucify Him!' Pilate said to them, 'Why, what evil has He done?' But they shouted all the more, 'Crucify Him!'" And Matthew adds this in chapter 27, verse 21, "But the governor said to them, 'Which of the two do you want me to release for you?' And they said, 'Barabbas.' And Pilate said to them, 'Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called the Christ?' They all said, 'Crucify Him!' And he said, 'Why, what evil has He done?' But they kept shouting all the more saying, 'Crucify Him!' Pilate saw that he was accomplishing nothing, but rather that a riot was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd, saying, 'I am innocent of this Man's blood; see to that yourselves.' And all the people said, 'His blood shall be on us and on our children!'" What a staggering statement. "Then he released Barabbas for them; but after having Jesus scourged, he handed Him over to be crucified."

Folks, this is satanic jurisprudence. Mark says the same thing verse 15, "Wishing to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas for them, and after having Jesus scourged, he handed Him over to be crucified." Beloved next to crucifixion, scourging is possibly the most severe torture man has ever devised. In fact, a Roman citizen was exempt from it. This satanic savagery was a hideous cruelty, designed to weaken and dehumanize a victim. The Romans used an instrument called a flagellum, which was a wooden handle attached with, or I should say, a whip, attached to a wooden handle made up of leather thongs that were that were fitted with small pieces of bone and lead or metal, and the victim would be stripped naked; the victim would be tied to a post, or sometimes bent over some type of a structure, and then several soldiers would beat him until the soldiers were too exhausted to continue, or the commander asked them to stop. The lashes would be so severe that they would gradually remove the skin. It would rip into muscles, to arteries, to nerves, but it would tear away bone and cartilage. In fact, eyewitnesses tell us that the beatings were so brutal that they would often break bones and expose the entrails of the victim. I hope you understand this is why Jesus was unable to carry his cross, which would have been just the top piece not the whole thing. John adds this in John 19 Verse one, "Pilate then took Jesus and scourged Him." And if that weren't enough, verse two, "And the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns..." this would have been a crown that they made out of date palms. In fact, some of the thorns would be as is as long as 12 inches. And they would twist them together to imitate the crowns of oriental god kings and the crown would look like it had the appearance of radiating glory. They did this, "...and put it on His head and put a purple robe on Him; and they began to come up to Him and say, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' and to give Him slaps in the face."

Folks after this unimaginable cruelty, we read in verse four, that "Pilate came out again and said to them, 'Behold, I am bringing Him out to you so that you may know that I find no fault in Him.' Jesus then came out, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, 'Behold, the Man!' So Pilate hopes that the Jews will be sympathetic to this poor creature, and let Jesus go. We read in verse six, and "When the chief priests and the officers saw Him, they cried out, saying, 'Crucify, crucify!' Pilate said to them, 'Take Him yourselves and crucify Him, for I find no fault in Him.'" There Jesus stood in silent agony, so bruised and bloodied that at this point, he no longer looked human. In fact, Isaiah predicted that the people would be, according to Isaiah 52:13, "astonished" to look at him, and "...His appearance be marred..." beyond human semblance, and "His form beyond that of the children of mankind."

Matthew tells us what happens next, in Matthew 27, beginning of verse 27, "Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole Roman cohort around Him. They stripped Him and put a scarlet robe on Him. And after twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on His head and a reed in His right hand; and they knelt down before Him and mocked Him saying, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' They spat on Him and took the reed and began to beat Him on the head. After they had mocked Him, they took the scarlet robe off Him and put His own garments back on Him, and led Him away to be crucified." Think about the dramatic reversal that will occur one day in judgment when the one who stood falsely accused will sit in judgment. He will not wear a painful crown that somehow mimics the fading glory of earthly kings. But rather we read in Scripture that upon his head will be many diadems, the glory that will never fade away. At that point, his eyes will no longer be swollen and soaked with blood, but we read that they will be like a flame of fire. A day is coming when he will not be a lamb that opens not his mouth, but the Lion of Judah that will thunder judgment. He will not wear a man's robe of mockery, in Revelation we read that he will wear a robe dipped in blood, referring to the blood of judgment and on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.

A day is coming dear friends when Jesus will return in all of his glory. And in Revelation we read "and from His mouth will come a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the wine press of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty." We could ask the question "why did they hate him so?" Though he stood before them in such a horrifying state, why would they, like savage beasts that had just had a taste of blood, want more and cry out for more? Why would they do that? Why would they demand that he be crucified when just a few days earlier, they wanted to crown him as king. Folks, the answer is this, Jesus was Emmanuel, God in the flesh. And Satan hates the living God. And Satan is the temporary god of this world. And those who belong to Him will hate him equally. Oh, they will love a Jesus of their own making, but they resent the true Jesus that we read about in Scripture.

Moreover, man by nature, hates God, does he not? We read that man is by nature at "enmity with God." He's alienated and hostile in mind. He's engaged in evil deeds; his heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick. Solomon declared in Ecclesiastes nine, three, "...the hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives." And Jesus said in John eight, verse 43, "'Why do you not understand what I am saying? It is because you cannot hear My word. You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But I speak the truth, and you do not believe me.'" And then he went on to say, "'He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason, you do not hear them, because you are not of God.'" Jesus exposed their sin, and they hated him for it, as people do today.

And you will also have to ask ourselves, why would Jesus submit himself to such unimaginable, indescribable cruelty? The answer is because of his great love for his bridal church that the Father had given him in eternity past. Those, quote "...chosen before the foundation of the world." Ephesians one four. Those that he knew by name; he knew each one of us. He knew the color of our eyes, the color of our skin. He knew everything about us. These are the ones whose names were written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world. Revelation 17 and verse eight. Just hours before the cross, you remember Jesus prayed in the garden, and it's recorded in John 17, the first couple of verses, "'Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You, even as You gave Him authority over all flesh, that to all whom You have given Him, He may give eternal life.'" That's why he suffered. The atoning work on the cross that he anticipated was an actual, not a potential, atonement in ways that we cannot comprehend. He had our faces in mind. I think of my own dear wife, and my children. There is nothing that I wouldn't do for them even if it costs me my life; by God's grace, I would do whatever. You all would do the same thing. And that's why Jesus would go to the cross for us. We are told in Isaiah 53 five that "He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging, we are healed." Not, "we are made healable" but we are healed; something actually happened at the cross. This is why he suffered and died.

So to wrap it up this morning, I want to remind you of the tragedy of those that treated the the Savior with such contempt. And here I quote, a 19th century theologian, Farrar, quote, "Mark for one moment the revenges of history. Has not his blood been on them and on their children? Has it not fallen most of all on those most nearly concerned in that deep tragedy? Before the dread sacrifice was consummated, Judas died in the horrors of a loathsome suicide. Caiaphas was deposed the year following. Herod died in infamy and exile, stripped of his pro-curatorship very shortly afterwards on the very charges he had tried by a wicked concession to avoid Pilate. We read out with misfortunes died in suicide and banishment, leaving behind him an execrated name. The House of Annas was destroyed a generation later by an infuriated mob, and his son was dragged through the streets and scourged and beaten to his place of murder. Some of those who shared in, and witnessed the scenes of that day, 1000s of their children also shared in and witnessed the long horrors of the siege of Jerusalem, which stands unparalleled in history for its unutterable fearfulness." Finally, he went on to add, "They had forced the Romans to crucify their Christ, and though they regarded this punishment with a special horror, they and their children were themselves crucified in myriads by the Romans outside their own walls, till room was wanting and wood failed, and the soldiers had to ransack a fertile inventiveness of cruelty for fresh methods of inflicting this insulting form of death." End quote.

Oh, dear friends, may the blood of Christ be applied to you even this day. I trust you know, and you love him. I pray that you bow before him today as your Savior and Lord, because if you don't, you will bow before him in the future as your judge and executioner. Though he stood in silent sorrow, bruised and bloodied, mocked and scorned, the dawn of truth awaits the morrow when Christ will wield his judgment sword. Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus, amen? Let's pray.

Father, when we reflect upon the cruelties that our Savior endured on our behalf, we are essentially speechless. All we can do is give you praise from the depths of our heart. And I pray that that praise will translate not just from words through our lips, but Lord, in our service and our worship to you. Use us as instruments of righteousness to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ to a lost and dying world. And if there be anyone here today that has never truly bowed the knee to Christ, come to him in genuine repentant saving faith, may you overwhelm them in such a way that they will do so today? We thank you and we praise you for the hope that is ours in Christ. And we pray again, Lord Jesus, that you will come quickly. We long to see you face to face. We give you praise for your glory. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark's gospel yet again, as we continue to examine what the Spirit of God has for us through his servant Mark; chapter 14, we're going to look at verses 66 through 72 this morning, under the heading "True, Tested, Unfailing Faith." Let me read the passage to you. Mark 14 beginning with verse 66.

"As Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant-girls of the high priest came, and seeing Peter warming himself, she looked at him and said, 'You also were with Jesus the Nazarene.'

But he denied it, saying, 'I neither know nor understand what you were talking about.' And he went out onto the porch.

The servant girl saw him, and began once more to say to the bystanders, 'This is one of them!'

But again, he denied it. And after a while, the bystanders were again saying to Peter, 'Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean too.'

But he began to curse and swear, 'I do not know this man you are talking about!'

Immediately a rooster crowed a second time. And Peter remembered how Jesus had made the remark to him, 'Before a rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times.' And he began to weep."

Peter's threefold denial of Christ exposes serious issues of sin in his heart, as well as deficiencies in his faith; matters that are not at all uncommon to each one of us. You will recall as we've studied over the past several months, Peter had an inflated opinion of his own spirituality, he did not truly know himself, he failed to realize and recognize the weakness of his flesh, that in himself, he was not able to withstand the temptations that would be a part of Satan's clever schemes. You will recall that he disregarded Jesus' warning to watch and to pray. And as we can see here, he feared man, more than he feared God. These are some of the things that we will examine this morning.

But we also see here that in his brokenness and his heartfelt repentance, the Lord restored him. And this really proved not only the genuineness of his faith, but the restoring love of Christ. Here we will see some of the distinguishing marks between genuine saving faith characteristics that are not found, and counterfeit faith that makes up most of Christianity today, as Jesus warned it would; a faith that cannot save. And here we will see the danger of spiritual drift, that gradual, almost imperceptible, wandering away from Christ. And here we will see how God uses our trials to strengthen our faith and to draw us closer into fellowship with Him. And to these ends, I've divided this very poignant, historical narrative into three categories that I trust will be helpful to you, we're going to see, number one, the neglected warning of Christ. And then we will examine the soul piercing gaze of Christ and finally, the loving restoration of Christ. And frankly, these truths are indispensable to every believer who longs to know and love and serve Christ and enjoy all that is available to him or her through him.

Now, let me remind you of the context--Jesus has been arrested, the disciples have fled, and the first of three ecclesiastical trials has been conducted in the palace of Annas, who was the former high priest and the father in law of Caiaphas. And as we examine the text, we can see that Annas and Caiaphas basically shared the same compound with a large inner court in the middle. Jesus was held in Annas' chamber, only long enough for the Sanhedrin to convene, albeit illegally. And this would have been the first place that Peter denied Christ. You will recall in Mark 14, or a little bit earlier in verse 54. We read, Peter had followed Jesus "at a distance right into the courtyard of the high priest; and he was sitting with the officers and warming himself at the fire."

Now, as we look at the gospel record, we can see that the high priest family did not know Peter, and would not allow him entrance through the guarded gate of the compound, were it not for another, quote, "disciple," according to John 18, verse 16, "who was known to the high priest who went out and spoke to the doorkeeper and brought Peter in." Traditionally, this is believed to have been the apostle John, the beloved disciple, who authored the fourth gospel, and First, Second, Third John; one of the sons of thunder. So it was in this courtyard where Peter first denied his Lord, even as Jesus predicted he would do. But in order to understand all that is going here going on here, I want to back up and look, first of all, at this whole issue of the neglected warning of Christ.

In Mark 14, verse 27, we read, "And Jesus said to them, 'You will all fall away.'" Then in verse 29, and following, "Then Peter said to Him, 'Even though all may fall away, yet I will not.' And Jesus said to him, 'Truly, I say to you, that this very night before a rooster crows twice, you yourself will deny me three times.' But Peter kept saying insistently, 'Even if I have to die with You, I will not deny You!' And they were all saying the same thing also." To be sure, his bravado underscored his lack of spiritual self awareness that fueled this overconfidence. And he refused to take seriously the grave danger that he was in, that the Lord was warning him about. Even the dangers that were expressed in the upper room during the Passover meal. Luke recorded some of this in Luke 22, beginning in verse 31, "'Simon Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.' But he said to Him, 'Lord, with You, I am ready to go both to prison and to death!' And He said, 'I say to you, Peter, the rooster will not crow today until you have denied three times that you know Me.'" So obviously, Peter overestimated his courage and his loyalty to Christ.

And we know then later in the Garden of Gethsemane, when Jesus said to Peter, James, and John in Mark 14:34, "'My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death; remain here and keep watch.'" Keep watch over your spiritual lethargy, and your indifference; matters that will make you trust in your own resources to somehow overcome temptation. Luke 22, verse 40, we read, "When He arrived at the place, He said to them, 'Pray that you might may not enter into temptation.'" Matthew records this in chapter 26, verse 41, "'Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.'" You see, Jesus knew that Peter, James and John were still operating in the power of their own sinful flesh rather than in the power of God, because just a few hours earlier in the upper room, they were all fighting amongst each other, with this arrogant bickering over who's going to be first in the kingdom? Talk about pride, talk about arrogance. Talk about overconfidence. And he knew that they were about to be humbled in ways that they could have never imagined. And that was all part of God's great sanctifying work in their lives. But they did not take seriously their need to stay spiritually and physically alert. And three times we know that Jesus returned to them, where he had left them, after he had been pouring out his soul before the Father, only to find that they were asleep. In anguish, he is crying out to the Father. Hebrews five seven says, "He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death." But every time he returned to them, they were asleep. Peter neglected the warnings of Christ. How much better it would have been if he would have fallen on his face before the Lord God said, "Father, I don't know all that's going on here. This is this is beyond me. I am terrified. Even though I feel confident that I will stand with the Lord. He says that I won't. So obviously, I don't know myself as I should. And the only thing I know to do is to cry out to you to help me do what I cannot." Oh, would that have been his prayer? And years later it was, but not now.

The Lord has also warned us to watch and pray that we will not fall into into temptation. Our spirits may be willing but our flesh is far weaker than we can imagine. And our sinfulness is far greater than we can imagine. There are several other passages where the Lord says similar things. For example, in Mark 13, verse 33, he says, "'Take heed, keep on the alert; for you do not know when the appointed time will come.'" Referring to the Lord's return. "Take heed, keep on the alert." Live with watchfulness, live in light of his return. Verse 37, "'What I say to you I say to all, "Be on the alert."'" Are you on the alert for that? Or are you more preoccupied with all of the passing pleasures of this world? Paul said the same thing in First Corinthians 16 verse 13, "Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong." Stand firm in the faith. That's the reference to sound doctrine, know sound doctrine. Be courageous, be confident, be mature in your thinking, unlike immature and childish people, that are according to Ephesians four verse 14, "tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming, but speaking the truth and love we are to grow up in all aspects unto Him, who is the head, even Christ." In Ephesians, six, we are warned, in verse 11, to "put on the full armor of God that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil." Verse 18, "Be on the alert, with all perseverance and petition for all the saints." And Peter would later write in First Peter, chapter five, beginning in verse eight, "Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him firm in your faith." Beloved, takes seriously the warnings that the Lord has given us in his Word. They will reveal the true status of your heart. They are indeed a lamp unto our feet. They are a light unto our path, as the Psalmist tells us.

You know, the world is like a dense jungle, filled with every imaginable, hidden danger. And I've been in some of those jungles before in Africa. And I can tell you, that there is no way I would be able to travel through those jungles, especially at night, if I didn't have a guide. And if he didn't have a light and a gun. This is what Peter had to learn because of his overconfidence. You know, a strong mature Christian is one that will acknowledge his weaknesses habitually. And also habitually cry out for a strength that he does not possess, one that only comes from the Lord God. A mature believer, a strong believer, will mourn over his or her sin, will hunger and thirst for righteousness, will do everything that they can to mortify the deeds of the flesh, to walk by the Spirit, to discipline their body to make it their slave; to separate themselves from the world so that it will not conform them into it. And why do Believers do that? Second Corinthians six gives us at least one answer. It's because we know that our body is the temple of the living God. And he longs to enjoy sweet fellowship with us and we with him. That's why Second Corinthians seven, beginning in verse one, Paul would say, "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord." I've been in Christian ministry for about 40 years now. And I've seen literally hundreds of people who name the name of Christ gradually wander off and begin to live like the world and eventually reject everything they once claimed; which proves that they were never a part of us. Once they claimed to embrace the gospel. At one time, they were passionate about their love for Christ, wanting to serve him, live for His glory, but a drift began to occur in their life. You can first see it in their conversations. They get around other people that are talking about spiritual things, and they don't enter in because they feel uncomfortable. They'd rather talk about entertainment, or something else that's frankly frivolous and superficial. It begins to manifest itself in their lifestyle. Little by little, they become increasingly infatuated with superficial things, matters that are eternally inconsequential. They're obsessed with gadgets. They're obsessed with social media. They're obsessed with physical appearance, entertainment, celebrities, the people that they look up to, are among the most godless. These are all idols of the heart, manifesting a soul sickness and eventually, even those things no longer satisfy so they gradually graduate to an even greater level of lustful pursuit. Sexual immorality, ungodly friends. They were on the periphery of the church, and then you don't see them anymore. They prefer friends that do not know or love Christ. Get into alcohol and drugs. They'll grab the hold of all of the ridiculous things like we have today in the whole woke agenda. And then before you know it, they're criticizing believers. Calling us legalist, homophobes, hypocrites bigots and on and on it goes. You've all seen it. You hear a lot these days about people deconstructing their faith. All that is is a fancy way of describing people that are apostatized people that never truly knew Christ. Like Demas remember, in the New Testament. At one time he was one of Paul's, quote, "fellow workers" in the gospel ministry, along with Mark and Luke, and others. Then in Second Timothy 4:10, Paul says, "...Demas having loved this present world has deserted me..." And Titus 3:10 tells us to avoid people like that, "reject a factious man"-- a "hairetikos"-- because they are "after a first and second warning" because they are "perverted and sinning."

We've all seen the progression, haven't we? But wandering away from Christ can also happen to believers. And that's what happened with Peter. That's the thing that's so frightening here. Because if it can happen to him, it can happen to any one of us. I share what Paul said in Second Corinthians 11 three, "But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." But we know that when this happens to the redeemed-- those that truly know Christ--God in his infinite love and mercy, will bring us low, so that he can bring us close. The father will prune the vine of our life through some great trial. In fact, later Peter would say in First Peter five, six, "Therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God." That mighty hand can be the hand of testing like we see with Job. It could be the mighty hand of deliverance like we saw with with Paul and Silas in the Philippian jail. It could be even the hand of chastening; I've experienced that, haven't you? For those whom the Lord loves, he disciplines and he scourges every son, whom he receives. As we read in Hebrews 12, six, "Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God," here's why, "that he may exalt you at the proper time." Which is always going to be his time, when he has completed that work that he is doing in you. Then he adds, "Casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you." Boy, Peter had to learn that the hard way didn't he?

Paul also experienced this, we read about in Second Corinthians 12, beginning in verse seven, "...to keep me from exalting myself, there has given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me--to keep me from exalting myself! Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that he might leave me. And He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.' Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content, with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong."

Well, to be sure, Peter's faith was severely tested. It forced him to see himself for who he really was, not that person who he thought he was. No saint will ever be able to survive the great sorrows of life, unless he or she understands this weighty truths that authentic faith must and will be tested by fire. That's just the reality of it. In fact, an untested faith is a dubious faith. And an untried commitment is frankly an unreliable commitment. Again, recall in Luke 22, verse 31, Jesus said, "'Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you.'" My, what hope there is in that phrase, "your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers." But while his faith faltered, it never failed. And while this fallen world is plagued with every imaginable evil, and as we read in Second Corinthians one five, the "...sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance..." we can find relief, dear friends, knowing that his sanctifying purposes are always at work in our lives. And there is nothing outside the sphere of his ultimate control and his intimate awareness. Know that. Be comforted by that. Be strengthened by that. It's for this reason Paul exhorts us in Romans five, three to "...exalt in our tribulations..." not merely in spite of them. He's not saying just resign yourself to them, he's not saying merely choose to be happy, not even rejoice in the midst of them, even though that is important. Rather what he is saying is, exult because of your tribulations. On account of them. Why? He goes on to say, "...knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who was given to us."

Indeed, God not only ordains, our afflictions, he oversees them for our good, and His glory, even though we may not see any of that, until glory. And as we will see, Peter learned this lesson well. He also learned the hard way--do not neglect the word of the Lord. Do not ignore his warnings. And beloved, the word of God is filled with those. Now let's notice what happens in the narrative.

Verse 66, "As Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant- girls of the high priest came..." This would have been the one that opened the gate to let him in, as we read in John 18. Verse 67, "...and seeing Peter warming himself, she looked at him and said, 'You also were with Jesus, the Nazarene.' But he denied it saying, 'I neither know nor understand what you were talking about.' And he went out onto the porch." It's interesting, the word "know" here, in the original language is not the typical "ginosko," meaning "to know something or someone by experience," or "to be intimately acquainted with or standing close relation to someone." Instead, he uses a less frequent term, "eido" meaning "to have information about something." And thus, he distances himself even further from any association whatsoever with Jesus. Literally, what he's saying is he neither knows Jesus, nor knows anything about Jesus. My what a lie. And won't you to notice how Peter wanted to remain incognito. He wanted to blend in with the crowd like a chameleon that can change its color to avoid detection. He wanted to keep a safe distance from Christ, so that no one, could in any way, associate him with him. Many Christians make the same mistake because they fear man more than God and they're quietly therefore ashamed of Christ.

And then when the suspicious girl exposed him, he panics and he lies. Why did he lie? He wanted to protect himself because at the end of the day, self was all that really mattered. He was also afraid someone might recognize him as the guy that cut off the other dudes ear, right? "'I neither know nor understand what you were talking about.' And he went out onto the porch." You see, the porch would have been where the exit was. He was looking for a way out, he wanted to get out the gate and evidently, he tried to leave the compound. Folks, if you find yourself acting in similar ways, you are denying Christ. When the conversation comes up around the water cooler at work, and you don't take a stand for Christ, join Peter. Jesus said in Luke 9:26, "'For whoever is ashamed of Me, and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels." You see, friends, you must remember that sin is like cancer. It always wants more of you. And it will never be satisfied until it has all of you. That's why you've got to get rid of it as best you can, every time you see even the slightest amount of it. Imagine going to a doctor, you've got something going on and the doctor says, You know what? There's a few little cancer cells here. And you say, well, good, I'm glad it's not a whole lot. We'll check on it here in a few months. Is that what you say? No, you get rid of it. We must guard our heart in this regard. And notice how sin's corrupting influence escalates, it begins to metastasize.

By the way, Luke 22:59 tells us what's about to happen here, happen after about an hour. And the news is spreading, this guy, this guy right here by the fire, he's one of them. As we see, some of the male officers in the courtyard recognize him, and they're bringing charges against him.

Verse 69, "The servant-girl saw him, and began once more to say to the bystanders, 'This is one of them!' But again, he denied it." Now, I believe this is a second servant girl, because of what Matthew says, in his account in chapter 26, beginning in verse 71, "When he had gone out to the gateway..." You know, he's trying to get out, "another servant girl saw him and said to those who were there, 'This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.' And again, he denied it with an oath, 'I do not know the man.'" So you probably have, you know, several girls and young women who were guarding the gate, that's part of their their job, maybe they've changed shifts here. But what the word is, hey, keep keep an eye on that guy over there. He's one of them. And word is spreading.

Go back to verse 70. of Mark's account, "And after a little while, the bystanders were again the saying to Peter, 'Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean too.' But he began to curse and swear, 'I do not know this man you are talking about!'" The word curse, "anathematize" in the original language; we get that word from that. He's literally putting himself under a divine curse. Kind of as if to say, may God strike me dead if I'm lying. I mean, he's poured it on thick. And the word "swear" means "to take an oath." I mean, he's taking an oath before God, by implication, he is inviting divine punishment upon himself if he is lying. And he's loudly proclaiming this so everybody can hear it, because everybody is looking at him. And it's fascinating how the plot thickens.

And we see this more in John's account. In John 18, verse 25. And following, gives us more insight into this whole drama. It says, "Now, Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. So they said to him, 'You are not also one of His disciples are you?' He denied it and said, 'I am not.' One of the slaves of the high priest, being a relative of the one whose ear Peter cut off, said, 'Did I not see you in the garden with Him?' Peter then denied it again. and immediately a rooster crowed."

Matthew's account is similar, Matthew 26, beginning in verse 73. "A little later, the bystanders came up and said to Peter, 'Surely you too, are one of them; for even the way you talk gives you away.'' Obviously, the Galileans had an accent, alrght? Imagine somebody born and raised in South Georgia, and now he's in New York City, alright? People are going to spot that real quick. "Then he began to curse and swear, 'I do not know the man!' And immediately a rooster crowed. And Peter remembered the word which Jesus had said, 'Before a rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.' And he went out and wept bitterly."

Again back to Mark 14, "After a little while the bystanders," in verse 70, were saying, "'Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean too.' But again, he began to curse and swear 'I do not know this man you are talking about!'" The same thing, the rooster crows a second time. And it's interesting. "Peter remembered how Jesus had made the remark to him, 'Before a rooster crows twice, you will deny Me three times.' And he began to weep."

Oh, dear child of God, what can I say? Guard yourself from the slippery slope of sin. And it begins when you imperceptibly wander away from Christ, and fall more and more with the things of this world; pursue the things of the flesh. What a heart wrenching scene. I mean, think about it, Jesus is suffering alone for Peter. And Peter is outside denying that he even knew him. Can't we all see ourselves in some ways, doing the same thing in our life, despite all that Christ has done for us?

But I asked you what was it that caused Peter to quote remember the word which Jesus had said, ''Before rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.'" What was it that finally broke him and would cause him to go out and just weep bitterly over what he had done? I believe Luke's account gives us the answer. In Luke 22, beginning in first 59, "And following after about an hour had passed, another man began to insist saying, 'Certainly this man was also with Him, for he is a Galilean too.' But Peter said, 'Man, I do not know what you are talking about.'" Then it says this. "Immediately, while he was still speaking, a rooster crowed." And then notice this phrase, "The Lord turned and looked at Peter." Then we read, "And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how He had told him, 'Before a rooster crows today, you will deny Me three times.' And he went out and wept bitterly."

This brings us to the second powerful reality in this drama and that is the sole piercing gaze of Christ. "The Lord turned and looked at Peter. And then Peter remembered the word of the Lord." Jesus was probably being escorted across the courtyard to a dungeon of incarceration to await his final trial with the Sanhedrin. That would occur a couple hours later, early in the morning. But friends, what we see here is a providential act of divine sovereignty. Imagine Jesus, his face still covered with spittle, bruised and cut and swollen from the blows that he has received. And even with all of that, at the precise moment when, Peter was denying him, the rooster crows, and he finds his eyes and he looks at him. Can you imagine what that must have been like? Amidst all of his brazen vows of denial, we see a deliberate, perfectly timed, soul piercing gaze from the incarnate Son of God. I mean, this was a dagger to the heart right? I mean, this exposed the vile nature of the sin within the heart. What a solemn scene. I just can't hardly wrap my mind around what that would have been like. There the Savior looks upon the sinner who is actually cursing the lover of his soul.

A 19th century cleric Frederick Farrar, of the Church of England said this, and I thought it was well stated, quote, "At that fatal moment, while those shameless curses still quivered on the air, first, the cock crew in the cold gray dusk and at the same moment, catching the last accents of those perjured oaths, either through the open portal of the judgment hall or as he was led past the group of the fireside through the open court, with rude pushing and rivaled cheers and blows and spitting, the Lord--the Lord in the agony of his humiliation, in the majesty of his silence, the Lord turned and looked upon Peter." And then he adds this, "Blessed are those on whom, when he looks in sorrow, the Lord also looks with love. It was enough, like an arrow through his inmost soul, shot the mute eloquent anguish of that reproachful glance. If the angel of innocence had let him, the angel of repentance took him gently by the hand." Then he adds this, "Sternly, yet tenderly, the spirit of grace led up this brokenhearted penitent before the tribunal of his own conscience. And there his old life, his old shame, his old weakness, his old self, was doomed to that death of godly sorrow, which was to issue in a new and nobler birth." End quote.

Folks, haven't we all experienced a similar gaze of Christ? Oh, not in a literal way. We have never seen him. But he sees us and penetrates our heart, through the power of his Spirit and his word, right? How many times have we heard something from the word and it's like an arrow through the heart. The writer of Hebrews says, in Hebrews for beginning of verse 12, "for the Word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two edged sword and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit of both joints, and marrow and able to judge the thoughts and the intentions of the heart." And he goes on to say, "and there is no creature hidden from His sight. But all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." And we know from the New Testament that it is the inspired, breathed out word of God that is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training and righteousness. And the psalmist tells us in Psalm 19, that it's the word of God that "restores the soul, that makes wise the simple, that rejoices the heart, that enlightens the eyes" and on and on it goes. Don't you know the soul penetrating gaze of Christ set his conscience on fire with guilt, and with shame, and with a sorrow leading to repentance. Oh, child of God, never allow yourself to follow Christ from a distance. Walk as closely to him as you possibly can. Never think that you can somehow navigate life on your own resources. You need him more than you can imagine. And know that spiritual overconfidence flows from the well of a frankly, deceitful heart. The uncharted trials of life will always expose the unknown self. That's their purpose. They expose our weaknesses, they reveal the truth of who we really are, and obliterate all those things that we think we are. Remember, autonomy from God is at the heart of our depraved nature. We want to do things our way. And when we allow that wickedness to rule our lives, we will not only forfeit God's blessings as believers, we will grieve the spirit we will create quench the spirit, but we will also place ourselves in the pathway of divine chastening.

But I want you to see something here. And that is that true faith, though tested, cannot fail. And the converse is also therefore true, phony faith, when tested, cannot persevere. This is what distinguishes true believers from false believers. Peter's faith was real, proven by his sincere sorrow over his sin after discovering the corrupting power of his flesh.

And finally, I want you to see the loving restoration of Christ. First think about the fruit of genuine repentance that we see here. Contrast what we see here, thinking about how once Peter followed Christ from a distance and denied him, and then later he ran to the empty tomb to find him. Once he hid among sinners, to spurn him and later, he obeyed Jesus, and he went to Galilee to serve him. Once he rejected the Lord's warning, and was defeated, and later, he heeded the Lord's voice, and he jumped out of his fishing boat, and he swam 100 yards to be with Christ, on the Sea of Galilee. And it was on that shore, you will recall that Jesus summoned his disciples, made them breakfast and restored their fellowship.

In closing, I want to visit the scene for a few minutes. Remember, Peter denied Christ three times. And Christ will challenge Peter, three times in John 21, verse 15, we read, "So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?'" Oh, my, how his heart must have been crushed. And it's interesting that Jesus chose the Greek word for love--that is the highest expression of love--"agapao." It speaks of a self sacrificial love, the supreme love, a love of the will that demands no reciprocation. But Peter's conscience screamed of his past failures. He knew that he did not love Christ in that way. "And he said to Him, 'Yes, Lord, You know that I love You.'" And here Peter chooses a different word for love--"phileo"-- a different one than Jesus did. It describes fondness affection. And perhaps he used this nuanced distinction because it better reflected the lesser love that he has, demonstrated because of all the things he had done. Perhaps he couldn't bring himself to agree that he truly possessed the kind of selfless loveJesus expressed in his question. But Jesus sees all of this. And it's this very kind of contrition that Jesus is looking for. This is the kind of humility that he wants, and that he produces by his sanctifying grace and therefore he says to Peter "'Tend my lambs.'" "'Tend my lambs.'" What a great lesson here. Those God uses the most are those who are convinced that they deserve the least. However, Jesus knew he needed to probe even further and because he loved Peter so much, he was jealous over him. So he challenges Peter once more, "He said to him again a second time, 'Simon, son of John, do you love Me?' Once again, using the verb that expresses the highest form of love. And Peter said him, "'Yes, Lord, You know that I love You.'" And again, he uses the lesser verb form, describing fondness and affection. He simply could not bring himself to say that he loved the Lord supremely. But Jesus says, "'Shepherd My sheep.'" It's interesting, the verb "shepherd" is a synonym of the previous verb "tend" that Jesus uses, and both of them really encompass the full range of pastoral responsibilities later described in detail in the pastoral epistles. Oh, the marvel of God's grace. Despite all of his failures, Jesus sees his brokenness and his humility, and he recommissiones him to service. Beloved, never forget this truth--in his love for us he continues to sanctify us, regardless of our faults and failures, that are many. But it is his love for us, not our love for Him, that has forever sealed the bond of His grace.

Verse 17 He said to him a third time, "'Simon, son of John, do you love Me?' Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, 'Do you love me?' And he said to Him, 'Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You.'" But what's fascinating this time Jesus use Peter's word for love, "phileo." As if to say, Peter, I know you want to love me supremely with total devotion, but at times your life calls into question if you are even fond of me.

I can only imagine that at this point, Peter's eyes began to fill with tears. His lips began to quiver. He looked around at his fellow disciples and all the fishing gear. And with the last ounce of self confidence, and bravado drained from his soul, his head begins to shake and he said to Jesus, "'Lord, you know all things; You know that I love You.'" You know that I love you, even though it's imperfect, I hate my hollow boasts, I'm ashamed of myself righteous pride. I grieve over my sin. Jesus said to him, "'Tend my sheep.'" He saw his contrition, he saw his heart. And folks we never love so deeply as when we are broken over how we have loved so poorly. And the man who boasts of His love the most is the one who loves the least. What a picture of undeserved grace.

I'm reminded of a passage in Isaiah 66, you don't have this on the screen, it just came to my mind. In verse two, God says, "But to this one, I will look." In other words, this is the kind of person that gets my attention; to the one who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at my word. That's where Peter was brought. In in verse 18, it's interesting what the Lord says, "'Truly, truly I say to you,'" Peter, "'when you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wish; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you and bring you where you do not wish to go.' Now this He said, signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He said to him, 'Follow me!'" For over 35 years, Peter continued to follow Christ until he was crucified, in about 68 ad under the cruel reign of Nero; crucified upside down by his own request. By the time John's Gospel was written, Peter had already been martyred for his faith. But what a testimony this must have been to the saints when they read this.

Please understand that true faith is Spirit empowered. It is a faith that animates within us a trust in God even in the fires of affliction. It is a faith that causes us to know that even though those fires be hot, all that's being burned off is the dross that we want to get rid of. And this is what Peter and the apostles had to learn, as well as all of us. And I'm reminded of David's psalm of deliverance. He speaks the same thing in Psalm 34, beginning in verse 18, "The righteous cry." That's what Peter did. "...And the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all. "Then in verse 22, we read, "The Lord redeems the soul of his servants, and none of those who take refuge in Him will be condemned." Peter learned this as I hope we all have, or we all will. And because of this, later, Peter would write in First Peter one and verse six, "In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ."

Dear friends, I pray that this is the true expression of your heart. If you're here today and you do not know Christ, I would beg you to examine your heart. Acknowledge your sin and come to him and ask for forgiveness, ask for his mercy. And he will give it to you and radically change your life and give you eternal life. But it doesn't mean all the trials are going away, right? But isn't it a wonderful thing that even in the midst of those trials, the Lord is working in us to accomplish his purposes, for our good and for his glory, amen? Amen. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. May they bear much fruit in our life we ask, for Jesus sake, and for His glory. Amen.

We return once again to Mark's gospel, as we continue to examine it verse by verse. So take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 14. And we will be looking at verses 53 through 65. Let me read the text to you.

"They led Jesus away to the high priest; and all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes gathered together.

Peter had followed Him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest; and he was sitting with the officers and warming himself at the fire.

Now the chief priests and the whole Council kept trying to obtain testimony against Jesus to put Him to death, and they were not finding any. For many we're giving false testimony against Him, but their testimony was not consistent.

Some stood up and began to give false testimony against Him saying,

'We heard Him say, "I will destroy this temple made with hands, and in three days, I will build another made without hands."

Not even in this respect, was their testimony consistent.

The high priest stood up and came forward in questions Jesus saying, 'Do You not answer? What is it that these men are testifying against You?'

But He kept silent and did not answer. Again, the high priest was questioning Him, and saying to Him, 'Are You the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?' And Jesus said, 'I am; AND THE SON OF MAN SITTING AT THE RIGHT HAND OF POWER, ANDD COMING WITH THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN.'

Tearing his clothes, the high priest said, 'What further need do we have of witnesses?

You have heard the blasphemy; how does it seem to you?' And they all condemned Him to be deserving of death.

Some began to spit at Him, and to blindfold Him and to beat him with their fists, and to say to Him, 'Prophesy!' And the officers received Him with slaps in the face."

As we look at Mark's account, along with other gospel writers, I would like to emphasize two things that we will use as part of our outline. First of all, we're going to look at number one, the mock trial. And secondly, I want you to focus with me on the majestic Messiah. We're going to see this in contrast, in this passage.

You know, we are increasingly witnessing the weaponization of our judicial system as our country continues to descend into the abyss of Marxism. And it is not at all uncommon for us to see corrupt politicians and judges and attorneys, holding kangaroo courts, using novel legal theories and perverted principles of law and justice, and false witnesses even, to prosecute their political rivals. And this is exactly what we see here in this historical narrative that reveals the greatest miscarriage of justice in the history of civilization. But here we also witness the falsely accused being the victor. Moreover, we will see the corrupt accusers becoming the vanquished. Though they will not fully experience their fate until later. To be sure God is not mocked, right? Whatsoever a man sows that will he also reap. And what the inspired gospel writers revealed in this scenario, must be considered yet another irrefutable evidence of the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ--the Son of God, the Messiah of Israel, the Lord of the church, and the coming King of Glory. And my goal this morning, is not only to help you understand what really happened in this historical narrative back in the first century, but I want to also address issues like why do people choose to believe things that are demonstrably false? You ever thought about that? And what causes people to do the things that they do, in light of such evil. But the biggest question of all is, what will you do with Jesus? That's the most important issue. What will you do with Jesus? And I trust you will be moved to bow low before him as we immerse ourselves in the scene.

Let me remind you of the context; a massive armed force, led by Judas Iscariot, one of the 12 and the religious leaders of Israel, the temple police, and a cohort of Roman soldiers, have all come now and arrested Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. And they asked if he was that person, and he said, "I am"--the covenant name of God. And at that point, they all were flattened on their back, what an amazing scene. Wow, would I have loved to have been there to see that. And somehow in my mind, I can see it. And then Peter gets upset and cuts off the ear of one of the servants. And Jesus heals the ear right there in front of everybody. And then he rebukes Peter. And then he willingly allows his captors to seize Him. And at that point, all of the disciples flee.

Now, this brings us to the mock trial. Notice verse 53. "They led Jesus away to the high priest; and all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes gathered together." Now, these religious phonies are ruled by the sin of covetousness that we talked about the last time we were together, just like Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus. They all craved material blessings, material wealth, which were easily attainable, because of their power and their prestige among the people. And Judas, of course, as you will recall, was frustrated because Jesus was not coming through for him the way he wanted to. He wasn't establishing the kingdom, so that he could be one of the big shots in the kingdom and have all these things that he wanted. Especially the prominence and the wealth that went along with it. But the high priest and the chief priests and the elders and the scribes, they already had a lot of wealth, they already had a lot of this, but Jesus was a threat, to their power, to their authority, and to their whole phony religious empire.

Moreover, they were jealous, they wanted what Jesus had--popularity. We see this all the time, don't we? In athletics. If you've been watching this whole WNBA thing with Caitlin Clark, you see the jealousy. You see it in politics, in the workplace, you see it in the families, you see it at times in church. Remember, the religious leaders did everything they possibly could to impress the people, to get them to worship them. But the problem is, this Jesus of Nazareth has come along and he's getting all of the attention. And he's doing things that's completely blowing everybody's mind with his miracles. In fact, we read in Matthew 21, verse 14, "And the blind and the lame came to Him in the temple, and He healed them. But when the chief priests of the scribe saw the wonderful things that He had done, and the children were shouting in the temple, 'Hosanna, to the son of David,' they became indignant..." And later on, even Pilate could see what was driving these guys. Mark records this in Mark 15, beginning in verse nine, "Pilate answered them, saying, 'Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?' For he was aware that the chief priests had handed Him over because of envy." Envy, jealousy, covetousness they're all part of the same category of sin. And they always produce strife and divisiveness, and factions and hatred and manipulation, lies, theft, violence, and on and on it goes. So "They led Jesus away to the high priest; and all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes gathered together."

Now you need to have some more background here. Very important. This will be the first of a three-part trial conducted by the Jewish leaders. First, Jesus will appear before Annas who was the former high priest and the father in law of Caiaphas, who was the high priest that year, according to John 18. And Annas was, you could liken him to a mafia boss, he ran the temple merchants and the money changers. It was a very lucrative enterprise. In fact, they nicknamed that whole enterprise the Bizarre of Annas. And, of course, Jesus disrupted it totally two times, one at the beginning of his ministry the other time at the end of his ministry. You will remember in Matthew 21:13, Jesus said to them, "'It is written, "MY HOUSE SHALL BE CALLED A HOUSE OF PRAYER"; but you are making it a ROBBERS' DEN."'" And it's also important to note that, over the years in that era, five of Annas' son's held that office of high priest. A little nepotism going on there. But now his son in law, Caiaphas, held the office, and they're all corrupt. So first, Jesus is going to go to Anis and then he's going to appear before Caiaphas in the Sanhedrin. And finally, he will appear before the Sanhedrin, just a second time after dawn.

But it didn't end there. Also, there will be beyond the three-part Jewish trial, which is some kind sometimes called the ecclesiastical trial, there will be a three part Roman trial, sometimes called the civil trial, and there he will appear before Pilate, and then Herod Antipas, and then Pilate again.

Now, as we come to this text, bear in mind that Mark is focusing on the second part of the Jewish trials, not when he appeared before Annas recorded in John 18:13 and following, but when Jesus was unfairly convicted by Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin, as we will see. But before examining this closely, I want to take you back to the first trial to give you a little sense of what has happened up to this point. Let's see what happened when Jesus stood before the blood thirsty Annas, who was clearly in search of a crime worthy of death. He's trying to trap Jesus, John 18, beginning in verse 19, we read about it, "The high priest then questioned Jesus about His disciples, and about His teaching. Jesus answered him, 'I have spoken openly to the world; I always taught in synagogues in in the temple, where all the Jews come together; and I spoke nothing and secret. Why do you question Me? Question those who have heard what I spoke to them; they know what I said.'"

Now, this was a very legitimate response by Jesus. Because under the Mosaic Law charges were not allowed to be brought against a person without credible witnesses. So this was an illegal arraignment from the outset. Verse 22, goes on, "When He had said this, one of the officers standing nearby struck Jesus saying, 'Is that the way You answer the high priest?' Jesus answered him, 'If I have spoken wrongly, testify of the wrong; but if rightly, why do you strike Me?' So Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas the high priest." In other words, he's unable to find any reason to charge him for something worthy of death. So he sends him over to Caiaphas, and the Sanhedrin, to see if they could conjure up something which will include on their part, enlisting--probably through bribery--false witnesses to testify against Jesus. Testimonies that proved to be contradictory and further proved what a legal farce this whole thing really is.

Now, notice what else Mark adds and we come back to the text. It's kind of a parenthetical statement here, undoubtedly at the request of Peter, who was giving him so much of this information because Peter was there. Verse 54, "Peter had followed Him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest; and he was sitting with the officers and warming himself at the fire." Now of course by this time, Peter's conscience is screaming at him; he has left Jesus. And to be sure, he is terrified like anyone would be. But he's also plagued with guilt. And no doubt Jesus statement concerning Satan wanting to sift him like wheat is resonating in the back of his mind. Moreover, he was thinking about Jesus' prediction that you're going to deny me three times, before the rooster crows; all of these things must have been weighing on his heart. Plus, he truly loved Jesus. Although he was learning how much more he loved himself. So this scene is going to set up his denial in the courtyard recorded later on in the chapter.

So we come back to verse 55, "Now the chief priests and the whole Council kept trying to obtain testimony against Jesus to put Him to death, and they were not finding any." Now bear in mind, the Romans would not allow the Jews to have the power of capital punishment. So therefore, the Jews had to give them a reason for a death sentence. And it had to be something beyond "Well, he's violating the Sabbath" or he's healing people on the Sabbath, or he claims to be our Messiah. I mean, the Romans would just laugh at all of that; they don't care about any of that stuff. They considered Judaism as nothing more than kind of a ridiculous and offensive oriental cult, practiced by a bizarre group of people that they have subjugated. So, you know, none of that is going to fly with them. But the Sanhedrin also knew that at Passover, Jerusalem would be filled with nationalistic Jews that wanted to somehow revolt against Rome. And so at Passover time, it was a powder keg; a powder keg for revolution. And the deadly knife of the Jewish guerrilla warriors known as the Sicarii, which means "dagger men" were always lurking in the shadows, and they were there by the 1000s. Especially on special occasions, like Passover. You may recall in Acts 21:38 The commander asks Paul, if he was, quote, "'...the Egyptian who had some time ago stirred up a revolt and led the 4000 men of the Assassins out into the wilderness?'" So the Sanhedrin knew that the Romans would be on guard. This, however, would be something that would play to their advantage, if they could find some way of accusing Jesus of being an insurrectionist. That would turn the Romans against him.

But they also had to find a charge severe enough to inflame the Jews, of whom so many of them love Jesus, for the wrong reasons. But inflame them enough to warrant a death penalty. Now, to accomplish all of this, they're going to have to violate every standard of jurisprudence, including their own laws. Let me give you a little feel of what their laws were so you can see what's going on here. As it relates to Jewish law, the Sanhedrin was only allowed to investigate and adjudicate cases brought to them. They weren't allowed to go out and try to find them. They were not allowed to initiate charges. But I believe obviously they're ignoring all of this. And private trials were forbidden. Trials away from the temple were forbidden, according to the Mosaic Law. They're violating this. Moreover, according to Pharisaic law, hearings pertaining to capital punishment were not allowed on the eve of a major festival, like Passover. you couldn't do that. Nor were they allowed at night. Yet Jesus is going to be tried and condemned between the hours of basically one and 3am. Also, Jewish law did not permit the sentence of capital punishment to be pronounced until a day passed after the accuser was convicted. Members of the court were required to fast; they were required to pray and to reflect upon their decision. And by the way, this is why the trials were not allowed on the day before a feast, when fasting was not permitted, and they believed, and I think this has great merit that that 24 hour period provided time for further testimony to surface. But of course, they violated all of this. Worse yet Jesus was executed on the day of the feast. None of this mattered. Remember, these vindictive religious phonies, had determined to kill Jesus a long time ago. But they feared that an assassination might initiate a bloody uprising among the Jews, which would result in Roman reprisals and might jeopardize their positions of authority. And so they had to weaponize their own legal system to do something to accomplish the task. And of course, this is a common practice, as I said earlier, among our politicians today, law enforcement agencies, attorneys, judges, in fact, we've got a name for it today. It's called lawfare.

So again, verse 55, "Now the chief priests in the whole Council kept trying to obtain testimony against Jesus to put Him to death. And they were not finding any." So, if you can't find any, what are you going to do, well you gonna bribe some guys to come in and give false testimony. Verse 56, "For many, we're giving false testimony against Him, but their testimony was not consistent. Some stood up and began to give the give false testimony against Him saying, 'We heard Him say, "I will destroy this temple made with hands and in three days, I will build another made without hands."'" Now, of course, this is not only a misinterpretation, but it is a mis quotation of what Jesus said. They're trying to say that Jesus was mocking the temple, and he's going to destroy it. You know, it's absurd. In John 2:19, for example, Jesus said, "'Destroy this temple, and in three days, I will raise it up.'" And then in verse 21, it says, "Jesus was speaking of the temple of His body." So it's easy to twist and to distort things to make it somehow spin in your favor.

Verse 59, Mark goes on to add, "Not even in this respect, was their testimony consistent." You see, liars cannot be consistent with their false statements. That's why police, when they arrest a group of people, they always separate them to question them. That's how you get all of the discrepancies. But if people are telling the truth, even when you separate them, they're essentially going to say the same thing, because that's really what they witnessed, rather than this is what they are making up. So the false testimonies were inconsistent. And they were also too flimsy, shall we say, to incriminate Jesus, much less than justify a death sentence. Therefore, knowing that this thing is going nowhere fast, all right, the whole thing is not going the way Caiaphas and the boys wanted it to. So Caiaphas decides to take over, he jumps to his feet, takes charge, verse 60, "The high priest stood up and came forward and questioned Jesus, saying, 'Do You not answer? What is it that these men are testifying against You?' But He kept silent and did not answer." Obviously, this infuriated Caiaphas. He was not used to anyone ignoring Him. But Jesus also knew he was being led into a trap. Plus Jesus refused to give credibility to the false testimonies by somehow offering a defense. Why legitimize a lie by responding to it? But even more importantly, his silence was also part of the Father's decorative will. This is what the Father had ordained in eternity past. And therefore, it was prophesied for example, in Isaiah 42, beginning in verse one. There we read, "'Behold, My Servant whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom my soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not cry out or raise His voice, nor make His voice heard in the street. A bruised reed He will not break and a dimly burning wick He will not extinguish; He will faithfully bring forth justice.'"

And we see Jesus' silence prophesied even more specifically in Isaiah 53 verse seven, "He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; like a lamb that has led to slaughter, and like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, so He did not open His mouth." You may recall that later, Jesus remained silent before Pilate, recorded in Mark 15, beginning in verse four, There we read, "Then Pilate question Him again, saying, 'Do You not answer? See how many charges they bring against You!' But Jesus made no further answer; so Pilate was amazed."

Back to Mark 14 verse 61, later in the verse again, "...the high priest was questioning Him, and saying to Him, 'Are You the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?'" Matthew gives us this insight in Matthew 26 verse 63, "And the high priest said to Him, 'I adjure You by the living God, that You tell us whether You are the Christ, the Son of God.'" In other words, I'm placing you under oath before the living God. My, what another example of the deceptive power of hypocrisy, right? Yeah, I mean, after all, God will judge liars in a court like this. We can't have any of that, we can't have any deception in this most holy court. Hypocrisy knows no bounds, right? This is the kind of sanctimonious behavior that Jesus condemned so many times. For example, in Matthew 23, beginning in verse 23, he said, "'Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. You blind guides who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!'"

Now, Caiaphas and these guys with the Sanhedrin, knew very well that Jesus claimed to be Christ, the Son of God; that was a well-known claim of Jesus. But this was also, shall we say, the decisive question. This was the key reason the Jews hated him. Because he claimed to be God's Son. That was blasphemy, that was worthy of death. Now, as I think about it, I'm sure some of those in attendance were thinking to themselves, "you know what, he just may be. After everything I've seen, I mean, I can look on my robes right now and see the grass stain and the dust from being thrown onto my back. Every part of me is aching from being thrown to the ground when he said 'I am.' I saw him heal the ear."

You know, this brings up that question, why do people choose to believe things that are demonstrably false? I mean, the evidence that Jesus was who He claimed to be, was absolutely overwhelming. Beloved, the answer is quite simple. People believe what they want to believe. They have to believe that which will advance their agenda, that which will justify their sin. That which will maintain their autonomy from God. That which will, further their rabid self-determination. A commitment that so many people have. I mean, think about it, the Jewish elite didn't care about the truth. They cared about their positions of power and prestige. So they're going to believe what they want to believe. Forget the truth. We see this all the time in our culture, do we not? I think of evolutionary theory. There is no evidence of single celled life transitioning into multicellular life forms over millions of years. And even if there were, where did the first cell come from? I mean, people believe what they want to believe. I mean, if you don't believe in evolution, you have to believe there was a creator. And if there's a creator, that means, oh, my, I should probably worship him and he will probably judge me. Because they're made in the image of God. They know that that is true. That's why Romans one says "...they suppress the truth in unrighteousness." The self-loathing transgender, believes in their mind that he or she is the opposite sex. Of course, that is demonstrably false. Why do they believe that? Well, they believe what they want to believe, because in their mind, this is their identity. This is how they can find life. This is how they can find fulfillment. This is how they can gain attention. This is how they can be treated special, although they're miserable, and they need Christ. So we try to force everyone to affirm them by using their pronouns so that we all join in with their delusion. They believe what they want to believe. Many religious people believe things that are biblically, and exegetically, indefensible. Why? Because their belief supports their preconceived ideas and convictions, not because they're true. And the cost of somehow acknowledging that they might be wrong is way too high. So I'm going to believe what I want to believe. Just listen to the so-called Christian homosexual, who will try to support their perversions with scripture, rather than asking, I'm wondering if it is possible that this text doesn't justify homosexuality? Is it possible for this text to justify homosexuality without doing violence to sober exegesis? Instead, they will violate every principle, every standard of hermeneutics, to make a text mean something that is utterly ridiculous. Why? Because they want to believe something that will justify their sin.

Think of politics. We're all aware of the debate this last week, and all that's going on with all of this chaos in the world system of presidential election. I was laughing, there are people who claim to believe that our president is mentally fit for office, that the economy is doing great, and that the border is secure. And you have the administration and the media that they can control, constantly gaslighting us to believe these things. But by every metric, those assertions are demonstrably false. And any reasonable, unbiased, informed person would agree with that. I mean, it's so sad, you see the debate and you see this decrepit old man that's senile in serious cognitive decline. I mean, ask yourself, if you were on the board of a major corporation, and this guy was applying to be the CEO, would you hire him? Obviously not. Yet he wants to be the leader of the free world. This is insane. Why do people believe those things? You pay your grocery bills, you pay your gas bills, your interest rate. I mean, you look at millions of people crossing the border. I mean, this is lunacy. But again, people want these things to be true. Because it is necessary for them to be true in order for them to promote their agenda. And in this case, it's kind of that immoral, globalist, centralized government agenda. You have to deify the state. So you've got to believe these things.

Well, this is the type of thing going on with the Sanhedrin. Caiaphas and his band of merry hypocrites knew they were violating the laws of jurisprudence. They knew Jesus was innocent, and they probably knew, at least some of them, that he was or just might be, who he said he was, but they simply could not bring themselves to embrace that. Moreover, we know that to the natural man, the things of the spirit are foolishness, and he cannot understand them because he's spiritually appraised. Not only that, Satan blinds the minds of unbelievers, right? Hearts are desperately... they're deceived, desperately wicked. So they believe what they wanted to believe, regardless of the truth, although it was all demonstrably false, so they could stay in power.

Now Caiaphas is so blinded by covetousness and rage that he treads where angels fear to tread. He gets in Jesus's face essentially, and says, I adjure you by the living God, that you tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God. Here my friends, we move from my first point of the mock trial, I want you to notice now, secondly, the majestic Messiah. Verse 62. "And Jesus said, 'I am; and you shall see THE SON OF MAN SITTING AT THE RIGHT HAND OF POWER, AND COMING WITH THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN.'" I marvel at the scene; Jesus not only acknowledges that he is indeed the Christ, the Son of God, which is blasphemy. But then he goes on to drive this nail of truth, even further into their evil hearts by claiming that he is the fulfillment of two Messianic prophecies that they would have been very familiar with. The first one, he quotes a portion of David's song of praise, directed at the coming Messiah. It's recorded in Psalm 110 verse one. We read, "The LORD says to my Lord, 'Sit at My right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for Your feet.'" Let me just briefly exegete that. The LORD, that's Yahweh, that's the covenant name, too holy to utter sometimes called the tetragrammaton--the four letters to wonderous to even utter from the lips, Y H W H-- "The LORD says to my Lord:" and here this is Adonai, this is a substitute for his covenant name; this is a title name referring to "master." "'Sit My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.'" So there, David is saying, Yahweh, Jehovah God, addressed my Lord, Messiah, my ancestral Son, the very Son of God, and by extension, the Lord Jesus Christ. And here's what Yahweh said to my Lord Messiah, "'Sit at My right hand until I make Thine enemies a footstool for Thy feet.'" In other words, Yaweh promised his mediator--the Messiah, David's master, David's Lord--that He might give him the final and ultimate glory, and majesty and power. Dear friends, this is a promise of preeminence, that could only be given to God himself and Jesus is saying, that's me. Caiaphas and all the other Jewish scholars understood this.

Let me add verse two of that text, "The LORD will stretch forth Your strong scepter from Zion saying, 'Rule in the midst of Your enemies.'" Can you imagine interrogating the incarnate Son of God? Can you imagine sitting in judgment of your Creator? I mean, folks, this is a prop. This is a an example of pride that just exceeds the limit of imagination. But what is amazing is Jesus is undaunted. I love this. He looks Caiaphas in the eye, so to speak. And with penetrating clarity, he tells him and the whole lot of them, that I am the Christ, the Son of God. And the Father has ordained that I sit at his right hand until the time when I make my enemies like you, a footstool for my feet. What an amazing in your face answer. And I might add, this was a warning. What an act of mercy on Jesus' part. Indeed, Messiah waits for the final surrender of his enemies, Hebrews 10:13.

Moreover, think of Paul in First Corinthians 15, beginning of verse 25. He comes into Corinth and he's telling them, "He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy that will be abolished is death." So again, think about this, Jesus pokes Caiaphas right in the eye with a sharp stick of truth. You want the truth presented in the presence of the living God? Here it is. Notice what else Jesus said, He responded to Caiaphas by quoting a portion of Daniel seven and verse 13. I'm going to read that to you, but also verse 14, because they would have understood it in that context. "'I kept looking at the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming, and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away; and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.'" In other words, guys, that is a reference to me, Jesus is saying. You know, this is this is such a powerful example of proper evangelism. I hear people many times say, you know, I just really don't know what to tell people, I really don't know where to begin. I, you know, especially people that are hostile to Christianity, like some of those in my family. Folks, I'll tell you what to tell them. Do what Jesus did, Tell them who Jesus is. That's where you begin. Tell them what he has done for you, and why he did what he did. You will recall in Matthew 16, verse 13, Jesus was asking his disciples, "'Who do people say that the Son of Man is?' And they said, 'Some say John the Baptist; others, Elijah; still others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.' He said to them, 'But who do you say that I am?' Simon Peter answered, 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.'" Folks, that's what you tell people. Beloved, there is no gospel, apart from the clear proclamation of the unsearchable riches of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Never be ashamed of that. Tell them Romans three, verse 23, that "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption, which is in Christ Jesus, whom God displayed publicly as the propitiation in His blood through faith." In other words, he was the satisfaction of divine wrath on my part. Let me tell you who Jesus is. Romans 6:23, "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 10, beginning in verse nine, "...if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord," which of course requires that you know who he is, "and you believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will shall be saved, for with the heart person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. For scripture says, 'WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.'" Again, never be ashamed of the gospel, dear friend, never be ashamed of Christ. Confess him before men, never tried to adjust the truth, never tried to compromise the truth, never tried to obfuscate the truth. Lovingly, but with spiritual boldness, look, a person in the eye. Look Caiaphas in the eye, lean forward and with indefatigable boldness, tell them who Jesus is.

I think of Paul as he went to the wicked, wicked city of Corinth, as some of us just returned from recently. In First Corinthians two, verse two, he said, For I determined to know nothing among you, except the social gospel....I determined to know nothing among you except the prosperity gospel...."I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness, and in fear and in much trembling and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men but on the power of God." So again, go back to the scene with his neck, veins bulging and rage; this high hypocrite gets in Jesus' face and says, "'I adjure You by the living God, that You will tell us whether You are the Christ, the Son of God.' And Jesus said, "I am; And you shall see THE SON OF MAN SITTING AT THE RIGHT HAND OF PWOER AND COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN.'" This was more than Caiaphas could handle.

Verse 63, "Tearing his clothes, the high priest said, 'What further need of witnesses do we have?'" Of course, this is an Academy Award winning performance at this point. I mean, tearing one's clothes was a sign of grief, in that culture it could be a sign of mourning, but also of righteous indignation. It's interesting that the Jewish Talmud even outlines how you tear your clothes, you must tear them with the outermost garment from the neck down in the front. But bear in mind, Caiaphas is not expressing grief, he is expressing glee. He is so happy. Oh, we've got him now. And his feigned righteous indignation was all show. Nothing more than pretend outrage. I don't know if I've ever quoted Shakespeare in the pulpit before, but me thinks Caiaphas doth protest too much. I mean, this sanctimonious old fool. I mean, he was as crooked as a barrel of snakes and all of them were that way. So this vile serpent spews even more venom at our Lord in verse 64. And to the rest of them, he says, "'You have heard the blasphemy; how does it seem to you?' And they all condemned Him to be deserving of death."

Now, bear in mind legally after the Sanhedrin made a verdict deserving of death, they were required to wait a full day before making a formal sentence. But they were afraid to wait that long, for fear that those brave disciples might amass an army and come take Jesus away, you know, get all of the people to revolt. So they had to get creative. Moreover, they had to preserve some semblance of jurisprudence. And so what they did is decided, well, why don't we just reconvene again a few hours later, early in the morning. And then after that trial, then the three trials with the Romans would begin. Well, friends, there you have it, the majestic Jesus, he's standing alone condemned for his explicit claims pertaining to his Messiahship, and his deity.

I might add as a footnote, according to Luke 23, verses 50 and 51, Joseph of Arimathea who later asked Pilate for the body of Jesus was, quote, "a good and righteous man." And the text says that "he did not consent to their plan of action." Isn't it interesting, even in the ranks of the most wicked, God is never without a witness. Verse 65, "Some began to spit at Him. "That's a horrible thing. I've had that happen to me. I remember the first time I was leading a small group of men and I made the comment that there is salvation in no other name apart from Jesus and a man got up and cussed me and walked over to me and knelt down and spit in my face and walked out. I remember being in Israel and a young Jewish pastor was telling the story, how he was walking down the street there in central Israel and an Orthodox Jewish man and his son, saw him, knew who he was, and he stopped the young pastor, and said to his son, I want you to see how we treat Christians. And then the man spit in his face and told his son to do the same thing.

Friends, the cruelty of the wicked knows no bounds. They spit at him. Verse 65. They blindfolded him, they beat him with their fists, "...and they said to Him 'Prophesy!' And the officers received Him with slaps in the face." They mocked him, they defied his claim to deity, demanding that he somehow prove his omniscience, which, of course, he could have done. And he will someday when they stand before him in judgment. Matthew 26 verse 68, we read what they said, "'Prophesy to us, You Christ; who is the one who hit You?'" You know, I cannot fathom such sadistic, inhumane cruelty that the Lord endured, and is going to grow so much worse. And I want to remind you folks, that this kind of hatred is extended towards us today. And it's going to get much worse. I think of what Jesus said in John 15, beginning in verse 18, "'If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this, the world hates you.'" And Paul told young Timothy in Second Timothy three beginning of verse 12, "Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." And he went on to add, "But evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived."

Beloved, I can assure you if it weren't for the laws that we have in our country that are gradually being removed, we would be treated equally as bad. Don't forget, Jesus predicted all of this, all the way back in Mark 10, beginning of verse 33. He said, "'Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles. They will mock Him and spit on Him, and scourge Him and kill Him, and three days later, He will rise again.'" That's exactly what happened. Let me ask another question, what causes a person to have such intense hatred of Christ? The answer is, people despise anyone who tells them the truth about their sin. Jesus said in John seven, verse seven, the world "'...hates Me because I testify of it, that it's deeds are evil.'" I mentioned it earlier in Romans one, verse 18, we read how "...the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them." Beloved, we need to love people enough to tell them the truth about their sin and the love of the Savior. And if they are among the elect to the Spirit of God will move upon their heart with that gospel message. And he will use that truth to pry open that box that they are trying to suppress so that they will see the horror of their sin and the glory of the cross, and they will be saved by the regenerating power of the Spirit of God.

I wish to leave you with this and again imagine the scene, Jesus is standing there alone. He's blindfolded. By now he is bruised, he has swelled. He has spittle covering his bloodied face. Unimaginable humiliation and pain that he is suffering. And this is mild compared to what he will endure. And yet Peter tells us and his epistle, First Peter two verse 23, "...while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously; and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed." O, what a Savior, what pain he endured. What love beyond measure, when in my place, he stood.

My friend, if you're here today, and you've never done business with God, and you've never humbled yourself before him, and acknowledged your sinfulness and cried out for the undeserved mercy that he would give you, I plead with you to do that before it's too late. Because one day you will stand before him either as your Savior and King or your judge and executioner. And for those of us who know and love Christ, may we leave here today with a renewed sense of what he suffered on our behalf and the glory that awaits us with him because of his saving grace, Amen.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word, may they find lodging in each heart and may they bear fruits of repentance for some and fruits of greater praise for others. We give you thanks, we give you praise for all you have done for us in Christ and it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

We find ourselves once again in Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn to Mark 14, we will be looking at verses 43 through 52, under the heading, "The Betrayal of the Lord Jesus Christ." Betrayal by a close friend or loved one is undoubtedly one of the most painful things a person could possibly experience. Especially if that betrayal might lead to death. The name Judas Iscariot has become synonymous with the word "traitor." You probably noticed no one names their child Judas, and for good reason. But why would a man who knew Jesus was the Messiah, a man who witnessed all of those miracles, a man who saw Jesus raise the dead, cast out demons, heal the sick, a man that showed him nothing but kindness and love, how could a man possibly betray Jesus? What causes men and women that we know to violate their conscience, to defy all reason to enlist others to join in some wicked cause? All for the purpose of slandering and betraying other people with such vicious contempt with no regard for the truth? I mean, we see this on a daily basis. And in our political climate, you see it in the workplace, it happens in families, it happens in churches, how? How can that happen? We're going to examine some of these things this morning, as we look at this text, but the primary focus of the text is not the wickedness of the betrayer. Nor will it be the cowardice of the disciples, but the focus will be on the resoluteness of the Savior. Nothing would stop him from doing the will of the Father, to purchase our redemption. And I trust you will be deeply moved and perhaps convicted as we look at this inspired narrative. Who, by the way, or I should say, Mark was the one who, by the way, wrote this, as you will recall, but he wasn't there. But Peter was and Peter was the one that conveyed this to Mark. In fact, Justin Martyr writing about ad 150, described the gospel of Mark as, quote, "the memoirs of Peter." So what we're seeing here is a narrative describing from an eyewitness perspective, what happened. And we will compare this narrative with other gospel writers as well. So let me read this, Mark 14, beginning in verse 43.

"Immediately while He was still speaking, Judas, one of the 12, came up accompanied by a crowd with swords and clubs, who were from the chief priests and the scribes and the elders.

Now he who was betraying Him had given them a signal, saying, 'Whomever I kiss, He is the one; seize Him and lead Him away under guard.'

After coming, Judas immediately went to Him saying, 'Rabbi!' and kissed Him.

They laid hands on Him and seized Him.

But one of those who stood by drew his sword and struck the slave of the high priest and cut off his ear.

And Jesus said to them, 'Have you come out with swords and clubs to arrest Me, as you would against a robber?

'Every day I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize Me, but this has taken place to fulfill the Scriptures.'

And they all left him and fled.

A young man was following Him, wearing nothing but a linen sheet over his naked body; and they seized him.

But he pulled free of the linen sheet and escaped naked."

I would like to divide this section of scripture into two general categories that I hope will be helpful to you. We're going to see first of all, the futility of human rebellion, and secondly, the triumph of divine sovereignty. And we see these things happening constantly in our environment. In fact, our postmodern, and I might add post Christian, culture utterly rejects the reality of absolute moral truth. Instead, for people in our culture, truth is relative, determined by feelings. And therefore, all viewpoints, no matter how absurd, or contradictory, must be considered as equally valid and embraced except the positions that are found in the Bible, those must be rejected. And as a result, if it feels good, do it. That's the mentality. That's the culture. And along with that, those who believe these things must silence anyone that differs with them. And this is why biblical values are being replaced by laws that impose a godless, immoral, oppressive social agenda on Christians who they see as a group of people that threatens their civil liberties. And this is essentially the platform of the Democratic Party, as well as many Republicans and libertarians and so forth.

Human rebellion, as we're going to see, once again, here in this text, is everywhere, it's all around us. So don't think that what we're looking at here is just some isolated incident, that doesn't find itself being manifested on a continual basis. Human rebellion against God is what produces people that want abortion on demand. We see the rebellion of these vicious pro Hamas, protesters who are largely female, screaming at the top of their lungs about things they know absolutely nothing about. Anarchists destroying property and getting away with it with our legal system. Then you see the alphabet mafia, coming out of this kind of rebellion. In fact, this is Pride Month, as you're all aware, and I was looking at the GLAAD website, which is the LGBTQ advocacy organization, I wanted to see how many days weeks and months they celebrate in our culture. And I looked at their LGBTQ community calendar, and to see this, and I counted 39 days, five weeks and three months, almost a half of year of celebrating that which God calls an abomination. This is rebellion, a kind of rebellion against God that would have us believe, for example, that personhood is defined by the individual, not by creational, or biological reality. And the state must therefore preserve a person's liberty, their civil rights to do and be whatever they want. And so you must eliminate all gender distinctions. And ultimately, you need to eliminate marriage, you need to eliminate family and on it goes. This is the hideous nature of rebellion against God. And I could give you many, many other examples. But folks, we've seen this down through human history, from Satan's rebellion against God along with a third of the angels that he lured into defecting with him to the depraved nature of every human being. We see rebellion, from Pharaoh to Hitler, from Nebuchadnezzar to Joe Biden. From the vile perverts of Sodom and Gomorrah to the LGBTQ mafia, in the United States, and on and on it goes.

And God describes the horrific fate of those who rebel against him in Proverbs one, beginning in verse 24. There we read, "Because I called and you refused, I stretched out my hand and no one paid attention; and you neglected all my counsel and did not want my reproof; I will also laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your dread comes like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you. Then they will call on me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently, but they will not find me, because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the LORD. They would not accept my counsel; they spurned all my reproof. So, they shall eat of the fruit of their own way, and be satiated with their own devices. For the waywardness of the naive will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them. But he who listens to me shall live securely and will be at ease from the dread of evil."

And here, we see that indeed, despite man's rebellion against God, God's sovereignty will prevail, he will accomplish all of his purposes, as Isaiah 46:10 tells us, "Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, 'My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.'" And we can take comfort in that text, and so many others, including Ephesians, one and verse 11, that he works "all things after the counsel of His will."

Well, Judas refused to believe all of that. He rebelled against God; he chose instead to pursue his own agenda. He rejected the word of the Lord that was right there in front of him. And he's now paying the price eternally for his rebellion. So, let's begin by looking at this text under the heading the futility of human rebellion. Now, the context, you will recall, as Jesus is in the garden; the garden was a familiar retreat for Jesus and his disciples. It was a place of beauty and peace, a sanctuary of for intimate communion, for fellowship, refuge, for rest and prayer. But as we can see from this text, there is no safe place in this world, right? No safe place, on this fallen planet, even the most sacred sanctuary can be defiled. And certainly, this is the preferred strategy of Satan, to defile that which is sacred, to destroy that which is beautiful, that which is blessed, whether it be a marriage of family, a church or a country. Now Jesus has just faced the most powerful temptation of his life, the temptation to somehow avoid being the sin bearer, and experiencing the alienation and wrath of the father to be treated as a sinner was utterly foreign to his holy nature. Perfect righteousness was always the automatic impulse of his soul, but he is now about to be assaulted, at the point of his transcendent holiness. And the thought of this produced such anguish within him that it brought him to the point of death, as he pleaded with the Father, "'Removed this cup from Me; yet not what I will, but what You will.'" Now, with his face, and his garment still glistening with sweat drops of blood, Jesus has resolutely accepted the cup that the Father has given him. And he says to his disciples in verse 42, to, "'Get up, let us be going; behold, the one who betrays Me is at hand!'"

And so now what we see, dear friends, in triumphant tranquility, Jesus now sets his face towards the cross, to willingly sacrifice himself on our behalf. So in verse 43 we read, "Immediately while He was still speaking, Judas, one of the 12 came up accompanied by a crowd with swords and clubs, who were from the chief priests and the scribes and the elders." "Judas," isn't it interesting, "one of the 12." It's fascinating that that phrase is a declaration that is made in all four of the Gospels. And the purpose of this is really clear. It's to underscore the reality that an apostle could be guilty of such a heinous crime. "Judas, one of the 12."

Now, the ones coming to arrest him are from the Sanhedrin. Sanhedrin literally means "sitting together." Thus we get the idea of a council or an assembly. It consisted of 71 persons, and essentially this was the Supreme Council or the tribunal of the Jews. It was headed by the high priest who's not a part of this mob. But this group had religious and civil and ceremonial jurisdiction over the Jews. And bear in mind, these are apostate Jews. These are the political power brokers. They are the corrupt, greedy, political leaders, as you might say, of the Jewish people. Not at all dissimilar to what we experienced today. And they're jealous of Jesus because of his astounding popularity, and supernatural powers. And you will recall that at the beginning, and then at the end of his ministry, Jesus absolutely up-ended their religious con game by forcibly expelling the merchants and the money changers from the temple precincts during Passover week, which would have been their most profitable season of the year. And so they absolutely hated Jesus. But also they hated him because he exposed their hypocrisy. Hypocrites do not like that; he exposed their greed, their corruption, their unbiblical, rabbinical traditions. But they also feared that Jesus might ignite a revolution against Rome, which would place their positions of authority in jeopardy. So they had to do something with him.

So we know from the gospels that they've been plotting to kill him for some time. And now they have their chance. And as I think about the scene in my mind, I think my, what a contrast. Here you have the innocent Jesus who preached about loving your enemies, along with 11 of his apostles. And they're up against a huge armed mob. We get further insights in John's gospel. In John 18, beginning in verse three, we read, "Judas then, having received the Roman cohort, and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons." Now, a Roman cohort was about 600 men, some up to 1000 men. We don't know for sure if it was the entire cohort, which would have included men on horseback and the cavalry. But certainly, these were Roman troops, they would have been stationed there at Fort Antonia in Jerusalem. And it would appear that they fully intended to capture not only Jesus, but also his disciples. Now, obviously, the Sanhedrin had convinced the Roman authorities that Jesus was an insurrectionist. After all, he was being called the Messiah, the King of the Jews. And so they come now with overwhelming force. It's in the middle of the night, probably the wee early hours of the morning, and they do this to avoid the crowds that might be sympathetic to Jesus. Plus, I'm sure they feared his miracle working abilities. Who knows what this guy might do?

And it's such a fascinating irony, as you think about it. Here we see this, these religious phonies, these wicked politicians--men carrying lanterns and torches in the darkness so they can extinguish the light of the world. How futile. Here we see the spiritually dead, coming to kill the only one that can give life. Here we witness powerless men bearing weapons to somehow overpower the one and only omnipotent god. Murderous men bearing swords to arrest God who was about to voluntarily give up his life as a ransom for many. Violent men that are coming to subdue the Prince of Peace. John 18, beginning of verse four, we read this, “So Jesus, knowing all things that were coming upon Him, went forth, and said to them, 'Whom do you seek?' They answered Him, 'Jesus, the Nazarene.' He said to them, 'I am He.' And Judas also who was betraying them was standing with them. So when He said to them, 'I am He,' they drew back and fell to the ground."

What an amazing scene. Here, Jesus uses the covenant name of God, "Ego Eimi." The title that he used to describe himself, for example, in John 8:58, when, where he told the unbelieving Jews quote, "'Before Abraham was born, I AM.'" You see, he referred to himself in the present continuous tense. That seems odd, why would he do that? Because he wants to underscore the reality that he has always, and he will always, exist. This is a title indicating self-existence. One that indicates therefore preexistence. There has never been a time when he didn't exist. You will recall, when Moses asked God on the mountain, "What shall I tell the people when they ask what is your name?" And in Exodus three, in verse 14, "God said to Moses, 'I AM WHO I AM'; and He said, 'Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you.'" Tell them, "I AM" is your God. I am the preexistent, self-existent, uncreated Creator of the universe; the one who always is, and who always has been, and who always will be.

So this was the title, he used to respond to his enemies who came to arrest him. So when he said to them, "'I am He'" the "He" being added to the text, "they drew back and fell to the ground." Here we have the testimony of an eyewitness. And this is still vivid in John's memory. This, by the way, would have been written some 50 years after that incident happened. How could anybody ever forget something like that? Absolutely astounding.

So we first see the futility of human rebellion. But secondly, now, the triumph of divine sovereignty. And again, think about this, Jesus just mentioned his name and hostile men are rendered absolutely powerless and thrown on their backs to the ground. What a demonstration of power, but also what a demonstration of mercy? I mean, he could have thrown them all into hell, immediately, rather than on their backs, but rather he gives them another chance to repent and to embrace the Savior. Think about this, if that amount of power went forth, in the days of Jesus' humiliation, can you imagine the amount of power that will come in his voice and the force of his name in the day of his exultation and wrath, when it comes again in power and great glory? The triumph of divine sovereignty. Again, John 18, beginning in verse seven, "Therefore He again asked them, "'Whom do you seek?'" You see, he asks them again; he wants them to verbalize the second time, that they are under orders to arrest him alone, not his disciples, which he knew they intended to do. "And they said, 'Jesus the Nazarene.' Jesus answered, 'I told you that I am He; so if you seek Me, let these go their way,' to fulfill the word which He spoke, 'Of those whom You have given Me I lost not one.'"

O dear friends don't miss this, here Jesus demonstrates his great love for his own. He has promised to love them to the uttermost; to love us to the uttermost. And here we see a picture of the Good Shepherd, do we not? The good shepherd that is protecting his sheep, unlike the hireling that will flee at the first sight of the wolves, as we read about in John 10. Here we have a marvelous picture of a substitute, as he steps forward to take the place of sinners. And this also implies, I believe, that had the disciples been arrested, their faith would have been too weak to endure the profound disappointment and the confusion and the pain. But here we see the Savior doing what only he can do. You see, Jesus not only saved sinners, he secures sinners. Thus fulfilling he says, "the word which He spoke, 'Of those whom You have given Me I lost not one.'"

As I meditated upon this scenario, Martin Luther's great hymn, A Mighty Fortress is our God came to mind. And in one of those verses, we read this, "Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing. Were not the right man on our side, the man of God's own choosing. Dost ask who that may be, Christ Jesus, it is He, Lord Sabaoth his name, from age to age the same, and he must win the battle." "Lord Sabaoth" must win the battle, which means "Lord of Hosts."

Back to John 18 and verse 10. "Simon Peter then, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s slave, and cut off his right ear; and the slaves name was Malchus. So Jesus said to Peter, 'Put the sword into the sheath; the cup which the Father has given Me, shall I not drink it?'" You know, you think about this, Peter must have really been emboldened when he saw all that whole mob just be thrown to the ground. You know, you can see him sticking out his chest, and he pulls the sword, come on, guys, you know, I mean, that's…you can see that happening here, right?

And I also think that one day in glory, we're going to meet some of those soldiers. And we may hear them say, "I was one of those guys, and I came to repentant faith before I got up off the ground." You know, you put yourself in the place of Peter, and the other disciples; you're fatigued, you're afraid, and then you got all of this fleshy stuff going on. You're self reliant, you’re overconfident. But your faith is weak, and you're not sure what all is going on. Folks, I'm telling you, that is a powerful mixture, that can cause a man to make a complete idiot out of himself. And to not even think rationally. I mean, Peter, really? As if Jesus couldn't defend himself, the one that could raise the dead and cast out demons? Do you really think if one angel could slay all of the firstborn of Egypt, that Jesus wouldn't be able to take care of himself here, and he needs you to take the sword of divine vengeance out of his hand? As if one angel didn't kill 185,000 Assyrians in one night to defend Jerusalem as we read about in Second Kings 19. Really, Peter, you didn't think about that, did you?

Well, like me many times, and probably like you, Peter was a ready, fire, aim, kind of guy. Shoot first and ask questions later, right? I think of Matthew 26 beginning in verse 52, "Then Jesus said to him, 'Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword.'" In other words, Peter, if you kill him, or any of them, that's a capital offense, and you will be put to death. So Jesus is protecting him. He goes on to say, "'Or do you think that I cannot appeal to My Father, and He will let once put at My disposal more than 12 legions of angels?'" 12 legions, that's 72,000 angels. That's a pretty good force, right?

"'How then will the Scriptures be fulfilled, which say that it must happen this way?'" Oh, dear Christian, would that we all learn to contemplate the glory of Christ and the power of his sovereignty to accomplish all that he has declared in eternity past and then be able to rest in his plan. The Great 17th century Puritan theologian, John Owen said this, in his work on the glory of Christ, quote, "By beholding the glory of Christ by faith, we shall find rest to our souls. Our minds are apt to be filled with troubles, fears, cares, dangers, distresses, ungoverned passions and lusts. By these, our thoughts are filled with chaos, darkness and confusion, but where the soul is fixed on the glory of Christ, then the mind finds rest and peace. For to be spiritually minded is peace (Romans 8:6)."

Back to Mark's narrative, describing the betrayal, we come to verse 44. "Now he who was betraying Him, had given him a signal, saying, 'Whoever I kiss, He is the one; seize Him and lead Him away under guard.' After coming, Judas immediately went to Him saying, 'Rabbi!' and kissed Him." That type of a kiss would have been a sign of intimate friendship. It's fascinating what Luke reveals in Luke 22 verse 48, regarding that scenario, there we read, Jesus said him "'Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man?'" Jesus said that him, "'Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man?'" He didn't say Judas, "are you betraying your friend?" No, he said, "The Son of Man." This is the title that Jesus used to refer to himself many times. And rightfully so because it is a messianic title, describing the only one who could fulfill mankind's role as the human race's only perfect representative, the Son of Man; the one who would rule over the earth, the one who would succeed as the last Adam in the realm where the first Adam failed. Judas, are you betraying the only perfect representative that can be your substitute and pay the price for your sin? Really, Judas? Is that what you're going to do? Worse yet, are you betraying me with a kiss? A sign of esteem and even love.

You know, when you think about that, what Jesus said to Judas was such a profound, solemn warning but yet it was a final act of mercy to Judas. Seriously, Judas, think about what you're doing. And once again, we see the tender love of the Savior seeking to save a sinner right? Right there in the garden. But that sinner rejected Christ's mercy, spurned his grace, even betrays him with a kiss. What staggering treachery. We all shudder in horror at the scene. Imagine what the other 11 must have thought when they're watching all of this play out. In Matthew 26:50, we also read "Jesus said to him, 'Friend, do what you have come for.'"

In verse 46, back to Mark's narrative, "They laid hands on Him and seized Him." And you must bear in mind that the only reason they laid hands on him and seized him is because he allowed them to do so. John 10 beginning of verse 17, Jesus said, "'...I lay down my life so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay that lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I've received from My Father.'" Once again, dear friends, o, the folly and the futility of human rebellion, to go up against the sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient God.

So verse 46, "they laid hands on Him and seized Him. But one of those who stood by drew his sword, and struct the slave of the high priests and cut off his ear." Luke says, in Luke 22:51, "But Jesus answered and said..." "Answered," by the way, could be translated, "reacted or responded." He said, "'Stop! No more of this.' And He touched his ear and healed him." And they all fell on their faces and worshipped Jesus. Doesn't say that does it?

Please understand dear friends, and this is such a dramatic picture of this, unless God quickens the dead soul of a sinner, they will never come to faith in Christ. They can see miracle after miracle, but apart from the magnificent reality and miracle of regeneration, that instantaneous impartation of spiritual life to the dead, that spiritual resurrection--apart from that, not even witnessing a miracle like this, will cause a person to place their faith in Christ. Again, Judas saw countless miracles. Plus, he just witnessed the reality of what happens when Jesus speaks his covenant name. He's just gotten up off of the ground. And now he sees Jesus healed the ear. Ah, but some will say no, man is spiritually debilitated, but he is not spiritually dead, he can therefore exercise his free will. And he can cooperate with God and make a decision for Christ. That God and man are co-saviors in rescuing the fallen race from eternal wrath. Therefore, faith precedes regeneration. I'm sure you've heard that before. And very often they will point to First John 5:1, to prove their case. And there we read, "Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God." Well, that seems to indicate that that is true. That you have to first believe and then you're born of God. But if you execute the passage properly, you'll see that it's saying just the opposite. The phrase, "whoever believes" can be translated, "everyone believing" it's a present active participle, indicating ongoing faith. Everyone believing that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. And here in Greek, we have what's called a perfect passive indicative, which is an action that has already taken place in the past, it is complete, but it has ongoing effects in the present. That's what the text is saying. So it can be translated "everyone who presently believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God." You see, dear friends, regeneration is the cause, not the consequence of saving faith. The blind must first be given sight before they can see their sin and behold the glory of Christ; there must be a spiritual resurrection. While sinners are called to repent and believe in the gospel, ultimately God must take the initiative. Because, as we read in Scripture, the sinner is spiritually dead, he is alienated from God. He has no capacity to discern truth, he cannot understand divine truth. Plus, he's blinded by Satan. Romans 3:11 says that no man understands, no man seeks after God. Therefore, God must seek after him. Nevertheless, in a mystery, we cannot comprehend, man is still responsible for his unbelief, like Judas, who had no one to blame but himself.

So Jesus addresses the mob in verse 48, says to them, "'Have you come out with swords and clubs to arrest Me, as you would against a robber?'" The term "robber" describes a plundering rebel that's notorious for pillaging and looting. Really? That's who I am? Of course, he knew that that was laughably absurd.

Verse 49, "'Every day I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize Me.'" In other words, what he's saying is, you are doing this under the cover of darkness, because you know, it is wrong. But then he adds this, "'...but this has taken place to fulfill the Scriptures.'" This, of course, is a reference to the many Old Testament prophecies that we have looked at on other Sundays--Psalm 41:9, Psalm 55:12 through 14, Isaiah 53:7, also verses seven and eight, verse 12, Zechariah, 11:12, and Zechariah 13:7 that Jesus just quoted in Mark 14:27, a few verses earlier, when he says, "'You will all fall away, because it is written, "I WILL STRIKE DOWN THE SHEPHERD, AND THE SHEEP SHALL BE SCATTERED."'" Again, he demonstrates that God is in complete control of all of this, this is not a plan B. This is prophecy being fulfilled. And all through Scripture, dear friends, we see that God has ordained to allow evil to accomplish his purposes, and to therefore put on display his infinite perfections, and all of his attributes. I ask you, is Jesus more or less glorified, because of what the Father did in sending him to the cross? Exceedingly more. That's how he puts his glory on display. And as we see these things, it unleashes the doxologies of the heart of the redeemed. So that with full throat and sincerity we can sing "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost. But now I see." I was blind or but now I see, sorry, I got the words mixed up there. And we can all testify to that, can we?

So they seize Jesus, verse 50, "They all left Him and fled." Again, remember, they did not take seriously the Lord's command, to watch and to pray. Remember that earlier in the garden? Unless you fall into temptation, unless you fall into spiritual lethargy and indifference, sins that make us vulnerable to all manner of temptation. Quite frankly, they feared man more than they feared God and had I been amongst them, I'm sure I would have been right with them. By the way, what a change later on, after Pentecost, when the Spirit lived within them permanently.

Then verse 51, "A young man was following Him, wearing nothing but a linen sheet over his naked body; and they seized him. But he pulled free of the linen sheet and escaped naked." And many believe this was Mark. We can't say for sure, but the point of including this event, I think, is what's really important. And while it doesn't say for sure, it would be in my humble opinion that what we see here is Jesus being abandoned by all of his disciples, left all alone with this vicious mob. All of the bravado has disappeared. And now even a curious and innocent young man wearing the linen from his from his bed; he probably was awakened with all that was going on and gets out, throws his linen around him and comes out to see what's going on. Even that curious bystander has now just barely escaped the murderous Christ haters. What a poignant picture of Christ's suffering all along. And even the curious following at a distance, running the risk of being swept up in the hatred of the wicked and being destroyed.

Now, what causes a man to violate his conscience? like Judas? How does this happen? What causes a man or a woman to defy all reason? What motivates a man to enlist others to join in some kind of a violent cause, to somehow destroy the innocent? What provokes people to slander and malign and betray the innocent, with such vile contempt, with such a total disregard for the truth that is so obvious. Well, in a word, dear friends, it is covetousness--the 10th commandment, Thou shalt not covet. To covet means to crave material things that others have. It also means to have a desire for something for yourself, and to have more than what you already possess, so you're not content with what you currently have. Judas wanted the material wealth that would come with his position of prominence and power in the kingdom. He was wanting Jesus to establish the kingdom now, as were the others. And it wasn't happening. You know, the heretical prosperity gospel capitalizes on this sin, and it leads people away from the true gospel. It leads the naive and the ignorant into idolatry because remember, where a man's treasure is there will his heart be also; that man cannot love, money, and God at the same time. He will choose one over the other.

Covetousness, Exodus 20 verse 17, the 10th commandment, "'You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not cover your neighbor's wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.'" And we know that covetousness originates in the heart and leads to many other sins. Mark recorded what Jesus said in chapter seven beginning in verse 21, "'For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. All these things proceed from within and defile the man.'" And if you look in Scripture, you'll see that Covetousness is idolatry that it never satisfies. It is vanity, it leads to injustice and oppression. It is foolish and hurtful lusts. It is a departure from the faith. It leads to lying, murder, theft, poverty, domestic troubles, and on it goes. And we see many of these things in the life of Judas. And you might see it even in your own life. Covetousness causes a man to search for satisfaction at the most deep level in his inner person, but to search for it in persons, in places and things other than Christ. Christ is never enough. In Colossians two and verse 10, the apostle Paul says, "In Him, you have been made complete." But the covetous man says, No, I know what's best for me. I know what will make me happy and it is not Christ. Think about it. Judas heard Jesus say in Matthew six, beginning in verse 32, "'For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things...'" is referring to what you eat, what you drink, what you put on your body, and what you wear. "'...for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.'" And then he says this, "But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.'" But the covetous person says no, I know what I want, and I will have it and I will have it now. The psalmist says in Psalm 16:11 "You will make known to me the path of life, in Your presence is fullness of joy; in Your right hand there are pleasures forever." But the covetous man, the covetous man will say, No, no, I want my best life now. And the false teachers will give you 1000 ways to find that, supposedly. Dear Christian, guard your heart against this wickedness. Psalm 119, verse 36, says, "Incline my heart unto Thy testimonies, and not to covetousness."

So, what happened to Judas after his betrayal of Jesus? In Matthew 27, beginning in verse three, we read, "Then when Judas, who had betrayed Him, saw that He had been condemned, he felt remorse and returned the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, 'I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.' But they said, 'What is that to us? See to that yourself!' And he threw the pieces of silver into the temple sanctuary and departed; and he went away and hanged himself." Luke tells us in Acts one verse 18, "...falling headlong, he burst open in the middle, and all his intestines gushed out." What a hideous death.

Back to Matthew's account, the chief priest took the pieces of silver, and said, "It is not lawful to put them into the temple treasury, since it is the price of blood." I have to stop here. What astounding hypocrisy. You're worried about violating the law with the money when you are about to kill an innocent man? Folks, that is the power of legalism to blind people utterly. It goes on to say, "And they conferred together and with the money bought the Potter's Field as burial place for strangers. For this reason, that field has been called the Field of Blood to this day. Then that which was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: 'AND THEY TOOK THE THRIRTY PIECES OF SILVER, THE PRICE OF TH EONE WHOSE PRICE HAD BEEN SET by the sons of Israel; AND THEY GAVE THEM FOR THE POTTER'S FIELD, AS THE LORD DIRECTED ME.'"

Oh, dear friends, the futility, of human rebellion and the triumph of divine sovereignty. I must ask you, what will you do with Jesus? Will you succumb to your own covetousness and live apart from him? Just live unto yourself and not put your faith in him? Will you, in your own way, betray Him and reject Him and treat him with indifference? As if all that he did is really of no importance. My friend if that is you, woe to you. Your foolish rebellion will seal your fate and the wrath of God will remain on you throughout eternity unless you repent. So I plead with you to come to Jesus. You know who you are. Your life is really going nowhere fast. You pretend to be what you're really not. And you know that if suddenly you were in a position where your death was imminent, you would have no peace, about where you're going to spend eternity. So as a minister of the gospel, I reach out to you and say, please, place your faith in Christ your only hope of salvation before it's too late.

And you, dear saints that love Christ, my, we can celebrate the triumph of sovereign grace today, can we not? Oh my the power of the gospel. And as I was thinking about this, my mind went to the final verse of "A Mighty Fortress is our God" that says this, "That word above all earthly powers, no thanks to them abideth; the Spirit and the gifts are ours, through Him who with us sideth. Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also; the body they may kill, God's truth abideth still; His kingdom is forever." Amen and Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the magnificent truths of your word that speak so clearly, so directly to each of our hearts. I pray that what we have examined here today will move each one of us in the direction of holiness. That sinners might be saved and saints might be sanctified. We pray all of this in the precious name and for the glory of our Savior in King Jesus Christ. Amen.

(Audio not available for first few minutes of message)....blood of the Passover lambs that were slain in the temple up above, in that area.

And it's fascinating when you think about it 24 hours earlier, he was in the same area, revealing to his disciples the glory of his Second Coming. But now he anticipates the unimaginable horror of being alienated from his heavenly Father; being crushed under the weight of the Father's wrath for unworthy sinners like you and me. I find it interesting that about 1000 years earlier, we read, for example, in Second Samuel chapter 15, especially in verse 30, that a broken hearted and betrayed King David, traversed this very same path along with his distressed entourage. You may recall the story, David was walking barefoot, with his head covered, crying. Which by the way, was an expression of intense grief in that ancient culture. And why did he do this? Well, it was because of his son, Absalom's conspiracy to usurp his father's throne. And because David's trusted advisor Ahithophel had betrayed him.

Now, I must say that we are on holy ground here, as we look at this passage, I find myself even retreating from the responsibility to explain it and to apply it. It's such a sacred passage. And because what the Spirit of God is revealing here, is so transcendent, it is so traumatic, it is so far beyond the realm of human comprehension and experience that frankly, it begs language. It certainly deserves a far more fitting tongue than mine, to appropriately and effectively explain what is happening here. But here we are given a supernatural glimpse of divine suffering, all that Jesus is enduring on our behalf. But I might say that what we see here is going to be mild in comparison to what he will experience on the cross. But let me read the text to you.

"And Jesus said to them, 'You will fall away because it is written, "IWILL STRIKE DOWN THE SHEPHERD, AND THE SHEEP SHALL BE SCATTERED." But after I have been raised, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.' But Peter said to Him, 'Even though all may fall away, yet, I will not.' And Jesus said to him, 'Truly, I say to you, that this very night, before a rooster crows twice, you yourself will deny Me three times.' But Peter kept saying insistently, 'Even if I have to die with You, I will not deny You!' And they were all saying the same thing also. They came to a place named Gethsemane; and He said to His disciples, 'Sit here until I have prayed.' And He took with Him Peter, and James and John and began to be very distressed and troubled. And He said to them, 'My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death; remain here and keep watch.' And He went a little beyond them, and fell on the ground and began to pray that if it were possible, the hour might pass Him by. And He was saying, 'Abba! Father! All things are possible for You; remove this cup from Me; yet not what I will, but what You will.' And He came and He found them sleeping, and said to Peter, 'Simon, are you asleep? Could you not keep watch for one hour? Keep watching and praying that you may not come into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.' Again, He went away and prayed, saying the same words. And again He came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were very heavy; they did not know what to answer Him. And He came the third time and said to them, 'Are you still sleeping and resting? It is enough; the hour has come; behold, the Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of sinners. Get up, let us be going; behold, the one who betrays Me is at hand!'"

Dave Harrell

I wish to focus on six categories of truth, divided into three headings that seem to be to emerge from this text. I pray that we will all be deeply impacted by what the Spirit reveals to us. We're going to see first of all, predicted defection and proud rejection. Secondly, we're going to see piteous supplication and perfect submission and finally, practical exhortation and powerful resolution. And in all of this, dear friends, we're going to see ourselves more clearly. Especially those secret sins we tend to justify, we tend to excuse, we tend to camouflage especially with our self righteous religiosity. It will expose our own spiritual overconfidence, but more importantly, what we're going to see here is the Savior's infinite love for us.

So first of all, let's look at the predicted defection and proud rejection, verse 27. "And Jesus said to them, 'You will all fall away, because it is written, "I WILL STRIKE DOWN THE SHEPHERD, AND THE SHEEP SHALL BE SCATTERED."'" When he says, "I will strike down the shepherd," the "I" refers to Yahweh, the Lord of hosts, Yahweh of hosts. And we know that this is true, Isaiah 53 and verse six, we read that, "the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all, to fall on Him." The 11 must have been shocked to hear the Lord's prediction. And to quote from Zechariah 13, verse seven, a text that was prophesied some 500 years earlier. And it's interesting, we know that later in the garden, after Jesus rebuked Peter for cutting off the ear of the high priest's slave, you remember that story, the disciples realize that Jesus was not going to defend himself. And that he was going to be arrested; allow them to arrest him. And so Mark tells us later on in verse 50, of chapter 14, "And they all left Him and fled." Just as the Lord prophesied.

But Jesus' prediction was not only a foreshadow of the cowardice of the disciples' on the night of his arrest, but it also speaks to the scattering of the saints just a little bit later on. We read of this, for example, in Acts eight one, There we read, "And on that day," the day of Stephen's death, "a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles." Furthermore, following Christ's death and resurrection, we see how God scattered the entire unbelieving nation of Israel all over the globe. And that was, and continues to be, an act of judgment for their unbelief, a period of, shall we say, purification and refinement through the trials of their sufferings, but he did not leave them without hope. In fact, if you go back to that same prophecy in Zechariah, chapter 13, the verse seven goes on to say, "And I will turn My hand against the little ones."God predicted this in the words of Isaiah chapter one, verse 25, he says, "I will also turn My hand against you, and will smelt away your dross as with lye, and will remove all your alloy. Then," and here's the hope, "Then I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. After that you will be called the city of righteousness, a faithful city. Zion will be redeemed with justice..."

So with this background, what we see here in Mark 14 is Jesus is clearly stating the disciples perceived loyalty to Christ would not be sufficient to sustain them in what was about to happen; their fears would get the best of them. He knew that they would be overcome by fear, that they would scatter to places of perceived safety. And, frankly, knowing that his companions would abandon him, undoubtedly made the prospect of his suffering all the greater, would it not? But his resolve to do the Father's will remained undaunted. And Jesus next statement, was no doubt reassuring to them, because it indicated that their cowardly abandonment would not be permanent, verse 28, "'But after I have been raised, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.'" There's a glimmer of hope here. All is not lost. And we see this, as well later on, the fulfillment of this at the tomb, the empty tomb. In Matthew 28, beginning in verse seven, remember, the angel said to the women, "'Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead; and behold, He is going ahead of you into Galilee, there you will see Him; behold, I have told you.'"

Now, as you would expect, proud Peter vehemently protested Jesus' prediction. Verse 29, "Peter said to Him, 'even though all may fall away, yet I will not.'" And certainly his strident boast, only underscored his lack of spiritual awareness, which fueled his overconfidence, and his refusal to take seriously what Jesus had told them--frankly, about an hour or so earlier in the upper room, at the Passover meal. Remember in Luke 22, verse 31, we read what the Lord said to Peter, "'Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.' But he said to Him, 'Lord, with You I am ready to go both to prison and to death!' And Jesus said, 'I say to you, Peter, the rooster will not crow today, until you have denied three times that you know Me.'" Oh, the power of pride--"I don't care what he says, I know myself." You know, our pride is often nourished by our selective hearing of what God says. Beloved, we must always be suspect of our own spiritual maturity. We should always be suspect, of how loyal we think we are, to Christ. Despite the self promoting deceptions that we tend to pander in our deceitful heart. You know, our pride would have us rely on our religious behaviors--externals--as an accurate measure of our spirituality. When in fact, many times our external religious behaviors are nothing more than an illusion of spirituality. Certainly not always, but they can be. Our true condition can only be known by an honest assessment of our love for Christ. You want to know your level of spirituality ask yourself, "How much do I really love Christ? How much do I really love my neighbor? And am I joyfully and humbly submitting to his Lordship?"

So here we see a prediction of defection. And as I say, a proud rejection; the sheer folly of self-assurance in the denial of the Lord's clear assessment of Peter's inflated opinion of himself. And in verse 30, we read, "And Jesus said him, 'Truly I say to you, that this very night, before a rooster crows twice...'" That means before dawn. A rooster crowing served as a time indicator in that culture. "...before a rooster crows twice, you yourself will deny Me three times.' But Peter kept saying insistently, 'Even if I have to die with you, I will not deny You!'" Oh my, what an inflated opinion of self. I struggle with it as well. So do you. Obviously he overestimated his courage, his loyalty to Christ. You might say, Peter simply did not know his own heart. But the word of God will expose it. And the difficulties in life, the temptations that we experience, will expose who we really are.

And the text also says that "...they were all saying the same thing also." Well, naturally, they don't want to be outdone by Peter. So we're all going to say, "Yeah, we're, you know, we're gung ho." Folks, again, we've got to guard ourselves against pride. It is so easy to convince ourselves that we are more mature than what we really are. Let me flesh this out a bit practically. "Oh, that's okay. Lord, I don't need to discipline myself for the sake of godliness. I'm good. I don't need the systematic in depth teaching and preaching of the Word of God. I don't need discipleship. I don't need to be around other godly people who can speak truth into my life. I don't need to have a passionate personal pursuit of holiness, church on Sunday morning is good enough for me." And on and on it goes. May I remind you of what God says in Proverbs 16 verse 18, "Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before stumbling." Proverbs 29 verse 23, says, "A man's pride will bring him low, but a humble spirit will obtain honor." And folks I've lived long enough to see men and women sow seeds of arrogant wickedness in the things that they do, all the while convinced that they are right, that they are innocent. And then over time, see how they sowed the wind and they're reaping a whirlwind of misery, still convinced that they are right, everybody else is wrong, and that they've been mistreated.

So first, we see predicted defection and proud rejection. Secondly, what I would call piteous supplication and perfect submission. And again, I approach this narrative with deep reverence. My exposition of it won't even come close to doing it justice. Verse 32, "They came to a place called Gethsemane;" Gethsemane means "olive press." "And He said to His disciples, 'Sit here until I have prayed.'" And he probably is having them sit near the entrance of the garden. And what they had then, as they do even do now, in that same area in Jerusalem, is they would have a fence around gardens that people owned. And this, no doubt, was a friend that owned the garden and they would go there to have privacy. Then we read in verse 33, "And He took with Him Peter, and James and John, and began to be very distressed and troubled." So he has one group stay towards the entrance, and then he takes his inner circle, Peter, James, and John, goes deeper into the garden.

And it says he became "very distressed." The term in the original language, the term for distressed, is one that means to be excessively affected by emotion. "...and troubled," it says, which carries the idea of being completely overcome by mental and spiritual anguish to the point of losing one's composure. This is what's going on in the Lord.

Verse 34, "And He said to them, 'My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death.'" "Perilypos" in the original language--deeply grieved. It means surrounded by intense sadness. And I want you to remember something here. Do not lose sight of this fact. We're talking about God incarnate here. This is our Creator. This is the Son of God, who was about to become the sole object of divine wrath, who is about to bear your sin and mine in his body, who was about to be alienated from his Father, something that we will never experience. This is supernatural suffering. Friends what is happening here exceeds the limits of our ability to imagine. And frankly, the temptation to avoid the torture of sin bearing that awaited him would have been the greatest temptation of all, an inducement that even exceeded Satan's temptations of Christ in the wilderness. But here Jesus is also confronted, we know, according to Luke 22, verse 53, the "power of darkness" in some mysterious way that we're not even told, Satan is there. Certainly, this was Satan's final opportunity to prevent Jesus from going to the cross to accomplish our redemption and fulfill the mission for which the Father had sent him. The depths of anguish that gripped him was so severe that he was at the point of death, as we will see. "'My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death.'" And yet, what is fascinating is he is still concerned for his disciples. And that's why he says, "'...remain here and keep watch.'" You see, he knew he must suffer alone. And he also knew that his disciples could really offer him no comfort. But what they could do, and what he's asked him to do, is to stay vigilant and pray, "remain here and keep watch." Keep watch for what Judas and the rest of the crew coming to take them away? No, no, no. He's asking them to keep watch over their own heart, to watch for the your own spiritual lethargy, your own spiritual indifference, especially toward obeying the will of the Father sins that plague each of us. In other words, what Jesus is concerned about is, I don't want you to fall into sin, as you are so prone to do. Remember, all that happened at the Passover meal where he had to confront them? I mean, they're in a time of worship and they're arguing over who's going to be first in the kingdom. Luke 22 and verse 40 says, "When He arrived at that place, He said to them, 'Pray that you may not enter into temptation.'" I want you to watch for this because your heart has a proclivity for this. In other words, I want you to pray, yes, Father, please, help Jesus with all that he's going through right now, but deliver me from my foolish pride that he has exposed. Even just a little bit earlier. I'm blinded by my own flesh, I am weak. I need your help. Give us all discernment. Give us the ability to somehow respond in a godly way, in the midst of this grim reality that we can't even begin to comprehend. We don't know what's going on. All I know to do is to cry out to you, as you have told us to do. And so I'm crying right now I'm watching and I'm praying, lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil. I've got to have help because I am so prone to spiritual lethargy and spiritual indifference, and seeking my own way, rather than submitting to the will of the Father, as He has revealed Himself in His Word.

Now to be sure, these brothers were emotionally, they were physically and you might say spiritually, exhausted, all of the events that had just occurred over the course of the Passover meal, which probably lasted about six hours. I mean, their vitality was drained from them. But the real problem was not so much their physical fatigue. The real problem was that they were operating under the power of their own sinful flesh, rather than the power of God. Now, while nothing we encounter, dear friends, will ever come close to the evil that Jesus endured, make no mistake, the same enemy is on the prowl. And our flesh is also weak. That's why we should all heed this command, to watch and to pray. Bear in mind that the enemy has all of the seductions out here that would cause you to go in the opposite direction of the will of the Father. And all of those seductions appeal to your flesh. And therefore, without you even realizing it, you are moving away and from God, and moving away from the blessing that he wants for you, for your faith, for your family, for your marriage. He wants to deceive; the enemy wants to deceive you. He wants you to say, "you know what, my kids are good, I'll just let them watch whatever they want. You know, my kids are good, they go to school, I don't have to be involved in their life and, and really try to instruct them and be intentional that everything's good. We got a good Sunday School at church." You see how it works? And we buy into all of those wise because we're not watching, we're not praying. Oh, dear Christian, keep watch. Keep watching and praying. Said differently, Ephesians six, beginning in verse 11, "Put on the full armor of God." You see how all of that fits together? Why? "So that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God so that you will be able to resist in the evil day and having done everything, to stand." So dear friends, learn well, this lesson. Get serious about keeping watch over your heart, guard yourself against spiritual lethargy, against spiritual indifference. And against all of those subtle ways that you are going in the opposite direction of what God has asked you to do.

Let me make this very practical. When was the last time you earnestly went before the Lord and prayed for these very things that I'm describing? When was the last time that you went before the Lord and said to him, "Lord, I'm blind. I'm weak in so many ways. Please help me to see my hidden faults helped me to see those ways that I'm just living for myself. Lord helped me to hate hypocrisy in my life more than the way I hate it in the lives of others. Father, help me stop looking for the speck in the eye of my brother and sister and see the log in my own? Husbands and wives, when was the last time you held each other by the hand and you got on your knees and you knelt by your bed, and you poured out your heart that God would give you all that you need to effectively love each other and teach your children and invest in them as God has asked you to do? Dear Christian, we know so little of holiness because we know so little of watchfulness. And we know so little of power because we just know so little of prayer.

Certainly the disciples learned this well, after all of this, Jesus says, Peter, James, John, "'My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death; remain here and keep watch.'" In other words, don't fall into more temptation, like I have already shown to you that you so easily do. Verse 35, "And He went a little beyond them." Luke tells us and Luke 22:41 That it was about a stone's throw. So Jesus goes about a stone's throw beyond them. And it says he, "fell to the ground and began to pray that if it were possible, the hour might pass Him by. And he was saying, 'Abba!Father! All things are possible for You remove this cup from Me. '"The term "cup" is an Old Testament metaphor for the wrath of divine judgment and the suffering that goes with that.

Please understand, this is what he hated more than everything else that he was experiencing, because he knew this was coming. What troubled his soul more than anything else, was the anticipation of being a sin bearer. This was utterly foreign to the sinless Savior. Perfect righteousness was the automatic impulse of his soul. But he is now about to be assaulted. And he's going to be assaulted at the point of his transcendent holiness. Charles Spurgeon says it's so well quote, "The penalty of sin began to be realized by Him in the garden. First the sin which had put Him in the position of a suffering substitute, and then the penalty which must be borne, because lie was in that position, a dread to the last degree, that kind of theology, which is so common nowadays, which seeks to depreciate and diminish our estimate of the sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ." He goes on to say, "Brethren, that was no trifling suffering, which made recompense to the justice of God for the sins of men. I am never afraid of exaggeration when I speak of what my Lord endured. All hell was distilled into that cup, of which our God and Savior Jesus Christ was made to drink. It was not eternal suffering but since he was divine, He could, in a short time offer unto God a vindication of His justice, which sinners in hell could not have offered, had they been left to suffer in their own persons forever. The woe that broke over the Savior spirit, the great and fathomless ocean of inexpressible anguish, which dashed over the Savior soul when He died, is so inconceivable that I must not venture far, lest I be accused of a vain attempt to express the unutterable. But this I will say, the very spray from that great tempestuous deep as it fell on Christ, baptized him in a bloody sweat. He had not yet come to the raging billows of the penalty itself, but even standing on the shore, as He heard the awful surf breaking at His feet, His soul was sore, amazed and very heavy. It was the shadow of the coming tempest. It was the prelude of the dread desertion, which he had to endure when He stood where we ought to have stood, and paid to his Father's justice the debt which was due from us. It was this which laid Him low, to be treated as a sinner, to be smitten as a senator, though in Him was no sin. That is what caused him the agony." End quote.

Because we know so little of holiness, we cannot even begin to fathom how infinitely repulsive sin really is. I mean, what we see of sin in our life is the proverbial tip of the iceberg. And as I say, it's only the snowflake or to own that tip. We don't see all of the rest underneath that God's see. In fact, Jesus temptation to sin throughout his ministry was far more powerful than any temptation that we will ever experience. Because typically when we are tempted, we just give in. We justify, we just do whatever and go on. We rationalize, we blame shift or just ignore it. But Jesus had never known any separation whatsoever from the Father, much less his wrath. And he knows that's what's awaiting him. So he "fell to the ground and began to pray that if it were possible, the hour might pass by. And He was saying, 'Abba! Father!'" by the way, that's Aramaic for "Papa." It is a term that affirms one's intimacy with the Father, in this case with his Father God.

"'All things are possible for you remove this cup from Me.'" Beloved, here in is the piteous, that is the mournful, the distressing supplication of our Savior. You might say this is the apex of human grief, one that would have killed any of us. Yet I find it fascinating in his, in his doleful entreaty, he still submits to the Father. "'yet not what I will, but what You will.'"

May I add another lesson that emerges from this passage. And that is simply this prayer is never about changing God's mind. It is about aligning our will with his. And once again, we see that God is in control of everything that is happening. He alone could remove the cup of suffering, he alone could choose some other way to reconcile sinners unto himself. But this was the perfect and just plan of God. Certainly perfection and justice can be defined very simply, it's what God does. Jesus willingly submits himself to the Father's will, not his own. Paul spoke of this in Philippians, two eight, "Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."

And in Luke 22 verse 44, the physician offers additional insight into the inconceivable stress on Jesus body, it says, "And being in agony He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground." This is a rare condition known as "hematidrosis" which is, as I understand it, the subcontanious capillaries dilate and they burst forth and mingle a little bit of blood with sweat with prespiration. That's what's going on here. I cannot fathom that kind of anguish.

So we've seen the predicted defection and the proud rejection. We've seen the piteous supplication and the perfect submission, and finally, the practical exhortation and powerful resolution. Verse 37, "And He came and found them sleeping, and said to Peter, 'Simon, are you asleep? Could you not keep watch for one hour? Keep watching and praying that you may not come into temptation.'" Once again, that you won't fall victim to your own spiritual lethargy and indifference and resistance to the will of God. And then he says, "'The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.'" Yes, "the spirit," those high aspirations of our own inner man informed by the Spirit of God, yes, that's willing. Oh, you can say all of the right things. And in your core, that's what you want to do. But it's the flesh. That's the problem. "The flesh is weak." And O, the proclivity of our flesh to choose the easy path that avoids doing the will of the Father; something we cannot do apart from divine power. We must all take seriously our need to be physically and spiritually awake and alert. Yes, our spirit may be willing but our flesh is weak. That's why we are told to "walk by the Spirit", the Holy Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of your flesh.

You see, we have an enemy within and we have one without. They are formidable foes beyond anything we can imagine. The enemy within is our own unredeemed human flesh and the enemy without is Satan. You know, Peter learned this lesson very well. Later on, he would write in First Peter five beginning in verse eight "Be of sober spirit, be on the alert." It doesn't say this, but I think in parenths, he could have said a whole lot there. I had to learn this the hard way, that whole deal. It goes on to say, why, "Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him firm in your faith..." And Paul speaks of the same thing in Romans 13, beginning in verse 11. He says, "Do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep..."---that's your lethargy here-- "for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is near. Therefore, let us lay aside the deeds of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts." And the lust of the flesh includes so many different things, but especially in this context, spiritual lethargy and indifference and resistance to the will of God.

So back to the text. Verse 39, "Again He went away and prayed, saying the same words. And again He came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were very heavy; and they did not want to answer Him." Obviously, they did not want to answer him because they're embarrassed. And frankly, they're bewildered by their own weakness. I mean, God put them in a place where they absolutely could not muster up enough faith, and boldness and love and loyalty to possibly endure that situation. This is reminiscent of chapter nine, verse 34, where quote, "they kept silence" when Jesus confronted them over their bickering about who would be greatest in the kingdom. That's what goes on here as well.

Verse 41, "And He came the third time and said to them, 'Are you still sleeping and resting?'" Then he says, "'It is enough; the hour has come; behold, the Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of sinners. Get up, let us be going; behold, the one who betrays Me is at hand.!'" An amazing scene, Jesus now sets his face towards the cross. This is the powerful resolution of the Savior to willingly sacrifice himself on our behalf. And as I see the scene in my mind, I can only imagine that his face and his garments are still glistening with sweat drops of blood. And yet the Lord Jesus is going to resolutely and triumphantly accept the cup that the Father had given him. Imagine the scene, Jesus knew that Judas Iscariot was leading the proud members of the Sanhedrin. Perhaps they could even see the lights; if you get in that area, as I have been, it would be easy to see such a large group coming towards you. Perhaps he saw them, but certainly in in his mind, he could see them. The Sanhedrin would have been with them as we're going to learn later in our studies, accompanied by the temple police, and a cohort of Roman soldiers--that's 600 Roman soldiers.

But what Jesus says essentially is, it's time to advance, not retreat. The writer of Hebrews reiterates the sacred scene. If I can close by taking you there for just a few minutes. In Hebrews five verse seven we read, "In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death. And He was heard because of His piety. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek." Let me explain this briefly. In the days of Abraham, according to Genesis 14 and verse 18, long before the Aaronic priesthood was established, Melchizedek, which by the way, means "righteous king." Melchi is "king," and zedek, the verb means "to be just or righteous." Melchizedek was king of Salem, it says, which was ancient Jerusalem; a priest of God Most High. And in Hebrews seven, in verse three, we learned that his priesthood was unending, unlike that of Aaron, which began later on in the days of Moses and ended in AD 70, when the Romans destroyed the temple. But as we look at this Melchizedek character, we see that he was a type of Christ. In the Old Testament, he was a person that pictured or prefigured the antitype that was far greater; that was perfect that was eternal. Though Melchizedek is in no way equal to Christ, his unique priesthood, and frankly, even his name, typify Jesus Christ and his work in a number of significant ways. And we don't have time, but in chapter seven of Hebrews, it goes on to explain all of that. So Melchizedek's priesthood elevated the priesthood of Jesus Christ, even beyond that of Aaron.

In verse 10, we read that he was "designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek." And so what's fascinating is in Hebrews five, verses seven through 10, which is a commentary on our text this morning, again we read, "In the days of His flesh," referring to Christ, "He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety." It's interesting--"krauge" in Greek--"loud crying." Fascinating term, very significant. It does not refer to a cry a man chooses to utter on his own. But rather it speaks of a cry that is extracted from him; the cry that is pulled or forced out of him as a result of excruciating anguish. This is what accompanied the prayers and supplications of our precious Savior in the garden. He prayed to the Father, not to avoid the cross, but to be resurrected from the dead, to be saved, it says "from" or "out of" death. And you will recall that for this reason, an angel from heaven appeared to him to strengthen him, Luke 22:44, "And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly and His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground." His distress brought him to the very threshold of death. And when you examine our Lord's life and ministry, you see that indeed, he was a man of sorrows, he was acquainted with grief. But he experienced the full spectrum of human suffering, of human temptation. And this made him eminently qualified to be our sympathetic high priest.

In verse eight of that text, "Although He was the Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered." Isn't it interesting, the Father didn't give him a pass; he was given no exemption from all of the sorrow, and all of the pain associated with the human condition. And because of his perfect obedience to do the will of the Father, he experienced death. So there's nothing that we can experience that he has not experienced and done so far greater. For this reason, he can be affirmed as our sympathetic high priest.

And then finally in verse nine of Hebrews five, he says, "And having been made perfect"-- he's not speaking here of metaphysical perfection, but in terms of function, in other words, having completed all that was necessary to make him perfectly fitted to become our Savior and priest-- "He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation." Is that not magnificent? "Being designated by God as a High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek." And I might add, as a footnote, that this was the inspired argument given to the Hebrews to prove the superiority and the deity of Christ.

Well, in closing, dear friends, may I challenge you to contemplate what we've examined here this morning; to contemplate the Son's willing submission to the Father's purpose, and to examine our own lives. My, don't you see our own weaknesses here, and the necessity to watch and to pray. And I close with just two verses of the lyrics of a 19th century English hymnist, James Montgomery, where he said this in his hymn: "Go to dark Gethsemane, you who feel the tempters power; your Redeemer's conflict see, watch with him one bitter hour; turn not from His griefs away, learn of Jesus Christ to pray." And then he also says "Follow to the judgment hall, view the Lord of life arraigned of the wormwood and the gall; O, the pains His soul sustained; Shun not suffering, shame or loss; learn of him to bear the cross."

Let's bow our heads together. Father, we humble ourselves before you realizing that what we've just examined is so far beyond our ability to comprehend, and yet you have given us enough to grasp some measure of what our Savior has done for us. May this evoke from each of us a higher level of praise perhaps than ever before? And may it also cause us to examine our hearts that we might indeed, be watchful; that we might pray, that we might not enter into temptation because we want to honor Christ with all of our heart, all of our lives. And we want to enjoy the full expression of all that he is given to the Redeemer. So we commit this to you and we pray it in Jesus' name, and for his sake. Amen.

Once again, we have a wonderful opportunity that we never want to take for granted, be able to worship together and open up the Word of the living God. And I would invite you to do that right now by turning to Mark's gospel, chapter 14. We're going to be looking at verses 17 through 26, as we continue to make our way, verse by verse, through this gospel. And I've entitled my discourse to you this morning, "Instructive Drama in the Upper Room." And you will see that drama played out as we examine the text. Let me give you a little context here before I read the passage.

It is Thursday evening, the night before Jesus went to the cross to be the final sacrifice for all whom the Father had given him in eternity past before the foundation of the world; an innocent substitute, the spotless Lamb of God, the only sacrifice that would atone for our sins. And on that evening, Jesus celebrated the last divinely authorized Passover meal established some 1500 years earlier, by God, when he delivered his covenant people from the bondage of Egypt. And in this meal, he will close out the old celebration - which would close out actually the entire sacrificial system that could never fully atone for sin - and he would inaugurate a new celebration; the first communion that we also call the Lord's Supper, celebrating the final sacrifice that would be slain.

But there is much instructive drama in this scenario, here, especially if we look at all of the Gospels, we will see everything from hypocrisy, to betrayal, deception, immaturity, pride, spiritual overconfidence, basically, all that is in the world - the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life. And I might add to that, the sting of the lash will fall on all of our backs this morning. Because as we look at the text, we can all see ourselves in various ways. And I might also add, if you are unable to see yourself, you really have no basis to claim genuine saving faith. For the conviction of sin is one of the greatest works of the Spirit in regeneration. In fact, he was given to us, given to the world, to convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment. And it's my earnest prayer that we will all be convicted, that we will all be instructed and that we will all be encouraged by what we see here in this text, and most importantly, it is my prayer that we will all behold the glory of Christ in a new and a fresh way.

So with that, let me read the text. Mark 14, beginning with verse 17.

"When it was evening, He came with the 12.

As they were reclining at the table and eating Jesus said, 'Truly I say to you, that one of you will betray Me - one who is eating with Me.'

They began to be grieved and to say to Him one by one, 'Surely not I?'

And He said to them, 'It is one of the 12, one who dips with Me in the bowl.

For the Son of Man is to go just as it is written of Him; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born.'

While they were eating, he took some bread and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to them and said, 'Take, eat, this is my body.'

And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them and they all drank from it.

And He said to them, 'This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many.

Truly I say to you, I will never again drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.'

After singing a hymn that went out to the Mount of Olives."

I'd like to look at this section of Scripture, we'll stop there, under two real simple headings. First of all, we're going to see the damning nature of self-deception. And secondly, we're going to see the inaugural celebration of the Lord's Supper. And I might also add that I have discovered over the many years that I've been in ministry that very few evangelicals understand either of those headings: the damning nature of self-deception, and really what the Lord's Supper is all about.

Now, let me give you a little historical context, the Passover celebration, was not like our sit down dinner, right? Where we would probably spend an hour, maybe an hour and a half at most, but rather, it would last for several hours. In fact, if we look at all of the Gospels, we will see that there would have been enough time for Jesus to wash the disciples’ feet, who by the way, were bickering over which one's going to be first in the kingdom. Also, there will be time for Jesus to confront Judas Iscariot; they will go through the various stages of the Passover meal, there will be time for him to institute the Lord's table or communion, as well as provide many lengthy discussions and instructions to the disciples. And we could read about all of them in John 13 through chapter 16; obviously will not cover all of this. But I want you to know that these are the things that are taking place on the eve of his sacrifice on our behalf.

But first, this morning, I want us to look at number one, the damning nature of self-deception. This is a frightening reality that we must all guard against in our heart. Notice verse 17, "When it was evening He came with the 12. And as they were reclining at the table, eating and drinking." I should say, it says table and eating. Let me pause there for a moment, here's what would have happened after opening with a prayer of thanksgiving for all that God has done. The first of four cups of diluted red wine would be offered followed by a ceremonial washing of the hands. Those of you that have participated in a Seder service, you probably remember how you wash the hands, which symbolizes the need for the cleansing of sin. And if you think about it, how easy it is, in the midst of a worship service, for that worship to become nothing more than ceremony, for it to become nothing more than a ritual, rather than a time of really examining our own hearts before the Lord. Instead, even in the midst of worship, as we're going to see here, you can be harboring all manner of pride and deception and somehow justify it in your heart. Because after all, you're worshiping the Lord. This is what was going on in the upper room.

Now, it was during this first stage of the ritual Passover meal, when they should have been honestly assessing their own heart, their own sinfulness and their desperate need for a Savior. That according to Luke 22:24, quote, "There arose also a dispute among them as to which one of them was regarded to be greatest." Their worship, therefore, was merely kind of a mechanical, empty ritual at this point. To put it in our vernacular, it was all sizzle but no steak. From my cowboy days, it was all hat and no cattle. All right? You know, God condemned Judah for the same thing. In Isaiah 29, verse 13. He said this, "...people draw near with their words and honor Me with their lip service, but they remove their hearts far from Me, and their reverence for Me consists of tradition, learned by rote..." In fact, we see in Matthew five and Mark seven Jesus used that very verse to describe the phony worship of Judah in his Day. And we should all take heed, in light of that warning. We must all examine the attitudes of our heart when we come into the presence of the Lord, both privately as well as corporately. God hates religious hypocrisy. And dear friends, if you come to church, for example, on a Sunday morning, and you're not really here to worship the Lord, because you really don't love the Lord, you're doing it because that's just kind of what you do on Sundays, just kind of going through the motions, you want to see your friends, you want to show off your latest shoes, or whatever it might be, that is a mockery to God. If you truly know the Lord, there's something terribly wrong with your spiritual heart attitude. And if you continue that, it will get worse. And you will forfeit divine blessing in your life and even place yourself under a cloud of divine chastening. So I lovingly warn you, to that end, God hates religious hypocrisy.

So the disciples perform their perfunctory ritual which mask the outworking of pride in their heart as they demanded, which one should be greatest in the kingdom? I find it interesting. What did Jesus do? Well he used their sinfulness as a teaching moment to somehow expose their pride, to give them a lesson in humility. And after the ceremonial cleansing of the hands, we're going to see even more of what happened. But at this point, it would appear from the text that Jesus washed their feet. Can you imagine what they must have experienced--to know what they'd been up to in the midst of a worship service, so to speak. And Jesus now in essence, confronts them and washes their feet.

Well, after the cleansing of the hands, they would eat a mixture of a bitter herbs. Typically, horseradish, mixed with romaine lettuce as we would call it dipped in charoset, which was a paste, perhaps you've had it before I have nuts and apples, pears, and I believe they have some wine in it. And all of that symbolized their bitter bondage in Egypt. And then next, they would sing the first of two songs of the Hallel, as I mentioned earlier: Psalm 113, through 118, Psalms of praise. And then they would drink the second cup of wine. And at that point, the head of the house, in this case, it would be Jesus, would rehearse the miraculous deliverance from the bondage of Egypt and thus explain the meaning of the Passover, all the great theological truths that are embedded in that scenario.

And next, the hands would be washed, and Jesus would serve them the unleavened bread. So you have another hand washing, the serving of Unleavened Bread along with the sacrificial roasted lamb, which would be the main course. And after this, a third cup of wine would be poured and then drunk, and then they would have sung the rest of the Hallel, followed by the drinking of the fourth cup of wine. Now, somewhere in this process, we read this at the end of verse 18, Jesus said, "'Truly I say to you that one of you will betray Me - one who is eating with Me.' They began to be grieved, and to say to Him one by one, 'Surely not I?'" My, talk about popping the worship bubble, right? Although Jesus had previously predicted his death on several occasions, this was the first time that he spoke of a betrayal by one of his own disciples, incomprehensible. But think about it, what better time to make such a shocking announcement than during a time celebrating his grace, his goodness, his deliverance, and at the same time, therefore exposing the very sin that deserve just the opposite.

You think about it, the sparkling diamond of saving grace shines most brightly on the black velvet of sin, does it not? And that's what we see happening here. And don't you know that there was never a time thereafter, when the disciples participated in communion and the Lord's Supper that they did not think about this. I mean, what a vivid memory of the exposure of their own sin and the reality that there can be sin that we don't even see amongst us. But a warning of the damning nature of self-deception. And this should be on all of our minds when we come to the Lord's table. We do it in remembrance of Him for all that he has done for us, in light of what we really deserve; all that awaits us in Christ. No man can truly sing "Amazing Grace" until he has first been amazed at his own sin.

Verse 19, they began to be grieved. The term in the original bears the idea of profoundly distressed. The text says, "They said to him, one by one, 'Surely not I?'" My, the power of the Word of the Lord, to cause us to ask the right questions; questions of our deceitful heart, a heart that we can't even fully know apart from the Spirit's work. So they're not only stunned with the fact that there was a traitor amongst them, but they're also at a stage now where they're seriously questioning their own love for Christ, their own loyalty? "Surely, not I?" Especially after he just exposed their self-promoting pride by washing their feet. What is even more astounding, according to Matthew's account in chapter 26, beginning in verse 25, we read, "And Judas, who was betraying Him said, 'Surely it is not I Rabbi?' Jesus said to him, 'You have said it yourself.'" Beloved, there we witness the damning nature of self-deception. Judas knew who Jesus was, he knew he was the Son of God, he witnessed his miracles. And he had to have known, that Jesus knew, he was lying through his teeth. He had witnessed things like that before. In fact, in John chapter two, beginning of verse 24, we read the Jesus, "...knew all men." And in verse 25, it goes on to say, "...and he did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for He Himself knew what was in man." Yet here we see the deceitful power of the human heart, to somehow be so desperately wicked, that you could justify lying to God, and think that he doesn't see it, or you're going to get away with it. I'm just glad I've never done that. Haven't we all in very subtle ways, and sometimes not so subtle ways. I pray that you don't do that, folks. We need to guard ourselves against this, especially as we come to worship the Lord our God. If you lie to God, by pretending your sin isn't that bad, and that you're going to somehow make the cut, thinking that somehow, you're good enough to impress him; that on the scale of divine justice, your goodness outweighs your badness, you are a fool. And if you continue to lie to yourself and to Him, you will perish in your sins.

So they're eating the bitter herbs. They're dipping now their flat bread in the charoset, that paste, when Jesus announces a betrayer among them. And one by one, they say, "Surely not I?" Verse 20, "And He said to them, 'It is one of the 12, one who dips with Me in the bowl.'" Now, apparently, Judas was sitting close enough to Jesus that he was sharing the bowl with him and maybe with some of the others. But what's interesting is the disciples are completely lost here. They have no idea who it is. They're not even sure of their own heart. We read more about this in John's account in John 13, beginning in verse 24, "So Simon Peter gestured to him, and said to him, 'Tell us who it is of whom He is speaking.' He, leaning back thus on Jesus' bosom said to Him, 'Lord, who is it?' Jesus then answered, 'That is the one for whom I shall dip the morsel and give it to him.' So when he had dipped the morsel, he took, and gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. After the morsel, Satan then entered into him. Therefore, Jesus said to him, 'What you do, do quickly.' Now no one of those reclining at the table knew for what purpose He had said this to him. For some more supposing, because Judas had the money box, that Jesus was saying to him, 'Buy the things we need for the feast'; or else, that he should give something to the poor. So after receiving the morsel he went out immediately; and it was night." Oh, how clever the cloaks of hypocrisy. The damning nature of self-deception. The disciples never suspected Judas. And then to think Judas thought he could fool his creator. Like the self-deceived Christians in name only, who will one day stand before the Lord Jesus Christ, at the Great White Throne of Judgment. And with incredulity, they will try to defend themselves, continuing to lie to themselves and lying to God. Jesus spoke of this in Matthew seven, beginning in verse 22, "'Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name, cast out demons, and in Your name, perform many miracles?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.'"

So Jesus says, "'It is one of the 12, one who dips with Me in the bowl. Verse 21, "For the Son of Man is to go...'" Notice this, "'...just as it is written of Him.'" So in other words, this is all part of God's plan, "...but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born.'" Now, you would think that perhaps they would have remembered that which was written of him, obviously, in the Old Testament. Remember Psalm 41, verse nine, "Even my close friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me." The prophet Zechariah says in chapter 11, beginning of verse 12, "I said to them, 'If it is good in your sight give me my wages; but if not, nevermind!' So they weighed out 30 shekels of silver as my wages. Then the LORD said to me, 'Throw it to the potter, that magnificent price at which I was valued by them.' So I took the 30 shekels of silver, and threw them to the potter in the house of the LORD." All of this was part of God's sovereign plan. Now, please understand, though, God ordained to allow Judas' treachery; an act as we see here, according to Scripture, Judas is still considered culpable for his sin. I mean, think about this. He has spent basically three years with the Son of God. He has witnessed all of these miracles. He's experienced the power and the perfection of his character of his love. He's heard the clear and compelling truths of the gospel. He has even enjoyed Jesus compassionate care for him. Yet he squanders all of this. How can a person do that?

It was because he followed Jesus for the wrong reason, like so many people do today. He followed Jesus for what he could gain in this life to serve himself, not because he saw the horror of his sin and wanted to be reconciled to a holy God and live to the praise of his glory. He had no love for Christ. He had no brokenness over his own sin. So Jesus was merely a means to his selfish ends, rather than the all sufficient, all glorious end himself. "It would have been good for that man if he had not been born," Jesus said. O dear friends think of this, to exist on this earth, and then to willfully reject Christ, with full knowledge, hat is not only a mockery of our Creator, but that is also a rejection of the very purpose for our existence, which is to live to the praise of his glory, rather than to live just for ourselves. As I think about this, I'm reminded of the words we read in Hebrews 10, beginning in verse 29, "How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, 'VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY.' And again, 'THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE.' It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

As we were coming to church this morning, after we had spent time over at the Allens, knowing that our brother had just been called home to be with the Lord. It was fresh on our minds, how important it is for people to know and love Christ, because that day will come for all of us. And I remember driving by one man out mowing his yard, another man with his boat getting ready to go to the lake and fish. And we stopped to get a cup of coffee and something here at the little store, and I watched the people coming in. I watched the one lady come in with a little girl, you could tell they were very poor. She comes out with a pack of cigarettes and the little girl with a pack of doughnuts. And I said to Nancy, 'Honey, isn't it sad to see these people living their lives apart from Christ. They have no desire to be in church today, to worship the Lord, because they're at enmity with him. They're alienated from him." O how people need the gospel, how they need Christ. And folks, were it not for his grace, every one of us would be right there with them.

When it comes to Judas, later, we know according to Matthew 27 and verse three, "...he felt remorse and returned the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders...and went away and hanged himself." And Luke tells us in Acts one beginning in verse 18, "(Now this man acquired a field with the price of his wickedness, and falling headlong, he burst open in the middle, and all his intestines gushed out. And it became known to all who were living in Jerusalem; so that in their own language, that field was called Hakeldama, that is, Field of Blood.) For it is written in the book of Psalms, 'LET HIS HOMESTEAD BE MADE DESOLATE, AND LET NO ONE DWELL IN IT'; and, LET ANOTHERMAN TAKE HIS OFFICE.'" Which later happened with Matthias. You know, when I think of the damning nature of self-deception, that is illustrated so graphically in the life of Judas, I'm reminded of what Jesus said regarding the Christ haters that Satan will deliberately plant in the world. And therefore, many of them will superficially attach themselves to the church, and many of them will build false churches. Wolves in sheep's clothing, and we're repeatedly warned about them. I'm reminded of the parable that Jesus gave in Matthew 13. Remember, it was a parable of a man who sowed seed in his field and then the enemy comes along and sabotages the field. Sows tares which are weeds, look like, virtually identical to wheat, but you won't know it until it matures and ripens. So this is a deliberate act of vandalism that's being described; it will destroy a person's crop. It will choke out all of the good growth and deprive the wheat of the nutrients they need, and therefore greatly reduced the yield. In fact, in the days in the first century, they had a Roman law against that very thing. So eventually, when the wheat ripens, the workers are horrified to discover all the tares amongst the wheat. And they ask, you know, "how could this happen?" And then we read that an enemy has done this. And then they asked, well, what should we try to pull them up? And the wise farmer says, no, no, no, no, no, no, don't do that. Even though all the roots are intertwined in the growth, if you uproot them, you will destroy the good with the bad. So in verse 30, we read, "'Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, 'First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.'" And all of this is explained later in verse 37, "'The one who sews the good seed is the Son of Man,'" verse 38, says, "'...and the field is the world,'" not the church. But the picture here is not the enemy planting seeds in the church, but rather Christ planting seeds in the world. And the good seed are "the sons of the kingdom," it says, the true believers, and the tares are "the sons of the evil one." And in verse 39, we read that, "...the enemy who sowed them is the devil."

And of course, the spiritual truth is simply this, Jesus plants true believers all around the world, sons of the kingdom. And then Satan, plants, even more unbelievers, and many of them filter into the church; sabotage not only the world, but the church; try to choke out the church. So what should we do? Should we uproot them? Do we go to war against unbelievers? Do we try to legislate Christianity, like Constantine once did, but kill all the Muslims? Resurrect the Crusades? Execute torture and imprison those who will not bow the knee to Christ, as the Roman Catholics did during the inquisitions of the Reformation? No, no, no, no, no. We're not to go to war against the enemies of Christ, but to coexist with them and love them for the sake of the gospel. Let the Christians and the non-Christians live together, though they will try to choke us out, though they will try to malign us and destroy us, even as Judas did, and many others. We know that vengeance is the Lord's, so we never tried to uproot the tares.

In verse 39, of that text it says, "'...the harvest is the end of the age; and the reapers are angels.'" My what a sobering reminder of the inconceivable judgment that awaits those who reject Christ. His angels will be dispatched as divine reapers, to execute judgment. Think about that, those magnificent beings created by God to communicate his will, to do his... execute his purposes, to celebrate the glory and eternal praise of God. To us, they are ministering spirits, they rejoice over every sinner that is saved, but to unbelievers, they are the enumerable and indomitable executioners of divine judgment. Imagine what that will be like when Christ returns, in all of his glory as the almighty judge. And we read finally in verse 42, of that text that these will be cast, "...into the furnace of fire; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"

Well, my point with all of this is true, there's always going to be Judas' in the world, Judas' is in the church. In fact, in First Corinthians 11, we read how there's always going to be divisive and factious people in every church, quote, "...so that those who were approved may become evident among them." First Corinthians 11:19. In other words, when evil factions manifest themselves, it provides a fitting contrast of the true believers that will remain that are approved of God. But repeatedly we're warned to be on guard against these kinds of people. That's why it's so important to have sound doctrine because that's what protects us from unsound doctrine from false teachers. I was thinking about this, just this last week in some things that I was reading, I was reminded that in the 1700s in colonial America, God raised up men like Jonathan Edwards and George Whitfield to bring about the Great Awakening. And now, in the last 20 years in my lifetime, we see Satan raising up people like Andy Stanley and Rick Warren and Russell Moore, Beth Moore, even Tim Keller, to bring about the "Great Awokening." So called Christians promoting social justice and critical race theory, DEI, intersectionality, the LGBTQ cult, on and on it goes. Folks, this is how Satan works, and he has a million Judas' at his command. They serve in every system of influence from government to our public schools and universities, from big tech to big pharma, and the liberal media to liberal churches and seminaries. And because of the living illustration, of the damning nature of self-deception, that the disciples witnessed in Judas, they could see the tremendous threat, the tremendous danger of this in the church. And therefore, their discernment level skyrocketed. And we read about this, and all of their warnings, throughout the New Testament, in the gospels, as well as in the epistles.

So we move from the damning nature of self-deception to something much more positive. And that is the inaugural celebration of the Lord's Supper. Now, mind you, what we're about to read here would have occurred somewhere in the middle stage of the Passover celebration when the roasted lamb and the unleavened bread were served. Verse 22, "While they were eating, He took some bread, and after a blessing He broke it, and gave it to them, and said, 'Take it; this is My body.' And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, and they all drank it. And He said to them, 'This is My blood of the covenant which is poured out for many.'" Now remember, the Passover looked back to the temporary rescue of God's covenant people from the physical bondage that they were enduring in Egypt. Whereas the Lord's supper now, points to the ultimate deliverance of God's people from the slavery and even the penalty of sin; the eternal death and separation from God that we deserve. And this now marked the end of all of the Old Covenant ceremonies and sacrifices and rituals, all of which pointed to Christ. The lamb slaughtered at Passover, merely foreshadowed the final sacrifice and perfect sacrifice of the spotless Lamb of God, who died on the cross to redeem sinners once for all. His atoning work on the cross, perfectly fulfilled all of those things that were promised in Scripture.

Peter, later on, wrote about this in First Peter one, verse 18, he says, "...you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life, inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished, unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ." I want to point something out here that is very important and very precious. And that is the symbolism here of the bread; you're familiar with the symbolism of the wine and the blood of Christ, and so on, but I want to speak about the bread just for a moment. While the unleavened bread of the original Passover, represented their need to leave all of the influences of their idolatry of Egypt's idolatry and immorality and wickedness to leave all of that behind, in the Lord's Supper, the Lord Jesus gave the bread a new meaning. While certainly all of those things are true, there's a new meaning here, it became a figure representing his body, which he would soon offer as the final sacrifice to propitiate the just wrath of God, that should fall upon every sinner. Moreover, and this is very important, it symbolized the believer’s union with Christ, because each of the disciples ate of the same loaf. In fact, it's very important, we have very strict guidelines for our communion service; we have one loaf; you don't get to see it's all broken up, alright? By the time you get there, but it's one loaf. In First Corinthians 10, the apostle Paul says this in verse 16, "Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one bread." So there's wonderful unity that is symbolized in the bread. Roman six, verse five, "For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection." Folks, I pray that you will never lose the wonder of our union with Christ; what a magnificent truth. Colossians one beginning of verse 21, "...you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach..." And folks, this must be central to our Gospel message - those without Christ must be told about the terrifying separation that exists between them and a holy God. In every gospel presentation, there must be a sober recognition of that horrifying reality, which makes our union with Christ all the more glorious. Because remember, sin is lawlessness. It separates man from a holy God. It exposes his rebellion against God. In fact, sin is man's innate inability to conform to the moral character and desires of God. And so apart from faith in Christ, apart from the human being united to Christ, every person without Christ, lives in alienation, a state of alienation and hostility toward God, whether they realize it or not, and the wrath of God abides upon them.

In Ephesians four, verse 17, we read about the unsaved. And this was us before we came to Christ by his grace. It says to, "...walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk." And here's how the unsaved walk, "...in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." And certainly, that is a perfect picture of the culture in which we live. But dear friends, unless God breathed spiritual life into the sinner, that sinner's mind will remain set on his own flesh. That's all he lives for. He's absolutely ruled by his flesh, by the desires of his heart. Romans eight beginning of verse six, "For the mind, set on the flesh is death." That's where it's going to lead. "The mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God." But what an amazing promise when we think of our union with Christ that the bread will symbolize. For example, in Ephesians, one, beginning in verse three and following, we read that before the foundation of the world, God chose by himself and for himself, those who determined to bless quote, "in Christ," that's where the blessing is. It's in Christ. Ephesians one beginning of verse five, "He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace." Folks, this is absolutely astounding--God's everlasting grace that united his elect to Christ, was ordained and it was accomplished in eternity past. In some inscrutable sense, this is what God has done for us already. And therefore it is not something that needs to happen and that's going to be somehow determined upon us, that's waiting to happen to us through self-effort.

This is why we must never pervert the Lord's Supper, as the Roman Catholics do, with the doctrine of Transubstantiation, in which the substance of the bread and the cup are supposedly transformed into the actual body and the actual blood of Jesus Christ. You see, for them, the Eucharist is regarded as an actual sacrifice that has to be repeated. What a damning heresy. Obviously, this undermines the reality that Christ's death on the cross was once for all sacrifice, fully completed at Calvary. In John 19 and verse 30, Jesus said, "'It is...'" what? "'It is finished!'" He didn't say "It is possible." He didn't say "It is available." He didn't say "It is now potential." No, "'It is finished!'"

Moreover, we must understand that although the application of redemption is effectually, applied at the moment of regeneration--when the Spirit of God raises a sinner from spiritual death to spiritual life, and implants within him a governing disposition of the soul that is radically new, that governs his life--he must understand that he has already, quote, "made us alive together with Christ," Ephesians, two, five. What a glorious thought, that once separated from God by sin, because of his great mercy, and his great love that was set upon us before the foundation of the world, when he chose us in Christ, according to Second Timothy one and verse nine, Paul says, he "...saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity." Literally, before time began. And all these magnificent truths, dear friends, are symbolized in the Lord's Supper.

Now, Jesus himself commanded that we commemorate his death on a consistent basis, we read about this in First Corinthians 11:24, and following, and we do so here at Calvary Bible Church, on the first Sunday of every month. We choose not to do it every Sunday, as some people do, to avoid reducing it to some kind of mechanical, kind of an empty ritual, that loses its meaning through constant repetition and runs the danger of fostering indifference towards what's going on in that celebration. But whenever we celebrate the Lord's table, we are told that we are to examine our heart, to repent of any known sin, less we make a mockery of the whole thing that we're celebrating here. In fact, Paul says in first Corinthians 11, beginning of verse 27, "Whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. But a man must examine himself and in so doing, he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself, if he does not judge the body rightly." Which by the way, the disciples were not doing at that time. But I have a feeling they did thereafter, given all that happened. And then finally, Paul says, "For this reason, many among you are weak and sick and a number sleep." God is very serious about the way we approach him, and the way we honor him in our worship.

John MacArthur and Richard Mahew, who have a good summary, they say this, quote, "The Lord's Table is best understood as a memorial celebration that strengthens believers in their walk with Christ because it one, commemorates Jesus substitutionary sacrifice, symbolized by the elements of the bread and the cup. Two, reminds believers of the historical truths of the gospel, including Christ's incarnation, death, resurrection and ascension. Three, prompts believers, to repent of any known sin. Four, causes them to rejoice in their redemption from sin, and in their saving union with Christ. Five, motivates them to continue walking in loving obedience to the Lord. And six, reminds them to hope in His imminent return." And that's what Jesus said here in verse 25, "'Truly, I say to you, I will never again drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.'" But don't you know, that was a wonderful word of encouragement to those disciples. What were they longing for? The kingdom. And now Jesus is going to leave? I mean, they're all confused. But he's basically saying, I'm going to return. And I believe this is referring to his millennial kingdom that they all long for, you will recall in Acts one and verse three, Jesus "...presented Himself," it says, "alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of 40 days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God." This is what he did after his resurrection. And verse six we read, "So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, 'Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?' And of course, that part of the kingdom was yet to come. But that's where their hearts longed, and wasn't at wonderful for Jesus to say, you know what day is going to come when we're going to do this in the kingdom?

Well, it's foreign to our Gentile minds. I might add that there are certain commemorative sacrifices from the Old Testament that will be restored during the Millennial Kingdom. We read about this in Ezekiel chapters 43 and 45, through 45, in particular. In fact, annual feasts of the nations will include three of the six Levitical feasts: Passover, Unleavened Bread, and the Feast of Booths, or Tabernacles. However, it's also interesting that three Levitical feasts that looked forward to what Christ fulfilled at Calvary will be excluded: the Feast of Pentecost, Trumpets and Atonement.

But until Christ's promised return, as King of kings and Lord of lords, we are to consistently celebrate communion; not only to look back at the cross--to remember what Christ has done on our behalf, but to also look forward to his glorious return. Despite the bittersweet realities of that eventful night, and though Jesus knew the torture that awaited him, I find it interesting that they sing a hymn of thanksgiving and praise. Verse 26, "After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives." My what a lesson there is for all of us, despite the difficulties that are known, as well as unknown, we still have a song to sing because of what Christ has done, amen? So let's sing it with all of our hearts. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. May they bear much fruit in our heart to the praise of your glory. And Lord, for those who may not know what it is to truly, be born again, to truly be saved, to truly be in a right relationship with you through faith in Christ, Father, I pray that you will bring such overwhelming conviction to their soul that today will be the day that they bow in humble recognition of their sinfulness and embrace the cross fully, and experience the miracle of the new birth. And then live to the praise of your glory. We thank you; we give you praise in all things, that in all of our lives, Christ might have the preeminence. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles this morning and turn to Mark 13, we will continue our verse-by-verse examination of this gospel. We're going to be looking at verses 32 through 37, in a few minutes, and then we're going to launch from there into Revelation 19. And this is actually the seventh and final part of a study on Jesus's prophetic discourse on the end of the age. It's exciting to see what God has revealed to us in His word concerning how things are ultimately going to end up, I'm glad to know what the final chapter is going to look like because right now, it would seem like the world is out of control; that there's a train that has lost its brakes, and it's winding around a mountain. And it's inevitably going to crash. And I think that's how most people feel.

Jesus has been responding to the disciple’s questions regarding the when and the what; in other words, the nature and the duration of Israel's desolation, and the sign of his coming, of his appearing. And he has described six very specific signs called "birth pangs." Including the abomination of desolation and so forth, that will occur just before he returns. Then he elaborated on the sequence of events that will lead up to his glorious appearing, the ultimate and unmistakable sign of his very presence, visible for the whole world to see. And he warns the generation that will be alive during that time, about the nature of his pre kingdom judgments, that which will occur during the time of the tribulation. But in so doing, every believer who has access to the Bible, can be profoundly blessed. Because again, we see here how the story ends; we see how God is ultimately going to fulfill his covenant promises to Israel, how he's going to defeat Satan, judge the world and ultimately bring glory to himself.

Now, before we look at the text, I would like to remind you that in Jesus’ day in the first century, although most of Judaism was thoroughly apostate, they nevertheless had a very accurate understanding of eschatology. Even without the help of the New Testament revelation, in fact, in Emil Schurer's classical work entitled "A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus," he outlines the Jewish understanding of the "eschaton," of the last things; concepts derived from the Old Testament which bear remarkable resemblance to the pre-millennial motifs, and themes that I've just described, and that we've studied.

According to Jewish eschatology, I'll just kind of list some bullet points. They believe that there would be a coming tribulation and confusion upon the earth, called "messianic woes." That Elijah would come before Messiah. They believed in the appearance of the Messiah, a final attack by the nation's own Messiah, and then a destruction of those powers; a restoration of the Jews, according to Ezekiel 40, through 48. And then a return of dispersed Israel, Kingdom glory with Jerusalem at the center, a renewal of the world and a general resurrection and final judgment. That's what they believe.

Now, as Christians, I want you to bear in mind the big picture of what is happening in redemptive history. In fact, this is a bit of a summary of the entire Bible, if you will remember that there are just two simple dominant themes in Scripture. Number one, we see that God is going to redeem the people. And number two, he is going to restore the Kingdom. Very simple. He's going to redeem the people. And of course, this is pictured throughout Scripture, with Jesus being the sacrificial lamb, the Savior, the suffering servant. But also with respect to restoring the kingdom, we read about him as the Lion of the tribe of Judah, as the Messiah King. We see a picture of a promise lamb and Genesis after the original sin. You remember when God killed an innocent animal to be a substitute that had to die to cover sin; a shadow of a coming Redeemer that would one day make atonement for sin, pointing to Christ. We see this Lamb pictured in the deliverance of Egypt in the sacrificial system and prophesied all through the Old Testament. And then we see he arrives in the Gospels.

And in the gospels, we see Christ in his humiliation, the Lamb that opened not his mouth; the one who died to save sinners. But also, all through the New Testament, we see him portrayed as king. As we learn more about his plan of redemption, we learn about the signs that point to him as the King of kings, and how we are to live for his glory. Again, bear in mind, the Gospels present him in his humiliation as the sacrificial Lamb. But in the book of Revelation, he's depicted in his exultation, as the Lion of Judah; as the king of Israel, who has promised to return and establish a glorious kingdom, where he will put his glory on display for 1000 years; a millennial kingdom that will be the consummating bridge between human history and the eternal state. Now, that's the big picture.

As we come back to Mark's gospel, we've seen that four times in these final verses of Mark 13, Jesus solemnly warns the generation that we'll be living in that day to stay alert. And this ultimately applies to us as well in a little bit different way, as we will see. Although the events leading up to his arrival, will cause them to know the general time of his return; the exact moment of his appearing is unknown, so they have to stay alert. And this brings us to verse 32. "'But of that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.'" Now, bear in mind, during the Incarnation, Jesus deliberately set aside temporarily certain aspects of his divinity. And indeed, in his incarnation, he did not know the specific moment of his future arrival. But he did know the signs that would lead up to that certainly, he knows it now. And so in verse 33, he goes on to say, "'Take heed, keep on the alert; for you do not know when the appointed time will come.'"

I might add, that every generation should remain vigilant. As we fervently anticipate our translation into glory, when he comes to snatch away his church in the rapture of the church, which will take place prior, I believe, to Daniel's 70th week, which is distinctively Jewish in nature. In First Thessalonians 1:10, the apostle Paul says that we are "...to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come." He will take us out and then pour out His wrath upon the earth during the time of the tribulation. But we have to remember that we are at war, we need to stay alert. There's no place for complacency in the Christian life.

Now back to Mark 13. Next, Jesus gives the tribulation saints an analogy to emphasize this need to stay alert. Notice what he says beginning in verse 34, "'It is like a man away on a journey, who upon leaving his house and putting his slaves in charge, assigning to each one his task, also commanded the doorkeeper to stay on the alert. Therefore, be on the alert - for you do not know when the master of the house is coming, whether in the evening, at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning - in case he should come suddenly and find you asleep. What I say to you, I say to all, 'Be on the alert.''"

We see Luke adding further insight into Jesus' warning when he records this in Luke 21 beginning in verse 34, "'Be on guard, so that your hearts will not be weighted down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of life, and that day will not come on you suddenly like a trap; for it will come upon all those who dwell on the face of the of all the earth. But keep on the alert at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are about to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.'" John MacArthur adds this, quote, "Though the events predicted in the Olivet Discourse are still future, it's truth serves to instruct every generation of believers throughout church history. On the one hand, it serves as a vivid reminder that the things of this world are temporary, and that the redeemed are citizens of an eternal kingdom that is yet to be revealed on earth when the Lord comes in glory. On the other hand, it provides a compelling motivation for believers to proclaim the glorious gospel of Christ, to those who are perishing, so that they might be saved from the impending judgment of God."

Now, let's project ourselves into the future. What will the people see when the Lord Jesus Christ descends to earth in his pre-incarnate glory, attended by the heavenly hosts of his heavenly angels, and his glorified saints? What will it be like when the world will behold the Lord our God; the one that they have mocked for so many millennia? What will it be like when they see his utter transcendence? When they see his consummate perfections, when they see his eternal glory? And what will they think when they witness the climax of human history? The climax of the Christian's hope; the fulfillment, yeah, the vindication of every saint down through redemptive history. I mean, think of this folks with unimaginable majesty and uncontested regal authority, the Lord Jesus Christ is going to come as both a judge and warrior; the Messiah, the warrior king. The king of kings, and the Lord of lords. And he will return as he promised, physically, to exercise his judicial power, and to destroy the remaining Christ haters on the earth, who have mocked him. The ones who have survived so far, the pre-kingdom judgments, of the past several years before he would return. And he's going to crush the Antichrist. He is going to defeat his minions, he's going to bind Satan, and he will put an end to all of man's foolish politics; to abolish all rule and authority. When Christ returns, man's long rebellion against God will be crushed. My how I long for that day. Don't you get tired of seeing our Lord so defiled so mocked and ridiculed? The Messianic Kingdom of Old Testament prophecy, long anticipated by both Jews and Gentiles will finally be established upon the earth for 1000 years, as God has promised, leading to the eternal and universal judgment of both the living and the dead.

Now, to further elaborate on this, I would like to take you to the book of Revelation, the book of Revelation turned to Revelation chapter 19. I just returned with several of our dear people, some couldn't be with us today, some are still in Europe. But we just came back from an educational tour of Turkey and Greece retracing Paul's second missionary journey, and we went down into the Aegean Sea, and we were able to visit the Isle of Patmos, to be able to see the cave that John stayed in. Tradition has it, pretty strongly, that this is where he was. And so with this in mind, I can just imagine in my mind's eye where John was when he received the Apokalypsis lesou Christos, the revealing of Jesus Christ; the revelation of Jesus Christ. And one of the things that I can tell you firsthand, having been, for example, in Ephesus and Corinth, and Athens, I can tell you that all you will see are ruins. Zeus and Athena didn't do all that they promised. All of the gods, the pantheon of gods of Greece and Rome, are dead. In fact, they never even existed. How sad. The idols of those ancient civilizations were all powerless. Even the human emperors that they would deify. ("Is that better?" audio glitch being fixed). Even the human Emperor's that they would deify are all dead. I mean, think about it. They worship the Pharaohs of Egypt; dead. They worship Nebuchadnezzar of the Babylonians; they worshiped Cyrus of the Medes and the Persians. They worship Alexander the Great of Greece. And they worshiped all of the Caesars of Rome. They're all dead. Oh, they're still alive, but they're in the torments of hell. It's so sad to see paganism. And today, it is still there, even though they worship in different ways. I think of going into Turkey, in what used to be Constantinople. Now, it's Istanbul, 21 million people, secular Muslims, and to see that these people have no understanding of who Christ is and don't want to know. Greece is different, but it's still a pagan land. So, so sad.

Folks, there is only one God who exists in three persons--the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And that's what God brought to those lands many years ago. The apostle Paul in particular sowed the seeds of the gospel, and many were saved. And it is the unrivaled preeminence of the Lord Jesus Christ that is the chief object of our praise, not some idol that we have manufactured in our mind. We must bear in mind that he is the Creator, he is the sustainer. He is the deliverer. He is the controller. He is the Redeemer, and he is the consummate author of all things. And he is coming again. In fact, the prophet Isaiah tells us in 46, verse nine, "For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, 'My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.'" And what is that? To redeem his people and to restore his kingdom. And it is his glory, that is at the very center of gravity of the theological universe, and it is his glory that our lives should orbit around that is the center of gravity for every believer. As the inspired Psalmist declared in Psalm 96, verse 10, we must do this, "Say among the nations, 'The Lord reign; indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved; he will judge the peoples with equity.' Let the heavens be glad and let the earth rejoice; et the sea roar and all it contains; let the field exult, and all that is in it. Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy before the LORD, for He is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His faithfulness."

Now, back to our text as we consider Jesus' Olivet Discourse, his final words concerning his glorious return, I'd like to, kind of, further ignite your hearts about what this return is going to look like because God has given us a glimpse of it in Revelation 19, for example, verses 11 through 21. And there are four themes concerning what I would call the warrior king that emerged from this text that I would like to look at, briefly here with you this morning. We're going to look at his arrival, his army, his authority and his attack, very simple.

Again, what must have gone on through John's mind as he witnessed the glorious future that awaited him and all of the saints? I'm sure the sufferings of Patmos paled into insignificance as he beheld the ineffable realities of God's sovereign purposes, to bring glory to himself. So we began with verse 11. This is really the first scene shall we say that introduces all the others. This is under the first heading, his arrival, verse 11, "And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war." This is an absolutely amazing scene, to see the spiritual world, beyond the veil of our limited sight. "I saw heaven opened." As I reflected upon this, John is one of the few that God selected to witness heaven being opened. You remember prior to this, he witnessed mighty angels of judgment, quote, "coming down out of heaven." We see this in chapter 10, verse one; chapter 14, verse 17; Chapter 18 and verse one. Imagine that you could see this. And now in chapter 19, moments before he sees heaven opened, and beholds, the Lord of glory on a white horse. He says in verse one, "I heard something like a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven saying, 'Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God.'" And now here in verse 11, we see the reality of these words. Okay?

Again, verse 11, "And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse, and He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war." Think what a stark contrast this is. From the first time he came in obscurity, and in humiliation. Remember, the king came into Jerusalem riding a donkey, a beast of burden. And indeed, he was coming there to bear the burden of our sins. But now he symbolically rides a magnificent mount, a steed of splendor, if you will. The kind of that conquering generals would ride into Rome. In the great processional marches of triumph. A white horse of triumph really points to his uncontested authority. And notice the rider here, "He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True." I mean, can there be a more perfect title for the King? Can there be a more fitting description of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ? I think not. Notice, first John learns that he who sat upon the white horse is called "Faithful and True." Alright? Faithful, as we know, carries the force of being totally trustworthy, totally dependable. Did not the distraught Prophet express his hope in the Lord saying in Lamentations 3:22, "The Lord's loving kindnesses indeed never cease, for his compassions never fail; they are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness." We just sang it a few minutes ago. And in Second Thessalonians three and verse three, the apostle Paul says, "the Lord is faithful, and He will strengthen and protect you from the evil one." And did not the Apostle Paul comfort us in First Corinthians 10:13, saying, "God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able." Oh, dear Christian, this is our faithful Savior, and King, who will sit upon the steed of final triumph.

And notice he is also "True." This term carries the idea of real or genuine. In other words, he is the very essence of truth. John 14, verse six, "'I am the way and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me.'" John said of him in First John 5:20, "And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life." My, what a contrast to our politicians, that we can't trust. So here the Lord describes himself as trustworthy, the very essence of truth. Earlier in chapter three and verse 14, he is described as, quote, "...the faithful and true witness."

Now practically speaking, in our world of satanic deception, of smoke and mirrors; of fake news; of the instability and unfaithfulness and lies, isn't it wonderful that we can rest assured that our Savior, our Lord, and our King is absolutely faithful and true. Notice also it says, "...and in righteousness He judges and wages war." Now think about it, here we see both the motive and the mission of his return. He's coming to judge and to conquer. We know from other passages that he is going to conquer the beast, the Antichrist. He will be vanquished and all who have opposed him will be punished. And in verse 12, he goes on to say and, "...his eyes are a flame of fire..." This symbolism can also be seen in chapter one and verse 14 and chapter two and verse 18. And it speaks of certainly the fierceness of his wrath against his enemies. But it also speaks of the penetrating eyes of his divine omniscience, that can, like a laser, burn through every barricade of rebellion; every fortress of deception and search and destroy hardened sinners. Daniel witnessed this as well in chapter 10 and verse six, when he beheld the pre-incarnate Christ. There we read, "His body was also like beryl, his face had the appearance of lightning, his eyes were like flaming torches, his arms and feet like the gleam of polished bronze, and the sound of his words, were like the sound of a tumult." Beloved, please hear me, this is my Savior, and my King, and my Lord, I hope he is yours.

And here we are reminded of what the author of Hebrews has said in chapter four verse 13, "There is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." He also tells us that upon his head are many diadems. You see, this is the crown of royalty. A ruler's crown was always emblematic of a king's authority. And we know that it was the ancient custom of conquering kings, to place their foot upon the neck of a vanquished king, and place that king's crown upon their head, to demonstrate how that they had completely subjugated that fall. In fact, many of the ruins that you will see in the Middle East are great statutes. Statues of this very thing.

But John sees something else that identifies this rider. Notice at the end of verse 12, "...and He has a name written upon Him which no one knows except Himself." Now, obviously, it's futile to speculate what that name might be. He alone knows what it is. He alone knows what it means. It was inscrutable to John, it's inscrutable to us and here we are reminded, are we not, of the ineffable, indescribable nature of our Savior King. Perhaps in glory, we will know what that name is; we're not told.

But notice what else John sees as he witnesses the arrival of the warrior king in verse 13, he says, "He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood." Robe here is a term, "himation"--it was a cloak that was worn by a horseman, but especially the cloak of a Roman general. And I want you to understand, this has nothing to do with the blood of Christ shed upon the cross. The context here has nothing to do with his work of atonement, or His work of redemption. It has everything to do with war. This is a reference to the blood of his enemies. And this imagery is drawn from Isaiah 63, especially verses one through six, where we read about this time of God's vengeance upon the nations that will come? He says, "Who is this who comes from Edom." Edom, by the way, here represents the world that hates Christ-- "...with garments of glowing colors from Bozrah." Bozrah was the ancient capital of Edom, that wicked civilization. "This One who is majestic in his apparel, marching in the greatness of his strength? It is I who speak in righteousness, mighty to save. Why is Your apparel red, and Your garments like the one who treads in the wine press? I have trodden the wine trough alone, and from the peoples there has no man with Me. I also trod them in My anger and trampled them in My wrath; and their lifeblood is sprinkled on My garments, and I stained all My raiment. For the day of vengeance was in My heart, and My year of redemption has come. 'I looked, and there was no one to help, and I was astonished and there was no one to uphold; so My own arm brought salvation to Me, and My wrath upheld Me. And I trod down the peoples in My anger and made them drunk in My wrath, and I poured out their life blood on the earth." So the imagery of the King clothed with a robe dipped in blood, speaks of the slaughter of Armageddon. When the Lion of the tribe of Judah reeks vengeance on his enemies.

And then the scene of his arrival closes with yet another mention of the warrior Messiah's name. It says, verse 13, "..and His name is called The Word of God." The inspired apostle also records this same concept and his gospel referring to Christ Jesus, remember in John one, one, as the Logos - the word of God. And now here again, he learns afresh that, "...His name is called The Word of God." And, of course, this speaks of the revelation of the purposes of God; His purposes that are being fulfilled even now but will find their full expression in the person and work of Christ at the end of the age.

So first, John speaks of the warrior king’s arrival; secondly, his army, verse 14, "And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses." My friends, this is the regiment of the redeemed, I like to call it. This is consistent with chapter 17, verse 14, quote, those who are with actually the King of kings and Lord of lords, "...are the called and chosen and faithful." In other words, this regimen is made up of the elect of God. This is further confirmed by their attire, notice they're clothed in "fine linen, white and clean." And this is the same portrayal that's used in verses seven and eight of chapter 19, to describe the Lamb's bride, the bride of Christ, who has quote, "...made herself ready. And it was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints." And we know that when we come to saving faith in Christ, and the Spirit of God causes us to be born again. We are declared righteous, we are justified and at that point, we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ; His righteousness is imputed to us. That's what he's speaking about here. Folks, this is the regiment of the redeemed. It's also important to remember that we're merely going to accompany our commander, we're not going to be fighting. And Paul tells us in Colossians, three and verse four, "When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory."

And I might add, just parenthetically, that the unarmed troops can really be placed in four categories, you're going to have the bride of the Lamb, which will include the rapture church, described earlier in chapter 19. Then you're going to have the tribulation saints; those saints that are going to be saved during the tribulation, who are pictured in heaven, in the identical attire that we read about in chapter seven and verse nine, and then the Old Testament saints who will be resurrected at the end of the tribulation, according to Daniel 12, verses one and two. And finally, the angelic host of heaven that Jesus describes in Matthew 25, verse 31. Also, Second Thessalonians one seven, and there we read, "...when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus."

So we've seen his arrival in his army. Notice next, his authority, in verse 15. And "From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may smite the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty." You see, the weaponry of the warrior king speaks of his divine authority, and it consists here of both a sword and a rod. And this imagery is also drawn from Isaiah's prophecy concerning the righteous reign of "the Branch," which is a messianic title in the Old Testament, let me read a little of this for you. And by the way, this is how you know how to interpret some of these passages; you see where these terms are used in other places. In Isaiah, chapter 11, verse one, we read that, "A shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse, and a branch from its roots will bear fruit."

Now let me pause there for a moment. Remember the Assyrians, they came in and they destroyed the northern kingdom. Then you have the Babylonians coming in and basically and all of the others that followed. And so it's like, the Davidic dynasty, the Jews, they're just gone, right? That's what many thought. But we're seeing here that a shoot it's going to spring up, it's like a shoot from a stump. You know, we've got trees like that here, unfortunately, you know, you cut them down as low as you can and within a few weeks, you begin to see branches coming up out of it again. That's the imagery here. He goes on to say, verse four, speaking about this shoot, the branch from the Davidic dynasty, referring ultimately to the Lord Jesus Christ, the greater son of David, "but with righteousness," verse four, "he will judge the poor and decide with fairness for the afflicted of the earth. And He will strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips, He will slay the wicked." Here we see that Christ alone will slay the wicked with just the power of his Word, including the arrogant antichrist. You will remember that Paul described his arrogance, and his very nature in Second Thessalonians two and verse eight. He's described as "the lawless one, whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming." And notice in verse 15, he wields the sword of his retribution, why? "That he may smite the nations."

Now we know in chapter one and verse 16, that "out of His mouth, comes a sharp two-edged sword." And there he is depicted as the Lord of the church who protects the church from the onslaughts of Satan. And then in chapter two and verse 16, he says that he quote, makes war against them with the sword of his mouth, okay, but here his sword, quote, "smites the nation" as he delivers Israel, from the hour of their greatest peril, and he puts an end to all who rebelled against Him. Bear in mind that when he returns, he will destroy all of the wicked gathered against Israel in the slaughter of Armageddon.

I was talking with some of my Jewish friends, one in particular that I was with while I was overseas, and it's so sad to see the world turning against Israel. Even though many of the peoples of the world for example, the people in Iran, they love the Israelis, the people in Turkey love the Israelis, people in Greece love, they vacation there, but it's their leaders that are militant Islamic fundamentalists that hate them. And you see how the whole world is being gathered together in this antisemitism, but we know that he's going to preserve a remnant of his elect from both Israel and from the Gentile nations. But the remaining unregenerate people on the earth will stand condemned before the warrior king.

I might add that it will be at that time, when he returns, that He will separate them; the sheep and the goats in that judgment. Read about that in Matthew 25:31, through 46. And at the end of that section, the Lord says something very powerful, "and these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." And then after rendering judgment upon the wicked, God's own mediatorial King--the greater son of David, the son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ--will finally put an end to Satan's long misrule upon the earth, through the agency of ungodly men. And we see further evidence of his regal authority in the next part of this verse 15, at the end, "...and He will rule them with a rod of iron..." A rod of iron, this is the same term in Hebrew for a king's scepter, a "shavat," a king's scepter; a symbol of rule. And here we see the combining of the king, as well as the shepherd. And we see this combination used throughout the Old Testament. He's the one who, not only as a Shepherd leads and provides and nurtures, but he also protects, and he delivers. And he avenges. And indeed, the scepter of the monarch always symbolizes the authority that God has granted to the Messiah King to rule over the nations. And he will do so with unassailable might and unrivaled authority. My, how I long for that day. And again, dear friends, this is my Savior. This is my king; I hope he is yours.

And it's amazing, in Revelation two beginning of verse 26. Jesus has also promised that quote, "overcomers," will rule with Him. By the way, overcomers, that's a designation of true Christians that persevere, even in the midst of great trial. And the only way any of us will ever persevere in the fires of extreme adversity, is by the power of the indwelling Spirit; we could never do it on our own. So they're called overcomers, and says, They will rule with him. And there we read it again, Revelation two, verse 26, "'He who overcomes, and he who keeps My deeds until the end, TO HIM I WILL GIVE AUTHORITY OVER THE NATIONS; AND HE SHALL RULE THEM WITH A ROD OF IRON, AS THE VESSELS OF THE POTTER ARE BROKEN TO PIECES, as I also have received authority from My Father.'" So when we return with him, we also will rule and reign with Him.

So again, verse 15, and, "From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it, He may smite the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron." At that time, all of the rebellion will cease, and his law will be the only law. I notice here in verse 15, it says, "And He;" this is a repetition from the preceding clause denoting the idea in the original language that he, himself, he alone will do this. And this graphic symbolism of an absolute bloodbath, is drawn from the ancient practice of winemaking where people would literally, and I'm sure you've seen pictures of this, they would use their bare feet to trample grapes in a large vat to acquire the juice for making wine.

And the language that is used here is derived from two Old Testament texts, Isaiah 63, one and four in particular that I just read a minute ago, but also in Joel three, in verse 11, Joel three verse 11, and following, "Hasten and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves there. Bring down, O LORD, Your mighty ones. Let the nations be aroused, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat." "Jehoshaphat" means "YAWEH Judges;" "For there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine press is full; the vats overflow, for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. The sun and moon grow dark and the stars lose their brightness. The LORD roars from Zion and utters His voice from Jerusalem and the heavens and the earth tremble. The LORD is a refuge for His people, and a stronghold to the sons of Israel. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God, dwelling in Zion, My holy mountain. So Jerusalem will be holy, and strangers will pass through it no more."

And then as if to underscore the absolute authority of the Warrior King, John sees a prominent name written even further on the Lord; this may be a banner that's draped across his shoulders, we don't know, or across his chest or hung from his side. But in verse 16, we read, "And on His robe and on His thigh, He has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.'" Beloved, Israel's long anticipated Messiah will finally ascend to his earthly throne in a literal Jerusalem and establish a literal kingdom, as he has promised. And all of the unconditional, irreversible covenants that God has given Abraham and David and even the New Covenant, all of those will finally be fulfilled to the letter; the seventh eighth week of pre kingdom judgments prophesied by Daniel will finally be over.

And in closing just a footnote, in the present church age we're looking for the rapture. In fact, the objective of the entire 70 weeks of judgment, bear in mind, is for Israel, not the church. I do not see the church involved in any of this. Daniel 9:24, "70 weeks had been decreed for Your people in Your holy city." And here's why, "...to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and anoint the most holy place." These were promises pertaining to Israel's messianic kingdom. The Lord promised that the church would be "kept from"-- Revelation 3:10, "kept from the hour of testing; that hour which is about to come upon the whole world." Again, I believe that the Gentile church has temporarily replaced rebellious Israel as the custodians of divine truth. But that church will be snatched away. Remember, we will be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye and then God will resume his final seven years of judgment upon his chosen nation, Israel. That again is Daniel 70th week, you can read about that in Daniel 9:24, and following.

And also bear in mind that the rapture of the church is a sign less event, it could happen right now. But the Second Coming has many signs. And I might also add that we are looking for Christ, not the Antichrist. We are looking for Christ, not the Antichrist. In the rapture, the Lord comes for his saints, and we meet him in the air. And the second coming, he comes with his saints. It's very different. And all other views apart from a Pretribulation rapture tend to cause men to be preoccupied with themselves, rather than Christ, who is our hope.

I might add, just very practically, I fear there's far too many Christians who devote themselves to preparing for survival during the time of the tribulation; are obsessed with politics and environment and social ills. And they arm themselves and all these things. By the way, when you read what's going to happen during the Tribulation, I don't think we will be here. But none of those things are going to help you. I don't care how good of a shot you are. All right? And this is a common device of the enemy. Be careful that you don't get ensnared with this. Has not Paul said, "...keep seeking the things above, where Christ is. Seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth." Colossians three, one. Now I'm all for having some extra water and protecting my family and all of that. But folks, we have a great commission and t's all about the gospel. It's not about getting ready to fight all of the bad people and being preoccupied with all of those things. That is a, that is a great distraction of the enemy that will bring you to ruin, it will cause you to forfeit divine blessing and actually place you in the pathway of divine chastening.

So in closing, I hope that each of you will examine your heart because the Lord Jesus Christ is my Savior, and he is my King. And I know he is, for most all of you, and I hope all of you, your Savior and your King, and he is coming again. Let's live in light of that. Let's be excited about that. Yes, the world will mock you, they will ridicule. You know, the Lord knows that. I mean, Satan is the god of this world right now. Right? But the purposes of God will not be thwarted. And let's be excited about these things. Let's be evangelistic and live to the praise of his glory. And as saints, rejoice in Christ, who is our hope, amen? Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. They bring such a joy to our heart, because we know that even though it appears that everything is opposed to the knowledge of Christ and the glory of the gospel, we know that in fact, you are ultimately in charge. And we know that you have promised to build your church, and that death itself cannot prevent that. Lord, thank you for saving us in eternity past, drawing us unto yourself. Thank you that we are a part of a love gift that the Father has given the Son. Thank you that there is nothing that can separate us from that love. So, Lord, take the words that we have studied today, apply them to our hearts, that you might be exalted in each one of us. I ask in the precious name of Jesus, our Savior and our Lord and King. Amen.

We come now to part six of Jesus's prophetic discourse on the end of the age and we find ourselves in Mark's gospel, chapter 13, verses 26 through 31. If you've been with us over the past five Sundays that I've talked about this, you realize we're going through Mark's account verse by verse. Before we look at the text, let me set the stage for what we are about to examine. Everybody that knows and loves Christ will acknowledge that our country is under God's judgment. We are experiencing the wrath of divine abandonment, whereby, consistent with Romans one, he has given this people over to the consequences of their depraved choices that they love so desperately. We see college campuses filled with chaos, people protesting against Israel, and demanding other leftist causes. I was reading that more than 22.3% of Generation Z adults now identify as LGBTQ plus. According to the Daily Mail, the number of transgender troops in the United States Army has doubled since 2020. The Pentagon has spent more than $26 million dollars treating transgender troops since 2020. According to the Department of Defense, the number of US Army staff with gender dysphoria has doubled in that time, from around 1800 to 3700. 65% of Americans do not approve of the Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. And a Rasmussen report that I read recently gives us a poll that shows that 41% of the United States voters say the country is likely to experience a second Civil War within five years. Folks, our only hope is in God, it's not in man. It's not in who gets elected next. And certainly, the return of Christ is ultimately what we look for, not the return, or the rising up of some great politician. And Jesus promised that he would return. But only after according to Mark 13, verse 19, "a time of tribulation such as has not occurred since the beginning of the creation, which God created until now, and never will." Mark 13:19. Indeed, the world is being prepared for the rule of the Antichrist. And then Christ will return and power and great glory.

But before that, Jesus tells us in our text this morning, that certain things are going to happen. Let me get a running start to this in verse 24 of Mark 13. Jesus says, "'But in those days, after that tribulation, THE SUN WILL BE DARKENED AND THE MOON WILL NOT GIVE ITS LIGHT, AND THE STARS WILL BE FALLING from heaven and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see THE SON OF MAN COMING IN CLOUDS with great power and glory. And then He will send forth the angels and will gather together His elect from the four winds from the farthest end of the earth to the farthest end of heaven. Now, learn the parable from the fig tree: when its branches already become tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. Even so, you too, when you see these things happening, recognize that He is near right at the door. Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away but My words will not pass away.'"

Here, the Spirit of God speaks to us, revealing to us where the world is heading, and gives us sobering warnings in all of these passages to help us understand what will come about on the face of the earth, especially for those who are alive during the time of the tribulation, the pre-kingdom judgments. And also in this text, he reassures us of the infallibility and the authority and the unchangeable nature of his word. Now, I've divided this section into three very simple headings that I hope will be helpful to you; three categories to grasp with the Spirit of God has to say. Number one, we're going to see the sign of his coming. Number two, the season of his coming and then finally, the surety of his coming.

First, let's look at the sign of his coming beginning in verse 26. "'Then they will see THE SON OF MAN COMING IN CLOUDS with great power and great glory.'" Now, you may recall, in the transfiguration when Jesus was on the mount with Peter, James and John, we had a preview of the glory of Christ, that will be seen when he returns. There you will recall the effulgence of his pre incarnate glory, burst forth from him. Glory that was veiled while he walked here on Earth in the flesh. Matthew tells us in chapter 17, verse two that, "...His face shone like the sun, and His clothes becameas white as light.'" Peter even reminds us of this occasion in Second Peter one beginning of verse 16. He said, "We did not follow cleverly devised tails when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty." Don't you wish you could have been there to have seen that? Ah, but we will. The apostle John described the same magnificent reality in Revelation one beginning of verse 14. There we read, "His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and his eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like burnished bronze when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and His voice was like the sound of many waters. In His right hand He held seven stars and out of His mouth came a sharp two-edged sword; and His face was like the sun shining in its strength." Can you imagine the horror on the face of the god mockers when the Lord Jesus Christ returns? Suddenly all of their perverted pride parades and all of their social justice demands, and all of their godless ideologies will dissipate like fog, when the sun rises. Matthew's account says this in Matthew 24, verse 30, "'And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky.'" Fascinating statement. The phrase, "the sign of"--the grammar here in the original language, does not refer to something pointing to the Son of Man, as it would be in what we would call an objective genitive, but rather the sign will be the Son of Man of subjective genitive. In other words, against the backdrop of all of this darkness and chaos, the ineffable light of the world, the Lord Jesus Christ will glaze forth in ways that we can't even imagine. Suddenly, the astounding, dazzling brilliance of his Shekinah will appear. And people will see the resplendent light of his majesty. And then according to Revelation, one seven, "...every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him; and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him."

Now, no student of the Bible would be unfamiliar with what the Lord Jesus is describing here, especially when it comes to this idea of the light of His presence, the light of His glory. You will recall that we can see this in the Old Testament. His presence led the children of Israel through the wilderness. It was a pillar of cloud by day and fire by night, leading them out of the bondage of Egypt through the wilderness. The light of his glory blazed forth on Mount Sinai at the giving of the law. And you will recall how the Shekinah blazed forth above the Ark of the Covenant between the outstretched arms of the cherubim, there in the Holy of Holies. And his first advent, we could see just the glowing light of his presence in his person, especially at the birth of Christ, when he was surrounded by light. Remember, in Luke two the angel announced his birth to the shepherds, and we read, "the glory of the Lord shown around them." And in Matthew two, we see the blazing light of God's presence that led the Persian kingmakers from the east to the very sight of their Savior and King. And later Jesus said in John 12, verse 46, "'I have come as'" a what? As "a light." "'I have come as a light into the world that everyone who believes in Me may not remain in darkness.'" So again, at the Transfiguration, we see the ineffable brightness of the glory of God that radiated from him affirming his transcendent majesty.

This, by the way, was the same light that Paul encountered on the road to Damascus. I want to digress for a moment to help you understand what I believe is important with respect to what Jesus is describing. We know that God is immaterial. And we see in Scripture that often when he would materialize himself, he would do so in this glorious light, which was called the Shekinah. It comes from a Hebrew word "mishkan", which means “to dwell.” So it's his presence that we see shining. And his presence would always be this resplendent, brilliant, unapproachable light. By the way, we had a little glimpse of this, did we not the other night here in Nashville, we got pictures of it when we saw the Aurora Borealis here in Nashville. Which I might say, pales into absolute insignificance compared to what it looks like in the north countries where I've been on many occasions, but it was still beautiful. But the prophet Daniel tells us in chapter two verse 22, that he emanates light without shadow saying "...light dwells with Him." And in Psalm 104, verse two, he covers himself "...with light, as with a garment." Paul describes Christ Jesus to Timothy in First Timothy six, verse 16, as quote, dwelling "in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and everlasting power." And John tells us in First John one five "...that God is Light, and in Him is no darkness at all." And what is truly fascinating is that scientists have no explanation for the origin of light. They cannot tell us where it came from. But of course, God has told us where it came from, in his self-disclosure in Scripture. On day one of creation, after creating the material universe, God created light by divine fiat. He spoke it into existence. Genesis one and verse three, "Let there be light and there was light, and God saw the light, and it was good." Instantaneously, think about this, the uncreated Creator of the universe, who dwells in unapproachable light, spoke the first light into existence.

Now, why it's easy for us to take for granted. Yet, it's an amazing thing, because when you think about it, it emanates from God who created it. Can you imagine a world without light, nothing would be able to exist. In fact, light is the single most important source of heat and energy on Earth. Light is the very essence of God that gives life to all things. Physicists struggled to understand light. And I struggled to understand what the physicists tell us about light, but I will do my best. They tell us that light is a form of energy that's made up of both particles and waves. That's what I thought, I'm sure that's what you thought to, right? And they tell us that light acts like particles, that light photons are like minuscule little bullets, that stream from its source and move at a measurable velocity. And of course, we know that, that's the speed of light. And when certain objects obstruct those tiny objects, we have shadows. But light is also very different from a particle, they tell us, it is also characterized as a wave that does not exist in finite space. In other words, it has no beginning. And it has no end. A perfect illustration of the eternally existent God that has created us; the one who was the Father of Light, the one who dwells in unapproachable light. And they tell us that live light waves are like ripples in space, instead of bullets. And this explains how rainbows work. They call it the wave particle duality. And it's one of the most mystifying aspects of physics. Light waves behave like particles, and the particle-like photons can behave like waves. Well, that clears it up for me, I'm sure it does for you, right? Isn't it funny, I mean, when you try to explain who God is, and what he has done, I mean we get some idea, but it's like whoa, it's beyond me. And they tell us that waves transfer energy from one point to another point without the transfer of matter. And so it's very different than the particle motion of photons, these waves are very different. And because light has both electric and magnetic fields, it is also referred to as electromagnetic radiation. Light waves come in a continuous variety of sizes and frequencies and energies. And this continuum of light waves is referred to as the electromagnetic spectrum. And what's really amazing is that the human eye cannot see light. Light is completely invisible; all we see is light interacting with the tiny particles of matter in the air that reflect it. And the colors we see in light depend upon varying wavelengths in the spectrum of light. In fact, they tell us that visible light occupies only 1/1000 of a percent of that spectrum of light. And think about that, and that minut portion of that spectrum, we can see all that we can see, all the beautiful colors.

They tell us that the energy spectrum of light goes from radio, to microwave to infrared, then you have visible light in the middle, then ultraviolet, X ray, gamma ray, and so forth. And it's absolutely staggering to me, that all that we can see, is able to be seen in that 1/1000 of a percent of that spectrum. And as I think about it, God has only allowed us to see a tiny bit of who he is. Yet in that miniscule range of spiritual light that he has given us, we see all of the dazzling realities of who he is. We can see his creation, and we can see him through his word. But oh dear friends, what will the world see when the glory of the Son of Man appears in the sky? Number 24 verse 17, the Prophet says, "...a star would come forth from Jacob." In Hebrew, a "kōkāb" have which is a blazing forth of light. You know, people say, Well, I just don't believe anything that I can't see. Well, one day you will see it. One day you will see it.

Now back to our text. In Matthew, I'm going to look at Matthew 24 verse 30, where Matthew is expanding on Mark's account, in verse 30, it says, "'And then the sign of the of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all of the tribes of the earth will mourn.'" Now, this will primarily be a mourning of despair over impending judgment. Most will be mourning over the terror of impending judgment. Some will mourn in heartfelt repentance. We read more about this in Zechariah 12, beginning in verse nine. And this portrays in a very graphic terms, the repentance of the Jewish people during that time. We read and, "In that day, I will set about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem." By the way, there we see, as in other places, that all of the nations are going to come against Israel. And we're already seeing that alignment, are we not? We see it in the United Nations and so forth. So there we have a prophecy of physical deliverance; the conquest of the promised land will finally be over. But God also promises a spiritual deliverance. He goes on to say, "I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only son. And they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn. In that day, there will be great mourning in Jerusalem, like the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the plain of Megiddo." That, by the way, is a reference to the death of Josiah recorded in Second Chronicles 35 that brought such mourning and such grief to the people.

So once again, Jesus says in Matthew 24:30, "'...all of the tribes..." --that could be translated "families"-- "of the earth will mourn.'" And again, most will be mourning in despair, the horrific prospect of divine judgment. And this is consistent with Revelation one in verse seven, where we read, "Behold, He is coming with the clouds, every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him." No doubt, in that day, many will be mourning over the blasphemies that they have spoken in the past weeks and months and years. Maybe they will come to mind at that point. In Revelation 16, verse nine, we read about this. Think about this, despite the inconceivable agonies of divine wrath that's being poured out upon the world during that time, in the pre kingdom judgments, we read, quote, "They blasphemed the name of God who has the power over these plagues, and they did not repent so as to give Him glory." And in verse 11, it goes on to say, "They blaspheme the God of heaven, because of their pains, and their sores, and they did not repent of their deeds." Verse 21, "And huge hailstones, about 100 pounds, each came down from heaven upon men, and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; because its plague was extremely severe." And Luke's account underscores, even more, the horror of those who reject Christ. In Luke 21, verse 25, Jesus says, "'There will be signs in sun and moon and stars and on the earth dismay among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, men fainting from fear and the expectation of the things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.'" Dear friends, today, men and women scoff and laugh, but a day is coming when that scoffing and that laughter will turn to trembling, and mourning. Jesus went on to say in that section in Luke 21, beginning verse 27, "'Then they will see THE SON OF MAN DCOMING IN A CLOUD with power and great glory.'"

Now back to Mark 13, verse 26, That's what he says, Jesus there, in that account, says, "'Then they will see THE SON OF MAN COMING IN CLOUDS with great power and glory.'" Matthew 24:30 says the same thing, "'They will see THE SON OF MAN COMING ON THE CLOUDS.'" He adds "'OF THE SKY with power and great glory.'" We're unsure what this means, can't be dogmatic, but it's probably a reference to a supernatural phenomenon that will occur when the glorious light of his presence will be seen around the globe all at one time. Daniel helps us see a bit of this in Daniel seven, and verse 13. And there God's revealing himself to Daniel as one who will be coming with "...the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming, and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him." And again, as I said earlier, Revelation one seven, "BEHOLD, HE IS COMING WITH THE CLOUDS and every eye will see Him..." I mean, this is an amazing scene. I try to visualize it as best I can, in my mind; suddenly then effable brilliance of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ will illuminate the whole world. And what's even more amazing is that when he appears, do you realize, we will be revealed with him in glory. The raptured church, the Bride of Christ, has been attending, quote, "the marriage supper of the Lamb" in Revelation 19 And verse seven, along with the Old Testament saints, quote, "Those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb," in verse nine. Apparently, both Old Testament believers who placed their faith in God's grace, before the Incarnation, along with his bride, who will need no invitation to the wedding feast, will accompany the Savior and King when he goes into battle, when he returns in power and great glory. In Revelation 19, verse 14, we read, "And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses." So we see here that somehow we will be an unarmed group of saints following him in his glory. He is armed, shall we say, with a broad sort of holiness in truth that's coming from his mouth, Revelation 19:15, "...that He may smite the nations and rule them with a rod of iron..." I remember the first time I was in Israel, a number of years ago, and I ascended up to Mount Carmel. That's where Elijah battled the prophets of Baal, you recall in First Kings 18. And I gazed across the vast valley of Megiddo, where the battle of Armageddon will be fought, or at least that's the main staging area; much of it will be fought all the way into Jerusalem. And I thought about these amazing truths that one day as one of his own, I will be with him, and I will be revealed with him in glory as he descends upon a wicked world. And I was trying to imagine what will that be like, as I look above this vast valley, following the invincible warrior king as he enters the fray, a heavenly army of overcomers. I remember it just brought tears to my eyes. And there was a hymn that came to my mind, "Lead on Oh King eternal, we follow not with fears, for gladness breaks like morning, where er they face appears. Thy cross is lifted or us we journey in its light, the Crown awaits the conquest, Lead on, oh God of might."

So indeed, he will come, as Jesus said in Matthew 24:30, "...with power and great glory." Bear in mind, dear friends, the first time he came, he came in humility. But not so the second time, he will come in glory. The first time he came in obscurity, the second time, nobody will miss him. The first time he came, there was no room for him in the inn. The second time he comes, the whole universe will not be able to contain his glory. The first time he came to seek and to save sinners. The second time he comes, he will come to conquer and judge sinners. The first time he came, the world mocked him and crucified him. But when he returns again, they will bow before him and indescribable horror as they await their sentence. Indeed, he will come in power to defeat all who oppose him. All of the scoffers will be silenced forever. And he will come in his unveiled glory, something that no human is ever seen completely. He will be accompanied by quote "many 1000s of His holy ones," according to Jude 14; which will include both angels and the raptured saints.

Colossians three, verse four, Paul says, "When Christ, who is our life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory." Let that sink in for a minute. First Thessalonians three verse 13. He says that "He may establish your hearts with without blame and holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints." You see at the translation of the saints, when he takes the world away in the rapture, he will come for his saints, but when he returns the second time, he will come with his saints. Revelation 19, verse 14, "...and the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, we're following Him on white horses." Symbolic of just the glory of what is going to transpire. It will be a time of judgment, but also a time of reconciliation for his elect remnant; a time of renovation, when he will return the world back to Edenic splendor. The long-awaited promises to Israel will finally be fulfilled. You must understand that at this point, the fullness of the Gentiles as described in Romans 11, verse 25, will finally come to fruition. And as it says in verse 26, "...and thus all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB.'" And then Jesus adds this in Mark 13:27, "'And then He will send forth the angels and will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the farthest end of the earth to the farthest end of heaven.'" And Matthew's account of our Lord's words, in Matthew 24, verse 31, says, "'And He will send forth His angels with A GREAT TRUMPET and THEY WILL GATHER TOGETHER His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.'"

Now, this is an astounding thought. A mighty host of holy angels will gather the remnant of his elect to receive the rewards and eternal blessings as they prepare to enter into the millennial kingdom; not only those who trusted Christ during the seven-year tribulation, but also the Old Testament saints will receive their resurrection bodies, according to First Corinthians 15, verse 23. And unbelievers also will be brought before their judge. We read about this in our Lord's words in Matthew 13, beginning in verse 39, he says, "...and the enemy who sowed them is the devil, and the harvest is the end of the age; and the reapers are angels. Therefore, just as the tares are gathered up and burned with fire, so it shall be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks, and those who commit lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire; in that place, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"

Let me pause here to remind you, that what he's talking here talking about here, is the solitary confinement of an eternal hell. This is not going to be party time, as some mistakenly believe. In fact, in Revelation 20 and verse 10, we read that, "The devil who deceived them who was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever." Many people reject the doctrine of eternal hell. And the reason they do so is because they have a low view of God and a high view of man. If you do not understand the transcendent otherness--the holiness of God--then you will think that he is not all that different than we are, and that we're not all that bad. But dear friends the chasm between his holiness and our sinfulness is beyond anything that you could even begin to imagine. The end of that section in Matthew 13, verse 43, Jesus said, "'Then THE RIGHTEOUS WILL SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears let him hear.'" I pray, my friends, that you have ears to hear. Another description of this reaping is found in the Apostle Paul's words in Second Thessalonians, one beginning of verse six. He says, "For after all, it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God, and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed--for our testimony to you was believed." Once again, lest anyone laughs at what God has promised in his word, if you do not belong to Him, this will be your fate. And that's why Jesus says, "'He who has ears let him hear.'"

So we've seen the sign of his coming, secondly, the season of his coming; verse 28, "'Now learn the parable from the fig tree: when its branches has already become tender, it puts forth its leaves, and you know that summer is near.'" So here. Jesus is giving a very uncomplicated parable to help the disciples understand what the signs will--that he's just been describing--what will happen and what you need to be looking for. And he's speaking primarily now to the Jewish remnant that will be alive during that time. He speaks about when the "parousia" is about to occur--the manifestation, the presence of Christ at his return. And that, by the way, is very important here; hat's the dominant theme of his entire discourse here--the return of the Lord Jesus Christ. And notice he says here in verse 28, "'Now learn.'" See this is more than just an intellectual understanding about something, but it speaks of a wholehearted reception of truth that motivates your entire life. In fact, the apostle Paul, used this term in Philippians 4:11. It says that Paul, quote, "...learned to be content in whatever circumstances..." God placed him in. In other words, Paul grasped the truth of divine sovereignty to such a degree, that his understanding shaped his life. So he could relax in the midst of his sorrow; he could be content and not complain. So likewise, Jesus is saying, "'Now learn the parable from the fig tree.'" In other words, let the simple analogy regulate your life. And he says in verse 28, "'...when its branch has already become tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near.'" We understand this, I mean, whether it's a fig tree or any other kind of tree, everyone knows that in the springtime, the sap begins to rise, and branches become pliable and tender, and you begin to see leaves budding and so forth. It's a sure sign that summer is right around the corner.

Verse 29, "'Even so, you too, when you see these things happening, recognize that He is near, right at the door.'" In other words, when you see these signs that he's been describing; these birth pangs, these pre-kingdom judgments; even as you know summer is near when the fig tree begins to bud in the springtime; when you see all of these signs, "...recognize that He is near, right at the door.'"

I might add that the pronoun "He" can also be rendered "it." "It is near." "It" referring to the glorious appearing of the king and the inauguration of the kingdom and so forth. In fact, Jesus said in Luke 21:31, "that the kingdom is near." So Jesus helps us understand the general timeframe, or the season of these events. And then he adds in verse 30, "'Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.'" It's interesting, the signs will not be stretched across 1000s or hundreds of years, but they're going to occur within the lifespan of the generation alive at that time. And I'll speak more to that in a moment. Other prophecies give amazing mathematical detail--and we've gone over many of these in the past--concerning the time of Daniel 70th week, Daniel nine, the seven years, the last half of the Tribulation Jesus described as "the great tribulation" in Matthew 24:21, lasting three and a half years as described in Daniel 7:25, Revelation 11 two through three, Revelation 12 and verse six, and so forth. And I might add that, in my humble opinion, this is further evidence that these prophecies are not to be spiritualized. They're not to be treated as some kind of a mysterious allegory and force into the events that occurred at ad 70. So the span, or the duration of these signs, these birth pangs, and all the events that Jesus has described, will occur before those witnessing them, it says, pass away. In other words, those who experienced the birth pangs will also experience the birth, if I can put it that way.

Now, it's important throughout his discourse, Jesus has been discussing those who will be living in the future. In verse four, "'See to it that no one misleads you.'" Verse six, you will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars. Verse nine, they will deliver you to tribulation, you will be hated by all nations on account of My name. Verse 15, "...when you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION..." Verse 23, "'Behold, I have told you in advance.'" So Jesus has been consistently speaking, prophesying, to a future generation, even as Daniel did, and the other prophets. Now some will argue that this term, "this generation," refers to the Jewish race that will not pass away until their Messiah ushers in the kingdom. That makes no sense to me. That seems contrived and confusing, even pointless. Of course, they will be alive. Moreover, if that was what Jesus meant, he would have simply stated "Israel" or "My people" will not pass away. Others will argue that since Jesus admitted in Matthew 24 verse 36, that he did not know, quote, "the day or the hour" that only the Father knows, that he just guessed and was referring to the disciple's generation, and it was kind of a bad guess. Well, so much for divine authority in Jesus teaching, right?

But in reality, during the time of his incarnation, you will recall that Jesus deliberately and temporarily set aside certain aspects of his divinity. In his incarnation, he admittedly did not know the specific moment of his future arrival, even though he did know the signs that we're going to lead up to it. Certainly he knows it now. And then others argue that "this generation" refers to those who were alive in Jesus' day, very popular view. Thus, they experienced all the events that Jesus described in Jerusalem in AD 70; that all of this was just talking about what happened at the fall of Jerusalem to the Romans. And I fear this position is fueled more by a commitment to preserve the philosophical system of Covenant Theology than the exegetical and contextual considerations of the text. If you begin with what I believe is an errant presupposition that insists that somehow the church has permanently replaced Israel, then you're going to interpret, you're going to have to interpret, the prophetic literature into such a way as to avoid any possibility of Israel as a nation ever becoming the undeserved recipients of divine blessing as God has promised them in the Abrahamic, Davidic, and New Covenants. Again, nothing that occurred in AD 70, in Jerusalem, compares to the universal scope, and the cataclysmic severity of the staggering events that Jesus, and the other prophets describe. Furthermore, given the exceedingly more horrific slaughter of the Jews, under the Nazis in the Holocaust, how would it make sense to say that all of these events occurred in ad 70? Because Jesus said in Matthew 24:21, "'...there will be a great tribulation, such as not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever shall. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved...'" Well, if that's referring to ad 70, how do you account for The Holocaust that was far greater than ad 70?

Also, I would humbly add, that such a view discounts the undeniable parallels that we see in the content and sequence of the events found in the Book of Revelation, which was written in 96 ad--long after the fall of Jerusalem. John MacArthur adds, perhaps the greatest single refutation of that view when he said, quote, "Most important of all, Jesus certainly did not appear then (referring to ad 70.) It is a strange logic," he says, "to argue that Jesus could accurately foretell the destruction of Jerusalem, some 40 years hence, but be mistaken about his returning at that time, or if at some suggest, the teaching here was merely symbolic and allegorical with the limited destruction of Jerusalem representing the vastly greater destruction of the end time. What event in AD 70 could possibly have symbolized Jesus return, which is the main subject of the discourse?" End quote. So I believe that the generation, of which Jesus refers, is that generation of people that will be alive during the tribulation.

We've seen the sign of his coming, the season of his coming, finally, the surety of his coming. This is so precious. Notice verse 31, "'Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.'" Indeed, we know from Scripture that Jesus has promised, this universe, this old universe, will soon pass away; it's filled with sin, it must be purged. And later it will be replaced with quote, "...a new heaven and a new earth.." Revelation 21 and verse one. And Peter tells us in Second Peter 3:10, "...the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up." And in Revelation 20 and verse 11, "Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them." That will be the judgment of the wicked as they stand in total space, no place to hide, no place to run, as they stand before the judge.

Folks, you want to remember, according to the Second Corinthians four and verse 18, "...we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." So again, Jesus says, "'Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.'" In other words, everything that I have promised is going to happen, just as I have said. Indeed, "His word endures forever", Psalm 19 and verse 19. And in Matthew five and verse 18, Jesus says, "'For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.'" Luke 16, verse 17, "'But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the Law to fail.'" Oh, dear Christian, what comfort we have in the unassailable and unchanging sovereignty of God. He has promised to do two primary things: to redeem his people and to restore his kingdom. And that is absolutely going to happen. What confidence we can have in his word.

May I remind you, as we bring this to a close this morning, folks, we serve a sovereign God, not a contingent God. He is the one, according to Isaiah 46 and verse 10, who has declared "...the end from the beginning..." And because of this, I want to leave you with three truths. Number one, God never changes his mind and pursues a Plan B, because Plan A was always perfect. First Samuel 15:29, we read, "Also the Glory of Israel will not lie or change His mind; for He is not a man, that He should change His mind."

Secondly, God does not make promises with his fingers crossed behind his back. His purposes is never change. Psalm 33 beginning of verse 11, "The counsel of the LORD stands forever, the plans of His heart from generation to generation. Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people whom He has chosen for His own inheritance." And in that great passage in Hebrews six beginning in verse 17, we read "...God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us."

And finally, God does not clearly say one thing, but in fact, mean something totally different. He did not clearly articulate what he was going to do in the Abrahamic, the Davidic, and the New Covenants, but really, in the back of his mind knew that none of those things, or most of those things, weren't really going to actually come true, especially the material blessings for Israel. But rather, one day people would wise up and see that all of that is merely spiritual talk merely an allegory. Isaiah 31, beginning of verse one, it says, in verse two, the Holy One of Israel, it says, "...does not call back His words." In Malachi three and verse six, "'For I, the LORD, do not change; therefore, you, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.'" And in Romans 11, verse 29, "...the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable."

Dear Christian, may you be encouraged as we think about these things. God is absolutely in control, he is going to accomplish his purposes; neither demon, nor man can thwart his purposes. And we can relax in that. And we can fearlessly proclaim the gospel, despite those that would mock us. May I also say that as undeserving sons and daughters of the kingdom, we should be captivated by a burden for the lost. We should have a heart to give the gospel to people in need. We need to love these people that so viciously hate us. We need to pray for them. We need to boldly stand in their face, and share the love of Christ forthrightly, but without compromise. We need to show mercy to them. We shouldn't disregard them. And in so doing, we prove as Paul said in Philippians, two verse 15, we prove ourselves to be quote, "...blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom we will appear as lights in the world." Will you join me as we close in prayer?

Father, as always, we rejoice in the hope that we have in Christ. We thank you that you have given us your word that gives us at least some general idea of how the story ends. And we rejoice knowing that it ends with you on the throne, but in a way that is visible to all those who mock that reality. And this morning, once again, I thank you that we don't mock that reality. Not because we're so smart, or we're so good, but solely because you have done a work of grace in our hearts. You've caused us to see the horror of our sin and the glory of the cross. You have forgiven us our sins because you gave us eyes to see. You cause us to be born again. You imputed the righteousness of Christ to our account. You made us new creatures in Christ. And now we have the hope of heaven. And we can understand your word because of the indwelling illuminating work of your Spirit, that we give you praise for all of these things. Cause us to be bold for the sake of Christ in the presentation of the gospel. And finally, Lord, if there be one here today that does not know you in a very real, personal way, I pray that you will bring such overwhelming conviction to their soul that they will have no rest until they come and throw themselves at the foot of the cross and receive the mercy that you will give all those who bow and repentant they. We thank you. We give you praise in Jesus' name and for his sake. Amen.

We return once again to our verse-by-verse examination of the gospel of Mark. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark 13. This morning, we will be looking at verses 14 through 26. And this is actually the fifth part of a series on our Lord's Olivet Discourse that I've entitled "Jesus Prophetic Discourse on the End of the Age."

Before we read the text and look at it closely, there are a few things that I would like to share with you with respect to some of the key essentials in understanding and interpreting Bible prophecy. As you are aware, we as a church, and certainly me as a pastor, are committed to a consistent literal, grammatical hermeneutic. Hermeneutics being the science and the art of biblical interpretation. Therefore, the prophetic Scriptures should be interpreted in a literal, natural, normal sense, taking into consideration figures of speech and, and symbols and so forth. Therefore, I reject the method of interpretation that believes that the prophetic Scriptures should be spiritualized or seen as some kind of an allegory; that you look for hidden meanings in the Old Testament passages, and then try to get the New Testament to somehow shape and inform those meanings. But from my perspective, when interpreted in a literal, clear cut, normal, consistent hermeneutic, the original message of the Old Testament authors will be continued in the New Testament. The narrative of the Old Testament prophets will be explained even further, not transformed. The New Testament doesn't transform what was said in the Old Testament, it doesn't transcend what was said in the Old Testament. Practically speaking, among other things, this means that Jesus is actually going to reign on this earth in an intermediate kingdom, prior to the eternal state, and this will happen between His Second Coming and the final consummation of all things, which will be the end of all things. And this particular position is known as premillennialism. I am unabashedly a pre millenarian. It's sometimes called Chiliasm, as well, from the Greek term that means 1000. And practically speaking, this simply means that as you look at the prophetic Scriptures, you must keep in mind that there is a distinction between Israel and the church; they are not one of the same thing. The church has not permanently replaced Israel.

Secondly, you have to realize that Israel has a future as God has promised, He is not finished with them. And thirdly, we must realize that there will be a literal kingdom on earth, where Christ will reign in all of his glory; that this will be preceded by a period of seven years judgment upon the earth, and especially upon Israel, consistent with Daniel 70th week that's detailed in Daniel 924, as Jesus declared in Matthew 24:14.

Now, this position I might add, contrary to the opinion of some, was not invented in 19th century Ireland by John Nelson Darby, who's considered the father of modern dispensationalism and futurism, and you may have seen some of his arbitrary charts and others have used things like that to somehow explain scripture. But clearly, the New Testament writers and the first century saints were premillennial. This was not some invented concept. In fact, in Acts chapter one and verse three, we read that Jesus presented himself alive after his suffering "by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of 40 days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God." Now, this would have been the absolute perfect time to tell them, guys look, you need to understand that the church now has replaced Israel, that all of those promises made in the Old Testament now need to be understood in a spiritual way; they will have a spiritual fulfillment in the church, that all the promises to ethnic Israel need to be understood in a spiritual way, they're not material, etc. But he obviously didn't tell them that, because what did they respond to him by saying in verse six? "So when they had come together, they were asking Him saying, 'Lord, is it at this time You're restoring the kingdom to Israel?'" Clearly, they were premillennial.

Moreover, Premillennialism was the Orthodox and exclusive view of the early church fathers. This would include all the major writers of the early periods of the church, even the disciples of the apostle John were premillennial. Men like Papias, the Greek apostolic father and Bishop of Hierapolis. Or like Polycarp of Smyrna, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian. And an examination of church history will reveal some very undeniable conclusions as my friend Dr. Doug Bookman, a New Testament scholar, has stated quote, "In the earliest days of Christianity, that is the centuries immediately after the apostles, Chiliasm, that is the persuasion that history would culminate with a 1000-year literal reign of Jesus on the earth, was virtually universal. The denial of Chiliasm and the concomitant rise of amillennialism were closely related to the acceptance of Christianity in the Roman Empire as a result of the conversion of Constantine and the subsequent rise of an official, authoritative centralized Church, which had a vested interest in the notion of a present spiritual kingdom. Throughout the eras of church history, there have been various groups of dissenting believers who affirmed and cherished the hope of Christ's earthly literal end time kingdom. When the Reformers, primarily Luther and Calvin, confronted and corrected the soteriological heresies of the Roman Catholic Church, they did not ultimately challenge or abandon the essential eschatology of that church." End quote. And so, I reject Roman Catholic eschatology, sometimes called amillennialism, or supersessionism. And my point with all of this is to simply say that when we approach the prophetic Scriptures, what you will see is that we will use a literal, grammatical hermeneutic that interprets all of Scripture, including the prophetic Scriptures in a literal, natural, normal sense. The church shares in the promises of Israel, but not in her unique identity as a nation. They are as Paul described them in Romans 11:16 through 24, the quote "natural branches" from a cultivated olive tree, some of which have now been broken off at the present time due to the hardening of their heart and the Gentile church is the wild olive branch that has been grafted into the quote, "rich root." The rich root of covenant or blessing, privileges originally promised to Abraham. And the church shares these promises with Israel, but never takes their place as a nation, despite the reject rebellion, even to this day. God has not abandoned them. He has not abandoned his chosen people. Paul understood this in Romans 9:10 and 11. You will remember in Romans nine you read about Israel's election, Romans 10, Israel's defection, Romans 11, Israel salvation when their Messiah King returns, and what an amazing history of these people.

Israel is a magnificent object lesson of how God deals with all mankind, saving some, judging others, all to reveal His glory, through the Lord Jesus Christ who is both Lamb as well as Lion. Who is both a suffering servant, as well as the conquering Sovereign King of Kings and Lord of lords. But before he returns, as we see in the prophetic Scriptures, Israel will experience tribulation as well as all of the people on the earth. And that's the thing that breaks my heart as I watch people today blindly following the insanity of our politicians and of Islam and on and on and on. Jesus said in Matthew 24:21 and following, before he comes, there will be a "'...great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'"

Now, as we approach our text with that little introduction, bear in mind that this is occurring on Wednesday evening before our Lord's crucifixion on Friday. Jesus is leaving the temple precincts with his disciples, making their way up the steep slopes of the Mount of Olives. That's why it's called the Olivet Discourse. And I've divided his lengthy answer to them under seven headings, we've looked at some of them already. We've looked at number one, the temples demolition, number two, the signs of the end, number three, the prospect of persecution. And the last time we were together, we looked some at number four, the abomination of desolation; we'll look at a little bit more of that today. But we're also going to examine number five, numbers five and six, the false Christ and prophets, the coming of the Son of Man, and then eventually we'll get to the final one, the warning to be prepared. Okay?

So let me read the text to you, Mark 13, beginning in verse 14, Jesus says, "'But when you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION, standing where it should not be (let the reader understand) Then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains. The one who is on the housetop must not go down, or go in to get anything out of his house; and the one who is in the field must not turn back to get his coat. But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days! But pray that it may not happen in the winter. For those days will be a time of tribulation, such as not occurred since the beginning of the creation which God created until now, and never will. Unless the Lord had shortened those days, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect, whom He chose, He shortened the days. And then if anyone says to him, "Behold, here is the Christ" or "Behold, He is there"; do not believe him; for false Christs and false prophets will arise, and will show signs and wonders, in order to lead astray, if possible, they elect. But take heed; behold, I've told you everything in advance. But in those days, after that tribulation, THE SUN WILL BE DARKENED AND THE MOON WILL NOT GIVE ITS LIGHT, AND THE STARS WILL BE FALLING from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see the SON OF MAN COMING IN CLOUDS with great power and glory. And then He will send forth the angels and will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the farthest end of the earth to the farthest end of heaven.'"

Now, by way of quick review, the last time we looked at this issue of "the abomination of desolation," may I remind you in Matthew 24, beginning of verse 15, Jesus said, "'Therefore, when you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'" When you see the "abomination of desolation," literally the abomination which makes desolate. And Jesus is referring here to Daniel 9:27. And there we read, "And he will make a firm covenant," "he" being the Antichrist, "with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate." So in the middle of the week, and this is referring to weeks of years, in other words, at three and a half years, this satanically empowered and satanically possessed Antichrist, will seize a restored temple in Jerusalem, betray the Jews, and demand to be worshipped for 42 months, according to Revelation 13 and verse five. That's the last half of the seven years.

Now there's a fascinating footnote I'd draw your attention to in Revelation 11 verses one and two. There we have John's vision that includes instructions for the measuring of the temple in that day that will be built in the first half of the tribulation. But there's a fascinating omission in verse two that suggests that the Church will no longer be around. It says, "'Leave out the court which is outside the temple and do not measure it.'" Now this refers to the Court of the Gentiles located outside the courtyard. And that court served as a, shall we say, a border beyond which Gentiles were not allowed to pass. And if they did, they could be executed. The Jews, or the Romans, would allow the Jews to do that; it was a first forbidden place. They didn't want them to, God didn't want them to defile that inner part with the brazen altar, and so forth. In fact, you will recall an Acts 21. You remember when the Jews falsely accused the apostle Paul, of bringing Gentiles into the temple. That was the whole issue, and it caused a riot and they got put in prison and so forth. And so the fact that when he says "Leave out the court which is outside the temple and do not measure it," seems to symbolize God's utter rejection of the Gentile persecutors of that day, because of their wickedness. And although there will be Gentiles that will continue to be saved during the time of the tribulation, most of them during this time will be allied with Satan and the Antichrist in their hatred of the covenant people in Israel, and of course, believers as well.

Moreover, this marked distinction between Gentiles and Jews, suggests that the church is no longer around because we know according to Colossians, 3:11, as well as in Ephesians two, that there is no distinction between Greek and Jew. So the unbelieving Jews are apparently alone at this point; alone in their beliefs, isolated by their stand, and the Gentiles are hating them. So the outer court of the Gentiles will not be allowed to exist. Well, why is that? Well, it goes on to say, "'...it has been given to the nations; and they will tread under the foot, the holy city for 42 months.'" That's three and a half year, the career of the Antichrist. And so what we're seeing here is a prophecy of just unparalleled oppression against the Jews that will ultimately culminate in the fulfillment of the times of the Gentiles when the Lord returns. In fact, and Luke 21, verse 24, Jesus describes this time, he says, "'...they will fall by the edge of the sword and will be led captive into all the nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.'" And we're waiting for that time to ultimately be fulfilled. I might also point out that in Zechariah 13, verses eight and nine, we read how that two thirds of Israel will be destroyed during that time and only 1/3 a remnant will be saved and restored.

So the abomination that causes desolation triggers what the Lord describes in Matthew 24:21, as the quote, "great tribulation such has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will." I might add, parenthetically, that rules out that particular statement right there alone; rules out this idea that all of these prophecies were fulfilled in ad 70. Remember also that the first four seal judgments in Revelation, that of a pseudo peace, wars, famines, and death, all of those have taken place now, by this time, by the middle of the week. And Jesus calls this in Matthew 24, eight, just the beginning of birth pangs. So it's going to get far worse. And the first half was the beginning of God's wrath, because we see how God holds the seven sealed scroll, the title deed of the universe, and it's the Lamb right? That unfolds, it, that unrolls it. We know, of course, according to Second Thessalonians two seven, the Holy Spirit is going to step aside, allowing Satan to have full vent of all that he wants to do during that time, to deceive and to kill. But now in the second half of the tribulation, the frequency and the severity of the birth pangs will increase as God pours out his wrath and his fury upon the nations of the world and even his covenant people to bring them to a place of genuine repentance.

So the temple has been rebuilt, the sacrificial system has been put in place and all of the Sabbath restrictions, plus the feasts and convocations of Leviticus 23 are being observed. The nation of Israel has now negotiated the contract with the Antichrist to be protected. And all of that is all fine and dandy until the Antichrist demands to be worshipped, betrays the Jews and seeks to kill them. That's what happens in the abomination of desolation. Daniel describes his violent career in Daniel 8:24, "He will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will; he will destroy mighty men and the holy people."

Now back to Mark 13:14, and here we see another example of our Savior's infinite compassion for his own, because what he's doing here is warning people--a remnant--living in that day of what's going to happen. And so we see in verse 14, "...but when you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION standing where it should not be (let the reader understand), that those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains. "Flee" in the original language is "pheugō" We got our word fugitive, actually from that. And this is what we see him telling them to do. You need to run for your life. Remember now, the satanically possessed Antichrist is desperate for revenge. He's insane with a jealous rage. He's demanding to be worshipped. They're not going to have any part of it, Christians aren't going to have any part of it. So he is incensed. So God is telling them here to flee to the safety of the mountains. The mountains and the cliffs in that area, I've been there a number of times, you can see that that's a place where you could hide and evidently that's what's going to happen. This east and south of Jerusalem; rugged, inaccessible kinds of terrain. Uninhabitable, apart from divine intervention, which is interesting in Revelation 12 and verse 14, we have a prophecy concerning God's providential care for his people during that time. There we read..."the two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman, in order that she might fly into the wilderness to her place, where she was nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the presence of the serpent"--again, the last three and a half years of the tribulation. Now, in the Old Testament, wings often picture divine protection. And this is probably, we can't say for sure, a reference to the angel, Michael, who is always seen in Scripture as the protector of Israel. He's certainly hard at work right now, is he not? And he will probably be the one that supernaturally transports the chosen people in some way, helps them in some way.

So Jesus warns those living in that day, "'those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'" In other words, you inhabitants of Jerusalem. Now, I want you to imagine for a moment 1000s and 1000s, if not millions, of anti Semites, foaming at the mouth, wanting to kill Jewish people. And this is not a leap at all for us to understand because we see it multiple times every day on the news. We see the spoiled, entitled, social justice brats in our colleges and universities, calling for the destruction of Israel. And of course, many of these people are Muslims as well. And they hate America, they hate Christianity, they hate Jews and so forth. And others are just ignorant fools and agitators that are being paid. I noticed maybe you saw this there was an interviewer that stuck the mic in front of some of these gals that were screaming, and they had their COVID masks on along with all of the Palestinian headdress. And he asked them "So you're screaming for an Intifada? What does Intifada mean?" And he kept going around with the mic and they were just looking all you could see is their eyes. They were absolutely clueless. By the way that comes from an Arab Arabic word that means uprising, or to shake off. I mean, these dear people, they're dumber than dung beetles. They have absolutely no clue what's going on in Israel, what's going on in the world, and certainly no clue of what God says. And so what they're calling for is violence against Israel and they don't even know it. Another headline caught my attention. It was this madness of the left "Queer Storytime for Palestine." Did you see that one? It said "Lil Miss Hot Mess, a drag queen, led the event where he read from his book." And of course, it got a picture of this guy all dressed up with all the drag queen stuff. And he read from this book, "the hips on the drag queen go swish, swish swish." After which he led the children in the chant. "If you are a drag queen, and you know it, shout Free Palestine." And all these little children are screaming this.

Beloved, I want you to hear me say this loud and clear. You cannot imagine the depth of depravity that's going on in the world today. What we're seeing in the news is the proverbial snowflake on the tip of the iceberg. And a day is coming when the nostrils of the Lord Jesus Christ are going to flare and he is going to rise from his throne and he is going to wreak havoc on this world, as he has promised. We are witnessing the wrath of divine abandonment today, Romans 11, the unrestrained freedom of the human heart to manifest the unspeakable depravity within the demands of full expression. How sad when you see these people. I see them, I pray for them, I think, oh, they have no idea the eternal terrors of hell that awaits them, unless they repent and believe in Christ. I was reminded the other day of Job 20 and verse five, where we read "...the triumphing of the wicked is short and the joy of the hypocrites but for a moment." Little do they know what the Prophet said in Isaiah 13, beginning in verse nine, under the inspiration of the Spirit, "Behold, the day of the Lord is coming, cruel, with fury and burning anger, to make the land a desolation; and He will exterminate its sinners from it. For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not flash forth their light; the sun will be dark when it rises and the moon will not shed its light. Thus I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity. I will also put an end to the arrogance of the proud and abase the haughtiness of the ruthless." And I might also add my friends, this antisemitism is not going to end with them. It's moving rapidly towards Christianity as well. Because Christianity cannot coexist in this satanic world that they're wanting in our country and around the world.

You see, the purity of our lives, as well as the testimony of the exclusivity of the gospel of Jesus Christ, serve as a living rebuke to their debauched lifestyles, and to the wickedness of their heart as they try to suppress the truth in unrighteousness. May I remind you a bit of history, the persecution of the church under the rule of the Roman Empire was unimaginably wicked. I won't take time to get into all of it, you're probably aware of a lot of it, but it did not end with the end of the Roman Empire. It did not stop. The Roman Catholic Church replaced Imperial Rome as the dominant power during the Middle Ages, and they were hell bent on eradicating the gospel of Jesus Christ. And through the so-called Christians, unimaginable persecution broke out. It continued on past Rome, you could see it in the Spanish Inquisition, You could see it in the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre and in the 1500s when the Catholic mob broke out against the Huguenots in France. Huguenots, by the way, were people that believed exactly what we believe. Communist regimes and Islamic regimes have killed millions down through the centuries. John MacArthur said this, "In fact, it has been estimated by none other than a Roman Catholic source, that in all of church history, roughly 70 million Christians have been killed for their profession of faith. With two thirds of those martyrdoms occurring after the start of the 20th century. The actual number is likely much greater. The same Catholic journalist that he cites, in a news article estimates that an average of 1 million Christians have been killed every year since 1990."

So indeed, the final days of human history that God has ordained will include Satan being unleashed upon anybody that defies him, especially the Jewish people. And then, of course, both Jews and Gentiles that come to faith in Christ during that time, as God has promised. In fact, in Revelation 17, verse six, we read how the ungodly of those days will be, quote, "...drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus." I might also remind you that during the first half of the Tribulation, we have the two witnesses, that will probably be Moses and Elijah, consistent with Revelation 11. And they will have proclaimed the gospel right out of Jerusalem, many people will be saved. And then we read how that they're going to be martyred, causing the world to gloat and to celebrate, and then they're going to rise from the dead, resulting in great fear among the people, many more will be saved among the elect. And that will be a huge embarrassment to the Antichrist, which will cause him to become even more incensed So by the midpoint of the Tribulation, he will be absolutely apoplectic and determined to extinguish all resistance.

So Jesus knows all of this and he's warning, compassionately warning, those who will be targets of the enemy, verse 15, "'The one who is on the housetop must not go down, or go in to get anything out of his house.'" If you know anything about that land, even to this day, they have kind of a deck on the tops of their homes where they go in the evening to relax. And he's saying that when this happens, don't even go downstairs to get your provisions, run down the sidesteps and flee for your life. Verse 16, "'and the one who is in the field must not turn back to get his coat. But woe to those who are pregnant, and to those who are nursing babies in those days!'" Can you imagine ladies how hard it would be to have to be pregnant during that time, or to have a little one that you're trying to care for. You're going to need nourishment to stay alive and to nourish the child. And then he says, "'But pray that it may not happen in the winter.'" And of course, the wintertime is a rainy time, a cold time. Sometimes there's snow; extremely difficult to survive. Jesus said in Matthew 24:20, "'pray that the flight may not be in the winter or on Sabbath." Interesting thought, by this time Old Testament Judaism will once again be enacted; be put in place. And of course, those Jews, at that point, prior to all that happening, think that the Antichrist is not going to harm them, that all was good. And evidently they will act as they did in the Old Testament and in Jesus' day. And they would attack anybody that would dare move about on the Sabbath. Perhaps what this is, that's what this is describing. We can't be certain.

So Jesus is warning about the perils of this time. They will be severe. The danger is so great. Don't risk being caught, trying to gather your supplies and your possessions. Imagine if it were to happen to us, the first thing you would want to do right? Is go home and get all your stuff, pack up your truck and head out, say you don't have time for that.

Well, next we turn to three more signs to signal his soon return. The first one is unprecedented death and destruction in verse 19. "'For those days will be a time of tribulation such as not occurred since the beginning of the creation which God created until now, and never will.'" This holocaust is described by the Lord Jesus Christ in this text, but also in Daniel and in John. Daniel seven, verse 25. We read and, "He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law; and they will be given into his hand for a time, times and half a time." Again, the last three and a half years. And John speaks of this in Revelation 11 two, again, speaking of the temple, "...it has been given to the nations; and they will tread underfoot the holy city for 42 months." Three and a half years.

Verse 20, "'Unless the Lord had shortened those days, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect, whom He chose, He shortened the days.'" Now, interesting concept. What does he mean he "shortened the days?" Well, it could refer to this three-and-a-half-year period being cut short, which literally means to curtail or to stop instantly. But I struggle with that interpretation because it begs for relevance, since this time is already predetermined, it's going to be three and a half years. So it's possible that this is speaking of daylight hours of the actual 24 day that will be shortened perhaps to provide safety under the cover of darkness. We know that he did this before. He did this in the age of the Egyptian charioteers, when they were pursuing the Jews in Exodus 14; a pillar of cloud by day and came between them and a pillar of fire at night. And so, there was light for the Jews at night, darkness for the Egyptians. There's also three texts that I noticed in Revelation that seems to strengthen this possibility. Remember, when the sixth Seal Judgment is unleashed upon the world according to Revelation six beginning of verse 12, a great earthquake will occur, and the sun will become like blood and the stars of the sky will fall to the earth as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. And the sky will be split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up. And so here we see catastrophic destruction. And this destruction could disrupt the normal light of the sun. Likewise, in chapter eight and verse 12, of Revelation, there's a similar description of a peoples in the luminaries, it says, "...a third of the sun and a third of the moon, and a third of the stars will be smitten so that a third of them might be darkened and the day might not shine for a third of it, and the night in the same way." Likewise, in Revelation 16, verse 10, where we have a description of the fifth bowl judgment. There we read, and "the fifth angel poured out his bowl upon the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became darkened." So we can't be dogmatic, but certainly we can see that the Lord is going to protect them. In some ways, as Jesus says in Matthew 24:22, he says, "'...no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'"

It's interesting, by the way, I noticed in Matthew 24:22, that's the first time in the New Testament that the term "elect" is used--the reference to all whom God has sovereignly, predestined to be saved, both Jew and Gentile. But Jesus then goes on to describe yet another sign, not only will there be unprecedented death and destruction, but secondly, demonic deception, notice verse 21, "'And then if anyone says to you, "Behold, here is the Christ," or, "Behold, He is there"; do not believe him; for false Christs and false prophets will arise, and will show signs and wonders, in order to lead astray, if possible, the elect. But take heed; behold, I have told you everything in advance.'" By the way, this is another passage that you simply cannot force into ad 70. This is the most precious and compassionate warning for those people. I thought about this. I mean, imagine being at that time living in that time, you're desperate for help, you're easy prey for anybody that would offer you help. And of course, Satan is going to provide as he always does, charlatans, to show you the way to show you to the Christ. But then, with all of the expectations for believers at that time, waiting for the Messiah, naturally, they're looking for him. The human and demonic agents of the Antichrist at this time, we're going to be butchering Gentiles and Jewish Christians, even nonbelieving Jews. Again, as I read earlier, Revelation 17 six, they are "drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus." So obviously, at that time, everybody is going to be in survival mode. Believers at that time, they're going to be looking for the Messiah. Imagine if that is your family. And you're going through all of this. You're terrified, you're excited, you're hungry, you're exhausted, you're trying to care for your family, and you are vulnerable. And then some demonic phony, infiltrates your ranks, wherever that might be, and says, "I am the Christ" or "I know where he is." And then you fall for it. And you're turned into the Antichrist and you're destroyed.

And they're going to have demonic powers to validate their claims. They're going to have great signs and wonders. By the way, this is this the same old tricks that Satan has used down through the centuries, all designed to mislead and deceive. But isn't it interesting? He promises that the elect aren't going to be deceived. My what a promise, an amazing thought. I think of John 10, beginning of verse 27, "'My sheep hear,'" what? "My voice and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of My hand.'" You all know what that's like? You hear some wing nut, say some theological absurdity. It's like, no, that's not right. At least I hope that your reaction.

Now, it's interesting had Jesus just stopped there in verse 22 and said "false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show signs and wonders in order to lead astray, if possible, the elect." Naturally the question will be, okay, again, you're living in that time, now in the future, and you're wondering, well, how will I know, how will I be able to discern fact from fiction? How will I be able to recognize the true Christ? Oh, the Lord is so faithful here. He says in verse 23, "But take heed; behold, I have told you everything in advance.'" Which indicates that he's already talked with him about this much in the past, but there's going to be more now, and this brings us to the third sign, the dazzling display of His glory. Here's how they're going to recognize the true Christ, verse 24. "But in those days, after that tribulation, THE SUN WILL BE DARKENED AND THE MOON WILL NOT GIVE ITS LIGHT, AND THE STARS WILL BE FALLING from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken.'" And they will see THE SON OF MAN COMING IN CLOUDS with great power and glory.'" Again, as a footnote that did not happen in ad 70. Jesus said in Matthew 24 and verse 27, commenting on the same thing, "'For just as the lightning comes from the east and flashes even to the west, so shall the coming of the Son of Man be.'" In other words, what Jesus is saying is, look, don't worry. You'll know when it's me. There will be no mistake when I arrive. That's what he's saying. I think about lightning, lightning comes instantly, right? And then you have the deafening thunder. Lightning never goes unnoticed, right? We all see it. Everything stops, it's awesome. It is a glorious spectacle, even terrifying. It may come from the east, but it's visible even in the west.

Beloved, this adds new meaning to a grand entrance, right? This adds new meaning to, shall we say the grand finale. I mean, this is the Lord returning. In Revelation one, verse seven. There's a description that the Lord gives us of his appearance. "BEHOLD, HE IS COMING WITHTHE CLOUDS, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him." And in Psalm 97, verses, one through nine, we read of the anticipation of the coming of the Lord to judge the earth and there the same scene as described. "The Lord reigns, let the earth rejoice; let the many islands be glad. Clouds and thick darkness surrounds Him; righteousness and justice are the foundation of His throne. Fire goes before Him and burns up His adversaries round about. His lightnings lit up the world; the earth saw and trembled. The mountains melted like wax at the presence of the LORD, at the presence of the Lord of whole earth. The heavens declare His righteousness and all the people have seen His glory. Let all those be ashamed who serve graven images, who boasted themselves of idols; worship Him, all you gods. Zion heard this and was glad, and the daughters of Judah have rejoiced because of Thy judgments O LORD. For Thou art the Lord Most High over all the earth; Thou art exalted, far above all gods." What a glorious spectacle that will be when the Lord returns.

After all of the darkness, both physical darkness and spiritual darkness, suddenly, the sky is illuminated with the brilliance of his Shekinah--the effulgence of His glory will blaze forth and no one will miss him. They missed him the first time when he came in humility. They won't miss him the second time when he comes in glory. Jesus predicted this once before in Acts 1:11. Remember when his flabbergasted disciples watched Jesus ascend into heaven. Two angels come and say to them, "this Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come just in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven." O child of God, this is the Jesus that I worship. This is the Jesus that we proclaim. We do not proclaim some effeminate social justice warrior that's carrying a banner that says "Jews Lives Matter." That is not the Jesus of the Bible. This is not some smiley face, God that winks at sin, and somehow wraps himself in rainbow garb and parades around with drag queens and sodomites and lesbians as his messengers. This is not some genie in a bottle, who can satisfy all of your desires if you just learn how to manipulate him just right. This is not some smiley face, God that winks at sin. This is not some impotent deity that paces the throne room of heaven, hoping that people will finally hear him knocking at the door of their heart and let him in because if they don't, they'll never be saved. Folks, that is not the God of the Bible. This Jesus, dear friends, is the thrice Holy God of Isaiah six. This is the ineffable tetragrammaton, the too wondrous to utter from the lips, four letters, this is the Lord this is YAWEH.

In Acts 17, beginning in verse 30, we read, that he is the one who is now "declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men, by raising Him from the dead." Folks the Jesus that I preach, the Jesus of the Bible, the Jesus that I plead with you, to believe in and to trust as your only hope of salvation is the Lord of hosts. He is a jealous God, he is an avenging God, he is a holy God, and an awesome God in His judgment. And never forget this, he is going to do all that he has promised, He is going to judge the world in his Second Coming, as we read in Revelation 19, verse 12, when he returns, "His eyes are a flame of fire." In verse 15, and following, "From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may smite the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh, He has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.'" Oh, dear friends, the glory of Christ's second return, and the promise of his Kingdom to be established, the whole world will be the theater that will manifest his ineffable glory--how I long for that day. I am so tired of seeing my Savior and King mocked and ridiculed. I long for that day, as Habakkuk describes in Habakkuk, two and verse 14, "when the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." When finally his kingdom comes, and His will is done, on earth as it is in heaven.

I was thinking about this last week. What if there were no earthly kingdom? What if the cataclysmic culmination of human history is nothing more but a devastated planet. Think about that. How unbelievably tragic for the Creator, the Messiah King to return in breathtaking glory, come to this earth and all there is are the ashes of devastation and the stench of death. That is not a glorious ending. And that is not the ending that we read in Scripture. May it never be. No, he has promised through his servant Daniel, chapter two and verse 35, that the stone referring to Messiah "...that struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth." You see, again, the Messianic, or the millennial kingdom will be the consummating bridge between a cursed human history and the kingdom in the new heaven and the new earth of Second Peter 3:13 when the last Adam will rule and reign, where the first Adam failed, when the four eternal, unconditional biblical covenants the Noahic Covenant, the Abrahamic Covenant, the Davidic Covenant, and the New Covenant will finally be fulfilled. When Israel will finally say "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord," as Jesus predicted; when all Israel is saved, and finally able to fulfill their role, as the Lord originally intended them to be, as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, Exodus 19 six. When the Lord will fill the new millennial temple, portrayed in Ezekiel 40 through 48. Oh, how I long for that day. As my friend David Larsen once said, "An ideal vision of the perfected kingdom of God, referring to the Millennial Kingdom, where every detail and facet discloses how spiritual truth and doctrine are enshrined and embodied in physical form and shape."

Now friend I asked you is this the Jesus that you worship? If so, you will fear him, you will tremble at his word. You will serve Him with all of your heart, he will be the priority of your life. Because a day of judgment is coming beyond my ability to describe. And if you have refused to trust in Christ as your Savior, that day will be unimaginably horrific if you live through it. And if you don't, it will be exponentially worse in the eternal torments of hell. Because you're going to stand before Him one day, as the Lord of the universe, and you will have nothing to offer him. We're told of this in Zephaniah one, verse 18, "Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to save them on the day of the LORD's wrath, in the fire of His jealousy, the whole world will be consumed, for He will make a sudden end of all who live on the earth." So my friend if you have never been reconciled to God through faith in Christ, if you've never honestly admitted the depths of your depravity, and cried out to him for mercy, and for his saving grace, I plead with you to do that today before it's too late, come to Christ, in repentant faith. And for those of us who know and love Christ, I hope that you will be encouraged with what you've heard today. And here's why, our God reigns. We know how the story ends. It's going to be tough between now and then; it's going to get a whole lot worse than it is now. We've lived in a bubble, you know, but it's going to get far worse. And that's okay, because the Lord will sustain us. He will prove himself powerful on our behalf. And he will continue to ignite our hearts with a longing for His glory. Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly. Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the magnificent self-disclosure that you have given us in your word. Thank you for the great prophetic truths of your word, that give us a sense of what is going to happen. We can't possibly know all of the details, nor do you even want us to, otherwise you would have given us more. But you've given us enough to know that you are indeed going to accomplish all that you have declared and decreed and determined in eternity past. And in this we relax and we rejoice, but we cry out to you to reveal yourself more and more to us and through us that we may experience all of the blessings that are undeservedly ours because of your grace. Use us mightily for the sake of the kingdom. Give us opportunities to present the gospel and to live it out with boldness and with clarity. That in our lives Christ will have the preeminence in all things. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

Hallelujah, what a savior, one of my favorite hymns. Certainly, the testimony of my heart as well as it is yours, I'm sure. Please take your bibles and turn to Mark chapter 13. We continue to do our verse-by-verse study of this gospel. And as always, my goal in preaching is to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ, that you might know him as Savior, and Lord. Because if you don't, you have no hope, you have no purpose, you have no lasting joy. And, frankly, you live in a fool's paradise, that will ultimately end a divine judgment. That's why it's so important to know what God has said in his word. And certainly, the title of this series says it all. And that is "Jesus Prophetic Discourse on the End of the Age."

This is actually part four of that series. I will not take time to review all that we've studied thus far, I have to assume that you are with me. But certainly, when it comes to the biblical promises of divine judgment, most people laugh, and they scoff. They can't believe people would actually believe anything that laughably absurd. And equally ridiculous is the promise of an eternal hell for those who refuse to trust in God's saving offer of faith in Christ. And certainly, this was the days, or this was the attitude of those that lived in the days of Noah. They laughed, they mocked, they scoffed until the waters began to rise, and then it was too late. I don't want that to be the case for you. So this is a warning, as well as a clarification, of what God has promised, that is going to happen in the world just before he returns. Because God is infinitely holy, we understand that he must punish sin, and we see this described in God's curse on Satan when Adam and Eve and their progeny, which would include all of us, including all of creation. We witness the tragic consequences of sins curse, in the things that we experience in our world, everything from tornadoes and tsunamis and volcanoes and earthquakes and war, to depression, disease, and death.

Moreover, God has revealed his judgment on moral creatures in both scripture and in history. The Apostle Peter spoke of this in Second Peter two beginning in verse four. He said, "For if God did not spare angels when they sinned but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly." Let me pause there for a moment. Evidence of that judgment is all over our world; our earth is scarred with irrefutable evidence of a worldwide flood. It's amazing how scientists don't want to see this. We see marine creatures fossilized in sedimentary rocks on every continent. Even on the highest of mountains. We see massive numbers of animals, including dinosaurs, in fossil graveyards where whole skeletons have been preserved, providing convincing evidence that they were buried very rapidly. A testimony of massive flooding. Every continent reveals sedimentary rock layers laid down by catastrophic flood conditions. It's everywhere. Layers that show no evidence of erosion over long periods of time. Moreover, you can see these layers and how they are folded and how they are curved, indicating that they were once soft and pliable when first deposited and yet people mock the idea of the flood.

Peter went on to say in Second Peter two and verse six, "And if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority." We now have irrefutable evidence of this in the discovery of the charred ruins of the five cities of the plain as we read about in Genesis 14 and verse eight, Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim, and the city of Zoar. Zoar was the only city you will recall that God is spared when Lot and his two daughters fled there for safety, Genesis 19. You can see on YouTube videos, that there are golf ball sized pieces of brimstone, of pure sulfur, that are absolutely all over the place. When God poured it down upon those cities, a lot of it fell into the Dead Sea and when you drop the ball into the Dead Sea, it will be extinguished. It washes up and then sediment covers it. By the way, you need to look up Joel Kramer and his Expedition Bible. He's got a video called "Sodom Burned - Zoar Did Not: the full story of the discovery of the Cities of the Plain." He's a colleague that works with our friends at Shepherd Seminary.

And prior to this God also used supernatural means to judge the Sodomites with blindness, you will recall, in Genesis 19. And he judged Egypt with all of the plagues that he poured out upon them during the time of the Exodus. He poured down fire consuming, murmuring Israelites in Numbers 11. We see that he caused the earth to swallow up Korah and his rebels in Numbers 16. We read about the fall of Jericho in Joshua six. We read about the Syrian army struck with blindness in Second King's six and on it goes.

And in the New Testament, we see how God's judgment was supernaturally poured out upon His Son, the Lord Jesus, on the cross. And at that moment, the veil was torn in two in the temple and the earth went dark from the hours of 12 o'clock, midday to three in the afternoon. There was a great earthquake; rocks were broken, tombs were opened, many dead saints were raised. And then of course, we see the resurrection of Christ. God is a God of wrath, a God that will judge. We saw that in the death of Ananias and Sapphira, that he killed in Acts five. And in Revelation, we read of the future judgments that will come upon the earth. And yet with all of this evidence, and I've mentioned just a few, people continue to mock, and they continue to scoff. And they will continue to do this until the waters rise. Peter also spoke of this in Second Peter three beginning in verse three. "Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, and saying, 'Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.' For when they maintained this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. But by His word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men."

And dear friends, if you are a mocker, or a scoffer at these things, all I can say is that unless you humble your heart before a holy God and come to Christ in saving faith, you will continue to mock, because only he can give you eyes to see and ears to hear and soften your heart to the undeniable reality that God has, he is, and he will judge the earth to bring glory to his name.

And this also helps us understand some of the current events that are going on in the Middle East today, as we look at the virulent, irrational, antisemitism, that's sweeping across the world. We know as we've studied in the past, that this is a result of two things. Number one, Satan's hatred of God's chosen people. And because of that hatred, he deceives, and he empowers his followers to hate Jewish people, to remove Israel and all these types of things. And it's also a result of God's judgment on his chosen people, his beloved enemy, and all of this is going to ultimately lead to their salvation and national restoration. God made this abundantly clear in Deuteronomy 28, when he said that he would bless them for their obedience to his law and curse them for their disobedience. He promised that ultimately, he would bless those who bless them and curse those who curse them, Genesis 12 verse three. We know that prior to Christ's return, according to Bible prophecy that he would bring the people of Israel back into their land. And we saw that happen beginning in 1948, when Israel became a nation. He promised that they would once again have control of Jerusalem and that happened in 1967. That they would be surrounded by enemies, that they would become an "exceedingly great army" according to Ezekiel 37 and verse 10. He went on to say in Zechariah 12 and verse six, "I will make the clans of Judah like a firepot among pieces of wood and a flaming torch among sheaves, so they will consume on the right hand and on the left all the surrounding peoples, while the inhabitants of Jerusalem again dwell on their own sites in Jerusalem." And it's amazing, is it not, that despite the fact that they are outnumbered 50 plus to one, they continue to win every battle because of God's protection.

In a recent post from the quote, "Behold Israel" website, which I would encourage you to follow. Its founder is Amir Tsarfati, who is a native Israeli and a former Major in the IDF, who's also a born again believer and Bible teacher, he said this regarding the attack on Israel just the other day, "An Israeli scientists who works for the security system and is a doctor of physics, wrote the following words to his rabbi yesterday. Here's what he said, 'I wanted to share with the rabbi something that is much more than a feeling that on Shabbat night, something happened here on the scale of the splitting of the Red Sea. I am a Doctor of Physics and I worked for several years in the defense industry in Israel, and projects that are still the cutting edge of the State of Israel. When I look at what happened on Saturday night, on a scientific level, it simply cannot happen. Everyone, I mean, everyone acted as one man in overall unity.'" He continued "'The likelihood that everything works out just as it should does not exist in complex systems, like the defense systems that were operating. They never have, I mean, never even beyond the State of Israel, then tried in real time. I took a pencil and dove into the calculations to check the likelihood that such a result would materialize. The large number of events that had to be handled at precisely the right time doubles the chance of making a mistake. With all the high technologies, the expectations was for a breach in the defense of the skies of the State of Israel. Even if we got 90% protection, it would be a miracle. What happened though, is that everyone, I mean, everyone the pilots, the system operators, the technology operators, acted as one man, at one moment in total unity. If this is not an act of God, then I no longer know what a miracle is.'" And then the doctor marvels and adds this, "'This is sharper than the victory of the Six Day War, or the War of Independence. There it can be explained according to nature. The rescue that took place for the people of Israel on Shabbat night is simply impossible naturally. I believe that this miracle saved the lives of many people from Israel. If the defense system had failed to intercept a number of cruise missiles, the result would have dragged us into a very complex campaign. I wouldn't bet that next time it will work like this without divine supervision. The simple proof of what I said is that the managers of the security industries who develop and manufacture these systems guarantee no more than 90% success. '" Then he close saying, "'Since the day you came out of the land of Egypt, we have shown you wonderful things. ' And with that he ended his words." It's truly astonishing to see how God continues to protect Israel. But also, it's truly astonishing to see how the world is being made ready for the rule of the Antichrist even as God has promised, which will include horrific judgments upon the peoples of this world, including Israel, but will ultimately lead to their salvation and restoration.

And with this, we return to the pre-kingdom judgments that Jesus described in Matthew 13, an explanation of what's going to take place after the end of the age when the Lord returns and establishes His kingdom. And of course, there are parallel accounts in Matthew 24, and 25, and Luke 21, which add further details. Let me remind you of the context. What Jesus is saying here occurred on Wednesday evening of the Passion Week; he would be crucified on Friday. This was the final hours of Jewish rejection, as he's responding to the questions of his disciples. So now as Jesus leaves the temple precincts, and with his disciples, they make their way up the steep Mount of Olives. And that's why many times this is called the Olivet Discourse.

I've divided Jesus' lengthy answer into seven headings. And we've seen the first three, number one: the temples demolition, number two: the signs of the end, and number three: the prospect of persecution. And today we're going to look at the abomination of desolation. And following that we will look at the false Christ and prophets, the coming of the Son of Man and the warning to be prepared. With this, we come to our text in Mark 13 and verse 14. Jesus said this, "'But when you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION standing, where it should not be, (let the reader understand), then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountain.'" Matthew's account puts it this way in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 15. "'Therefore, when you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'"

The little phrase "let the reader understand" is an indication that Jesus is not addressing his disciples or the current generation, but believers who would one day read these warnings in the pages of Scripture, and through that be able to understand what was coming upon them how to respond, and the glory that will follow.

Dave Harrell

"'When you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION'“ literally, the abomination which makes desolate, or causes desolation, or lays waste. The word abomination speaks of a detestable thing, an object of utter abhorrence; that which is repulsive. We see it used for example, in the Old Testament did it to describe moral abominations like bestiality, homosexuality, transgenderism, child sacrifice, and even occult practices, dishonest business practices, and so forth. And in the Septuagint, we see it used to describe cultic sacrilegious objects, paraphernalia and rites of wicked pagan worship. Things that are repulsive, that are vile, that are revolting, that desecrate a holy place. In fact, that term is used in Revelation 17, verses four and five to describe the great horror of the final apostasy that is called "'BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OFF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.'" That will be the ultimate ecumenical church that will exist. An enormous amalgam of apostate religious people led by the false prophet that deceives the world. So bottom line, abomination speaks of anything that offends the holiness of God and evokes His wrath.

So Jesus warns those, who will be alive in that day, when you see this abomination that causes desolation, standing in the holy place, which will be a reference to the temple as we see in Acts 21:18, Run for your life. Seek refuge.

Now, what is this abomination? What is this vile object? Well, Jesus gives us a hint. He says, it was that "'which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet.'" And we see this mentioned in Daniel's prophecies in Daniel chapter nine and verse 27, Daniel 11, and verse 31, and Daniel 12, and verse 11. Now, let me take you there for a moment, first of all, in Daniel 11. It's also immediately a clear reference to the hideous defilement of the temple by the Syrian King Antiochus Epiphanes the Fourth, who ruled Palestine as a surrogate of the Greek Empire, between 175 and 165 BC. And we see this in Daniel 11:21 through 35. And we know that Antiochus Epiphanes demanded to be called Theos Epiphanes, which means manifest God. We read from history that he slaughtered 1000s of Jewish men and sold wives and children into into slavery. He sacrificed a pig upon the altar, even forced the priests to eat the flesh of the most unclean of all animals. Worse yet, he erected an idol of Zeus in the temple. And he even considered himself to be the manifestation of Zeus. It's interesting that his enemies nicknamed him "Epimanes," rather than "Epiphanes," because Epimanes means madman or the insane one. And ironically, his inability to defeat the Jews, you will recall, led by Judas Maccabeus, actually drove him insane. And he died a madman in 165 BC.

But obviously, Jesus wasn't talking only about a past historical event, nor was Daniel, but something yet future. Daniel's prophecy of Antiochus Epiphanes was a preview of the ultimate abomination of desolation that would be committed by the Antichrist. Let me give you a little context in Daniel, where you will remember that Daniel was exiled in Babylonian captivity. In Daniel two he explained Nebuchadnezzar's dream of the great statue and there God revealed to him the successive stages of Gentile world domination that would exist throughout world history: the Babylonians, the MedoPersians, the Grecians, the Romans, and then a revived Roman Empire that would eventually come. And finally, he revealed how the Messiah would defeat all of them and reconcile his covenant to people to Himself and reestablish them back into the land of promise. This is what we read in Daniel and many other prophetic books. And so he prays for his people. And in Daniel nine, two, he recalls the years of captivity that the Lord had prophesied through Jeremiah and 70 years; that time was almost over. So he implores the Lord to reestablish his beloved people back into the land of promise. And then God speaks to him through an Angel Gabriel in Daniel 9:24. And here's what he said, "'70 weeks,'" literally 70 sevens or 70 heptad which is units of seven that would be 70 years, "'have been decreed for your people and your holy city.'" And then he lists six goals. And by the way, the 70 sevens would be 490 years. And so he then lists six goals all yet to be fulfilled. Here's why that 70-week period must occur: "'to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy place.'" And hear God reveals the future far beyond and Antiochus, all the way to Antichrist. There must be 490 years of judgment that must occur before the six glorious objectives can be realized. And the next verse tells us when the clock would start ticking in verse 25. "'So you are to know and discern that from the issue of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks,'" that's 69 weeks or 483 years. "'It will be built again, with plaza and moat, even in times of distress.'" And as promised, as we read in Nehemiah chapter two, King Artaxerxes, issued the decree to rebuild and restore Jerusalem in 445 BC. Then, as God promised, seven weeks and 62 weeks, in other words, the 483 years elapsed until Messiah the Prince, the Lord Jesus Christ, passed through the multitudes and entered Jerusalem as their Messiah, precisely as Jesus predicted.

And then notice in verse 26, "'then after the 62 weeks,'" you add the seven weeks are total of 69 weeks, "'the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing.'" Indeed, after the 62, sevens are 483 years, after that 69 weeks had begun, the Messiah was cut off and had nothing. It could be translated, literally no one, had no one. All of his followers abandon him, or they were arrested during his trial and crucifixion. And at that point, the 69 weeks were fulfilled. And then 43 years later, "'the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary,'" which is a clear reference to the Roman invasion in 70 ad. But it's important to note that all of this occurred before the final 70th week is even revealed in verse 27.

And then God reveals what's going to happen after the fall of Jerusalem. He says at the end of verse 26, "'And its end will come with a flood; even to the end, there will be war; desolations, or are determined.'" A more literal rendering could be "and the end of it will be in the overflowing, and unto the end, there will be war, a strict determination of desolations, or the determined amount of desolations." So you can see God is in charge of all of this. And I might add that there are undeniable parallels of Jesus' prediction in Matthew 24:7 through verse 22. So this refers to the entire intervening period before the final 70th week. And when we examine the content of verse 27, and other parallel passages, we must conclude that many years must transpire before verse 27.

We ultimately discover that the 70th week, occurs just prior to Christ's second coming. I believe that is the most compelling way of understanding these things. Therefore, a long period of war and desolations, verse 26, will be the fate of the covenant people, until the 70th week finally ushers in the kingdom. And indeed, this has been the history of the Jewish people from that day to the present, but then notice the events of the 70th week.

And once again now the prophetic texts sweeps Daniel from the near, to the distant future. He says in verse 27, "'And he.'" Now let's stop there. Hebrew grammar suggests that the subject of the verb is linked to the last eligible antecedent, namely, verse 26, "the prince who is to come, who will destroy the city and the sanctuary." Now because of the unheard, unrivaled, unparalleled events, described at the end of verse 27, or verse 26, and in verse 27, as well as other parallel passages, this cannot refer to the Roman ruler in ad 70. None of those types of things happened. So it'd be reasonable to assume that it refers to another ruler of a yet future Roman Empire, that we believe is the 10-horned beast of Daniel seven and Revelation 13, namely, the Antichrist.

Daniel 7:24, tells us that the Antichrist will rule a massive kingdom that will basically comprise the old Roman Empire. This will probably be a confederacy of a united Europe, that Daniel describes as a 10-nation empire. As a footnote, you will recall when we examined this battle of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 37, and 38, or 38, and 39. If that battle occurs before all of this, then bear in mind that the Islamic power base will be defeated, and a new world order will obviously emerge in order to maintain global stability. And this will probably be some kind of a NATO-like alliance of nations, which would account for the 10-nation empire that Daniel described. We can't be dogmatic, but that is plausible. But certainly this would provide the perfect scenario for the Antichrist to rise to power. However, we also know that he will eventually declare war on the 10 kings of that alliance, according to Daniel 11:44, through verse 45, and he will even kill three of them--Daniel 7:24, and Revelation 17, verses 12 through 13.

Now, back to Daniel 9:27. And the reason I'm taking you to Daniel, is because Jesus did that, to explain what he was saying. So we need to understand some of this. "'And he will make a firm covenant with the many,'" referring to the Antichrist. "'He will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.'" I find it interesting. I did a lot of research on the word "wing." The "wing of abominations." The Hebrew term "kānāp" is the subject of many controversial explanations, and some of them are rather fanciful, but I agree with a number of Old Testament scholars including Randall Price, who suggests quote, "The kānāp or the wing, might suggest the location where the abomination of desolation is placed, that is, in the Holy of Holies, in relation to the winged cherubim of the Ark of the Covenant." Which I by add must be recreated since there is no indication that the original Ark will be discovered and be used. And you will recall in Second Thessalonians two and verse four, the Apostle Paul describes what will happen, that he will take "his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God." Moreover, in Psalm 80 and verse one and 99, in verse one, we read that the throne of the Lord in the tabernacle, and later on in the first temple was said to be, quote, seated above or between the cherubim. And whenever you look at any of the archaeological reliefs, we see kings seated on winged thrones. What better place for the Antichrist to desecrate and defile the temple and to usurp the throne of the LORD the God of Israel, than by seeding himself between the wings of the cherubim from above some facsimile of an ark in the Holy of Holies.

Commentator Frederick Tatford stated quote, "Evidently the audacious rebel will blasphemously take his seat in the sanctum sanctorum itself." Again, verse 27, "'He will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week,'" in other words, the middle of that seven years, weeks of years is what he's talking about, "'he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate.'" So 69 weeks of judgment have elapsed, 483 years from the decree of Artaxerxes to the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ, but 70 weeks were decreed. There's one more heptad that still awaits; seven more years. And here in Daniel 9:27, we have the very text that Jesus refers to, as shall we say, the prophetic template, to be used to determine the chronological sequence of the beginning of birth pangs, as we read in Matthew 24, verses 15 and 16. And Mark 13 and verse 14. Which I also might add, correlates perfectly with the seal judgments in Revelation chapter four through six.

So all of that to say, here we get a glimpse of what will happen before Christ returns and what the saints of that day must look for and endure. This text describes a great deceiver will lure Israel into a protective agreement called a "firm covenant." And we know according to Revelation chapter six, and verse two, and following--we read about the sealed judgment--it will be in an era of unparalleled world peace, but it will be a great hoax; it will be the calm before a storm. We read how a white horse and he who sat on it had a bow, a bow with no arrows, implying probably some kind of diplomatic rather than a military victory; a peace sealed by a covenant, not by war. He also has a crown given to him and he went out conquering and to conquer. I believe a picture of the Antichrist; the one who will conquer the world in a bloodless triumph.

And given all that we are witnessing today, it's easy to understand why modern Israel would be interested in peace protection, right? In some kind of a covenant. I was thinking of this again, think about this. Israel today is the size of New Jersey about 9000 square miles. It's surrounded by 22 Arab countries that have 5 million square miles. 650 million people who are supported and aligned with a whole Muslim world consisting of over 1 billion people in an area twice the size of the United States; a region 672 times the size of miniscule Israel. Israel today has a population of 9.24 million people, and only 7.2 of them are Jews. It's interesting, they continue to grow every year. And yet we have antisemitism sweeping the nation, as it always has, sweeping the world. According to FLAME, which is "Facts and Logic About the Middle East," we find some things very interesting. I want to read this quote to you and it was written in 2005. Bear in mind, 2005. "The new anti Semites do not publicly proclaim their desire to bring about a second Holocaust, or to subject the Jews to mass murder or annihilation." Interesting, isn't it? They don't publicly do that. They didn't do that in 2005. They do today. It's very public here in the United States. They went on to say, "The hatred is aimed against the State of Israel, which according to the new anti Semites represents all that is evil in the world in which is the main violator of human rights and guilty of virtually every other abuse that can be conceived. This poison is now so widespread that a poll taken in Europe not too long ago found Israel to be the greatest menace to the peace of the world, far ahead of such murderous regimes as those of Iran or North Korea. The leaders and instigators of this new anti-semitism are concentrated on the political left. Its most active and vocal spokesman being found in our prestige universities, such as the anti-Zionist or anti-semitic focus of the left that almost incomprehensibly, it includes a fair number of Jewish professors and other intellectuals, not just here in the United States, but even in Israel itself. Those on the extreme left call for the abolition of the State of Israel outright, although they do not tell us what they propose to do with the 5 million Israeli Jews." It's 7.2 million now. "They would presumably be left to the tender mercies of the Arabs, who would, of course, have no greater joy than to emulate or perhaps even to improve on the Nazi model and to give final solution to the Jewish problem once and for all. That isn't going to happen. Of course, not because anybody in the world would lift a finger to prevent it, but because fortunately, Israel is a very strong and most capable nation." End quote. I would add that that is not the reason, the reason is because God is protecting them.

Daniel 9:27, "he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering.'" Obviously, a new temple has been built. And we know that today plans are our already made. You can even take a virtual tour of what they want to build, it will take less than a year to build it. But he will demand that their worship be stopped. And according to Revelation 12, verses seven through nine we see how Satan, at this time, and his minions will be cast to the earth in the middle of the seven years. And this will be infuriating to Satan, who now becomes even more desperate and more determined. And according to verse 12, he says "'Woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, knowing that he has only a short time.'" And so in Daniel 9:27, "'on the wing of abominations will come this one who will make desolate.'" And we know that in the middle of the week, three and a half years, this satanically empowered antichrist will seize the temple and betray the Jews, demand to be worshipped like his four runner Antiochus Epiphanes. And he will do this for 42 months according to Revelation 13 and verse five; the last half of the seven years. And this is the one pictured in Revelation 13, verses one and five as the beast that's coming up out of the sea, given quote, "a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies and authority to act for 42 months was given to him." In verse seven and following he says "it was given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. And all who dwell on the earth will worship him; everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain."

And what will he do that will be such an abomination? That will be so abhorrent in the eyes of God? Paul gives us insight here again in Second Thessalonians two verse three. It describes him as "the son of destruction who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god, or object of worship." And he says that he "takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God." Now, we know from Scripture that Satan has always wanted to be worshipped. He's always been jealous of God. And this is why he is so determined to deceive people through false religions, false messiahs, false teachers. He is the father of lies. And we read as well, in verses nine and 10, that he is "the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, so as to be this, so as to be saved." Now, the grammar that is used here indicates that this detestable thing that's going to be standing in the holy place will be some kind of a permanent image, probably of the Antichrist, that will be displayed there in the temple. And so this is the abomination of desolation, that Jesus refers to Matthew 24:15 and Mark 13:14.

As a footnote, in Daniel 12 and verse 11, we read "and from the time that the regular sacrifice faces abolished and the abomination of desolation is set up, there will be 1290 days." Now, it's interesting that's 30 days beyond the three and a half years. Revelation 12 and verse six indicates that this period of unprecedented persecution against Israel, and this great tribulation, as it's called, where God miraculously protects some of his people, last 1260 days. So what's going on here? Well, the additional 30 days of Daniel's prophecy is thought to account for the period of time between when the Lord descends upon the Mount of Olives, and you know that it will create the Valley of Jehoshaphat. The valley of decision that Joel describes; the time between that and his judgment of the nations, in Zechariah 14 verses four through five. Moreover, in Daniel 12, and verse 12, he even adds 45 more days that would seem to be a time to establish leadership throughout the glorious kingdom. So again, 1260 days of unprecedented tribulation. And then you have 30 days after the Lord's return until he judges the nations 45 more days to establish His kingdom around the world.

Now, if I can pause for just a moment, it is absolutely beyond me how anyone can spiritualize all of these precise number of days and get them to mean something that is inconsistent with the normal use of language, especially to try to squeeze all of these things into what happened in AD 70. That simply makes no sense whatsoever to me. Dear friends, make no mistake, the prophetic Scriptures are replete with descriptions of upcoming tribulation that will culminate in the end of man's reign upon the earth, and will inaugurate the reign of the one that we love and serve, the Lord Jesus Christ. The time of inconceivable calamities will one day encompass the world. But it will be a time where God will especially focus his attention on the on his people Israel.

Let me give you a few passages in closing this morning. Isaiah 10 verse 20 and following, "Now it will come about in that day that the remnant of Israel, and those of the house of Jacob who have escaped, will never again rely on the one who struck them, but will truly rely on the Lord the Holy One of Israel. A remnant will return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God. For though your people, O Israel, may be like the sand of the sea, Only a remnant within them will return; a destruction is determined overflowing with righteousness." And the prophet Jeremiah says this, under the inspiration of the Spirit of God in chapter 30, beginning in verse 5, "For thus says the LORD, 'I have heard a sound of terror, of dread and there is no peace. Ask now, and see if a male can give birth. Why do I see every man with his hands on his loins, as a woman in childbirth, and why have all faces turned pale? '" This is describing suffering where people will be writhing in pain. He went on to say, "'Alas! for that day is great, there is none like it; and it is the time of Jacob's distress, but he will be saved from it. And it shall come about on that day,' declares the LORD of hosts, 'that I will break his yoke from off their neck, and will tear off their bonds; and strangers shall no longer make them their slaves. But they shall serve the LORD their God and David their king, whom I will raise up for them.'"

Daniel the prophet likewise says in Daniel 12, beginning in verse one, "'Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a great time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time, your people, everyone who was found written in the book will be rescued.'"

The prophet Zechariah says in chapter 13, beginning in verse eight, "'It will come about in all the land,' declares the Lord, 'That two parts in it will be cut off and perish; but the third will be left in it. And I will bring the third part through fire, refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them; I will say "They are My people," and they will say, "The LORD is my God." Behold, a day is coming for the Lord, when the spoil taken from you will be divided among you. For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city will be captured and houses plundered, the women ravished and half the city exiled, but the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.'" And so indeed, we see as Jesus promised, in Mark 13:14, "'When you see the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION standing where it should not be (let the reader understand) then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'"

Dear friends, the world is being prepared for the rule of the Antichrist. According to Revelation 13, three, the "whole world was astonished and followed the beast." That's what's going to happen. I want to close with a true story. On June 7, 1967, in the final moments of the Arab Israeli Six Day War, the Jews finally repossessed the temple area for the first time in 1897 years. Israeli soldiers with tears in their eyes, even ran past their Arab enemies in the final assault, because they were driven with an insane with intense passion to be near the temple mount. Chief Ashkenazic Rabbi Shlomo Goren, stepped out of a half-track with a long black robe and he approached the Wailing Wall. And he sounded the shofar, calling his fellow Jews home. And he announced, quote, "The days of Messiah have begun." Many believe and have been taught that the generation that recovers the site must rebuild the temple. And Rabbi Mendel Lewis has stated, quote, "The rebuilding of the temple will be the acme of the redemption process." But also on that day, General, Moishe Dayan approached the Western Wall and here's what he said, "We have returned to our holiest of holy places, never to be parted from it again. We earnestly stretch out our hands to our Arab brethren in peace, but, we have returned to Jerusalem, never to depart from her again."

Beloved, while we would never want to use current events to interpret Bible prophecy, we would be fools not to see the miracle of modern Israel as at least a demonstration of divine preservation, if not a harbinger of the tribulation. I would submit to you on the basis of scripture that God is not finished with Israel. Isaiah 62:11 says, "Behold, the Lord has proclaimed to the end of the earth. Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Lo, your salvation comes; behold, His reward is with Him, and His recompense before Him.'" Then he adds this, "and they will call them, 'The holy people, the redeemed of the LORD', and you will be called, 'Sought out, a city not forsaken.'"

I trust that these prophetic truths will impact your heart and help you to realize that again, God is a holy God. He will judge sin, he has a plan, he's working it perfectly. And if you do not know Christ as your Savior, one day you will know Him as your judge. And I plead with you not to let that happen. But to trust in Him even this day. Come to him in repentant faith and be saved. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. As always, I would plead with you to penetrate every heart with that which you would have them hear to understand more of who you are. To perhaps be reconciled to you and saving faith, or for those of us, who by your grace have been saved, for us to be more diligent and our desire to serve you in these last days. And to pray as you have asked, that your kingdom would come, that your will would be done on earth as it is in heaven. We commit these things to you for the glory of Christ in whose name I pray. Amen.

We return again this morning to Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn there to Mark chapter 13. In a few minutes, we will be examining verses nine through 13 as we continue to understand Jesus prophetic discourse on the end of the age. This is actually part three of that series.

Of course, we're all aware of what's going on in the Middle East-- Iran's attack upon Israel, which is, frankly, evidence of liberal buffoonery that we see in our country and other places around the world. The idea that you can appease Islamic terrorists is insane. To think that you can somehow warm fuzzy these kinds of people into the civilized world is insane. And frankly, they have a faulty anthropology. They believe that man is more deprived than depraved. And if you just give him what he needs, then he will be a good person. Nothing could be further from the truth. And of course, this all points to the fact that the world is inexorably heading toward unprecedented conflict. Conflict consistent with the battle of Gog and Magog as we read in Ezekiel 38 and 39, where there will be an alliance of nations that will come upon Israel, and ultimately God will destroy them. Boy don't you get weary of all the evil in the world, every time you turn on the news, you just want to shake your head and turn it off and watch cartoons or something right? I mean, I long to see the name of the Lord vindicated. I am so tired of seeing him mocked and ridiculed. I long for that day, when true, social justice will be meted out by the only infinitely just and righteous God.

And we've been examining the signs that Jesus has given, predicting what will happen on the earth at the end of the age, just prior to his physical return to the earth. And you know, Jesus commanded us to pray in Matthew 16 "Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." A technical point here, but it is significant--the Greek text is very revealing, in that in each of these petitions, the verb is not only in the emphatic position, but it is also what we call an aorist active imperative, noting that this will be a single instantaneous action. This is something that is going to explode upon the earth, something dramatic and glorious. This is not merely some spiritualized kingdom that already exists upon the earth. It's not something that's gradually going to appear over time. So we pray for that day when the glory of God will explode upon this earth and his kingdom will come, it will instantaneously burst forth; I long for that day. In fact, the godly and learned 19th century Hungarian Jewish convert to Christianity, and Presbyterian minister missionary by the name of Adolph Saphir, longed for this day to come as I do, and you do. And he stated that the kingdom of God must come quote "on Earth, where God has been denied and forgotten. Where his honor has been disregarded and His commandments have been transgressed; where nations and kingdoms instead of seeking His glory, and showing forth His praise, have not bowed to His authority and referenced His name. It is on earth, that the Lord shall reign, injustice, cruelty and war shall be banished, and instead of idolatry, selfishness and sin, the fear and love and beauty of God will be manifest."

And of course, the Old Testament prophets foretold of this day of Messianic glory, his rule upon the earth; a day when the historical theocracy of Israel would be restored to a perfect theocratic kingdom. A day when the coming King will, according to Isaiah nine, seven, "sit on the throne of David," and execute according to Jeremiah 33:15 "judgment and righteousness in the land." Can you imagine that? And this is consistent with God's covenant promises that cannot be broken, nor can they be transferred. As God declared in Jeremiah 33, beginning in verse 20, "Thus says the LORD, 'If you can break My covenant for the day and My covenant for the night, so that day and night will not be at their appointed time, then My covenant may also be broken with David My servant so that he will not have a son to reign on his throne." The prophet Amos said as well, in Amos nine and verse 11, "In that day, I will raise up the fallen booth of David and wall up its breaches. And I will also raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old." And folks, this is why Satan and his minions are so hell bent on the genocide of Jewish people around the world, especially in Israel. This is why they're trying to take back the land from them. Of course, it's an embarrassment to them that somehow Yahweh is more powerful than Allah, right? That's a huge humiliation.

But we know biblically that the capital city of the Messianic Kingdom will be the city of Jerusalem. And according to Isaiah 24 in verse 23, the divine king "shall reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem." And there according to Isaiah 33 and verse 17, the people of the kingdom will, quote, "see the King in His beauty." And as the prophet Habakkuk said, in Habakkuk, two and verse 14, that will be the day when "the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea." And eventually regenerated and restored Israel will enjoy the divine promises that were given to them, for example, the one in Ezekiel 37, beginning in verse 25, "'They will live on the land that I gave to Jacob My servant, in which your fathers lived; and they will live on it, they, and their sons and their sons' sons, forever; and David, My servant, will be their prince forever." A reference to the Lord Jesus - "I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will place them and multiply them, and I will set My sanctuary in their midst forever. My dwelling place also will be with them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people. And the nations will know that I am the LORD who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forever.'" Aren't you glad you know the end of the story, right?

Most Jewish people today are practical atheists. I have many friends in that camp. I grew up with many Jewish people. And those who are religious, do not worship the Lord Jesus Christ as their Messiah. We understand this from Scripture; they are currently, what we could say, as God's beloved enemy. The Apostle Paul understood this, and he wrote in Romans 11, beginning in verse 25, that a "partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.'" From the standpoint of the gospel, they are enemies, for your sake..." speaking to Gentiles, "but from the standpoint of God's choice they are beloved, for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." And Satan is frantically and brilliantly, trying to thwart the purposes of God, to these ends, and naturally, the New Testament underscores the same promise of a mediatorial kingdom - an intermediate Kingdom - between the end of human history and the eternal state, which will be the millennial kingdom, the kingdom on earth where Christ will reign.

We see this for example, in the witness of the angel, announcing Jesus’ birth to Mary, remember Luke 1:31. This is what he said, "'And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.'" Now let me pause there. That was fulfilled literally, we know that. And when interpreted in its natural, normal sense, the rest of the statement should also be interpreted literally as well. He goes on to say, "'and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father, David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.'" Only some form of theological prejudice would justify a spiritualized interpretation of that passage of scripture. The promise to Mary cannot be limited to some kind of a spiritual kingdom that only exists in the hearts of men; even though there is an element of that that is very true; but rather it reflects the political connotations of the historic theocracy of Israel that the prophets described at length in the Old Testament.

And this, of course, is also consistent with Jesus' promise to his disciples, remember, in Matthew 19 and verse 28, this is what he said to them, "Truly, I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." No wonder the very well instructed followers of Jesus persistently questioned Him after His resurrection. As we read in Acts one six, saying, "'Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom?'" And while he went on to make it clear that it wasn't for them to know the time, he did not correct their assumption that the restoration of the kingdom of Israel would be certain. And later Peter understood this, as recorded in Acts three and verse 21, that Christ must remain in heaven. He says, quote, "until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time."

So therefore, like the early apostles whom Jesus sent out to proclaim the kingdom of God, Luke nine and verse two, we do the same, we do the same. Now to be sure, the kingdom of God is the all-encompassing and unifying theme of Scripture. And this will be ultimately the outworking of God's unilateral, unconditional, irreversible, irrevocable covenants through which his kingdom will come that God made to his people. That would include the Noahic Covenant of Genesis six and nine, the Abrahamic covenant of Genesis 12, and 17, as well as the priestly covenant that we read about in Numbers 25, the Davidic Covenant that we read about in First Samuel, or Second Samuel chapter seven, and of course, the New Covenant that we read about in Jeremiah 31. And therefore, the very last chapter of the Bible, in Revelation 22, verses three and verses five, we read the final rule of God, and the Lamb and God's people ruling upon a new earth. And there the text says, "There will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it and His bondservants will serve Him...and they will reign forever and ever."

But, prior to all of this, great judgment is coming upon the earth, as the scriptures make very clear. Judgments that will come upon Israel, as well as the nations of the world consistent with, for example, Daniel's 70th week promises. And beginning here in Mark's gospel, few weeks ago, we started here in Mark 13 and verse five, Jesus describes certain signs that will appear upon the earth before he returns. Six specific signs, which he calls "birth pangs," according to Mark 13 and verse eight. And these are going to occur just before his appearing. You will recall they include false messiahs, nations at war, natural disasters of epic proportions, and we've already covered those three. And now today we will look at the last three: persecution of tribulation saints, mass evangelism and defection of, and betrayal by, false believers.

Now bear in mind while all of these things have existed throughout the course of redemptive history in various ways; they merely foreshadow what will come upon the earth during the time of the tribulation. These will be events of far greater severity, and frequency and scope. So let's look at now the fourth sign of his coming that Jesus gives: persecution of tribulation saints. And we read about this in verse nine of Mark 13. "'But be on your guard;'" Jesus says, "'For they will deliver you to the courts.'" By the way, courts is literally "sanhedrins" which would describe local Jewish courts attached to synagogues. "'They will deliver you to the courts, and you will be flogged in the synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them.'" Now, we know that Jesus has warned in other places about this kind of persecution against Christians. We can read about it, for example, in Matthew 10, verses 16 and 17. And we know in the upper room when Jesus was with his disciples, in John 16, beginning in verse two, he said this, "'They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God. These things they will do because they have not known the Father or Me.'" And of course, we've seen elements of this again down through history, some of them are recorded in the New Testament. We think of the story of John the Baptist and Stephen and the Apostle Paul, and of course, the Lord Jesus Himself. In fact, Paul said in Second Corinthians 11, beginning in verse 24, "Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods." If you could have seen the Apostle Paul's chest and back, it would look like spaghetti. We know of the governors that are recorded in the New Testament, Pontius Pilate, Felix, Festus, and kings like Herod Agrippa the First in Acts 12, Herod Agrippa the Second in Acts 25, and even Herod Antipas that beheaded John the Baptist; all examples of wicked rulers who hated Christ and all who belong to Him.

But folks think about this, what will it be like when the Antichrist helps the Jews build their next temple in Jerusalem? After making a covenant with them. The Islamic rule in the world will have been defeated in the battle of Gog and Magog. The Jewish people will be ecstatic, they will think that now the kingdom has arrived. This will be a season of national revival, a regathering of Jewish people from among the nations. And at that point, they will have zero tolerance for any kind of a Christian witness. Despite the many Jews and Gentiles that will come to faith in Christ during that period. And no doubt, the world will rejoice at the removal of the church and the rapture--the snatching away. And yet, now, they will say my goodness, here they are, again. People following after this Jesus of Nazareth. One can only imagine the bit bizarre explanations that will be given to explain that supernatural event; explanations that will somehow tickle the ears of those who are confused in that godless world. And remember, the end of the age is going to be characterized by unparallel deception. Paul describes the Antichrist in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse nine, as "the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason, God will send upon them a deluding influence, so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness."

We see elements of that today, do we not? People that are completely deluded. Many things are tantamount to two plus two is five. And no matter what you say, that's what they see. And for this reason, every man, woman and child who will profess the Lord Jesus Christ during the Tribulation will be hated by all, especially those in the unbelieving Jewish community. In Revelation six, beginning in verse nine, we are given a little glimpse of the fate, and the mournful prayer of the saints who will be martyred in that day. There we read, "When the Lamb broke the fifth seal, I saw underneath the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God, and because of the testimony which they had maintained; and they cried out with a loud voice, saying, 'How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the earth?' And that was given to each of them a white robe; and they were told that they should rest for a little while longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who were to be killed even as they had been, would be completed also." And folks, we shouldn't be surprised if much of the same treatment comes upon us, before these days arrive. In fact, suffering and mistreatment have always been the experience of the redeemed. And Paul told Timothy about this, remember in Second Timothy, chapter three and verse 12, "Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted."

So, Jesus gives these signs in answer to his disciples who are questioning him; there's going to be false messiahs, nations that war, natural disasters of epic proportions, persecution of tribulation saints. And then he says in verse 10, "'the gospel must first be preached to all the nations.'" And this brings us to our fifth sign, the fifth birth pang--that of mass evangelism. Now, this is absolutely astounding. If you understand the context, let me give you a few thoughts in that regard. We know that the final world system will be ruled by a demon possessed man, the Antichrist. He will be according to Scripture, a brilliant man with captivating charisma that is able to deceive the world. And we're told that he will blaspheme God and lead others to do the same. In fact, the whole drama of the apocalypse is the vicious beast trying to destroy the Lamb. But we also know biblically that during the time of the tribulation, unparalleled wickedness and death will appear upon the earth. And in that time, we read that God is going to raise up 144,000 gospel preachers from every tribe of the sons of Israel, Revelation seven and verse four. Now, why is he going to do this? To fulfill what Jesus promised in Mark 13 and verse 10, "the gospel must be preached to all the nations." We also know that God is going to raise up two supernaturally empowered gospel preachers, the two witnesses, we read about this in Revelation 11 and verse three says, "And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy." It doesn't mean foretell, it means to forth tell, "'they will preach the gospel for 1260 days, clothed and sackcloth.'" Now, there's much speculation regarding the identity of these two witnesses. We can't be dogmatic, but the most compelling evidence points to the actual Moses and Elijah, as I have preached before, in other passages, verse five of Revelation 11. "And if anyone desires to harm them, fire proceeds out of their mouth and devours their enemies and if anyone would desire to harm them in this manner, he must be killed." So by implication, many are going to want to harm them. And later we know that the beast, the Antichrist, is going to overcome them, and their dead bodies, the text says, will "lie in the street of the great city.... for three and a half days." The world is going to celebrate their demise; these gospel preachers, these morons, these idiots are finally gone. And then verse 11, of Revelation 11, we read, and "after the three and a half days, the breath of life from God came unto them, and they stood on their feet; and great fear fell upon those who were beholding them. And they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, 'Come up here.' Then they went up into heaven in the cloud, and their enemies watched them." Now, why would God allow all of this to happen? The answer is simple. Because the Gospel must first be preached to all the nations, as Jesus promised.

And according to Revelation 13, we know that soon after this, the Antichrist is going to fake his death and resurrection to further deceive the world into following him. Revelation 13, beginning of verse seven, "It was also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world, in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." And we know that it is in that context, that another character will arise that is called the False Prophet. He comes on the scene, he is called "the second beast," "the one out of the earth" in Revelation 13. Now bear in mind, the Antichrist is going to be a political and military leader, but the False Prophet is going to be a religious leader, and he too will be controlled by a powerful demon. Think about it, even as the rulers of Rome once to control the masses politically, they also did so religiously, and Satan is going to continue to use the strategy as he has down through recorded history. And this will be manifested in the rule of the Antichrist and the False Prophet. And as we study the various passages, we see that the False Prophet is going to assist the Antichrist by forming the final false church; a great amalgam, religious amalgam called "the great horror" of Revelation 17. And we know that the False Prophet will basically be a counterfeit of the Holy Spirit, he will be able to perform mighty wonders and point unceasingly at the beast, even as the Holy Spirit points unceasingly to Christ. And frankly, the False Prophet will make up the third person in the unholy trinity. Satan is always creating counterfeits, and the unholy trinity will consist of Satan, the Antichrist, and the false prophet. And according to Revelation 13 and verse 11 and following, we read how he is going to deceive the inhabitants of the earth with signs that he has given to perform in the presence of the beast. And of course, the unregenerate are already easily deceived. If you're here today, and you've never come to saving faith in Christ, you are easily deceived. You not only believe your own lies, but the lies of the world and the Word of God is foolishness to you. And this will be even more so in that day; they will be easily deceived. We read about the unregenerate, those apart from Christ, their foolish heart is darkened, right? Satan blinds the minds of the unbelieving, and so forth. And we read about this in Revelation 13, beginning in verse 14, "and he deceives those who dwell on the earth because of the signs which it was given him to perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image of the beast who had the wound of the sword and has come to life."

So, you have a fake resurrection from the dead. "And it was given to him to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast would even speak and cause as many as do not worship the image of the beast to be killed. And he causes all, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the freemen and the slaves, to be given a mark on the right hand or on their forehead, and he provides that no one will be able to buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name." Now think about this, notwithstanding all this militant unbelief, all of this deception, many converted Jews and Gentiles are going to stand defiantly against the Antichrist, and refuse to take the mark of the beast. And in so doing, their testimony will once again fulfill what Jesus has promised in our text here, in Mark 13 and verse 10, "The gospel must first be preached to all the nations."

So, think about the context, God will provide 144,000 Jewish missionaries, he will provide two witnesses, new converts, and if that isn't enough, he is going to dispatch angelic evangelists. We see this for example, in Revelation 14, beginning in verse six, "And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people; and he said with a loud voice, 'Fear God and give Him glory, because the hour of His judgment has come; worship Him who made the heaven and the earth and sea and springs of waters.' And another angel, a second one, followed, saying, 'Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who has made all the nations drink of the wine, of the passion of her immorality. Then another angel, a third one, followed them saying with a loud voice, 'If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of His anger, and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb.'" Now, why all of this witness? Why all of this proclamation? The answer is simple. Because "the Gospel must first be preached to all the nations," as Jesus promised.

So, on the earth, there will be unimaginable chaos and deception and suffering and death. Again, think of the unfolding judgments in the Apocalypse, that will cause even man, all of mankind to cry out for the mountains and rocks, according to Revelation six, verse 16, to "'Fall on us, hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?'" In this context, we read how there will be demonic hordes that are released to torment the inhabitants of the earth causing men according to Revelation nine, six, "to seek death, but will not find it, they will long to die, but death will elude to them." So despite all of the horror, the deception, the group think, the threat of death, the gospel is going to be preached to all the nations.

I might also add that here we see God's covenant people beginning to fulfill the role for which they were intended. Genesis 22:18, God said, "'In your seed, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.'" Exodus 19 verse six, "'You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.'" You see, Israel was to be a witness nation of the Lord our God. They were to be the custodians of divine truth. And during Daniel's 70th judgment, many are going to finally join in that mission. We read a little of this in Isaiah 43, beginning in verse nine, "All the nations have gathered together so that the peoples may be assembled. Who among them can declare this, and proclaim to us the former things? Let them present their witnesses that they may be justified, or let them hear and say 'It is true.' 'You are My witnesses,' declares the Lord, 'And My servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe Me and understand that I am He. Before me there was no God formed, and there will be none after Me.'"

And do you realize that this kind of praise is even going to continue into the millennium, according to Joel two and verse 28, "'It will come about that after this I will pour out my Spirit on all mankind, and your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams and your young men will see visions.'" But even during the time of the tribulation, the gospel is going to go forth for. Why? Because this is God's sovereign plan. Because as Jesus said, "the gospel must first be preached to all the nations." And to think that it will be preached in that kind of chaos and horror. O Child of God, never be ashamed of the gospel. Never underestimate the power of the gospel. Many of your family members and your friends, and the majority of the world will laugh at you. But you continue to preach it because the word of God will either harden or soften hearts. And God will absolutely save those that he has set his love upon. And in this we can rejoice. Never forget that Christ promised "I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it." And although the world may will overpower us, it will not overpower his church.

And for this reason, Jesus warns the saints during the time of the tribulation, in Mark 13, verse nine, "'But be on your guard; for they will deliver you to the courts, and you will be flogged in the synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them.'" And then he goes on to offer a marvelous word of encouragement that we would all do well to remember notice in verse 11, he says, "'When they arrest you and hand you over, do not worry beforehand about what you are to say, but say, whatever is given you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but it is the Holy Spirit.'" Perhaps you're like me, there's been times when I've thought that a day may come when I face death, because of my love for Christ. And I'm comforted to know that I don't have to worry about what I'm going to say because the Spirit of God is going to help me say what needs to be said. Isn't that a marvelous thought? And that's what we're saying here. And certainly, down through redemptive history, we've witnessed the power of the Spirit of God in his people as they face martyrdom. I mean, think of Peter and John who proclaim the truth of the gospel to the Sanhedrin, when they were arrested in Acts four. Think of the courage of Stephen, who gave a bold testimony before the Jewish Council, and even as he was being stoned as we read about in Acts seven. I think of the apostle Paul, who gave unflinching proclamations before governors and kings. In fact, he told Timothy in Second Timothy four beginning in verse 17, "But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me. So that through me the proclamation might be fully accomplished, and that all the Gentiles might hear, and I was rescued out of the lion's mouth. "Then he says this, "The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom. To Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen."

I wish to draw your attention to another example of how the Spirit of God empowered various men and women for that matter, in the face of martyrdom. And here I use an example of which I've written about in my book Warrior Preachers, regarding Spirit empowered, warrior field preachers of Scotland. I was fascinated with this because my ancestry hails from that area. So, I've written this, "Redemptive history records many such men, including the young" quote, "field preachers. Who under the threat of fine and imprisonment, of torture or death, preach the gospel in Scotland during the dreadful years of persecution between 1663 and 1688. Because of the edicts of King Charles Second of England, they were forbidden to proclaim a decidedly Calvinistic soteriology that extolled the doctrines of grace. Though thoroughly biblical, their teachings were considered to be hostile to the doctrines of Pelagianism and Arminianism that ultimately developed into Deism and indifferentism. Doctrinal errors that dominate American evangelicalism today. During that dreadful season of persecution--that also may be our fate in the coming years of American tyranny--the 19th century historian and theologian William Blakey wrote this in his monumental work "The preachers of Scotland, from the sixth to the 19th century." Here's what he said, 'The wildest efforts were made by the bishops and their friends to put down conventicle.'" Conventicle was an unlawful religious assembly. "'Grievous fines were imposed on men of property who might attend to them. To harbor a preacher or to help them in any way exposed one either to a heavy fine or to imprisonment; perchance with the boot and thumbscrew.'" The boot and thumbscrew were instruments of torture, possibly even to death. "'The preacher with a great price on his head had no certain dwelling place, and where there was no friendly cottage to shelter him, had to wonder about in wild lonely places, sleeping in woods and caves, often cold and wet and hungry, wracked by rheumatism or prostrated by dysentery. Glad if he could succeed in keeping his pocket Bible dry. And not so much as dreaming of the luxury of books or of a quiet room for study. These were considered the warrior preachers of Scotland. Men like,'" and this is my example to you, ''James Renwick, who was captured, tortured and hung at the Grassmarket of Edinburgh on 17 February 1688. He was a man like many who refuse to bow to the demonic edicts of a Stuart King, and the apostate Christianity he forced upon his subjects through his own tyranny, and that of the phony religionists that served him. In his timeless work, "Fair sunshine: character studies of the Scottish Covenanters" Jock Purves records, the final minutes of this warrior preacher, who was strong and courageous to the end.'" Now what I'm about to read is an example of the Spirit of God empowering one of his own, in the face of certain death. "'By the side of the scaffold, a curate said, 'Own our King and we shall pray for you. 'He answered, 'I will have none of your prayers. I have come to bear my testimony against you and such as you are.' The curate persisted, 'Own our King and pray for him, whatever you say against us.' And Renwick replied, 'I will discourse no more with you. I am within a little to appear before him who is King of Kings and Lord of lords, who shall pour shame, contempt and confusion upon all the kings of the earth who have not ruled for him.' While the drums beat out their wild disharmony, he magnified and blessed the Lord in singing from the 103 Psalm, and in reading his last chapter, Revelation 19. Amid all the din, his manly voice thrilled with rapturous faith, as he read the words, quote, 'He hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.' To prayer he went, again, while the drums continued their deafening, earthbound thunder, and was heard of him in heaven, his dwelling place. The harsh order was given to him to go to the death ladder. He climbed up and prayed again, being heard to say, quote, 'Lord, I die in the faith that thou wilt not leave Scotland, but that thou will to make the blood of thy witness the seed of thy church, and return again to be glorious in our land. And now, Lord, I am ready. The bride, the Lamb's wife, hath made herself ready.' The blinding napkin was tied about his face. And he spoke to his friend close by his side saying, quote, 'Farewell. Be diligent and duty, make your peace with God through Christ. There is a great trial coming. As to the remnant I leave, I have committed them to God. Tell them for me not to weary nor be discouraged and maintaining the testimony of the Lord will provide you teachers and ministers. And when He comes, He will make these despised truths glorious in the earth.' His last words were, 'Lord into the hands I commend my spirit. For thou hast redeemed me, Lord God of truth.' And at that the hangman turned him over.'" Oh, dear Christian, never underestimate the power of the Spirit, even in the face of death should it come your way.

The sixth sign that we will close with this morning is defection of and betrayal by, false believers. And here Jesus warns about the unparalleled persecution of the tribulation saints. He says in verse 12, "'Brother will betray brother to death and the father, his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death.'" Amazing, isn't it, even those who should love us the most will turn against us. And many of you have and are experiencing that right now. Verse 13, '"You will be hated by all because of My name.'" Matthew records it this way in Matthew 24, beginning in verse nine, "'Then they will deliver you to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name.'" Jesus said in John seven, seven, that "'the world hates me because I testify of it, that it's deeds are evil.'" See, people don't want to hear that they don't want to hear the gospel. Matthew went on to record what Jesus said at that time, "'many will fall away,'" literally to disbelieve permanently or finally. In other words, these will be phony Christians in that day. "They went out from us, because they were never a part of us," as we read in First John 2:19. And he says, "'they will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and mislead many because lawlessness is increased.'" Meaning that it's going to grow great in amount. You think it's bad now, it'd be far worse then. And he said, "'most people's love will grow cold.'" Foremost commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength. And then secondly, to love our neighbor as ourself. And as that love for God and neighbor is extinguished, betrayal of loved ones will be much easier. Even as Judas betrayed the family of the 12 in the Lord Jesus Christ.

But then the Lord says this at the end of verse 13, "'but the one who endures to the end he will be saved.'" Now this isn't a works righteousness statement, but rather perseverance is the fruit, not the root of genuine salvation. Jesus said in John 8:31, "'If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine, and you will know the truth and the truth will make you free.'" And this of course, is the work of the Holy Spirit in the redeemed. And for this reason, James would say in James one beginning of verse to "Consider it all joy, my brethren when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces," not apostasy, but "endurance. And let endurance have its perfect results so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." Dear friends, remember that God uses the fires of testing, to burn off the impurities that draw us that is a part of our faith, and to temper the steel of our faith that we might be useful for the sake of the kingdom. And like Job, those whom God saves will stay saved, come what may, because of the power of God that is within them.

For this reason, Paul said in Second Timothy 4:18, "The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and will bring me safely to His heavenly kingdom. To Him be the glory forever and ever, amen." And because of this, the Apostle Paul could say in Romans eight beginning in verse 30, "These whom He predestined, He also called; and these He called He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified." And he went on to say, "Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?" He went on to add, "But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

And when we understand these great doctrinal truths, and we embrace them wholeheartedly, by the power of the Spirit, no matter what the trial, we will be able to sing the lyrics of the hymn that was written in the days of the warrior preachers in Scotland. The words of a hymn "What God ordains is always Good” written by Samuel Rodigast in 1675. I'm just going to close with the last three stanzas. "What God ordains is always good; He is my Friend and Father. His hand protects from every harm, though many storms may gather. Now I may know both joy and woe; someday I shall see clearly that He has loved me dearly. What God ordains is always good. This truth remains unshaken. Tho' sorrow, need or death be mine, I shall not be forsaken. I fear no harm, for with His arm, He shall embrace and shield me; so to my God, I yield me."

Oh, dear friend, I hope you know Christ as Savior. If you don't, I plead with you as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that you come to him this day in repented faith, and trust in Him as your only hope of salvation, lest you perish in your sins. And for those of us who know and love Christ, may we celebrate him all the more as we contemplate not only what he has done for us, and what he is currently doing for us, but what will happen when he returns and fulfills all of his promises. Oh, what a day that will be, amen? Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. May they penetrate our hearts in such a way as to cause us to bow before your presence in abject humility and thanksgiving because of the hope that is ours in Christ, may we all rejoice. So, we commit your word and all that you will do with it, to you, for the sake of Jesus, Amen.We return again this morning to Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn there to Mark chapter 13. In a few minutes, we will be examining verses nine through 13 as we continue to understand Jesus prophetic discourse on the end of the age. This is actually part three of that series.

Of course, we're all aware of what's going on in the Middle East-- Iran's attack upon Israel, which is, frankly, evidence of liberal buffoonery that we see in our country and other places around the world. The idea that you can appease Islamic terrorists is insane. To think that you can somehow warm fuzzy these kinds of people into the civilized world is insane. And frankly, they have a faulty anthropology. They believe that man is more deprived than depraved. And if you just give him what he needs, then he will be a good person. Nothing could be further from the truth. And of course, this all points to the fact that the world is inexorably heading toward unprecedented conflict. Conflict consistent with the battle of Gog and Magog as we read in Ezekiel 38 and 39, where there will be an alliance of nations that will come upon Israel, and ultimately God will destroy them. Boy don't you get weary of all the evil in the world, every time you turn on the news, you just want to shake your head and turn it off and watch cartoons or something right? I mean, I long to see the name of the Lord vindicated. I am so tired of seeing him mocked and ridiculed. I long for that day, when true, social justice will be meted out by the only infinitely just and righteous God.

And we've been examining the signs that Jesus has given, predicting what will happen on the earth at the end of the age, just prior to his physical return to the earth. And you know, Jesus commanded us to pray in Matthew 16 "Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." A technical point here, but it is significant--the Greek text is very revealing, in that in each of these petitions, the verb is not only in the emphatic position, but it is also what we call an aorist active imperative, noting that this will be a single instantaneous action. This is something that is going to explode upon the earth, something dramatic and glorious. This is not merely some spiritualized kingdom that already exists upon the earth. It's not something that's gradually going to appear over time. So we pray for that day when the glory of God will explode upon this earth and his kingdom will come, it will instantaneously burst forth; I long for that day. In fact, the godly and learned 19th century Hungarian Jewish convert to Christianity, and Presbyterian minister missionary by the name of Adolph Saphir, longed for this day to come as I do, and you do. And he stated that the kingdom of God must come quote "on Earth, where God has been denied and forgotten. Where his honor has been disregarded and His commandments have been transgressed; where nations and kingdoms instead of seeking His glory, and showing forth His praise, have not bowed to His authority and referenced His name. It is on earth, that the Lord shall reign, injustice, cruelty and war shall be banished, and instead of idolatry, selfishness and sin, the fear and love and beauty of God will be manifest."

And of course, the Old Testament prophets foretold of this day of Messianic glory, his rule upon the earth; a day when the historical theocracy of Israel would be restored to a perfect theocratic kingdom. A day when the coming King will, according to Isaiah nine, seven, "sit on the throne of David," and execute according to Jeremiah 33:15 "judgment and righteousness in the land." Can you imagine that? And this is consistent with God's covenant promises that cannot be broken, nor can they be transferred. As God declared in Jeremiah 33, beginning in verse 20, "Thus says the LORD, 'If you can break My covenant for the day and My covenant for the night, so that day and night will not be at their appointed time, then My covenant may also be broken with David My servant so that he will not have a son to reign on his throne." The prophet Amos said as well, in Amos nine and verse 11, "In that day, I will raise up the fallen booth of David and wall up its breaches. And I will also raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old." And folks, this is why Satan and his minions are so hell bent on the genocide of Jewish people around the world, especially in Israel. This is why they're trying to take back the land from them. Of course, it's an embarrassment to them that somehow Yahweh is more powerful than Allah, right? That's a huge humiliation.

But we know biblically that the capital city of the Messianic Kingdom will be the city of Jerusalem. And according to Isaiah 24 in verse 23, the divine king "shall reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem." And there according to Isaiah 33 and verse 17, the people of the kingdom will, quote, "see the King in His beauty." And as the prophet Habakkuk said, in Habakkuk, two and verse 14, that will be the day when "the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea." And eventually regenerated and restored Israel will enjoy the divine promises that were given to them, for example, the one in Ezekiel 37, beginning in verse 25, "'They will live on the land that I gave to Jacob My servant, in which your fathers lived; and they will live on it, they, and their sons and their sons' sons, forever; and David, My servant, will be their prince forever." A reference to the Lord Jesus - "I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will place them and multiply them, and I will set My sanctuary in their midst forever. My dwelling place also will be with them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people. And the nations will know that I am the LORD who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forever.'" Aren't you glad you know the end of the story, right?

Most Jewish people today are practical atheists. I have many friends in that camp. I grew up with many Jewish people. And those who are religious, do not worship the Lord Jesus Christ as their Messiah. We understand this from Scripture; they are currently, what we could say, as God's beloved enemy. The Apostle Paul understood this, and he wrote in Romans 11, beginning in verse 25, that a "partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.'" From the standpoint of the gospel, they are enemies, for your sake..." speaking to Gentiles, "but from the standpoint of God's choice they are beloved, for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." And Satan is frantically and brilliantly, trying to thwart the purposes of God, to these ends, and naturally, the New Testament underscores the same promise of a mediatorial kingdom - an intermediate Kingdom - between the end of human history and the eternal state, which will be the millennial kingdom, the kingdom on earth where Christ will reign.

We see this for example, in the witness of the angel, announcing Jesus’ birth to Mary, remember Luke 1:31. This is what he said, "'And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.'" Now let me pause there. That was fulfilled literally, we know that. And when interpreted in its natural, normal sense, the rest of the statement should also be interpreted literally as well. He goes on to say, "'and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father, David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.'" Only some form of theological prejudice would justify a spiritualized interpretation of that passage of scripture. The promise to Mary cannot be limited to some kind of a spiritual kingdom that only exists in the hearts of men; even though there is an element of that that is very true; but rather it reflects the political connotations of the historic theocracy of Israel that the prophets described at length in the Old Testament.

And this, of course, is also consistent with Jesus' promise to his disciples, remember, in Matthew 19 and verse 28, this is what he said to them, "Truly, I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." No wonder the very well instructed followers of Jesus persistently questioned Him after His resurrection. As we read in Acts one six, saying, "'Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom?'" And while he went on to make it clear that it wasn't for them to know the time, he did not correct their assumption that the restoration of the kingdom of Israel would be certain. And later Peter understood this, as recorded in Acts three and verse 21, that Christ must remain in heaven. He says, quote, "until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time."

So therefore, like the early apostles whom Jesus sent out to proclaim the kingdom of God, Luke nine and verse two, we do the same, we do the same. Now to be sure, the kingdom of God is the all-encompassing and unifying theme of Scripture. And this will be ultimately the outworking of God's unilateral, unconditional, irreversible, irrevocable covenants through which his kingdom will come that God made to his people. That would include the Noahic Covenant of Genesis six and nine, the Abrahamic covenant of Genesis 12, and 17, as well as the priestly covenant that we read about in Numbers 25, the Davidic Covenant that we read about in First Samuel, or Second Samuel chapter seven, and of course, the New Covenant that we read about in Jeremiah 31. And therefore, the very last chapter of the Bible, in Revelation 22, verses three and verses five, we read the final rule of God, and the Lamb and God's people ruling upon a new earth. And there the text says, "There will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it and His bondservants will serve Him...and they will reign forever and ever."

But, prior to all of this, great judgment is coming upon the earth, as the scriptures make very clear. Judgments that will come upon Israel, as well as the nations of the world consistent with, for example, Daniel's 70th week promises. And beginning here in Mark's gospel, few weeks ago, we started here in Mark 13 and verse five, Jesus describes certain signs that will appear upon the earth before he returns. Six specific signs, which he calls "birth pangs," according to Mark 13 and verse eight. And these are going to occur just before his appearing. You will recall they include false messiahs, nations at war, natural disasters of epic proportions, and we've already covered those three. And now today we will look at the last three: persecution of tribulation saints, mass evangelism and defection of, and betrayal by, false believers.

Now bear in mind while all of these things have existed throughout the course of redemptive history in various ways; they merely foreshadow what will come upon the earth during the time of the tribulation. These will be events of far greater severity, and frequency and scope. So let's look at now the fourth sign of his coming that Jesus gives: persecution of tribulation saints. And we read about this in verse nine of Mark 13. "'But be on your guard;'" Jesus says, "'For they will deliver you to the courts.'" By the way, courts is literally "sanhedrins" which would describe local Jewish courts attached to synagogues. "'They will deliver you to the courts, and you will be flogged in the synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them.'" Now, we know that Jesus has warned in other places about this kind of persecution against Christians. We can read about it, for example, in Matthew 10, verses 16 and 17. And we know in the upper room when Jesus was with his disciples, in John 16, beginning in verse two, he said this, "'They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God. These things they will do because they have not known the Father or Me.'" And of course, we've seen elements of this again down through history, some of them are recorded in the New Testament. We think of the story of John the Baptist and Stephen and the Apostle Paul, and of course, the Lord Jesus Himself. In fact, Paul said in Second Corinthians 11, beginning in verse 24, "Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods." If you could have seen the Apostle Paul's chest and back, it would look like spaghetti. We know of the governors that are recorded in the New Testament, Pontius Pilate, Felix, Festus, and kings like Herod Agrippa the First in Acts 12, Herod Agrippa the Second in Acts 25, and even Herod Antipas that beheaded John the Baptist; all examples of wicked rulers who hated Christ and all who belong to Him.

But folks think about this, what will it be like when the Antichrist helps the Jews build their next temple in Jerusalem? After making a covenant with them. The Islamic rule in the world will have been defeated in the battle of Gog and Magog. The Jewish people will be ecstatic, they will think that now the kingdom has arrived. This will be a season of national revival, a regathering of Jewish people from among the nations. And at that point, they will have zero tolerance for any kind of a Christian witness. Despite the many Jews and Gentiles that will come to faith in Christ during that period. And no doubt, the world will rejoice at the removal of the church and the rapture--the snatching away. And yet, now, they will say my goodness, here they are, again. People following after this Jesus of Nazareth. One can only imagine the bit bizarre explanations that will be given to explain that supernatural event; explanations that will somehow tickle the ears of those who are confused in that godless world. And remember, the end of the age is going to be characterized by unparallel deception. Paul describes the Antichrist in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse nine, as "the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason, God will send upon them a deluding influence, so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness."

We see elements of that today, do we not? People that are completely deluded. Many things are tantamount to two plus two is five. And no matter what you say, that's what they see. And for this reason, every man, woman and child who will profess the Lord Jesus Christ during the Tribulation will be hated by all, especially those in the unbelieving Jewish community. In Revelation six, beginning in verse nine, we are given a little glimpse of the fate, and the mournful prayer of the saints who will be martyred in that day. There we read, "When the Lamb broke the fifth seal, I saw underneath the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God, and because of the testimony which they had maintained; and they cried out with a loud voice, saying, 'How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the earth?' And that was given to each of them a white robe; and they were told that they should rest for a little while longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who were to be killed even as they had been, would be completed also." And folks, we shouldn't be surprised if much of the same treatment comes upon us, before these days arrive. In fact, suffering and mistreatment have always been the experience of the redeemed. And Paul told Timothy about this, remember in Second Timothy, chapter three and verse 12, "Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted."

So, Jesus gives these signs in answer to his disciples who are questioning him; there's going to be false messiahs, nations that war, natural disasters of epic proportions, persecution of tribulation saints. And then he says in verse 10, "'the gospel must first be preached to all the nations.'" And this brings us to our fifth sign, the fifth birth pang--that of mass evangelism. Now, this is absolutely astounding. If you understand the context, let me give you a few thoughts in that regard. We know that the final world system will be ruled by a demon possessed man, the Antichrist. He will be according to Scripture, a brilliant man with captivating charisma that is able to deceive the world. And we're told that he will blaspheme God and lead others to do the same. In fact, the whole drama of the apocalypse is the vicious beast trying to destroy the Lamb. But we also know biblically that during the time of the tribulation, unparalleled wickedness and death will appear upon the earth. And in that time, we read that God is going to raise up 144,000 gospel preachers from every tribe of the sons of Israel, Revelation seven and verse four. Now, why is he going to do this? To fulfill what Jesus promised in Mark 13 and verse 10, "the gospel must be preached to all the nations." We also know that God is going to raise up two supernaturally empowered gospel preachers, the two witnesses, we read about this in Revelation 11 and verse three says, "And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy." It doesn't mean foretell, it means to forth tell, "'they will preach the gospel for 1260 days, clothed and sackcloth.'" Now, there's much speculation regarding the identity of these two witnesses. We can't be dogmatic, but the most compelling evidence points to the actual Moses and Elijah, as I have preached before, in other passages, verse five of Revelation 11. "And if anyone desires to harm them, fire proceeds out of their mouth and devours their enemies and if anyone would desire to harm them in this manner, he must be killed." So by implication, many are going to want to harm them. And later we know that the beast, the Antichrist, is going to overcome them, and their dead bodies, the text says, will "lie in the street of the great city.... for three and a half days." The world is going to celebrate their demise; these gospel preachers, these morons, these idiots are finally gone. And then verse 11, of Revelation 11, we read, and "after the three and a half days, the breath of life from God came unto them, and they stood on their feet; and great fear fell upon those who were beholding them. And they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, 'Come up here.' Then they went up into heaven in the cloud, and their enemies watched them." Now, why would God allow all of this to happen? The answer is simple. Because the Gospel must first be preached to all the nations, as Jesus promised.

And according to Revelation 13, we know that soon after this, the Antichrist is going to fake his death and resurrection to further deceive the world into following him. Revelation 13, beginning of verse seven, "It was also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world, in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." And we know that it is in that context, that another character will arise that is called the False Prophet. He comes on the scene, he is called "the second beast," "the one out of the earth" in Revelation 13. Now bear in mind, the Antichrist is going to be a political and military leader, but the False Prophet is going to be a religious leader, and he too will be controlled by a powerful demon. Think about it, even as the rulers of Rome once to control the masses politically, they also did so religiously, and Satan is going to continue to use the strategy as he has down through recorded history. And this will be manifested in the rule of the Antichrist and the False Prophet. And as we study the various passages, we see that the False Prophet is going to assist the Antichrist by forming the final false church; a great amalgam, religious amalgam called "the great horror" of Revelation 17. And we know that the False Prophet will basically be a counterfeit of the Holy Spirit, he will be able to perform mighty wonders and point unceasingly at the beast, even as the Holy Spirit points unceasingly to Christ. And frankly, the False Prophet will make up the third person in the unholy trinity. Satan is always creating counterfeits, and the unholy trinity will consist of Satan, the Antichrist, and the false prophet. And according to Revelation 13 and verse 11 and following, we read how he is going to deceive the inhabitants of the earth with signs that he has given to perform in the presence of the beast. And of course, the unregenerate are already easily deceived. If you're here today, and you've never come to saving faith in Christ, you are easily deceived. You not only believe your own lies, but the lies of the world and the Word of God is foolishness to you. And this will be even more so in that day; they will be easily deceived. We read about the unregenerate, those apart from Christ, their foolish heart is darkened, right? Satan blinds the minds of the unbelieving, and so forth. And we read about this in Revelation 13, beginning in verse 14, "and he deceives those who dwell on the earth because of the signs which it was given him to perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image of the beast who had the wound of the sword and has come to life."

So, you have a fake resurrection from the dead. "And it was given to him to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast would even speak and cause as many as do not worship the image of the beast to be killed. And he causes all, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the freemen and the slaves, to be given a mark on the right hand or on their forehead, and he provides that no one will be able to buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name." Now think about this, notwithstanding all this militant unbelief, all of this deception, many converted Jews and Gentiles are going to stand defiantly against the Antichrist, and refuse to take the mark of the beast. And in so doing, their testimony will once again fulfill what Jesus has promised in our text here, in Mark 13 and verse 10, "The gospel must first be preached to all the nations."

So, think about the context, God will provide 144,000 Jewish missionaries, he will provide two witnesses, new converts, and if that isn't enough, he is going to dispatch angelic evangelists. We see this for example, in Revelation 14, beginning in verse six, "And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people; and he said with a loud voice, 'Fear God and give Him glory, because the hour of His judgment has come; worship Him who made the heaven and the earth and sea and springs of waters.' And another angel, a second one, followed, saying, 'Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who has made all the nations drink of the wine, of the passion of her immorality. Then another angel, a third one, followed them saying with a loud voice, 'If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of His anger, and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb.'" Now, why all of this witness? Why all of this proclamation? The answer is simple. Because "the Gospel must first be preached to all the nations," as Jesus promised.

So, on the earth, there will be unimaginable chaos and deception and suffering and death. Again, think of the unfolding judgments in the Apocalypse, that will cause even man, all of mankind to cry out for the mountains and rocks, according to Revelation six, verse 16, to "'Fall on us, hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?'" In this context, we read how there will be demonic hordes that are released to torment the inhabitants of the earth causing men according to Revelation nine, six, "to seek death, but will not find it, they will long to die, but death will elude to them." So despite all of the horror, the deception, the group think, the threat of death, the gospel is going to be preached to all the nations.

I might also add that here we see God's covenant people beginning to fulfill the role for which they were intended. Genesis 22:18, God said, "'In your seed, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.'" Exodus 19 verse six, "'You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.'" You see, Israel was to be a witness nation of the Lord our God. They were to be the custodians of divine truth. And during Daniel's 70th judgment, many are going to finally join in that mission. We read a little of this in Isaiah 43, beginning in verse nine, "All the nations have gathered together so that the peoples may be assembled. Who among them can declare this, and proclaim to us the former things? Let them present their witnesses that they may be justified, or let them hear and say 'It is true.' 'You are My witnesses,' declares the Lord, 'And My servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe Me and understand that I am He. Before me there was no God formed, and there will be none after Me.'"

And do you realize that this kind of praise is even going to continue into the millennium, according to Joel two and verse 28, "'It will come about that after this I will pour out my Spirit on all mankind, and your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams and your young men will see visions.'" But even during the time of the tribulation, the gospel is going to go forth for. Why? Because this is God's sovereign plan. Because as Jesus said, "the gospel must first be preached to all the nations." And to think that it will be preached in that kind of chaos and horror. O Child of God, never be ashamed of the gospel. Never underestimate the power of the gospel. Many of your family members and your friends, and the majority of the world will laugh at you. But you continue to preach it because the word of God will either harden or soften hearts. And God will absolutely save those that he has set his love upon. And in this we can rejoice. Never forget that Christ promised "I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it." And although the world may will overpower us, it will not overpower his church.

And for this reason, Jesus warns the saints during the time of the tribulation, in Mark 13, verse nine, "'But be on your guard; for they will deliver you to the courts, and you will be flogged in the synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them.'" And then he goes on to offer a marvelous word of encouragement that we would all do well to remember notice in verse 11, he says, "'When they arrest you and hand you over, do not worry beforehand about what you are to say, but say, whatever is given you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but it is the Holy Spirit.'" Perhaps you're like me, there's been times when I've thought that a day may come when I face death, because of my love for Christ. And I'm comforted to know that I don't have to worry about what I'm going to say because the Spirit of God is going to help me say what needs to be said. Isn't that a marvelous thought? And that's what we're saying here. And certainly, down through redemptive history, we've witnessed the power of the Spirit of God in his people as they face martyrdom. I mean, think of Peter and John who proclaim the truth of the gospel to the Sanhedrin, when they were arrested in Acts four. Think of the courage of Stephen, who gave a bold testimony before the Jewish Council, and even as he was being stoned as we read about in Acts seven. I think of the apostle Paul, who gave unflinching proclamations before governors and kings. In fact, he told Timothy in Second Timothy four beginning in verse 17, "But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me. So that through me the proclamation might be fully accomplished, and that all the Gentiles might hear, and I was rescued out of the lion's mouth. "Then he says this, "The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom. To Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen."

I wish to draw your attention to another example of how the Spirit of God empowered various men and women for that matter, in the face of martyrdom. And here I use an example of which I've written about in my book Warrior Preachers, regarding Spirit empowered, warrior field preachers of Scotland. I was fascinated with this because my ancestry hails from that area. So, I've written this, "Redemptive history records many such men, including the young" quote, "field preachers. Who under the threat of fine and imprisonment, of torture or death, preach the gospel in Scotland during the dreadful years of persecution between 1663 and 1688. Because of the edicts of King Charles Second of England, they were forbidden to proclaim a decidedly Calvinistic soteriology that extolled the doctrines of grace. Though thoroughly biblical, their teachings were considered to be hostile to the doctrines of Pelagianism and Arminianism that ultimately developed into Deism and indifferentism. Doctrinal errors that dominate American evangelicalism today. During that dreadful season of persecution--that also may be our fate in the coming years of American tyranny--the 19th century historian and theologian William Blakey wrote this in his monumental work "The preachers of Scotland, from the sixth to the 19th century." Here's what he said, 'The wildest efforts were made by the bishops and their friends to put down conventicle.'" Conventicle was an unlawful religious assembly. "'Grievous fines were imposed on men of property who might attend to them. To harbor a preacher or to help them in any way exposed one either to a heavy fine or to imprisonment; perchance with the boot and thumbscrew.'" The boot and thumbscrew were instruments of torture, possibly even to death. "'The preacher with a great price on his head had no certain dwelling place, and where there was no friendly cottage to shelter him, had to wonder about in wild lonely places, sleeping in woods and caves, often cold and wet and hungry, wracked by rheumatism or prostrated by dysentery. Glad if he could succeed in keeping his pocket Bible dry. And not so much as dreaming of the luxury of books or of a quiet room for study. These were considered the warrior preachers of Scotland. Men like,'" and this is my example to you, ''James Renwick, who was captured, tortured and hung at the Grassmarket of Edinburgh on 17 February 1688. He was a man like many who refuse to bow to the demonic edicts of a Stuart King, and the apostate Christianity he forced upon his subjects through his own tyranny, and that of the phony religionists that served him. In his timeless work, "Fair sunshine: character studies of the Scottish Covenanters" Jock Purves records, the final minutes of this warrior preacher, who was strong and courageous to the end.'" Now what I'm about to read is an example of the Spirit of God empowering one of his own, in the face of certain death. "'By the side of the scaffold, a curate said, 'Own our King and we shall pray for you. 'He answered, 'I will have none of your prayers. I have come to bear my testimony against you and such as you are.' The curate persisted, 'Own our King and pray for him, whatever you say against us.' And Renwick replied, 'I will discourse no more with you. I am within a little to appear before him who is King of Kings and Lord of lords, who shall pour shame, contempt and confusion upon all the kings of the earth who have not ruled for him.' While the drums beat out their wild disharmony, he magnified and blessed the Lord in singing from the 103 Psalm, and in reading his last chapter, Revelation 19. Amid all the din, his manly voice thrilled with rapturous faith, as he read the words, quote, 'He hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.' To prayer he went, again, while the drums continued their deafening, earthbound thunder, and was heard of him in heaven, his dwelling place. The harsh order was given to him to go to the death ladder. He climbed up and prayed again, being heard to say, quote, 'Lord, I die in the faith that thou wilt not leave Scotland, but that thou will to make the blood of thy witness the seed of thy church, and return again to be glorious in our land. And now, Lord, I am ready. The bride, the Lamb's wife, hath made herself ready.' The blinding napkin was tied about his face. And he spoke to his friend close by his side saying, quote, 'Farewell. Be diligent and duty, make your peace with God through Christ. There is a great trial coming. As to the remnant I leave, I have committed them to God. Tell them for me not to weary nor be discouraged and maintaining the testimony of the Lord will provide you teachers and ministers. And when He comes, He will make these despised truths glorious in the earth.' His last words were, 'Lord into the hands I commend my spirit. For thou hast redeemed me, Lord God of truth.' And at that the hangman turned him over.'" Oh, dear Christian, never underestimate the power of the Spirit, even in the face of death should it come your way.

The sixth sign that we will close with this morning is defection of and betrayal by, false believers. And here Jesus warns about the unparalleled persecution of the tribulation saints. He says in verse 12, "'Brother will betray brother to death and the father, his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death.'" Amazing, isn't it, even those who should love us the most will turn against us. And many of you have and are experiencing that right now. Verse 13, '"You will be hated by all because of My name.'" Matthew records it this way in Matthew 24, beginning in verse nine, "'Then they will deliver you to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name.'" Jesus said in John seven, seven, that "'the world hates me because I testify of it, that it's deeds are evil.'" See, people don't want to hear that they don't want to hear the gospel. Matthew went on to record what Jesus said at that time, "'many will fall away,'" literally to disbelieve permanently or finally. In other words, these will be phony Christians in that day. "They went out from us, because they were never a part of us," as we read in First John 2:19. And he says, "'they will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and mislead many because lawlessness is increased.'" Meaning that it's going to grow great in amount. You think it's bad now, it'd be far worse then. And he said, "'most people's love will grow cold.'" Foremost commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength. And then secondly, to love our neighbor as ourself. And as that love for God and neighbor is extinguished, betrayal of loved ones will be much easier. Even as Judas betrayed the family of the 12 in the Lord Jesus Christ.

But then the Lord says this at the end of verse 13, "'but the one who endures to the end he will be saved.'" Now this isn't a works righteousness statement, but rather perseverance is the fruit, not the root of genuine salvation. Jesus said in John 8:31, "'If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine, and you will know the truth and the truth will make you free.'" And this of course, is the work of the Holy Spirit in the redeemed. And for this reason, James would say in James one beginning of verse to "Consider it all joy, my brethren when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces," not apostasy, but "endurance. And let endurance have its perfect results so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." Dear friends, remember that God uses the fires of testing, to burn off the impurities that draw us that is a part of our faith, and to temper the steel of our faith that we might be useful for the sake of the kingdom. And like Job, those whom God saves will stay saved, come what may, because of the power of God that is within them.

For this reason, Paul said in Second Timothy 4:18, "The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and will bring me safely to His heavenly kingdom. To Him be the glory forever and ever, amen." And because of this, the Apostle Paul could say in Romans eight beginning in verse 30, "These whom He predestined, He also called; and these He called He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified." And he went on to say, "Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?" He went on to add, "But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

And when we understand these great doctrinal truths, and we embrace them wholeheartedly, by the power of the Spirit, no matter what the trial, we will be able to sing the lyrics of the hymn that was written in the days of the warrior preachers in Scotland. The words of a hymn "What God ordains is always Good” written by Samuel Rodigast in 1675. I'm just going to close with the last three stanzas. "What God ordains is always good; He is my Friend and Father. His hand protects from every harm, though many storms may gather. Now I may know both joy and woe; someday I shall see clearly that He has loved me dearly. What God ordains is always good. This truth remains unshaken. Tho' sorrow, need or death be mine, I shall not be forsaken. I fear no harm, for with His arm, He shall embrace and shield me; so to my God, I yield me."

Oh, dear friend, I hope you know Christ as Savior. If you don't, I plead with you as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that you come to him this day in repented faith, and trust in Him as your only hope of salvation, lest you perish in your sins. And for those of us who know and love Christ, may we celebrate him all the more as we contemplate not only what he has done for us, and what he is currently doing for us, but what will happen when he returns and fulfills all of his promises. Oh, what a day that will be, amen? Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. May they penetrate our hearts in such a way as to cause us to bow before your presence in abject humility and thanksgiving because of the hope that is ours in Christ, may we all rejoice. So, we commit your word and all that you will do with it, to you, for the sake of Jesus, Amen.

After taking a break, for Resurrection Sunday, we now return once again to our verse-by-verse study of Mark's gospel. So will you turn to Mark chapter 13, as we look at part two of a series that I'm doing from this passage of Scripture, entitled "Jesus Prophetic Discourse on the End of the Age." A few thoughts before we read the passage and begin to examine it closely.

It's fascinating in Scripture, how light is used as a metaphor for truth. The Psalmist tells us, for example, in Psalm 119:105, that "Your word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path." And Jesus said in John 8:12, "'I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in darkness but will have the Light of life.'" And indeed, the absence of light is darkness. Likewise, the absence of truth is darkness, spiritually. And intellectually, we all know what it's like to be in the dark, both literally and figuratively. Literally, when you're in the dark, you don't know where you're going. You don't know what's in front of you. And it's dangerous. And frankly, that's how most people live spiritually. In fact, Jesus describes hell in Matthew 8:12 as "'outer darkness; in that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"And we are witnessing today in our country the sunset of truth, and the onset of darkness; a foretaste of hell, frankly, an eternal existence apart from the presence of God. Unimaginable. To be sure, we're witnessing the self-induced destruction of what was once the most powerful nation in the history of the world. We're watching the wrath of divine abandonment play out as we read, for example, in Romans one. We're now being governed by people who have no fear of God in their eyes, they are corrupt and greedy and violent. Murderers of unborn infants; unimaginably and grossly immoral. I was reading the other day that we now have approximately 50 special days set aside to celebrate the vile perversions of the LGBTQ mafia. Our educators deny God as the Creator and teach our children that we are really nothing more than sophisticated germs, the result of random selection, all part of evolutionary theory. We have been lied to about the health of our economy. We've been lied to about the whole COVID pandemic, and the efficacy of the vaccines and all of those types of things. We're continually being lied to about global warming. We're being fed lies about systemic racism and gender identity, and orientation. We're lied to about the benefits of gender affirming treatments and procedures. We're lied to about illegal immigration and the implications of all of that. And frankly, it reminds me of Hitler's commitment to deceptive propaganda, as stated in Mein Kampf where he said, quote, "The skillful and unrelenting use of propaganda can persuade people that heaven is hell. For the broad mass of the people, and the primitive simplicity of its heart, more readily falls victim to a big lie than a small one." End quote.

Frankly, the whole lie of the woke agenda is more evil than you can even begin to imagine. I'm not going to take time to get into all of it, but it is satanic to its very core. As I have written elsewhere, "An evil cloud of satanic darkness encompasses the world today. The fierce winds of deception are pummeling all that God deems righteous. The very foundations of basic civility and common sense are being shaken. And without question, the Church of Jesus Christ is under siege. Only the most naive, undiscerning and biblically illiterate Christians can deny this. Like never before a violent storm of persecution against authentic Christianity is gaining strength across the globe." And indeed, we've seen the failed policies of the progressive Marxist agenda continue to divide our country; and gullible people are sucked into all that they're trying to do. And ultimately, what they must do is eradicate genuine Biblical Christianity, because that cannot coexist with a socialist state. They must destroy the nuclear family, they must destroy capitalism, and on and on it goes. And sadly, many gullible Christians of all political stripes, even pastors, are falling victim to the Marxist goal of an atheist utopia.

Well, none of this surprises any serious student of the Bible. This is all part of God's judgment on America. The world is being prepared for the rule of the Antichrist. The "man of lawlessness" according to Second Thessalonians two. We know biblically that he will come about eventually, and he will pretend to be the answer for all of man's problems; he will offer himself as Israel's savior, a counterfeit Messiah, that will make a phony treaty with Israel, according to Daniel 9:27. But he will be against Christ and all who belong to him and he will persecute Israel in the middle of Daniel's 70th week and so forth. A lot of these things you've heard discussed in the past. We know that he is going to rise out of a revived Roman Empire, according to Daniel nine, verse 26. He will be what is called "the wicked prince" who will exert his power, essentially through a united Europe. And as we read the biblical record, we see that he will fuse the world into a political collectivism. The scourge of tribalism, as we would see, for example, in the whole jihadist movement, and hyper-nationalism will finally be replaced with a super national utopia, a one world government, one world economy, one world religion. And after all, you must understand that this is the evolutionary vision of the progressives today. As David Larsen puts it, quote, "Human progress for them is linear, automatic and upward, and the accelerating tendencies toward a world religion with the surrender of biblical supernaturalism in favor of a syncretistic plural liberal pluralism." He went on to say, "Under the aegis of the false prophet, religion will join the Antichrist. The super-church is described in Revelation 17 as "Babylon"; She Lords it over the nations of the earth displays great pageantry and sits upon the beast. This ecclesiastical and ecumenical big top will have brief usefulness and serviceability to the world ruler, but her doom is sealed because she is unfaithful and untrue to the Lord. Her spiritual adulteries are infamous."

Folks, this is where the world is heading. Just prior to the pre-kingdom judgments, we're going to see these things being manifested as the prophetic Scriptures tell us; just prior to our Lord's second coming. And we see Matthew chapter 24, and 25, along with Mark 13, and Luke 21, that we just read a few minutes ago, and Revelation six through 19, providing much detail regarding these matters.

And I might also add that these great prophetic truths out of the New Testament must also be viewed through the lens of the Old Testament, especially Ezekiel's prophecy, Daniel's prophecy, Zechariah's prophecy.

Now with this in mind, we come to what's happening here in our text in the first century. You will recall that this is Jesus' final pronouncement of judgment upon apostate Judaism. And this is followed then with a lengthy explanation of what must take place just prior to his return in power and great glory. And we know that this occurs on Wednesday evening of the Passion Week, in the final hours of Jewish rejection. And you will also recall in Matthew 23, there's a record of the conclusion of Jesus's terrifying pronouncement upon Israel and a farewell promise. In verse 36, we read, "'Your house'"--referring to the temple, where he was standing at the time--"'Your house is being left to you desolate.'" Then he added in verse 39, "'I say to you from now on, you shall not see Me until you say, "BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!"'" Jesus did not say "unless" he said, "until." There's glorious hope there.

So, after his scathing denunciation of their phony religious system, and his ominous prediction of their temple's demise, he concludes with a message of hope, and he quietly withdraws himself from the presence of the multitudes there, on the temple precinct. And obviously, this prediction of judgment upon Israel, animated intense concern with the disciples. Again, they were hoping that he was going to establish his kingdom, right then; that Rome would finally be destroyed. And so they're wondering, "What are you talking about here? What will be the nature and the duration of Israel's desolation? When is this going to happen? And what do you mean 'You shall not see Me until we say, "BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!'" So that's the context here.

Now you will recall the last time we were together, looking at these things, I have given you a little bit of an outline to help you understand Jesus lengthly answer to their question. We're going to look at a little bit more of it here this morning. Let me give you the outline once again. First of all, he speaks of the temple’s demolition; secondly, the signs of the end. Thirdly, the prospect of persecution, then the abomination of desolation, the false Christ and prophets, the coming of the Son of Man, and the warning to be prepared. And this will take us all the way through, beyond where we have just read. And while we do not know the date or the time when the Lord will return, we do know that the stage is being set, even now, as we look at the constellation of prophetic signs.

Now let me read the passage to you in Mark 13, beginning in verse one, "As He was going out of the temple, one of His disciples said to him, 'Teacher, behold, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!' And Jesus said to him, 'Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left upon another which will not be torn down.' As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives, opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew were questioning Him privately, 'Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are going to be fulfilled? 'And Jesus began to say to them, 'See to it that no one misleads you. Many will come in My name saying I am He! and will mislead many. When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be frightened; those things must take place; but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise up against nation and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will also be famines. And these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.'"

Now, by way of review, verses one and two, he's going out of the temple. They're looking at this beautiful edifice, and Jesus says, "'You see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left upon another which will not be torn down.'" So, we examined number one: the temple's demolition. And again, this was an astonishing edifice, a magnificent building, and they are viewing it from the adjacent mountain, the Mount of Olives. Those of you have been there with me, or even on your own, you've been able to see where that would be. The Al Aqsa Mosque is there now, but that's where the temple was. But sadly, the temple had become a symbol, a tragic symbol, of apostate Judaism. And we know that in 70 AD, the Romans came to the Temple Mount, they set fire to the entire thing, and it was so hot the stones crumbled into powder. And the stones that we see there today are just merely the foundation, the retaining stones of the original temple.

And so, if there's not going to be a temple, then that means there's not going to be a Messiah to return to his temple as promised. And that means there's no kingdom, so they're confused. So, in verse three, we read this, "As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew, were questioning Him privately, 'Tell us when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are going to be fulfilled?'" Matthew adds this in Matthew 24, verse three, "'Tell us, when will all these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?'" "Coming"--"parousia." He uses this in the technical sense, in the original language, to describe his appearing, his manifestation at his second coming.

So beginning in verse five, now, Jesus begins to answer their questions in reverse order. And he begins by addressing the signs of his coming, of his "parousia." And in the combined accounts of Mark, or Matthew and Mark, and Luke, Jesus describes six very specific signs called, quote, "birth pangs," as we see in Mark 13, verse eight. And these things are going to appear just before he arrives during the time of the Tribulation. Let me give you those six signs. Number one, false messiah; secondly, nations at war; number three, natural disasters of epic proportions; number four, persecution of tribulation saints; number five, detection of and betrayal by false believers. And then number six, there's going to be a time of mass evangelism. And I might also add that these six signs have undeniable parallels that we see with the seal trumpet and bowl judgments written in the Book of Revelation, which was written in about AD 96. The seal judgments are going to take maybe a few years, the trumpet judgments perhap weeks, and then the bowl judgments, just days and hours.

So we saw the temple's demolition, the last time we were together. Also, we saw a bit of the signs of the end, that would be the second section here. And there's six signs, six birth pangs, of the pre-kingdom judgments. You will recall, we looked at the first one, which was false messiahs; there's going to be great deceivers--false teachers, leading to the worship of the ultimate false messiah, the Antichrist. And that's why Jesus says in verse five, "'See to it that no one misleads you. Many will come in My name, saying, "I am He!" and will mislead many.'" And Jesus repeats this in verses 22 and three, "'For false Christs and false prophets will arise, and will show signs and wonders, in order to lead astray, if possible, the elect. But take heed; behold, I have told you everything in advance.'" Now we all know that false messiahs and false teachers have always existed. They're out there today. In fact, today they multiply like maggots on manure. They're everywhere, especially with the Internet. And they will greatly increase in numbers and in power at the end of the age. And imagine what chaos there will be upon the earth when the church is caught up, when the church is snatched away, according to First Thessalonians four and verse 17. People will be looking for answers; they will be more confused than ever. And of course, that is fertile soil for false messiahs and false teachers to take advantage of people.

And we know that sometime after the rapture of the church, the seal judgments will begin to occur in the first three and a half years, which is in the broad sense called The Tribulation, as we read in Second Thessalonians, one six. And at the beginning of the Tribulation, bear in mind, that the Lord Jesus Christ is going to unleash the first Seal Judgment. We read about that in Revelation six verses one and two, that will be a pseudo peace that will lull the world, including Israel, into a false sense of security and visions of utopia. But it will only be the calm before the storm. And it's fascinating even today, as we watch the social phenomena of group hypnosis, which is often called "mass formation”; we see deceived people believing things that are just utterly absurd. The demonstrably false tenets of critical race theory, the gross immorality of the whole LGBTQ mob, the totalitarian ideologies of Marxism, with the whole woke mafia, and we marvel at man's utter desertion of common sense and critical thinking; while at the same time, employing totalitarian methods to somehow vilify and silence those who differ with them. And this has always been the modus operandi of the liberal elite. This is how they function. They believe that they know what's best, and everyone must do what they say; they must control the populace.

But again, imagine the chaos, imagine the confusion when the church is removed. The Rapture will provide the perfect storm for the arrival of the Antichrist. People are desperate today, looking for answers, imagine what it will be like at that time. Daniel eight, verse 23, gives us a sense of what this will be like. There we read, "A king will arise, insolent and skilled in intrigue. His power will be mighty, but not by his own power, and he will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will; he will destroy mighty men and the holy people. And through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence; and he will magnify himself in his heart, and he will destroy many, while they are at ease. He will even oppose the Prince of princes, but he will be broken without human agency." And Daniel goes on and tells us in Daniel 11, beginning in verse 36, "Then the King will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god, and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods; and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." The apostle Paul adds to this in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse three, "Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come"--referring to the day of the Lord--"unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed as the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God."

So that's a bit of a review of what we looked at the last time and now we move to another prediction here that Jesus gives us, and that is, nations at war. Notice verse seven, "'When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be frightened; those things must take place; but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise up against nation and kingdom against kingdom.'" And Matthew adds this in chapter 24, beginning in verse six, "'And you will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars.'" The grammar here indicates that you're going to constantly be hearing of actual wars and impending wars. And then he goes on to say, "'See that you are not frightened, for those things must take place, but that is not yet the end.'" "Telos," in the original language, which speaks of the very end, the ultimate end of the age when conflict will cease. In other words, there's still more to come. That's the point. And again, this is only the beginning of birth pangs. Verse seven, "'For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.'" And of course, we can already see how there is escalating violence in the world today. I was reading from the Geneva Academy, they monitor, right now, more than 110 armed conflicts around the world. They say that some of them have started recently, while others have lasted for more than 50 years. And according to the International Crisis Group, there are 10 conflicts they say that we should watch even in 2024. They say by the way, quote, "More leaders are pursuing their ends militarily. More believe they can get away with it." And the 10 conflicts that they have, are as follows: Gaza, wider Middle East war, Sudan, Ukraine, Russia, Myanmar, Ethiopia, the Sahel. That, by the way, would include six countries in Central Africa; there's a vast semi-arid region in Africa separating the Sahara Desert to the north, and the more tropical savannas to the south; and that place is just exploding right now. And then Haiti, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and of course, US and China. And today, we know that most of the world hates the United States. Pundits and politicians frequently address the growing fears that we have pertaining to Russia and China and North Korea and the Arab Islamic nations; South America that is now flooding our borders and becoming part of us.

But what we especially must bear in mind is what Ezekiel says in Ezekiel 38, and 39. There is a detailed description of a coalition of nations that will come upon Jerusalem come into Israel. Including Russia, along with numerous other Muslim nations, including Iran, Libya, Egypt, Ethiopia, regions of Armenia and Turkey. This, of course, speaks of the great battle of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38, and 39. And that very well could be the event that sets the first seal into motion. And that battle describes a Russian/Arab alliance of, again, predominantly Muslim nations coming down on Israel from the north and being supernaturally defeated. And there's nothing in that text that would rule out the conditions, even of the State of Israel prior to the Hamas attack on October 7. Is it possible that that attack is kind of the beginning of where this is ultimately going to lead in the battle of Gog and Magog? And it has certainly triggered more violence from the north with Hezbollah. And it's galvanized the Islamic nations around the world against Israel, including those nations that are described in Ezekiel 38, verses five and six.

In fact, Israel's devastating ground operations in Gaza, that's going on right now has outraged the Islamic world, including Turkey, along with millions of non-Islamic Marxists in the United States and so forth. And we see antisemitism and anti-Israeli protests growing at an alarming rate. And we know too, that our current president is losing support of his radical left and continuing to back away from helping Israel. I mean, just think about it, what if we back away completely, what if the rapture of the church occurs and so forth. Israel is already vulnerable, but we know that God will continue to protect them at some measure, because ultimately a remnant of them will be saved. Could this be God's way of fulfilling his promise in Ezekiel 38 and verse four, where he says, "'I will turn you about, and put hooks into your jaws, and I will bring you out, and all your army.'" And then we see that he will destroy them on the mountains of Israel. And Russia, as I have, and others have said in the past, could very well fulfill the role of Gog in Ezekiel 38 and 39. And currently, Russia has six of the former Soviet republics to the north of Israel that are now independent Islamic nations, and they're all calling for Israel's annihilation. Russia is getting arms we know from North Korea, getting arms from Iran, getting arms from China, forming alliances with all of them, along with Turkey and Pakistan and Iran and Libya, Syria, Sudan and Ethiopia. But whoever makes up the alliance of nations God causes to come upon Israel, and they will ultimately be destroyed. My point with all of this is to say that we know of some things that are going to happen during that period of time, of nations and kingdoms in conflict, so it's easy to see, with all of the powder kegs in the world today, how all of this could ultimately explode.

And what's interesting is we look at Scripture, if we go to Revelation, chapter five, the first seven verses, we see how God the Father, hands Christ Jesus, a scroll, the title deed to the universe, and it's sealed seven times, which was customary, of Roman laws of that day, to be sealed in that way. And beginning and then in chapter six, we see how Christ begins to open up those seals and look into the scroll. Seven seals, each of which is a specific category of divine judgment, that God will pour out upon the earth prior to the Lord's return, and they will be sequentially discharged upon the earth. I wanted to just, I've written these out for you just so that you have a sense of this, obviously, we're not going to look at all these but just to give you a flavor of it, we see that the Worthy Lamb opens the scroll and the seals are as follows. First, you have the arrival of the Antichrist. And there you have the white horse and then the red horse of war. Thirdly, the black horse of famine; fourthly, the ashen horse of death; sometimes these are called "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse." And that ashen horse we know, kills 1/4 of the Earth's population with the sword, with famine and pestilence and wild beasts. We'll look at that in a moment. And then number five, you have the seal of martyrdom, and then earthquakes.

It's also worth noting that at that point, in the time of the tribulation, the world will know that they are experiencing the wrath of God, and the Lamb, the Lord Jesus. They will know it. Revelation six, beginning of verse 15, tells us "they hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains; and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, 'Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of the wrath has come, and who is able to stand?'"

And then you have the seventh seal, which unleashes the seven trumpets, and again, these parallel the birth pangs that Jesus describes in the gospels, and then you have the trumpet judgments. The first 1/3 of the earth trees and grass are burned up, then 1/3 of the sea creatures die and the ships are destroyed, then 1/3 of the waters are polluted and many die. 1/3 of the sun, moon and stars are dark and locusts, demons are released to torment people. Four bound demons are released to kill 1/3 of humanity that's left at that point. And then Christ's kingdom reign is proclaimed. And then you have the bowl judgments that will come even more quickly. Painful sores come on people. The sea becomes like blood and everything in the sea dies; the rivers and springs of water are turned to blood. The sun scorches people with fire and heat; darkness and intense pain afflict humanity; the Euphrates River is dried up to prepare the way for kings from the east. Then you have severe earthquakes that split the great city into three parts; cities fall, and severe hail falls from heaven.

And Daniel's prophecy gives us further insight into these types of conflicts of that day. Again, remember in Daniel 9:27, Israel makes a covenant with the Antichrist, he deceives them with his promises to protect them, and in Daniel 7:24, he will rule a massive kingdom that will basically comprise a Roman Empire, a Western confederacy of a united Europe that Daniel describes as a 10-nation empire. And we'd been given more insight here in Daniel 11, beginning in verse 40, which by the way, in this prophecy, he juxtaposes both near and far historical events, which is common in the prophetic literature. The near prophecies were fulfilled by the Persian kingdom and the reign of Greece through Antiochus Epiphanes, and then the future prophecies are concerning the Antichrist. And there Daniel says, "'At the end of time, the king of the South will collide with the Antichrist, and the king of the North will storm against him with chariots.'" This is likely a Russian and Arab Alliance. He goes on to speak of how they will be "'with horsemen and many ships; and he will enter countries, overflow them and pass through. He will also enter the Beautiful Land, and many countries will fall; but these will be rescued out of his hand: Edom, Moab and the foremost of the sons of Ammon. Then he will stretch out his hand against other countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape. But he will gain control over the hidden treasures of gold and silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt; and Libyans and Ethiopians will follow at his heels'" Evidently, there is a temporary defeat of these nations, but the the northern and eastern forces, as we study it, will regroup and kindling his wrath, and so he's going to attack them. That's why he goes on to say, "'But rumors from the East and from the North will disturb him.'"

Let me pause there for a moment. In Revelation nine, verses 14 through 16, we read of an eastern army, composed of 200 million that will destroy a third of the remaining inhabitants of the earth. And it's interesting that today, the Chinese army has an active personnel of 2,035,000. So it gives you some sense of what could be some day. So this will disturb him and "'He will go forth with great wrath to destroy and annihilate many. He will pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain.'" In other words, his headquarters is going to be between the Mediterranean Sea and Mount Zion. "'Yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him.'"

This is also described in Revelation 19, the Battle of Armageddon, the pinnacle of the Day of the Lord, when the Antichrist is defeated, and the Lord Jesus Christ executes all the kings of the earth and the armies. So in summary, this is inconceivable what God predicts, absolutely unimaginable. All of these nations will be destroyed--Russia, to the north, and all of those that are a part of that group, the Confederated Europe to the West, Africa to the South, Asia to the east. They all converge upon tiny, little Israel, which is fascinating. It is the most fought over and most fought on piece of real estate on the planet. They're all going to be destroyed. And the prophet Zechariah tells us in chapter 14, beginning of verse two, that the Lord "will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle." People say, "Where's America in all of this?" It'll be right there. "All of the nations against Jerusalem to battle, the city will be captured, the houses plundered, the women ravished, and half of the city exiled, but the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city. Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as when He fights on a day of battle." Bottom line, all of these conflicts are going to increase in severity and scope just before the Lord returns. No one, regardless of where they live, will be exempt from these worldwide conflicts. And today, I would submit to you that the stage is being set for these things to eventually explode.

Back to Mark 13 verse seven, "'When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be frightened; those things must take place; but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise up against nation and kingdom against kingdom.'" And again, Matthew 24th at the end of verse six, "'See that you are not frightened, for those things must take place.'" Isn't that a word of encouragement there? It tells us that God is sovereign, that God has a plan, God is in control. And he will be here soon, is the point. He will be here soon. So Jesus describes false messiahs, nations at war, and now thirdly, the next birth pang, natural disasters of epic proportions. Notice at the end of verse eight, "there will be earthquakes in various places; there will also be famines. These things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.'" And Matthew puts it this way in Matthew 24 at the end of verse seven, "'and in various places there will be famines, and earthquakes. But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.'" Now we have a whole lot more detail, for example, in Revelation six eight; we see Christ breaking the fourth seal of the scroll. And there we read, "I looked, and behold, and ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by the wild beasts of the earth." Folks, this is such a macabre scene; a terrifying scene, horrifying beyond imagination. This ashen horse, it's fascinating. Ashen is "chlōros" in the original language. We get chlorophyll and chlorine from that. But it's a pale-yellow green color. The color of sickness; it's the color of a decomposing corpse if you've ever seen that. It's a hideous sight. It's also the blanched appearance of a person that is struck with paralyzing fear.

And of course, global war will inevitably lead to famine, especially if nuclear arms are used. And here John sees Hades--meaning the grave--following this ashen horse mounted by Death. We read of the sword, famine and pestilence, and whenever those are mentioned in Scripture, the context is that this is what will lead to death. Pestilence--"thanatos" in the original language. It's also translated "death." In this context, it encompasses all of the natural disasters, like famines and earthquakes that Jesus has predicted. But many of the diseases, it would include many of the diseases, that inevitably accompany such cataclysmic events like typhus fevers, which is one of the greatest killers throughout history. Typhus is different types of bacteria as I recall from my very brief days in biology. They can be carried by fleas and lice and chiggers. In fact, more casualties in the Civil War were due to disease than battle. So you can imagine what it will be like during that time. The great influenza epidemic of 1918 and 19 killed an estimated 30 million people. And we know historically, that wherever you have corpses and famine, you will have wide scale disasters and disease, described by the term pestilence. And you will have wild beasts. It's interesting the original language--"thērion"--it could refer to any kind of wild carnivore starving for a meal. But the term is also used to translate "birds and insects." It could very well, and probably will, include rats. Imagine the disease born even by mosquitoes. Mayo Clinic estimates that malaria is responsible for killing 2.7 million people annually. There's great fears of bird flu being spread today. Imagine during this time, hospitals will be scarce if not non-existent. Supply of life saving drugs are interrupted. And of course, rats thrive in highly populated areas notorious for spreading disease. You will recall in the 14th century, rats spread the bubonic plague that wiped out 1/4 to 1/3 of Europe. It's called the Black Death. This is horrible. It's inconceivable. And this is just the fourth seal of Revelation eight; the third birth pang of Jesus' prophecy.

You see, by the time the Lamb breaks all the seals, and all the trumpet and bowl judgments are poured out upon the earth, the planet as we know it will cease to exist. I can't even begin to imagine what this place will look alike. And those who refuse to repent, will be in such unimaginable torment that we are told, according to Revelation nine beginning in verse five that they will "seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, and death flees from them." Revelation 16 verse 10, says they will "gnaw their tongues because of pain."

By the way, nothing of this severity and scope took place in ad 70. Which is one more reason why I reject the argument that this is merely a description of what happened with the Jews and the Romans at that time. And to think Jesus says in Matthew 24, verse eight, "'all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.'"

As we close this morning, I was thinking, how ironic it is--mankind loves to worship himself, exalt himself above God. Mankind loves to worship the planet, rather than the God that created all things. In fact, today, pets and animals have more protection than unborn babies. Isn't it amazing when you think about that? People worship the environment, but not the Creator. But isn't it interesting in the pre-kingdom judgments, God is going to tear down all of those idols, every single one of them, and then they will know that he is Lord. Beloved, we need to all rejoice in the comforting promise that we have, that the apostle Paul records in First Thessalonians five beginning in verse one where we read, let us, who "are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and has a helmet, the hope of salvation. For God did not appoint us to wrath but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ." We're not going to be a part of that, I believe the church will be snatched away before that happens.

But certainly today, the world scoffs at the existence of God. If you tell the world that he is the Creator, as I often say, the Sustainer, the Redeemer, and consummate are of all things, they think you are a knuckle dragging Neanderthal that needs to live in a cave. And that would be putting it nicely. People absolutely mock at Christ's saving work on the cross. Isn't it amazing that the President would call for a transgender day of visibility on the day where we celebrate His resurrection. Celebrate these self-loathing people that desperately need Christ. Celebrate people who are damaged and depressed and dysfunctional, delusional; some even being demonized--as we saw with one of the transgender shooters here recently in Nashville. People who despise God so much that they deny his stamp of his image placed on their biological God-given body. I mean this is soul suicide, and we're supposed to celebrate that. This is the mockery of God. And this is what is going to bring about his judgment one day. But people have always mocked his second coming and judgment. Peter tells us in Second Peter three, three, "In the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, saying, 'Where is the promise of His coming?'"

And may I remind you all of Jesus' warning in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 37, he said, "'For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be.'" And what were those days like in days of Noah? Genesis six tells us it tells us that they were days of unmitigated evil and rebellion against God. Moreover, days of granite, indifference and apathy, concerning his judgment upon their sin. I give you the world today. Dear friends, I pray that this doesn't describe your attitude. Because if it does, I would plead with you to put your trust in the saving work of the Lord Jesus Christ lest you perish in your sin. And for those of us who know and love Christ, may I remind you, dear Christian, we are at war. And we will not bow. So, we need to be vigilant, we need to be alert, we need to be marching on our knees in prayer. We cannot be ashamed of the gospel. We need to unleash it in all of its force and fury, in love and in compassion; that others will come to a saving knowledge of Christ even as we have, solely by his grace. And then we just all need to keep looking. Because Jesus is coming. Jesus is coming again. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for revealing so much to us in your word. While we cannot understand the full implications of everything that you give us in your prophetic word, we we can understand enough to know that things are gonna get much worse before they get better. And that you are a holy God that will pour out his judgment upon the wicked, just as sure as the sun rises in the east. And so therefore, we thank you for your word; may it animate each of our hearts, to live in light of it, as people that are alert, that are sober, as people whose world orbits around the gospel of Jesus Christ, and the glory of his return. Speak to those who are without you today. Give them no rest until they truly, genuinely, come to a place of repentant faith and experience the miracle of the new birth. And bless us now, all of us who know and love you, as we rejoice in all that is ours in Christ, for it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

Once again, we have a wonderful opportunity to look into the Word of God and understand more of who he is and what he's done for each of us. And this morning, we're stepping away from our verse-by-verse study of the gospel of Mark and I want to take you to First Peter one, in a few minutes; we're going to look at some other passages before we get there. But we're going to do so under the heading "Resurrection Joy" for after all, this is Resurrection Sunday.

Now, I know that the internet is burning up with this proclamation from our president. March 31, 2024, has been declared Transgender Day of Visibility, which obviously happens to be on Easter Sunday, this year. Many of you have sent me that information. I'm very aware of it. And I was reading how some apostate churches have incorporated drag queen performances with their Easter service. Now, folks, this is disgusting. This is deplorable. This is demonic. But this should be no surprise. This is once again, evidence of the wrath of divine abandonment on our country, where God has given people over to the consequences of their iniquities as Romans one makes abundantly clear in other passages. And sadly, this is also indicative of those who are spiritually dead. Those who are ruled by the desires of the flesh and of the mind. As we read in Ephesians. These are those who are, by nature, children of wrath; they have no fear of God before their eyes. And so naturally, these are the types of things they're going to do. And sadly, the whole transgender, LGBTQ, that whole movement, is repeatedly called an abomination in the eyes of God, and that indeed it is. In fact, there's no such thing as a transgender, you're either a male or a female made in God's image. Nevertheless, this should be no surprise, and may I encourage you, and I know many of you are very angry over this, and certainly I am righteously indignant as well, but these people need our pity. And they need our prayers. Because unless they repent, they will perish in their sins. And certainly, this is another example of the postmodern world in which we live, where truth is determined subjectively by every individual, not through the objective, authoritative word of the living God found in Scripture. And indeed, this is purposeful, satanic blasphemy. And please hear me, this is going to get much worse. This is going to get much worse and what better way to inaugurate such wickedness than on the day when Christians celebrate the redemption, validated by the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

And I might add that the light of the glory of God in the face of Christ and His Kingdom shines even more brightly against the darkness of this satanic evil. And while our pagan culture worships humanity at the altar of wokeism, we as Christians worship the Lord Jesus Christ, at the altar of his sacrifice, where he took upon himself our sins, and paid the penalty that we deserved, that we might have forgiveness of sins; that he who knew no sin would become sin for us that we might have the righteousness of Christ, amen? And now because of his imputed righteousness, we have been declared justified, we've been declared righteous. And though we still sin, God no longer sees that sin, but he sees the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom we have forever been united and hidden and clothed in his righteousness. So let's celebrate these things together.

Now, as we think about the resurrection of the Lord Jesus from the dead, I mean, this is absolutely a staggering truth. And its implications are equally staggering. And many I know are gathered, even here today, to worship the Lord. And I want to encourage you as we look at his resurrection, because I know that some of you are struggling with significant issues in your life. I know that for a fact, with a number of you. And I'm sure there are many more because we're all sinners living in a fallen world, right? And our sin is bad enough, but everybody else's sin splatters on us too, right? And so, as we look at these passages of scripture this morning, I want those of you that are struggling with health issues or financial issues, you're lonely, you're discouraged, you're depressed, you're whatever it might be, I want you to know that there is hope, there is joy. There is purpose and eternal life with Christ. But that is only available to those who have placed their faith in Christ, and who have been truly, genuinely born again. And then, it is also true for those who not only know him, but walk with Him in obedience, who love him, and who long to have intimate fellowship with Him.

But fundamental to all of this is an understanding of the gospel, which includes an understanding of Christ's death, his burial and his resurrection. Do you realize that according to Second Peter one, beginning of verse three, "His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust." Then he adds these admonitions, "Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge and in your knowledge, self control, and in your self control, perseverance and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And that's my goal this morning, to give you the true knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ." So these virtues will be yours, and they will be increasing. So you can be useful and fruitful, so that you can enjoy all of the magnificent blessings that belong to those who are united to Christ.

Now, let's focus on the resurrection and its implications. Let me remind you of the context, Jesus was buried sometime before sundown on Friday. And then just before sunrise on Sunday, God the Father raised him from the dead. We see this clearly in Romans six, four and Acts 2:32, for example. However, you must realize that Jesus also participated in his own resurrection. John 2:19, he said, "'Destroy this temple, and in three days, I will raise it up.'" And in verse 21, John adds, "He was speaking of the temple of His body." God, the Father gave him that authority. We read about this, in the words of our Lord in John five, verse 21, "'For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom He wishes.'" He went on to say the Father "'has given all judgment to the Son.'" And in that familiar passage in John 10 and verse 18, we read the words of Jesus, "'I lay down my life, so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it up again.'"

Now, I want you to listen to Matthew's account of the resurrection, earlier I read Luke's account. Follow along as I read from Matthew 28, beginning in verse one, "Now after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave. And behold, a severe earthquake had occurred, for an angel of the LORD descended from heaven, and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. And his appearance was like lightning, and his clothing as white as snow. The guards shook for fear of him and became like dead men. The angel said to the women, 'Do not be afraid; for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. He is not here, For He has risen, just as he said. Come, see the place where He was lying. Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead; and behold, He is going ahead of you into Galilee, there you will see Him; behold, I have told you.'" My friends, the most irrefutable and compelling evidence that Jesus was indeed who he says he was, and is the son of God, is the fact that he rose from the dead. In fact, we read in Romans one four, "He was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead." The angelic announcement just runs shivers up my back. Can you imagine that, when they said, I invite you to come and see the place where he was lying. Come, see the stone rolled away from the sacred sepulcher. Enter the empty tomb, gaze upon the slab where your dear Savior was lying. The God-Man who was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows acquainted with grief is not there. His work is finished. And now he sets at the right hand of the Father, awaiting that day when he will return in power and great glory.

And dear friends, please hear me, someday every single person who has ever lived will see him. And you will see him either as your risen Savior and Lord, or as your righteous judge, and executioner. I wish to encourage every believer this morning by reminding you have the implications of Christ's resurrection. And this now takes us to our text in First Peter one, and I'm going to focus mainly on verses three through nine. So let me read that section to you and then give you a brief introduction to it. He says there in First Peter one three, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire may be found to result in praise and glory and honor, at the revelation of Jesus Christ; though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy and expressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls."

I want to give you three reasons to rejoice that comes out of this passage of Scripture? Number one, we rejoice in the promise of our faith. Secondly, the permanence of our faith and finally, the power of our faith. Again, as we go to First Peter one, let me give you a bit of context by looking at the first few verses that he gives us leading up to our text. It says in verse one, "Peter an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who reside as aliens." The term in the original language denotes a pilgrim, a foreigner or a sojourner temporarily living in a strange place that is not one's home; a temporary residence whose laws and culture and everything about it is foreign. A person whose allegiance in love is for another place. The term is "paroikos" and we get the word English word "parish" from that is derived from the Greek term "paroikos." In fact, Calvary Bible Church, you might say, is a parish, an assembly of aliens. And I can say that in a rather comical way, but also in a spiritual way. Sometimes we do look and act like aliens. But to be sure, as believers, we're aliens here. This is not our home. And we all understand that. We are sojourners in this world. And he says he's writing to those who are aliens scattered throughout. This is the Diaspora, the Jews dispersed with their deportation. And through deportation, some of them voluntarily have left for a foreign land, though they longed for their land and for Jerusalem, for their temple. But their supreme longing was for heaven, as it is for each of us.

And he says that they are "scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia." These are all Roman provinces in Asia Minor, a listing that is perhaps in the order of the mail route in which this letter was originally delivered. It's interesting that in his lust to build, the Emperor Nero burned Rome, and he blamed it on Christians, which caused enormous persecution. And so these regions in which this letter is now being circulated, were hostile to Christians. So they suffered persecution, they were very badly in need of encouragement. Even years after Peter had written this letter, a man named Pliny the Younger was put in charge of Bithynia. And he wrote to the Emperor Trajan asking for advice about how to handle these Christians. And they tried to force them to recant their faith and worship their pagan gods. They had their own version of what we're dealing with in our country today, where we have to somehow celebrate all of the wickedness of our culture, and they wanted them to curse Christ and bow down before the emperor himself, the image of the Emperor. Some did, most did not. So, here's what Pliny wrote to the Emperor, quote, "It seems to me to be necessary to get advice. Because many in every age group, every status of life, and both male and female are now in danger, and will be in the future. This plague of superstition has spread over cities, and over the fields and villages. But I believe that its advance can be stopped." Well, obviously, he was wrong. The Lord has promised to build his church.

So, you must understand that our text here this morning is that really the front edge of this great expansion of Christianity, during a day of enormous persecution of both Jews and Gentiles? So, he says to them, the end of verse one, he says that you are those "who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father." Remember, he's trying to encourage them; "who are chosen." "Eklektos"-- it's translated "elect." It means "to choose," "to pick," "to select." It denotes those whom God has sovereignly chosen for salvation. In fact, the same term is used in the Septuagint, to translate Deuteronomy 14 two that describes God's election or choosing of Israel. There we read that the Lord has "chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth." So he's reminding these dear persecuted saints that their sovereign God has chosen them. What a wonderful comfort.

He says, "who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father." Herein is why God chose us--it's because he wanted to. It was his divine prerogative to choose whom he will. He did it, it says, "according to the foreknowledge of God the Father." "Foreknowledge" comes from a Greek term "prognosis." And it can also be translated, foreordained or foreloved or foreknown as it is in verse 20, of this passage. In fact, foreknowledge is paired with predestination in Acts two and verse 23, where we read, "This Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God"-- referring to Christ. So the idea here of foreknowledge is far beyond some naive concept that God merely knew what would happen in the future. Although that is certainly true because he is omniscient, but the term must be understood in terms of covenantal love. In fact, the word "know" in Hebrew often refers to God's covenantal love, bestowed upon his people. So he not only knew who would be his, he chose them, according to his unconditional sovereign election. It was a divine decree, and he's using this to encourage them. And I am unimaginably, unbelievably encouraged that God would choose me, as you should be as well. Romans 8:28 We read that we are "called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew--"proginóskó" in the original language. "He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son." So foreknowledge speaks of predetermined choice, to set his love upon us and forge an intimate and indissoluble bond of love with us. So foreknowledge here must be understood as foreloved as foreordained, not merely for observed, there was never a time when God is in omniscience lacked knowledge, and he had to somehow look down the corridors of time and see who would and who wouldn't believe in Him, and based on that, decide to choose them. That is a heresy. That is untrue.

So Peter begins with these profound words of encouragement, as if to say, folks, I want you to remember that he set his love upon you in eternity past and he drew you unto himself. As Paul said in Romans 9:16, salvation "does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs"-- referring to human effort, "but on God who has mercy." Indeed, it is God who is the author and the finisher of our faith, not us. So the same God that chose us in eternity past, will, by the power of his omnipotent and sovereign love, safely deliver us unto himself in his good time, as he accomplishes his glorious plan of redemption.

Then in verse two, he says that he does this "by the sanctifying work of the Spirit." Sanctifying work, it means he sets us apart, or he consecrates us, not only unto salvation--that is the imputed righteousness and declared righteousness of Christ in our justification--but he also sets us apart under holy living. A process of conforming. Notice the universe to that you may "obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with his blood." This is a curious phrase. In Exodus 24, one through eight, we understand what he's referring to here. And there, if we were to go to it, we would see that Moses rose up early in the morning, and he built an altar at the foot of the mountain and offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings unto the Lord. And he took half of the blood and put it in basins, and he took the other half and sprinkled it on the altar. And then we read that he read the book of the covenant to all of the people. And the book of the covenant would include all of the civil and the social, and the ceremonial, moral laws, etc., that God gave him on Mount Sinai. And they agreed, saying, "'All that the Lord has said we will do, and be obedient!'" And then in verse eight, we read this, "And Moses took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, 'This is the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made with you, according to all these words.'" So in response to the people's commitment, to be obedient, he officially sealed the treaty with the blood and likewise, you must understand, in the New Covenant, it is the blood of Christ, that seals God's covenant promise to us to forgive us of our sin. His blood was the perfect atonement--the propitiation-- as we mentioned earlier in our time of communion, that satisfied the justice of God, but his blood also seals our commitment to be obedient to Him.

So Peter, my point with all of this is just to simply say, Peter uses all of these magnificent theological themes to bring comfort to the Diaspora. To these aliens, to the suffering saints. Imagine what it would be like if it was us, if we had lost our homes, and maybe we're scrounging around just to find food someplace. Some of our family members have been tortured and killed. My how they needed comfort, as we all do. So he reminds them of the activities of all three members of the Godhead, the Triune God that we worship, our faith is a trinitarian faith and because of the absolute certainty of these astounding realities, he concludes his salutation by saying, "May Grace and peace be yours in fullest measure."

And then is if he couldn't contain himself--it's like he's just bursting to go on with verse three and following, out of all of this abundance--he gives the saints, three reasons to rejoice, all made possible by the resurrection of Christ. First, he tells them to rejoice in the promise of your faith. Now, I want to stop here for a moment. Remember, now, Peter is encouraging them to rejoice, and yet he knows what the Lord has told him, that is soon going to happen to him; that he is going to die by crucifixion. It's amazing, isn't it? How he is encouraging others knowing all of that; John 21:18 through 19 tells you that. Nevertheless, his heart is overflowing with joy. And the reason for this, dear friends is because he is relaxing in God's sovereign purposes for his life, and he's rejoicing in all that will be his in glory. And he also knows what the Lord said in Matthew 5:11, "Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say, all kinds of evil against you because of Me. Rejoice and be glad for your reward in Heaven is great." Don't you love being around people that live in light of eternity? I mean, their joy is absolutely contagious. And it's rooted in the great truths of scripture. And so now he is able to encourage the struggling saints, dealing with life and death issues, calling them to do the same. He's telling them, I want you to live above the fray. I want you to live victoriously, don't lose hope, trust in the Lord. And here's the perspective that you must have.

Now we come to verse three. "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ." Because again, the resurrection was a validation that Jesus was the Son of God and that he had conquered sin and Satan and death, and that his resurrection secures our resurrection body. What did Jesus say in John 14, I believe in verse nine or so, "Because I live, you too, will live," right? And it also secures our new spiritual life. We can go to Romans six and we read how that we've been buried with Christ and raised with him. So we too, might walk in newness of life. Goes on to talk how we are no longer slaves to sin, but slaves to righteousness. And this is why Paul said in Philippians, 3:10, that I want to know Christ "and the power of his resurrection." And so he's saying to these dear people, as I'm saying to you, folks, you are the recipients of divine mercy, he has set his love upon you in eternity past, he has given new birth to you, because you and maybe your family, to be born again to this living hope. You're a new creature in Christ, you have a new destiny.

Real practically, if I can put it this way, despite the wickedness that we know is occurring, even on this day, in our country, I'm so thankful to know that this godless world is not my home. And the reason I know that is because I know that according to his great mercy, he has caused me to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. I have a living hope, you have a living hope. The concept here is you have an unshakable confidence confirmed and secured by the Holy Spirit of God that dwells within you. In fact, we read in Romans 15 in verse 13, "Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." O dear Christian, we possess a living hope, one that is confirmed and secured, by the historical fact of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. An undeniable proof of the infinite power of God over death. Our hope is an abiding hope, it is an eternal hope, it is a spiritual power that cannot be extinguished by any circumstance in our life, unless we lose perspective. How incredibly glorious, that our God loves us with an everlasting love. And he has infused us with his nature and given us eternal life. As I think about it, what on earth can possibly dim this glorious light and cause, we as believers, to somehow live in gloom, and doom, and darkness? There's only one thing and that is you have lost your perspective of who you are in Christ--what he has done is doing and will do. You know, a man can endure just about anything as long as he has hope. You take away his hope, all is lost. And all too often Christians, perhaps unwittingly, doubt the goodness and faithfulness of God.

I think of James one and verse six, "the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind." Doubt--"diakrinō" in the original language--refers to a defective faith. It speaks of uncertainty of something that is set forward as an object of faith, not sure that all that I'm hoping in will happen. And you know doubt and depression walk hand in hand. That's the opposite of what Peter is trying to communicate here. I think of Bunyan's great spiritual allegory Pilgrims Progress. Remember, Bunyan, who in the allegory, is Christian. He had a friend named Hopeful. Bunyan succumbed to doubt, and so Christian, as the name is, in particular, lost his perspective of who he was in Christ and he was thrown into a dungeon of Doubting Castle, remember that story? That's where Giant Despair and his wife Distrust beat him mercilessly. He became so consumed, so overwhelmed by the problems in his life that he felt like he could go on no more. Feelings of sorrow and helplessness and bitterness and fear, and even anger just consumed him, enveloped him, like a cold, dark fog. He was blinded by self-deception. He was confused by errant doctrine, and he even refused to hear any words of encouragement from his friend, Hopeful. As a result, he felt like the only way out was suicide. And so here's what we read, "Now, when night had come and went Giant Despair and his wife, Distrust, had gone to bed, they began to renew their discussion of the prisoners. The old giant wondered why he couldn't bring the pilgrims to an end, either by his blows or his council. His wife said 'I fear that they live in hopes that someone will come to set them free. Or maybe they hope to find a way to pick the lock and escape. Since you mentioned it, my dear, I will go down and search them in the morning,' the giant replied. But it so happened that on Saturday, at about midnight, the pilgrims began to pray and continued in prayer until almost daybreak. Then Christian, a short time before daylight, became astounded and passionately exclaimed, 'What a fool I am. Here I lie in a stinking dungeon. When I could be walking in complete liberty. I have a key in my pocket called Promise that I'm sure will open any lock in Doubting Castle." And so as we go on to read, Christian pulled out the Key of Hope. He opened up the door and "the door flew open easily," it says.

Folks, this is a great illustration of what Peter was trying to do with those dear saints. And what, by the grace of God I'm trying to do with you, is to encourage you. Because it's so easy to be discouraged in these days. Never forget the promises that are yours in Christ. Because as soon as you do, you will begin to succumb to the deceptions of your own flesh and the lies of the evil one. And you will begin to sink down into the abyss of despair and discouragement. And you will reach out for the anesthetizers of life. Why do you think so many people are looking for drugs and alcohol these days? They have no hope. They're trying to escape. And for the believer, when you succumb to those things, you lock yourself in a dungeon of doubt and depression that will ultimately ruin your life, and it will ruin your testimony.

Notice Peter goes on further to describe the promise of our faith. He says in verse four, "to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you." Now as children, we have a family inheritance that awaits us, at least most people do. And the term "inheritance" here--"klēros" in the original language, literally means a portion of the lot. It's an allotment, especially according to the terms of will. In fact, in Colossians, one and verse five, Paul says that we have this "hope laid up for us in heaven." In other words, it's reserved for us. Verse 12, believers, he says, will please God when they are joyfully, quote, "giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light." Which includes all of the blessings of salvation.

By the way, I hope you notice we did not qualify ourselves by our own personal righteousness, rather solely because of his grace, he qualified us when we trust in Christ and his atoning sacrifice on our behalf. Verse 13, of Colossians, one goes on to say, "For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." Now, folks, I want you to let this sink in. Do you realize that if you belong to Christ, you have been allotted a portion of God's kingdom and it is an inheritance that is currently reserved for you with your name on it in heaven? Let that sink in. This is called a portion of the lot. Now you say, well, what will this include? Well, we're not really sure. A little hint maybe in Deuteronomy 15 four we read, "For the Lord will greatly bless you in the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess as an inheritance." So our inheritance will probably include some kind of geographical territory in the cosmos. In this case, it was a land flowing with milk and honey, a place of magnificent plants and livestock and water and houses, to make life full and enjoyable, to bring glory to God; a place where we could live that would just evoke even more glory, and worship and praise. Along with this, it was a place of responsibility, and a privilege to care and give oversight to what God has given us, as each family worshipped the Lord by having their dominion over the earth and subduing it for the glory of God. So somehow, I think it's safe to say that our portion of the lot will reflect some elements of all of this. But certainly, whatever it will be, it will be a possession of unimaginable glory and infinite delight.

And herein again is the reason to rejoice. That's the promise of our faith. Secondly, notice how we are to rejoice in the permanence of our faith. In verse four, he says that it "is imperishable"-- unending, everlasting, permanent. The term was used even to describe how a place cannot be ravaged by invading armies. Have you ever seen anyone able to steal the Christians joy and hope? Nobody can do that unless you allow that. And so this is great comfort to these people who have been ravaged, whose homes and possessions have been plundered by those who hate them, but not so in the permanent inheritance. He says also, it will be "undefiled." Meaning unstained by sin, uncontaminated by any form of evil, and "will not fade away." In other words, it will never decay, it will never cease to exist.

And if that isn't wonderful enough, he goes on in verse five, and says, "who are protected by the power of God." Protected here in the original was a military term describing a soldier that is standing guard over a very important object. And grammatically, because it's in the present tense, it emphasizes that this is a never ending, ongoing protection for indeed there's a constant struggle for our souls in the spirit realm; but we don't have to be afraid, because our souls, our inheritance, are constantly guarded by the power of God. You say, well, what about that person that was saved, and then they apostatize; they renounced their faith, they renounce their inheritance, they exercise their free will? What I would say is what the scripture says, they were never born again. No person who's truly been born again, would ever want to do such a thing, would never want to exercise their will to do such a thing. Both the child of God and his inheritance are protected by the power of God.

Again, verse five, it says, "through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." I want you to remember that even our faith is empowered by God, is it not? Do you realize that? Romans eight, I mean, Romans two beginning of verse eight, "For by grace, you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast." And I might add that as we look at Scripture, enduring faith is certain evidence that we possess genuine faith. That's why we read, for example, in Hebrews three and verse 14, "For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end" and that's the validation of genuine faith. And this salvation, he says, "is ready to be revealed in the last time." Again, grammatically here, and even in the English, we can see this he's saying that our salvation is completely prepared and available and awaiting the day when our pilgrimage on Earth is over, and God calls us home.

Therefore, notice what he says in verse six, "In this you greatly rejoice." Folks, I pray that this is true for you. So not only do we rejoice in the promise of our faith and the permanence of it, but finally, in the power of our faith. Verses six and seven. "In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found," not might be, but "may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ." We can all attest to the fact that the great trials that come into our life are like fire that burns away impurity in our life. And as we look at these two verses, there's seven things that we learn about trials.

Let me just give them to you; I don't have them written out for you. I want to close with these thoughts. We see that trials cannot eclipse Christian joy; we see that trials only last a little while; we see that trials are a necessary part of God's purposes; we see that trials do cause distress, that trials do come in various forms, that trials are fiery tests that validate true saving faith that will never perish. And finally, trials result in praise and glory and honor from Christ Himself.

Beloved, please know that God tempers the steel of our faith in the fires of adversity, and he forges it on the anvil of affliction. And so when they come, not if but when they come, we have to stand on the great theological promises that God has given us in His Word. And O child of God, ours is a powerful faith that can endure all of this. And as a result, we can be jubilant, we can be thankful, we can rejoice, knowing that King Jesus is going to return and reveal himself.

And he says this in verses eight and nine, he says, "Though you have not seen Him, you love Him, though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls." This is why Paul would say in Philippians, four, four, "Rejoice in the Lord always. And again, I say, rejoice." And again, I say, that's the point. Just keep on rejoicing. Yeah, life in this fallen world stinks. Yeah, there are idiotic demonic types of things that our president and our government are going to try to force upon us. Welcome to a fallen world. The whole world lies in the lap of the evil one. Get used to it. That's just how it is. But this isn't our home. And ultimately, our God reigns. He rules and he will redeem us and transport us out of this place into his glory. Oh, but pastor, you just don't understand my situation. Oh, my problems are so great, it's far more bleak than you could ever imagine. So I think I'm quite justified in my despair. No, you're not. No, you're not. Friends, you've lost your perspective. You've forgotten about the object and the outcome of your faith

Great 19th century preacher Charles Spurgeon, put it this way, "The cure for care is joy in the Lord. No, my brother, you will not be able to keep on with your fretfulness. No, my sister, you will not be able to weary yourself any longer with your anxieties. If the Lord will but fill you with His joy, than being satisfied with your God, yea, more than satisfied, overflowing with delight in Him, you will say to yourself," and here he quotes the psalmist, "Why art Thou cast down on my soul and why art Thou disquieted in me. Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise Him for the help of His countenance." Then he went on to say, "What is there on earth that is worth fretting for even for five minutes. If one could gain an imperial crown by a day of care, it would be too great an expense for a thing, which would bring more care with it. Therefore, let us be thankful. Let us be joyful in the Lord. I count it one of the wisest things, that by rejoicing in the Lord we commence our heaven here below. It is possible so to do. It is profitable, so to do. And we are commanded, so to do."

So folks, let me leave you with this challenge. The next time you find yourself in one of your pity parties. The next time you're laying on the couch with your thumb in your mouth whining about how bad life is. The next time you're moping around, like little Eeyore, that pitiful, forlorn little donkey in Winnie the Pooh. The next time your flesh lies to you and says, "it's all over, all is lost,” I want you to rejoice in the promise of your faith, in the permanence of your faith, and in the power of your faith. Because you have an inheritance if you are in Christ, that is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven, and that inheritance is protected by the power of God, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead, and will raise you from the dead. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. They penetrate our soul like nothing else, because our soul has been softened and prepared, indeed transformed by the power of your Spirit. Lord, if there be one, within the sound of my voice that knows nothing of what it means to be in an intimate, loving, saving, transforming relationship with the Lord Jesus, I pray that you will bring such conviction to their heart that they will repent this day and experience the new birth, the miracle of the new birth in Christ, that they too might have the hope of resurrection. Thank you. We praise you in Jesus name and for his sake. Amen..

....(audio/transcription not available)...Corinthians chapter six. We will continue our verse-by-verse exposition of this epistle. And this morning we will be in verse 14 and go through chapter seven and verse one. And I've entitled my discourse to you "The Damning Consequences of Being Unequally Yoked." Follow along as I read the Word of God to you, Second Corinthians chapter six, beginning in verse 14. "Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, 'I WILL DWELL IN THEM AND WALK AMONG THEM; AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD, AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE. Therefore, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE,' says the Lord. 'AND DO NOT TOUCH WHAT IS UNCLEAN; And I will welcome you. And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,' says the Lord Almighty. Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness, in the fear of God."

I have experienced a progressive alienation, especially over the last year, from some of my distant family members and friends and even other pastors; perhaps you have experienced the same thing. In fact, recently, a Christian friend felt he needed to confront me on my stand against the whole social justice movement, the social justice gospel. He rebuked me for not being what he called woke, and you're familiar probably with that term. He lectured me on the fact that I was blind to systemic racism, that I was blind to my white privilege, that I was blind to the needs of others to be somehow compensated for the way they have been abused over the years. He rebuked me for denouncing Black Lives Matter as racist, Neo Marxist, frankly, a satanic group. And as he proceeded and kind of gained steam, I finally said, "Brother, we need to stop here. Because I find everything that you have just said utterly reprehensible, and blasphemous. It is contrary to the Word of God, it is certainly a misrepresentation of what I believe, and with all due respect, I want to hear no more of this." And then I took him to this passage. Friends, this is a very important passage of Scripture, very instructive.

Obviously, there are cultural issues that are dividing our country today. And even dividing people in the church. To be sure, truth and error cannot coexist. As we are going to see there can be no partnership between righteousness and lawlessness; light and darkness cannot coexist. There is there is no harmony between Christ and Satan. And whenever the church embraces the things of the world, Christ is dishonored; Satan is exalted. And the church is weakened and divided. Now to be sure, America is in an ideological civil war right now that threatens the very survival of our country. Conservatives believe in individualism and personal responsibility. They believe in limited government, that's kind of at the heart of capitalism. Whereas liberals believe in a socially owned economy that requires broad government control to promote egalitarianism, which is really at the heart of democratic socialism that is gaining so much steam these days. They believe that individualism, that is inherent in capitalism, empowers the rich to oppress the poor. They believe that a white, patriarchal society, where white men enjoy power and privilege has disenfranchised other people. Now, here's the problem with this, our country was founded on Judeo Christian ethics that are inscribed in the Constitution of the United States. And since the Constitution holds sacred the doctrine of individualism that ensures, for example, private rights, and ownership to citizens, like you would read in the Fifth Amendment. This means that biblical Christianity is considered oppressive. In a current book that I'm writing entitled "Why America hates Biblical Christianity" I say this, quote, "The democratic socialists envision an egalitarian utopia that requires all social, gender, economic and political inequities to be eradicated. Practically speaking, this means the government must be in charge of defining what is fair and unfair. The government must determine what is morally and socially acceptable, then the government must equally distribute wealth opportunities, outcomes and privileges for the citizens; a subjective and arbitrary system of justice based solely upon the moral authority of man, not God. Obviously, Republicans or capitalists, and Christians believe this political ideology will not only infringe upon the rights of those the state deems morally and socially unacceptable and oppressive, it will also continue an aggressive, cancel culture and legal campaign to silence and eradicate all who oppose them. Especially those people who oppose a woman's right to dismember her inconvenient baby in her womb. Those who find the LGBTQ agenda morally reprehensible and those who believe gender is based upon biology, rather than personal preference."

Of course, Jesus fought for none of this. None of this has anything to do with the gospel. Who would have thought that a nation founded on Judeo Christian ethics would stray so far that by the year 2020, as some research indicates, only 6% of Americans hold a biblical worldview? And here we are. And what is even more unimaginable is that many Christian churches not only support many of the things that I've just described but are co-conspirators with them. And it's heartbreaking to me. Oh child of God, please understand, Satan is far more lethal when he joins the church than when he attacks it. This is at the heart of the text that we have before us this morning. Remember the context, Paul is defending his apostolic authority and his character against the scurrilous, slanderous attacks of false teachers that had infiltrated the church. They were wolves in sheep's clothing. They were predators in pulpits. They were teaching a mixture of Jewish legalism and pagan mysticism. And frankly, we have similar things today. We have legalists and sacramentalists and pragmatists and health/wealth charlatans and all kinds of other characters that are out there in churches. But theirs was a very appealing message to the very immature believers there in the church of Corinth; many of them still caught up in the worldly ways that they had been saved from. In fact, if you were to take the most depraved parts of the most immoral cities around the world and mix them together, you would have Corinth. Imagine coming out of that kind of culture, all the baggage that you would have that you would bring into the church.

They had temple prostitutes that roamed the streets at night. The sexually transmitted diseases were rampant, especially syphilis. Idol worship was a part of their trade guilds and their workplace environment--you think we have canceled culture today, it's nothing compared to what they had back then. But friends, this passage of Scripture is not demanding, that we as believers, be separated from ungodly people in the world and not have any social contact with them. That's not what this is about. However, I might add that there are other passages that warn us against not being conformed to this world like we would read in Romans 12 two. James four and verse four tells us that "friendship with the world is hostility toward God. Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world, makes himself an enemy of God." And we read likewise, in First John two beginning in verse 15, "Do not love the world nor the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him." That said, we must remember that Jesus was "a friend of tax collectors and sinners," Luke 7:34. We must remember that we have a great commission to go into all the "world." So the people that are opposed to God, that are opposed to us, warrant maybe our pity, but they do not deserve our contempt. We should love them for the sake of the gospel.

You will recall in First Corinthians five beginning in verse nine, Paul says, "I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people." "Associate" means to keep intimate close company with--I don't want you to keep intimate close company with immoral people--"I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers, or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world." Evidently, some must have broken off all contact with unbelievers; he's not advocating that. Verse 11, "But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolatry, or a reviler"--which means an angry verbally abusive person--"or a drunkard or a swindler--not to even eat with such a one." By the way, that's not a representative list. That's not the intention here. We read, for example, in Second Corinthians three that we're not to associate with people that are lazy people that are unteachable, Titus 3:10, tells us that we are to reject a "hairetikos"--a factious man, and so forth. But he goes on in verse 12 of First Corinthians five and says, "For what have I to do with judging outsiders?" And the point is nothing. I mean, we evangelize the lost, we don't judge them for the purpose of maintaining purity in the church. They're not part of the church. He goes on to say, "Do you not judge those who are within the church?" Well, of course we do. You simply cannot allow persistent unrepentant patterns of sin and heresy to infect the church. Verse 13, he says, "But those who are outside, God judges. And then he adds this, "REMOVE THE WICKED MAN FROM AMONG YOURSELVES." Dear ones, like an enemy spy embedded in a military, or like a terrorist living in your neighborhood, there is nothing more dangerous in a church than a person that holds beliefs that are contrary to the Word and to the will of God. There's nothing more dangerous than a person who calls Jesus "Lord", but refuses to do what he says. In fact, Jesus said that in Luke 6:46 "'Why do you call Me 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say?'" Tolerating this kind of unrepentant sin in a church will actually cause three things to happen. First of all, when you tolerate these things, it will cause the church to grow like crazy. Secondly, it will cause it to become more like the world and finally it will cause that church to lose its power and to lose blessing. Ichabod will be written across its doorway--the glory has departed.

And here Paul helps us see the damning consequences of being unequally yoked. Ignoring the Lord's commands will betray five frightening characteristics. Let me give them to you, and then we'll discuss them. It will betray a depraved mind, a dead faith, a defiant heart, a divisive spirit and a defiling religion. Once again, this is a very instructive, very important passage of scripture and I hope the simple outline will help you to grasp the great truths here in.

Notice again in verse 14, he says, "Do not be bound together with unbelievers." You see, Paul understands that unless the people in Corinth make a clean break from the false teachers attacking him and his inspired message, there will be no reconciliation; he understands that. "Bound together," translates a participial verb, "heterozygeo" which means "to be unequally yoked"; that's where we get that term. It could be translated "Do not be harnessed in an alien yoke with unbelievers." And Paul, no doubt, drew his analogy from Deuteronomy 22:10, where we read, "You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together." Obviously, such a mismatch of disparate species would be disastrous. Their temperament, their natural instincts, their gait, everything about their physiology would prevent them from working together.

I have to smile as a former horseman. I know the difference between what cattle can do, what horses can do; what mules can do and what donkeys can do. And believe me, you do not want to hitch them up together, or you will have a Chinese rodeo. Moreover, according to the dietary laws, the ox was considered a clean animal, but the donkey was unclean. Very interesting, the distinctions between that which was considered clean and unclean, was God's way of teaching great spiritual lessons with respect to being set apart from those things that God rejects. That which was clean was considered holy or set apart unto the Lord and therefore were worthy of God's blessing. That which was unclean symbolizes a state or a condition of being unclean, unholy, separated from God. I suppose the unclean donkey is a fitting mascot for the Democratic Party that embraces virtually everything that God abhors. So, Paul's point is simple, believers and unbelievers are two radically different species. And any intimate religious association between them is impossible. So do not be bound together with unbelievers in the spiritual religious realm, as you will see.

Now Satan wants just the opposite, right? How often do we see the little "coexist" bumper sticker on cars? I cringe every time I see that. And I pray for the poor fool who proudly affirms such deception. Again, Satan loves to join a church, he loves to fill it with unbelievers who have no discernment, who considers the things of the Spirit to be foolishness, who cannot understand them, because he's spiritually appraised. And then a church has no discernment, and they begin to believe anything and everything.

Politically and biblically speaking, we are to separate, or to refuse to have intimate fellowship and collaboration with believers essentially on two things, the gospel and the authority of Scripture, to put it real simply. Not personal preferences that have no legitimate basis in Scripture. We don't break fellowship with believers because they don't use the version of the Bible that we do or because they wear different clothes or they, I don't know, they have a different style of music, or they have tattoos or they drink wine or all of those types of things. We separate on matters pertaining to the purity of the gospel, and the authority of the inspired, infallible word of God. This is why I will not join in the local ministerial alliance. This is why I will not be a part of any of the ecumenical associations--I get these things all the time wanting me to be a part of those things. Because too many of the people in those organizations preach a false gospel and they have no respect for the authority of Scripture. I'm not going to join in with lesbian pastors and women pastors and people that embrace all of these crazy things that are out there. This is why evangelicalism frankly, today, is kind of an amorphous amalgam of Christians in name only. In fact, I was reading a recent article by John MacArthur, "Is the Evangelical Movement Really Evangelical?" I'll give you a little sample he writes, quote, "Recent surveys reveal that a large percentage of people who self-identify as evangelical do not understand even the most basic principles of gospel truth. In a recent poll of self-styled evangelicals, 52% said they reject the concept of absolute truth. 61% do not read the Bible daily. 75% believe people are basically good. 48% believe salvation can be earned by good works. 44% believe the Bible does not condemn abortion. 43% believed Jesus may have sinned. 78% believed Jesus is the first being created by God. 46% believed the Holy Spirit is a force rather than a person. 40% believe lying is morally acceptable in certain circumstances. 34% accept same sex marriage as consistent with biblical teaching. And 26% reject Scripture as God's word. And 50% say church attendance is not necessary." Folks, we're not to be bound together with people that believe those kinds of things. We can be kind to them, cordial to them, but we're certainly not going to pursue spiritual ends with them. And to do so makes a person a co-conspirator with them. Moreover, it provides them with a false assurance that somehow all is well between them and God, when in fact it is not.

We're not to join together with unbelievers in any kind of a spiritual cause, or union, by the way, including marriage. Marriage is to be a sacred covenant, one that God ordained to illustrate God's covenantal love for his bridal church. And you're gonna marry somebody that rejects Christ? To do so will result in disaster and you'll forfeit God's blessing and initiate his chastening. So such disobedience betrays these five frightening characteristics. Let's look at them for a moment here this morning.

First of all, to embrace these things, to ignore what God has commanded in this regard, betrays number one, a depraved mind. And I'm using this in the sense that it was used in Romans 1:28. You will recall there, Paul describes those that do "not see fit to acknowledge God" are given over to a "depraved mind to do those things that are not proper." "Depraved"--"adokimos" in the original language--means "worthless," it means "irrational." Morally reprehensible, despicable. And here's why I would say that, and Paul gives us a series of questions here to prove his point. First of all, in verse 14, he says, "For what partnership," literally what fellowship, "have righteousness and lawlessness?" Obviously, the answer is none. They are opposites. Righteousness marks the heart and the life of a believer. Lawlessness is the mark of an unbeliever. God has imputed his righteousness to believers. We see this in the new nature of a believer. First John three beginning in verse four, "Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness." He goes on to say, "Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. The one who practices sin is of the devil; and the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he's born of God. By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God." And Paul tells us in Romans chapter six and verse 19, that unbelievers are "slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness." And we know that the unbeliever will one day stand before the Lord Jesus Christ and hear that dreadful sentence "Depart from me, you workers of iniquity, I never knew you. Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness," Matthew 7:23.

So, the question is, why would anyone want to participate in a spiritual endeavor to honor God, when that person, who in truth, rejects him and is destined to eternal wrath? What kind of depraved mind even considers that kind of thing? Secondly, he asked another question, "or what fellowship has light with darkness?" I mean, think about it, light is the absence of darkness, and darkness is the absence of light, the two cannot coexist. Light in Scripture is always a metaphor, for truth, and for holiness. In fact, in John 8:12, Jesus said, "'I am the,'" what? "'The light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in darkness but will have the Light of life." And we read in First Thessalonians five, beginning of verse five, we are "sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness; so then let us not sleep as others do but let us be alert and sober." And we know that our eternal destiny will be the ineffable and glorious light of heaven, where, according to Revelation 22, verse five, "there will no longer be any night; and they will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illumine them; and they will reign forever and ever."

Now, contrast that with darkness, a metaphor that describes evil and deception, and Satan's kingdom of darkness. We see this all through Scripture. We know that Satan, at times, will disguise himself as an angel of light to deceive people in churches and seminaries and Bible colleges and Bible universities, and every other influential world system that he controls. Jesus said, in Luke 22:53, that Satan has the power of darkness. Why would you want to be a part of somebody that's a part of that. Ephesians 6:12, "Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers against the world forces of this darkness." And tragically, we know that sinners love darkness, rather than light. John 3:19, we read, "This as the judgment, that the Light has come into the world. And men love the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his the deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God."

I think of Paul who in Acts 26, in verse 18, was sent by God, quote, "to open their eyes, “referring to the Gentiles, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me." So, what Paul is saying is, really are you going to dialogue with other faiths that reject Christ, that reject his Word? Are you going to join together in an interfaith initiatives for global peace and climate change and social justice and same sex marriage and transgender rights and radical feminism and all of these kinds of things? Really, you're going to do that? We're told in Ephesians 5:11, "Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them."

He asks another question, number three in verse 15, "Or what harmony has Christ with Belial?" "Symphonesis"-- harmony; it means "agreement." We get our English word "symphony" from that word. "What harmony has Christ with Belial?" Belial was an ancient word for Satan. I mean we serve Christ, we're not part of Satan's kingdom, we've been delivered from that. It's an opposing kingdom. Colossians 1:13, "He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." Causing us to, according to Acts 26:18, "turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God." And my friend, I would ask you this morning, "to which kingdom do you belong?" To the kingdom that is accessed by repented faith in the living Christ, or to the kingdom of Satan that opposes God and seeks your eternal destruction? Don't be deceived. One day, every single person in here, every single person who has ever lived, will bow before the Lord Jesus Christ and will do so either in humble adoration or defiant trepidation. One or the other. If you reject Christ, you will hear him say "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Master," Matthew 25:22. But if not, you will hear him say throw out "the worthless slave into the outer darkness. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." And my friend, your response to the King's provision of saving grace, set forth in the gospel, will determine your eternal destiny.

He asked the fourth question in verse 15. "Or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever?" You've probably heard what I've heard many times, "you Christians are from another planet." You ever heard that? Or something along that line? And you know, at some level, they're really right. I always laugh when I hear that. Jesus said in John 17:14, "'they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.'" And boy, the more you are around ungodly people, the more you realize you're just a freak. You're an alien. I just don't belong here. Jesus said in John 15:19, "'If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you." So to be unequally yoked with an unbeliever in a spiritual enterprise to honor God, betrays a depraved and irrational mind. God asked apostate Israel in Amos three three "Can two walk together unless they are agreed?" And of course they can't.

But not only does this betray a depraved mind, but secondly, a dead faith. Notice verse 16, "Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? We are the temple of the living God; just as God said, 'I WILL DWELL IN THEM AND WALK AMONG THEM; AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD, AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE.'"

Here Paul harkens back to the numerous examples of Israel mixing pagan, idolatrous practices with the worship of the one true and living God. And sometimes they even did this inside the temple, which is inconceivable. In fact, the kings of Judah, you will recall, had erected, according to Jeremiah 7:31, "the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom." That is an East West Valley at the south end of Jerusalem. The term "Topheth" comes from the Hebrew word "tof", which means drum. It was in that valley of Hinnom, where the ancient Israelites would sacrifice their children to the idol of Molech, by throwing them alive into the fire, and the drums would be pounded loudly to drown out their screams. In Jesus' day, the Valley of Hinnom was also called Gehenna. A garbage dump where fires burned continually, and it was a place of massacre and now a place of perpetual flames that became a symbol of the eternal fires of hell. In fact, Jesus described it in Matthew 5:22 as "pyrho geenna" which means fiery hell. Dear Christian, this is where spiritual compromise and being unequally yoked will take you. This is why we have to guard it in our in our lives, in our heart, in our families, in our church. As believers, we are the temple of the living God. Think about that. He has redeemed us that he might inhabit us; the triune Godhead dwells within us. Anyone wishing to bring some blasphemous counterfeit into God's sanctuary betrays a dead faith that cannot save.

Thirdly betrays a defiant heart. Verse 17, he says, "Therefore, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE,' says the Lord. AND DO NOT TOUCH WHAT IS UNCLEAN.'" In other words, make a break from all that defiles the temple of the living God; all of the false religious beliefs; all of the unclean false teaching described in the New Testament, doctrines of demons. I know of churches that have embraced, for example, evangelical pragmatism, this idea that you've got to become more like the world in order to win it. If they like us, maybe they'll like Jesus. So they removed everything that spiritually dead sinners that walk in the futility of their mind that are darkened in their understanding, might find defensive. They present some phony gospel that will appeal to everybody. They avoid sound biblical doctrine. They think it's too divisive. They dumb everything down to a point where people don't know anything; they have no spiritual discernment. They never discipline sin and as a result, they become nothing more than a religious country club. You know, people today are empty. We see this so often, we're seeing it more and more. People are crying out for truth. They listen to the media, and even to many of the politicians and they know they're being lied to. We are drowning in an ocean of deception. Here, tickling preachers have banished their congregations to an island of spiritual infancy at best or spiritual bankruptcy at worst. Because they won't preach the truth. Oh, if you do that people are gonna get mad and leave your church, let them leave. Give them the truth of the gospel. Don't be ashamed of the gospel. It is the power of God unto salvation. I talked with a prominent teacher in a large evangelical church just recently. I was fascinated that he did not understand the phrase, "the doctrines of grace." Didn't know what I was talking about. And he also admitted that he knew nothing of the Protestant Reformation. And he also believed that Roman Catholicism and Mormonism are Christian denominations. Dear child of God, avoid being in close fellowship with these kinds of people. As nice and as friendly as they might be. They are to true believers and to the church. What Round Up is to grass--a little bit will make you sick and a lot of them will kill it. It will kill a church; it will kill your family. Avoid reading their Facebook pages, unfriend them. I think I know what that means, I'm not a Facebook person, but I think that's kind of a Christian cancel culture, right? You can punch a little button and unfriend them. You don't have to put that poison in before you. I've read some things...Nancy will call me, "Honey, you gotta read this thing. Okay, what is it? She says, "look what's so and so said." And I read this godless venom and we both just kind of roll our eyes. Can you believe that person goes to such and such a church? Can you believe this person calls Jesus Lord? Incomprehensible.

By the way, Be especially careful interacting with apostates. Their lies are like an opiate that clouds the mind and corrupts the soul. In fact, Jude tells us to handle these type of people with "much apprehension lest you be contaminated by them." We've all been around some notorious false teachers before. Jude 23 says "snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear." But he says "hating even the garment polluted by the flesh." They are a contaminating influence. That's the point. By the way, false teachers are demonic, you must understand that they are demonic. But their counterfeit truths are both brilliant, and compelling to the naive and to the ignorant. And often they know error better than Christians know truth. Dear church family, young people in particular, guard your heart and your mind with the truth of the Word of God. Fill your heart and your mind with God's wisdom, not man's wisdom, Peter says in First Peter 1:14, "As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, 'YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.'" And folks, refusing to come out and be separate from these kinds of people, even if they're in your family puts you in a place of contamination and pollution, and it betrays a defiant heart. God has told you not to do that. Do you really think you're somehow excluded from that command, because of your unique situation?

Number four, it betrays a divisive spirit when you do this, notice, verse 17, God says, "'And I will welcome you.'" The term, "eisdechomai" in the original language; it carries the idea of finding favor from God as a result of obedience to His command; to be separate from phony worshipers in the church. That's the context here. To disobey, therefore, betrays the divisive spirit. It betrays a person that says, you know, God, this doesn't really apply to me. I'm not really worried about being cut off from intimate fellowship and blessing that you would like to lavish upon me. So I'll kind of do my own thing. But he says, "I will welcome you. And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,' says, the Lord Almighty." You know, I am sure I speak for all of you, there is nothing I wouldn't do for my children and for my grandchildren. I love them, I would give my life, just like this, for them. There is nothing that would cause me to not love them. But boy, there are things that even our children can do that can break fellowship.

Paul was probably drawing his analogy here from God's unconditional covenant with David in Second Samuel seven. You remember there he made an irrevocable pledge, that a king from the line of David would rule forever--that will be fulfilled ultimately in his millennial kingdom. We read about this in Ezekiel 37, and Zechariah 14 and Revelation 19. And then Second Samuel seven, verse 14, God speaks of a coming descendant of David, and he says the same phrase, "'I will be a father to him and he will be a son to me.'" Same phrase that Paul uses here First Corinthians 6:18. Now, the immediate reference was Solomon, although the ultimate reference is the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. But indeed, we know that when Solomon obeyed God, and remained separate from their idolatrous practices of the culture, God blessed him, but when he disobeyed, God judged him. That's why in the last half of Second Samuel 7:14, we read, "When he commits iniquity, I will correct him with the rod of men and the strokes of the sons of men."

And you will probably remember the story of Solomon. Solomon was supposed to be the wisest man, and I'm sure he was, but he still had an evil streak in him. And he disregarded God's command. He had a divisive spirit; he preferred his own pleasure over God's blessing. So he decided to have fellowship with idolaters and God judged him severely. We read about this in First Kings chapter 11. He says, "Now King Solomon loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian and Hittite women, from the nations concerning which the LORD had said to the sons of Israel, 'You shall not associate with them, nor shall they associate with you, for they will surely turn your heart away after their gods.'" And then we read this, “Solomon held fast to these in love." He had 700 wives, princesses, and 300 concubines and his wives turned his heart away. For when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. For Solomon went after Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians and after Milcom the detestable idol of the Ammonites. Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, and did not follow the LORD fully, as David his father had done. Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable idol of Moab, on the mountain which is east of Jerusalem. And for Molech the detestable idol of the sons of Ammon." I described that to you with some of their child sacrifices. The text goes on to say this, "also he did for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods. Now, the LORD was angry with Solomon because his heart was turned away from the LORD, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice, and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods; but he did not observe what the Lord had commanded. So the Lord said to Solomon, 'Because you have done this, and you have not kept My commandment and My statutes, which I have commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom from you, and will give it to your servant.'" Beloved, this is what happens when you ignore what God has commanded. This is what Paul is saying here, Second Corinthians 6:18, that he wants intimate fellowship with us. He wants to bless us, but if you spurn his commandment, and you refuse to separate yourselves from those who are even a part of the church who call themselves Christians, who believe things that are an abomination to the living God, you will forfeit blessing in your life and God will chasten you. And we see evidence of this everywhere today.

Well, you notice he closes this passionate section of admonitions by saying, chapter seven verse one, "Therefore having these promises." What promise? What's he referring to? Well, those that he just described in chapter six, verses 16, through 18..."THAT I WILL DWELL IN THEM AND WALK AMONG THEM; I WILL BE THEIR GOD AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE...I will welcome you. I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me." By the way, all of you, who know and love Christ, and who walk with Him in obedience, understand the soul satisfying joy, that exhilarating reality of the presence of the living God within your soul. Because you're walking in harmony with Him, you're being obedient to Him. And it's for this reason he tells them, "Therefore, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE,' says the Lord." Those are the promises.

It not only betrays a depraved mind, a dead faith, a defiant heart and a divisive spirit, but finally, a defiling religion. Any religious alliance with unbelievers is an insult to the Most High God, because it defiles. The word "defile" means "to corrupt," "to pollute." It defiles you, and it defiles your family, and it defiles your church and as a result, you forfeit God's blessing. Worse yet, you've sacrificed the joy and the power of having an intimate communion with God. O dear Christian, come out and be separate from professing Christians who advocate things that are unbiblical. Yes, love them, be kind to them, present truth to them. But don't join in with them. Don't be a part of their church. Don't sit under their teaching. Don't read their books, don't read their blogs. Again, separate on the purity of the gospel and the authority of Scripture. Because to embrace these things, or have close fellowship with those who do, betrays a defiling religion, that is frankly a stench in the nostrils of God.

"Therefore, having these promises," he's going to bless us and those who fail to take this seriously know little of the joy of his presence in their life because they grieve the Spirit of God, they quench the Spirit of God in their life. And that begins to manifest itself in how they live their life. They begin to have a secret life that is morally reprehensible to God. Their marriage, reversed to kind of a roommate status, at best, divorce at worst. Their children do not walk with the Lord because they get no shepherding in the home, and on and on it goes. They have chosen division over unity. They have chosen estrangement over fellowship, and how ungrateful for we as believers to embrace these kinds of things that God finds have abhorrent. And therefore, in essence, say, "God, thanks for all the wonderful things that you've done in my life and all of the things that you want to do, but you know what, this is really important to me. I really like these people. I don't want to cause any disunity. I don't want to rock the boat. I mean, after all, we all need to get we want to love everybody, right? So we just need to be tolerant here." No, dear friends, you've got to be careful with that. We need to be separate. We don't need to be unequally yoked with ungodly hypocrites.

"Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves." "Ourselves" is a reflexive pronoun, we call it in Greek grammar, and in this context, it acknowledges God is the one who does the cleansing. Nevertheless, it also reveals that we, as believers, are required to put forth effort. "Let us go cleanse ourselves from all defilement of," notice, "flesh, and spirit." In other words, let's be clean on the inside and on the outside, any of us can put on a good show but God sees the heart. Then he says, "perfecting,"--could be translated "completing" or "finishing"--"holiness in the fear of God." In other words, we do all of these things because we have a reverential awe of his glorious person and work in our life. Maurice Roberts said, quote, "If society is to be awakened one day from its deep slumber, it will only be done by Christians who have first woken up themselves to the full splendor of their privilege, and who have taken seriously the call to live holy and entirely for God."

Well, dear friends, providence has placed these truths before you. The question now is, what will you do with them? What will you do with them? I challenge you to take these things seriously. May I plead with you to take these things seriously. I have lived long enough and worked so many hours with so many people. I know, horror stories, by the 1000s, of what happens to people who ignore what God has said here. Spiritual, doctrinal compromise is a slippery slope. And once you go too far, the gravity of evil will overpower you and pull you into a life of untold misery. And so because of my love for you and my love for the Word of God, I warn you, this is the damning consequence of being unequally yoked. But for those who are willing to cleanse themselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit and perfect holiness in the fear of God, the outcome is very different. That person will be marked by the fruits of the Spirit. And I'm so thankful that I can honestly say, what I have preached today is basically preaching to the choir, because you are these people, and I rejoice that you love the truths of the Word of God and you're willing to separate yourselves from things that are an abomination to Him. May God's Spirit plant these truths deep within your heart and cause them to bear much fruit for the glory of Christ Jesus, our Savior and our coming King. Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for your Word, it speaks so practically to us. But I plead with you that by the power of your Spirit, you will help us to live out these great truths. I pray as Paul did that, you will grant us according to the riches of your glory to be strengthened with power, through your Spirit in the inner man so that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith. And then each of us being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge that we may be filled up to all the fullness of God. I pray that you will grant all these things in Jesus name.

It's thrilling to be up here and hear your voices coming this way. What a joy it is to sing the songs of redemption, because of what Christ has done in us. Will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter six. We continue to make our way through this epistle; we are going to be looking at verses 11 through 13. And then jump over to chapter seven in verses two through four. These verses are actually bookends if you will, that support the intervening section and Second Corinthians six beginning in verse 14 through chapter seven and verse one. And in that intervening section, Paul will be exhorting believers to not be bound together with unbelievers in any kind of religious enterprise or event and so forth a strong warning against ecumenism, where tolerance is preferred over truth. And, of course, the motivation for this stern warning is going to be his great love for Christ and for all who belong to Christ, though some had spurned his love, as you may recall. So let me read the passage and then we will look at it closely and see what the Spirit of God has for us this morning. Second Corinthians six beginning in verse 11, Paul says, "Our mouth has spoken freely to you, oh, Corinthians, our heart is opened wide. You are not restrained by us, but you are restrained in your own affections. Now in a like exchange--I speak as to children--open wide to us also." And then in chapter seven and verse two, the other bookend he says, "Make room for us in your hearts; we wronged no one, we corrupted no one, we took advantage of no one. I do not speak to condemn you, for I have said before that you are in our hearts to die together and to live together. Great is my confidence in you; great is my boasting on your behalf. I am filled with comfort; I'm overflowing with joy in all our affliction."

Now once again, remember the context. Paul is defending his apostolic authority and the message of the gospel against the the scurrilous attacks of the false teachers that are doing everything they can to undermine him and to gain a following within the church. Satan has commissioned basically some phonies to attack the apostle Paul, they've come into the church. In fact, the ringleader is probably the thorn in the flesh that Paul mentions; they were vicious wolves in sheep's clothing. In other words, they were dressed up, so to speak, as true shepherds. They looked like real pastors. They talked like them. They talked as though they were messengers from God. And many sheep began to follow them, but they were vicious predators. They were phony believers who were superficially attached to the church, as often happens, and they saw how that becoming part of the church they could gain some recognition, gain some power, make a little money. And they began to deceive naive and ignorant believers into following them. This was breaking Paul's heart. They were the original televangelists. They were the original charismatic prosperity preachers, the original Pentecostal screamers, the original megachurch charlatans. And they said that Paul was basically immoral, and that was the reason for all of his suffering, and all of his persecution, because God was punishing him. They led people to believe that he was deceitfully manipulative; that he was trying to fill his pockets with money, just a con artist; that he was a self-appointed false teacher who merely fabricated his message and ultimately distorted the true Word of God.

Now, I want you to be reminded of something very important. And that is, Satan prefers to join a church rather than attack it. Because he knows that if he attacks the church, it will get stronger. And that's what we've seen historically. So, the great strategy then is to infiltrate the church. In fact, that strategy basically looks like this infiltrate, deceive....(glitch in audio, not transcribable). They gain influence in our classrooms, in our media, in our pulpits (glitch in audio, not transcribable)... with their immorality, and with promises they know they could never keep and today we see their foot soldiers rioting in the streets. I was reading how just last week in a place called Moscow, Idaho. Interesting name. I've been to Moscow, Russia and what happened in Moscow, Idaho is really rather similar. There, the city arrested several Christians for gathering together in the streets and singing hymns. One man was charged for not social distancing and flouting the facemask order. And a husband and wife were arrested on charges of singing too closely together. What an amazing double standard. Here we have violent antifa anarchists and BLM domestic terrorists allowed to flood our streets, intimidate citizens, and on and on it goes; they're allowed to riot, to loot and to burn. Police have even been killed, but Christians can't sing, and they can't worship and churches. You say how does this happen? The strategy was put into place. Immoral God-hating people have infiltrated positions of power. Once again, they infiltrate, they deceive, they divide, they intimidate, and they conquer. In Los Angeles County, I'm sure you're aware of how they have sought to shut down Grace Community Church, where my good friend and mentor Dr. John MacArthur is pastor and many other friends that I have there and many of your friends--some of you came out of that church. They have been accused of not complying with what are frankly irrational and draconian COVID restrictions that violate first amendment rights. The right that we have under the Constitution, to exercise freely our religion to have peaceable assemblies and so forth. And now they are being charged with contempt of court. And their attorneys from the Thomas Moore society have been successful in challenging the constitutionality of the county's orders and a judge has agreed to the fact that they are entitled to a trial and so that's coming up. Thomas Moore society Special Counsel Jenna Willis explained quote, I'm sorry, Jenna Ellis said, quote, "This is significant because no person can or should be held in contempt of a constitutionally invalid order. Los Angeles County continues to presume that its order is valid with utter disregard for First Amendment protections. It is tyranny to even suggest that a government action cannot be challenged and must be obeyed without question. This case goes to the heart of what our founders designed for the purpose of legitimate government--not to be above the rule of law. Pastor MacArthur is simply holding church which is clearly his constitutionally protected right in this country.” But again, how does this happen? In America? There's the strategy, you infiltrate, you deceive, you divide, you intimidate. And then you conquer.

Pastor MacArthur declared, quote, "We are holding Church. The Lord Jesus requires us to meet together, and we will continue to do that because we are commanded to and because it is our right. I'm very grateful to Judge Beckloff for providing full due process and recognizing the importance of these constitutional protections. The reality is that the county cannot show that their order is even rational, much less necessary. They have also applied their orders arbitrarily and discriminatorily against churches and we enjoy a heightened protection in America to hold church. I'll continue to stand firm, and we will continue to fight to protect religious freedom for the church." Those are some examples. And there's many more, you all are familiar, I don't need to belabor the point. But folks, what I want you to understand what Paul was dealing with is the same type of thing in the church. That is how Satan works in a church--infiltrate with false believers, or sometimes with believers who are just unwitting in the errors that they teach, and then deceive and divide and intimidate and conquer. And we see this all the time today. We see apostate, compromising, politically correct seminaries, training heretics, and graduating ungodly men and women and then unleashing them upon the church. Churches then begin to attract more unbelievers than believers. Therefore, they understand nothing about the Scripture, their undiscerning and being unsaved, congregations end up loving darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. This is what Paul was afraid of. This was his great concern. By the way, this is my great concern for Calvary Bible Church. This is the elder’s great concern. And I know, I would assume, all of you share that concern. And for this reason, we're on guard constantly because we know that a little leaven, what? Leavens the whole lump. If you have a little bit of cancer, what do you do? I don't worry about it, not that big a deal. Know how you get rid of it. Eventually, people that believe error and begin to promote it, undermine the truth in a church, and then they will outright attack it. And then in an effort to promote their own agenda, they will cause all kinds of problems, they will deceive. Some people in the church usually first their closest friends and enemies, I mean, and family, and they will become enemies of the church. And then they will recruit them to join their cause, and they will become the foot soldiers of slander and destruction in a church. And of course, this can just wear down a church, especially the pastors and the elders. We haven't had much of that in our church, but we've had some, and those of you that have been a part of those things, know that it's difficult. I've kind of learned to just rise above it, you just kind of keep moving on. In fact, when I'm attacked, I just fight harder and just keep moving on, you know, because I know ultimately, it's the Lord's church. In the early years of Charles Spurgeon's ministry, the pain of slander and scorn, was so great that he was tempted to quit. In fact, his wife, Susannah would often hide the morning newspaper to protect him from further insults. And he described the melancholy that he endured this way, quote, "The iron bolt, which so mysteriously fastens the door of hope, and holds our spirits in a gloomy prison, needs a heavenly hand to push it back." He also said, "Scarce a day rolls over my head in which the most villainous abuse, the most fearful slander is not uttered against me both privately and by the public press. Every engine is employed to put down God's minister; every lie that man can invent is hurled at me." End quote. We saw the same thing in the 20th century with another great preacher, Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones. And he took the same type of biblical stance that Spurgeon, and many others have taken, down through the history of the church; the stands that we take. The stands that you would see for example, in the solas that are around this worship center. And he was likewise slandered. For example, in 1966, the Evangelical Alliance Assembly he said he was quote, "wrecking evangelical unity." And regarding Lloyd Jones, J. I Packer wrote this, "His peers and official Christianity treating him as scarcely more than an extremely able freak. Bing themselves consciously and complacently," catch this, "progressive. They saw him as a throwback to a type of ministry that as a general pattern, had long since ceased to be viable." He went on to say, "that a deep level isolation for most of his ecclesiastical peers, was a permanent part of the doctor's experience."

Well, folks, this is going to be the fate of every faithful pastor, every faithful church leader and every faithful saint until the Lord returns. So, get used to it. But we got to learn how to deal with it, biblically. And the question is, how should how should a pastor, how should church leaders, respond to unfair criticism and slander? What do you do with that? And as believers, how do we respond to attacks and bitter resentment, especially from people that you know have proven wickedness in their lives? Well, of course, the answer is we are to respond in love. But what does that look like? Well, I would submit to you that we see it here in this passage, and many others. Love will manifest itself in five ways that we will examine here this morning. It will first of all speak truthfully in love. Secondly, overlook offenses and restore fellowship, walk in integrity of heart, believe the best and offer joyful praise. That's what we're going to see Paul did. Too often we're tempted to do the opposite, aren't we? We tend to speak dishonestly. Or we use flattery, or we obfuscate to avoid the hard truths. We keep a record of wrongs. We sabotage any hope of reconciliation and fellowship; we walk in hypocrisy of heart, rather than integrity of heart. We want to believe the worst about people. We want to offer bitter incrimination instead of joyful praise. So, let's look at this closely.

First of all, I find it interesting that Paul chose to speak truthfully in love. Notice the text, chapter six, verse 11, "Our mouth has spoken freely to you, O Corinthians, our heart is opened wide." "Open wide" literally means it is enlarged, it is warm emotionally. And notice how he's speaking with compassion here. "O Corinthians"-- can't you just hear him? Probably with tears in his eyes? "O Corinthians, our mouth has spoken freely to you." The term and the original language means that he's speaking forthrightly. He speaks to them candidly, straightforwardly, honestly, without reserve. He's saying, my mouth is open, and my heart is wide open. That's the point. And we know that the mouth expresses what is in the heart. So we know that Paul spoke to them the truth in love, telling them what they needed to hear, not necessarily what they wanted to hear. And why? Because of his great love for them. This is what we must do in evangelism. Right? We must unleash the gospel even in all of its offense and do so winsomely with great love. This is what the church must do. And throughout both epistles, here to the Corinthians, we see Paul doing this over and over. He speaks candidly, he speaks forthrightly, no obfuscation. No beating around the bush. No subtle innuendos, no watered down, I don't want to upset you, mollycoddling, none of that type of thing. No, he loved them too much for that. He spoke truth to them. He feared God more than man. I think of Proverbs 28:23 where we read, "He who rebukes a man will afterward find more favor than he who flatters with the tongue."

If I can put it this way, folks, he was willing to look them in the eye and talk straight with them. And as you will recall, if you read the Corinthian epistles, you will just see him saying things like, "you people are divisive, you people are worldly, you people are immoral." He said, I could not even speak to you as to spiritual men, but as men of flesh, as to babes in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food for you are not able to receive it. And even now you're not able to receive it because you're fleshly, you're worldly. You're filled with jealousy and strife, he says. You're walking like mere men, meaning unsaved men. You're arrogant, he tells them, you're selfish. He even challenged them in chapter 13 and verse five, to examine your faith to see if you're even born again. Is your faith even genuine? Then he said in First Corinthians 4:14, "I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children." Boy, as parents, we know what that's like, right? You know, when little Thurlow does something that is really bad, we have to sit him down, and we have to talk straight to him. I've done that with my kids and my grandkids. And I can remember many times where I say, I want you to look at Daddy. Or now in these years, look at Papa, look me in the eye. And what did tell Papa tell you, Papa told you not to ever do this, right? You remember that? Yeah. And you did this and this and this, now do you understand that that's dishonoring to God, and it's dishonoring to your grandparents, et cetera, et cetera, you get the point. Now, why would you do that? Because you're cruel? Because you love them. And you want the best for them. Look, folks, when you've been slandered or treated wickedly, what you need to do set up an appointment. Need to sit down with someone and say, "We need to talk. In honor of my great for love for you, I want to speak truth to you in love. But I we need to talk." Proverbs 27 verse six, "Faithful are the wounds of a friend." You need to confront these things. In fact, in Matthew, chapter 18, there's a fourfold process to do this. Galatians six says that we are to "restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness." That's the idea. And we do all of this out of love. Romans, chapter 12 and verse 18, says, "If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men." So you do all you can, it doesn't mean it's always going to come out well, but you're praying for that. You're seeking that and you're willing to speak the truth in love. That's what Paul did. Remember Second Corinthians two verse four. He says, "Out of much affliction, and anguish of heart, I wrote to you with many tears; not so that you would be made sorrowful, but that you might know the love, which I have, especially for you."

Now, if we go back to the text, I want you to notice verse 12. He's going to practice what he preached in verse 11. He's going to speak candidly with them. He says, "You are not restrained by us, but you are restrained in your own affections. The term "restrained" in the original language means to confine or to make narrow, to constrict. He's saying, basically," Look, folks, there is no restriction in my affection for you. But there is in your affection for me. My heart remains open to you. But you've closed your heart off to me. That is wrong. You're treating me with contempt, you're treating me with suspicion. You're treating me with distrust." So anyway, the first thing that Paul does is, he speaks truthfully in love.

Secondly, love will overlook offenses and restore fellowship. We could put in there, "seek" to restore fellowship, "try to restore fellowship. Verse 13, "Now and like exchange--I speak as to children--open wide to us also. Folks, this is so precious. I know as a pastor, the pain of slander, and the pain of seeing people that you love do and say things that you know are so wrong, that God is going to chasten them for it. Paul is hurting here. I mean, you would be hurting if people that you loved believed lies about you. And we're discrediting you and undermining your message. And he's saying "please, Corinthians, you're my spiritual children, I'm your spiritual father, open up your heart to me, as I have to you." That's what he's saying

Then if we jump over to the other bookend in chapter seven and verse two, He says it again, "Make room for us in your hearts." And here again, he's drawing from the verses here in chapter six verses 11 and 13. And we see the same thing when he says in verse three of chapter seven, "I do not speak to condemn you." "Condemn"--"katakrisis" in the original language. It was a judicial term. It's the act of pronouncing someone as guilty in a criminal case, it was the idea of passing final judgment. It was used only one other place in the New Testament. In chapter three and verse nine, where it refers to the work of the law, bringing condemnation upon sinners. So what Paul is saying is, look, that's not my motive here. That's not my desire. That is not my intention. There is no final verdict of condemnation in the law of love. I'm not saying look, I am finished with you get out of my life, I don't want anything to do with you ever again. That's not what he's saying. No, no, no, no, no. He was willing to overlook their offenses and restore fellowship. Certainly, that was his prayer. That must be our prayer. And that can happen where there's real repentance and asking for forgiveness. By the way, aren't you thankful the Lord is that way with us. Proverbs 19, verse 11, "It's a man's glory, to overlook a transgression." Our flesh doesn't want to do that. Our flesh wants to spot it, exaggerate it, and then publish it right? And then justify our anger. That's our flesh. First Corinthians 13 five, "Love does not take into account a wrong suffered." First Peter four eight, "because love covers a multitude of sins." Folks, it's so easy in our flesh to become "splinter hunters." We're looking along, everybody up, there's a splinter in your eye. There's a speck in your eye, rather than seeing the log in your own.

So, Paul is longing to restore fellowship with them, but only on the basis of genuine repentance and sincerity of heart. That's why he's confronting them on the real issues. Notice he repeats what he said in chapter six, verse 11, the end of verse three of chapter seven. He says, "for I've said before, that you are in our hearts." And then he adds this amazing statement "to die together and to live together." What a profound statement of Christian love. I was thinking about this. Here's what he's saying, "Look, folks, we're all going to die. That is our destiny. And we're all going to live together in glory. So, let's deal with these things. Our lives are interwoven. They're bound together by the bond of grace. So, there is nothing that you can do to cause me to abandon my affection for you. But folks, our fellowship is broken. You simply must repent of this folly that I have delineated to you candidly, so there's no mistake about it." So, he spoke truthfully, in love, he overlooked offenses, tried to restore fellowship, but number three, we see that he walked in integrity of heart.

Notice at the end of verse two, he says, "we wronged no one." The term "wronged" and the original language means what you would think it means--to treat someone unjustly, unfairly, in an effort to cause injury. We did not do that. By the way, since the same verb is used in Second Corinthians two five through 11 and chapter seven and verse 12. In the context of dealing with the incestuous man, remember that whole situation? It's described First Corinthians five, perhaps, since that same verb is used, in that context, there was some kind of accusation levied against him that somehow he had injured this guy or others wrongly, we don't know, it could be that. It's probably 100 other things because that's usually how those things work. Somebody will grab a hold of something, they'll kind of twist it and distort it. And then all of a sudden, you look and there's like this whole list of horrible things this person has done. So, it could be 100 other things. He also added, we "corrupted no one." The term "corrupt" means to pervert in Greek; to corrupt morally. So that's the connotation. Maybe they charged him with helping other people embrace libertinism by teaching freedom in Christ as he did in First Corinthians 6:12 through 20. Or it could be 100 other things that they concocted against him. But no, he walked in integrity of heart.

By the way, this is this is one of the first two qualifications of an elder in First Timothy three and verse two, is that an overseer must be first of all above reproach means blameless. It means that there must be no valid accusation made against him. It means that there's no obvious blatant sin in his life that mars his life. And then he adds this. Secondly, he must be the husband of one wife, in Greek, literally "a one-woman man." And what he's referring to here is he must be sexually pure; he must be devoted to his wife. If he's married, he must not be a womanizer. Has nothing to do with he has to be married or he can't be divorced or some of these other silly things that people concoct. Beloved, whether you're a man or a woman, you must be on guard of your heart. You must be a man or a woman of integrity. Because if you lack integrity, your life will lack credibility, and it will lack power. God promised to bless Solomon and his Kingdom. In First Kings nine verse four, "If you will walk before Me as your father David walked, in integrity of heart and uprightness, doing according to all that I have commanded you, and will keep My statutes and My ordinances." You see, Paul was a man of integrity. He was a man of moral purity. And for this reason, he could say to the saints, and in verse one of chapter seven, "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness, in the fear of God." Folks, this is what love does. This what love must continue to do in order to deal with the inevitable attacks that will come against you for the sake of Christ. Paul said in Ephesians four beginning in verse one, "Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace." And in Ephesians five, verse three, he says, "But immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints; and there must be no filthiness and silly talk, or coarse jesting, which are not fitting but rather giving of Thanks."

So again, he said, "Look, I've wronged no one, I've corrupted no one." Notice he also says, "we took advantage of no one." That carries the idea of defrauding someone for the purpose of financial gain. He's saying we didn't do that. I didn't do that. Now, no doubt he was accused of that. And we've seen that in the text, that he was just, you know, like a lot of people today, a lot of pastors are nothing more than entrepreneurs trying to make a buck off of people. Or maybe there were 1000 other false accusations, but none of that was true. No one suffered it is at his hands, and Paul's life proved it.

Well fourthly, we see that he believed the best. Notice what he says in verse four, chapter seven. He says, "Great is my confidence in you." You know, when you read that, especially if you read that in context of both epistles, you have to say, Whoa, wait a minute here. Yeah, he's got great confidence in them. I mean, are you kidding me? I mean, these people were real scoundrels. I mean, this was a pretty messed up church. If you were to look up immature in the dictionary, you'd see a picture of that congregation. And in the forefront, you'd see this silly grin with the people holding up their wine. They're all the rich people that are destroying the time of fellowship at the Lord's table. And then in the background, you'd see all the poor people kind of looking. I mean, that was the church. I mean, this church was a mess, and he says, I've got great confidence in you. Why would he say that? Folks, the answer is he believed in the power of the gospel. He believed in the power of the Holy Spirit that indwells people, even if they're seriously immature; to somehow grow them in the grace in the knowledge of Christ. He was confident on that basis. In fact, he said in Philippians 1:6, "For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus." Beloved, look back on your life. Think of the really stupid things that you've done. The things that really dishonored the Lord. Now, granted, most people only know the tip of the iceberg, but you know what's underneath the water, right? I mean, it's bad stuff. We're all guilty. And I'm sure your parents at times said, "Oh, Lord, please do something with my child, he or she is off the deep end, please, save them or if they're saved, do something to grow them. Lord, please grow them in you." And many of us have prayed the same for our children. Oh, God, please grow them up in you. And he did. And he's still growing us. Right? That's why Paul had confidence. Paul had seen what God had done in his life. He knew the power of the word. Jesus said, "Sanctify them in the truth. Thy word is truth." He's praying to the Father before he goes to the cross.

And by the way, that's why we constantly take you into the word. Because it's not my words. It's not my wisdom or anybody else's that's going to help you to become more like Christ. It's the Word of the living God. Beloved, believe the best about your brothers and sisters in Christ, even if they act wickedly towards you, God is up to something in their life. So many times I pray for enemies that I know hate me with a passion. I say, "Lord, please be merciful to them as you have been to me." You know, I just go about my business. That's what you have to do. I think of First Corinthians 13 seven. Remember the passage that "Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." When he talks about how love bears all things, he's talking about how love--it carries the idea, by the way, of throwing a cover over a blunder or a grievance. That's what we have to do. "Love believes all things." It believes the best and never assumed the worst. That means that love is going to be quick to interpret a fault or an injury with the most gracious explanation possible.

Love is quick to trust, it's slow to doubt. It is guarded against suspicion. It's going to take a person's word at something until proven otherwise. Love leaves no room for cynicism. It gives no quarter to contemptuous scorn towards another person; that is wicked. Love will take God at his word without misgivings and take others at their word without misgivings. It's going to believe that people are innocent until proven guilty. And love's first reaction to failure is going to be one of restoration. Never humiliation, or retaliation. He also said that "love hopes all things." That's what Paul is doing here. He hopes for the best in every situation, that the Lord would be glorified. Love never gives up right? It never despairs. Love never stops praying for the wayward child, or the wayward friend, or the enemy that is saying horrible things about you. Again, aren't you glad God never gave up on you? I'm constantly reminded of that. In fact, I'm old enough to see the hand of the Lord work in marvelous ways as a result of fervent prayer. In fact, my most fervent prayers sprang from the well of hope that I have for those who show no signs of spiritual growth, spiritual maturity, which includes a number of you in this precious church. But I have confidence in the power of the Spirit and his Word that if you're true really born again, God's gonna grow you. He is going to trim the vine in your life so that you will bear more fruit. So with Paul, I can say "great is my confidence in you."

So, love will speak truthfully in love, overlook offenses and restore fellowship, walk in integrity of heart, believe the best and finally, offer joyful praise. Notice what he says in verse four, "great is my boasting on your behalf." Folks, this is so exciting. I mean, again, think about it. These people had all of these problems, but Paul was eager to praise the Lord for his grace in their life because there were things that he could see that were worthy of praise, worthy of honor to the Lord. And that's what he focused on. My goodness, if you focused on all of my faults, you certainly wouldn't want me in the pulpit. And if I focused on yours, we wouldn't want you up here either. Right? I mean, we're all sinners, we're all growing. And that's what he did. He could see the budding fruit in their life, and he could rejoice in that. In Second Corinthians eight, verse 24, he says, "Therefore openly before the churches, show them the proof of your love, and of our reason for boasting about you." You know, I boast about you all the time. I hope you boast about your church family. I do. Whenever anybody asked me, oh, tell me, tell me about your church. I said, Oh, my, what a testimony of God's grace. These are the most, the most godly, faithful, loving saints that you will ever find anywhere. These are people that love Christ, passionately. These are people who love his Word, who have an insatiable appetite for it. These are people who crave the glory and the greatness of God. I will literally say those things to people, and mean them with all of my heart, a testimony of God's goodness in our lives. And there's no way that you folks are even close to the level of immaturity that we see in the Corinthian saints. By the way, I'm sure they all grew up rather quickly, and we'll get to meet them someday. They will know us and we will know them.

"Great is my boasting on your behalf," he says. "I am filled with comfort." By the way, this is interesting, a little technical thing in Greek grammar. It's a "perfect passive indicative verb," which means he had been and he still was filled with comfort. In other words, he's not just filled with comfort, because some of them are straightening up and they've responded positively to his severe letter. No, no, no, no, no. He is comforted all the way through and that's the work of the Spirit. He is the paraclete; he is the comforter. He is the one who comes alongside. He is our advocate. He's the fount of every blessing. You see, Paul derived his comfort from the truth, and the power of the gospel. Our joy is in Christ, it's not in our circumstances. And he goes on to say, "I am overflowing with joy in all our affliction." In other words, despite the rejection, despite the things that break my heart, I am still joyful. And by the way, he was especially joyful, as was Titus, when he learned how they responded--how many of them responded faithfully and obediently and lovingly to the severe letter. You want to ask yourself, "Does this describe my attitude towards those who wronged me? Or do I have a heart of contempt? A heart of revenge? Do I seek retaliation? Rather than reconciliation?" Well, yes, but pastor so and so really offended me. Oh, really? Boy. Oh, my goodness, I didn't realize that. You know, in that case, I mean, God's command for you to love them and to forgive them, I mean, that's out the window. I mean, if they really did that, I mean, you're off the hook here. I mean, you need to make them pay. You need to get even. They acted wickedly. They maligned you, really? Oh, they slandered...h my goodness. I just break fellowship with them. That'll show them, that'll teach him. That'll show the world how you treat people, right? Well, obviously, the Lord is not honored in any of that. By the way, we've all been there, right? We've all had those very things to deal with in our flesh. And maybe you're dealing with that now. I mean, think about it, after all the Lord has done for you, and forgiving you of the most egregious crimes against him, and you're not willing to forgive others who have offended you? You're not willing to try to seek restoration after all the promises and privileges that are yours in Christ?

As we wrap this up, I want to just read to you and I think it was put in your bulletin. I'm such a great fan of the Puritans and one of them that I became familiar with many years ago at Oxford was Thomas Manton, an English Puritan and clergyman trained at Oxford, he was a chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, and forgive the Old English here, but it's worth meditating on. Here's what he has to say in light of all of this. "A defected spirit doth not behave itself answerable to its principles, privileges and hopes. Are you at peace with God? And have you communion with Him at every turn? And have you hopes of glory and you are so troubled when you are a little cut short in your temporal comforts?" He went on to say, "Dejection of spirit, argueth too great addictiveness to worldly comforts, and love of ease and flesh pleasing, and in gratitude for all the spiritual good we have received. Shall God lay in such great comforts and after such great receiving, do you take it ill to be put to a little expense?" And he quotes Job 15:11 "Are the consolations of God's small with thee." In other words, where is your priorities, folks? After all God has done all of these things? Is this your attitude? He went on to say, "If you had a due sense of the world to come, you would be glad to keep your conscience, though you lose your coat.” Hebrews 10:34 "Ye took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven, a better and an enduring substance." Then he quotes Romans 8:18. "For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." "Do you look for glory to be revealed in you, then look upon all the sufferings of this life as a feather, put into the scales against a talent. We are to have a sense of our condition. Yet in regard of the honor done to us to bear a part of Christ's cross, and in regard of the comfort and happiness provided for us, we should be cheerful, that it may not be known to be an unwilling patience and exhorted by force." End quote,

Well, folks, this was Paul's life. This was his attitude. He was filled with comfort, overflowing with joy and all of our afflictions. Imagine if the people in our country began to function this way. I know this is going to be a bit laughable. But think about it. What if the Republicans and the Democrats began to respond to each other this way? Instead of speaking dishonestly, they would speak truthfully out of a heart of love. Instead of keeping a record of wrongs and sabotaging any hope of friendship, what if they were willing to overlook offenses, and seek to restore fellowship? Rather than walking in hypocrisy of heart and being morally corrupt, they walked in integrity of heart. Rather than believing the worst they were committed to believing the best and instead of screaming bitter incriminations with the most vile and vulgar epithets, hat if they offered joyful praise for the good things that they could see in others? Well, obviously, that's impossible because they're ruled by the flesh rather than the Spirit. But not so for us. Dear friends, if we walk by the Spirit, we will not carry out the desires of the flesh, because of the indwelling power of the Spirit. These great manifestations of love can be and should be godly virtues that characterize our lives. This is how God loves us. This is how He expects us to love others. This is love in action, right. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal joy truths of your word and the way they speak so directly to our hearts. May what we've heard today bear much fruit in our lives, for our good and for your glory. In Jesus name I pray. Amen..

I invite you this morning to take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter six as we continue to make our way verse by verse through this amazing epistle, and see what the Spirit of God has for us this morning under the heading, "The Bittersweet Realities of Serving Christ." Let me read the text to you, Second Corinthians chapter six, verses one through 10. And working together with Him, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain--For He says, 'AT THE ACCEPTABLE TIME I LISTENED TO YOU, AND ON THE DAY OF SALVATION I HELPED YOU.' Behold, now is 'THE ACCEPTABLE TIME,' behold, now is 'THE DAY OF SALVATION'--giving no cause for offense in anything, so that the ministry will not be discredited, but in everything commending ourselves as servants of God, in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses, in beatings, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in hunger, in purity, in knowledge, in patience, in kindness, in the Holy Spirit, in genuine love, in the word of truth, in the power of God; by the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and the left, by glory and dishonor, by evil report and good report; regarded as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown yet well-known, as dying yet behold, we live; as punished, yet not put to death, as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things."

Mature Christian saints are always characterized by their selfless service and their devotion to Christ; come what may. They will have a love for the word, they will have a zeal for evangelism; a deep burden for the lost; desire to worship. They will have a song in their heart-- the songs of redemption. And we all know who these people are around us, you young people know who they are in school. Families, you know who they are. You families know when you've got a mature Christian father, who has a passion to shepherd his family. You wives know what that's like, to have that for a husband. And husbands you know what it's like to have a godly wife that is committed to the Lord and will do all she can to see her children come to saving faith in Christ. And every godly servant of Christ, who is willing to take a stand for Christ regardless of the cost, is part of what Paul is talking about here. I find it fascinating the mature believer will actually thrive in his or her service for Christ, regardless of the cost. Like Paul who said in Romans 8:18, "I consider the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us."

But the immature believer will struggle all the way. They will not thrive in their service to Christ. They'll just survive at best. The mature believer will persevere with joy in the power of the Holy Spirit. They will manifest spiritual and theological discernment, but the immature believer will be as Paul said, in Ephesians, 4:14, "children." "Children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine." And my how the winds are blowing these days. By the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming. The immature believer will trudge along in their service to Christ doing as little as possible, whining and complaining all the way; ruled by their flesh, miserable and making everybody around them miserable. But the mature believer will bear the fruits of the Spirit. Love joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness self-control. But the immature will bear sickly fruits; the opposite of the fruits just mentioned. You will look at the vine of their life and see the fruit of selfishness, bitterness, conflict, impatience, rudeness, impropriety, unfaithfulness, harshness, and self-indulgence. Of course, there's a third category of Christian that's just a Christian in name only, the cultural Christian. Matthew seven, Jesus said that that will make up the majority of those who call me Lord, and they will never enter the kingdom. These are the self-deceived, the worldly; the politically and religiously correct. The ones who embrace and promote false gospels like the prosperity gospel, the black liberation theology gospel, the social gospel, the gospel of permissive grace, the gospel of New Age, spirituality, the gospel of my sexual preference, the gospel of interfaith dialogue and on and on it goes. Paul says of them in Second Timothy three, beginning in verse two they'll be "lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure, rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power."

Well, for those of you who know and love Christ, this text will minister to your soul. It's encouraging, it will help you see better how to savor the sweet and ignore the bitter, if I can put it that way. Because as we all know, when we're serving Christ, you're going to have both. And that's what we see here. Let me remind you of the context, Paul is defending his apostolic authority against the savage, just the ruthless attacks of the false teachers that had infiltrated the church at Corinth. They were trying to undermine his apostolic authority; they were trying to discredit his gospel message. And of course, they had accumulated a group of sycophants who were agreeing with them. They wanted to replace the truth of the gospel of grace with the lies of a gospel of grace plus works. Lots of legalism. Paul had returned to Corinth to confront them, but that trip didn't work out very well as we know. So Paul is heartsick. He loves these people; he hates to see what's happening to them. But as we will see, Paul was able to transcend the pain of the slander. And he did this basically on the basis of what we see emerging from this text. And I've divided it into five convictions that we see in Paul's heart that we'll look at this morning. Number one, we will see that he was delighted to be a co-laborer with God. Number two, he was defensive of the true gospel of grace. Number three, he was driven by evangelism and discipleship. Number four, he was devoted to a personal pursuit of holiness. Number five, he was disciplined in the face of suffering. Dear friends, no matter who you are, or what sphere of influence the Lord has placed you in to serve Him, these convictions are absolutely essential. If you're going to thrive in ministry--and for those of you who say you love Christ, but really, you live on the periphery of the church, you really don't do much of anything, you just kind of live for yourself--I pray that this will bring conviction to your heart, because you don't know what you're missing out on in serving Christ. So let's look at the text closely.

The first phrase, verse one, he says, "And working together with Him." "Working together", "synergeo" in the original language; we get our word "synergy" from that, and it just means to collaborate with someone. And this brings us to my first observation as I look at Paul's life, number one, he was delighted to be a co-laborer with God. Now you will notice "with Him” is italicized. That has been inserted. But it's the proper translation because it goes back to chapter five and verses 19 and 20. There we read that, that God is the one he's talking about here. "God," he says, "has committed to us the word of reconciliation." He goes on to say, "we are ambassadors for Christ as though God were making an appeal through us." Also, in First Corinthians three nine, Paul says we are "God's fellow workers." Folks don't just gloss over that. That is absolutely astounding when you think about it. What a privilege to co-labor with God; to be on his team. Think about that. To experience his power, surging through the veins in the muscles of our spiritual life. And Paul recognizes this in Colossians 1:29. He says, "For this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me." And he reminded the saints in Ephesus that he was, according to Ephesians, 3:7, "made of minister, according to the gift of God's grace which was given to me according to the working of His power." And he also prayed for them in Ephesians 1:19 that they would comprehend "what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of the strength of His might." That we are co-laborers with God is an astounding reality, dear friends, that should motivate all of us, in our service to Christ. Think of the many times where you have been absolutely astonished to see how, in some small way, God used your life to impact somebody else. And maybe you didn't even realize it at the time, and you hear about it later. Parents, you know what that's like to see a child finally come to saving faith and to walk with Christ. What a joy it is for me to see that in my family, and to see grandchildren come to faith in Christ. And then know that somehow, you were a little part of that, co-laboring with God. For a camp counselor, or a Sunday school teacher or a student ministries worker, a musician, a godly man or woman in the church, to have someone come up to them and say, "you know, I just want to thank you, you may not realize this, but I've been watching your life over the years and, and your life has impacted me for the sake of Christ. Thank you for that." Isn't that a wonderful feeling. And to know that that was God working through you. "Thank you for sharing the gospel with me when I was so rebellious." "Thank you for gently confronting me when I was living in sin." I jotted down a few that I've received over from over the last year. "Thank you for being an example of Christ, speaking to my dear wife, and because of your life, I want to be more like Christ." Folks, that's co-laboring with God. Never underestimate that. Beloved, know this, whatever you do for God, you do with God. And that's such an exciting truth that we may sow the seed, but he's the one that gives us the strength to do so, right? He prepares the soil, he causes the seed to germinate, he causes it to bear fruit for his glory.

Think of what Jesus said in Mark four beginning in verse 26, "The kingdom of God is like a man who casts seed upon the soil; and he goes to bed at night and gets up by day, and the seed sprouts and grows"--obviously, he didn't have anything to do with that--"how he himself does not know. The soil produces crops by itself; first the blade, then the head, then the mature grain in the head. But when the crop permits, he immediately puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come." Dear friends, may I ask you, are you a co-laborer with God? Or are you a freeloader? Are you sowing the seeds of the gospel or do you just kind of stand back and watch other people do that? Does the very thought of the privilege of co-laboring with God animate your heart to praise and to service? Or is your attitude one of, that's just not for me? Can you point to any fruit as a result of your co-laboring with God? Dear Christian, look at the mission field all around you. Your family, right? Your friends. And we have this amazing tool that can be used for such evil; the internet, that can be used for such good. Get on social media and start spreading seed. Paul says in First Corinthians three remember, he says, "I planted, Apollo's watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants or the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth." That's what's so exciting. I just sow the seed, that's what we do.

First Peter four, verse 10, Peter says, "As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God." Let me remind you of that. We studied this in the past in First Corinthians 12. Remember, in verse five, Paul says "there are a varieties of ministries." In other words, there's a variety; apportionments that God has allotted to each one. "And the same Lord," he says. And then he says, "there are varieties of effects." "Energema" in the original language; it carries the idea of implementation; the practical means by which something is accomplished. So he's saying here, there's a variety of ways that that is worked out, that that is energized. And the point is, God is the supernatural power source that makes our gifts effective in serving Him. And it's working with them. But he goes on to say, "but the same God who works all things in all persons. But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good." "Manifestation" refers to a genuine work of the Spirit of God, and what's the common good? It's to edify the church. So we've all been gifted to do this. And God wants us to work with him; Paul understood this. And it's the Spirit that produces visible effects of his transforming power in our service for him. And when our gifts are being used properly, we're blessed and God is honored.

And if you're a Christian, and you're not using your gifts, and you're just sitting on the sidelines, God is dishonored, and you are forfeiting blessing in your life. Moreover, you have placed yourself in the pathway of divine chastening. Folks, there's no such thing as the Lone Ranger Christian, biblically, a do nothing Christian that just kind of hangs out in the periphery of the church. All that does is grieve the Spirit. Those kinds of people are miserable. They're unproductive, they dishonor God. Rather than co-laboring with God, they're in the way. I remember back, somehow, my mind went to this illustration; I was unloading a big truck, somebody had moved in and we had a couple of teenagers with us. And every time we would go in to get something else to move out, they were pulling their phone out working, they were just in the way. And I remember I finally said to one of them, why don't you go over there to that tree, and sit down under the tree and play with your phone so that we can get some work done. That's sometimes how I feel in the church, right? You know, either get with it or get out of the way, but the Lord wants you to get with it. That's the point. A lot of people would prefer to sit back and watch rather than join the fight.

Well not so Paul, he labored to the point of exhaustion, he was number one: delighted to be a co-laborer with God. But notice, secondly, he was defensive of the true gospel of grace. Again, "And working together with Him, we also urge you,"-- present tense, a constant pleading here. This was habitual part of his life--"we urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain." And the context tells us here that he's saying, "Don't let these false teachers with these with this false gospel, cancel out the true gospel that I have preached to you." Now obviously, some of these people had an intellectual understanding of the gospel, but they had never fully embraced it wholeheartedly. So they really weren't saved. Paul was fearful that they would be deceived. And by extension, according to the context, he's also saying, "failure for you to be reconciled to me would prove that you reject the gospel that I have preached. We can't have that; all my preaching would be in vain. By joining the slander against me, you're being distracted by these false teachers lurking in the shadows and therefore you will either not see and understand the truth and be saved, or if you are saved, you're not going to understand how to grow in Christ and be sanctified."

So he was concerned about this. You know, this was Paul's great concern for the saints in Galatia. Remember, many of them were also deserting grace to pursue the heresies of legalism that the Judaizers were teaching. And in Galatians, one and verse six, Paul says, " I am amazed," I just see him pulling his hair out. "I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel." That's like, what, what's going on here? He goes on to say, if anyone "preach to you a gospel contrary to that which you have preached to you, what we have preached to you, let him be accursed!" Now, some of those folks were truly saved by grace, but they were being misled by the Judaizers. Once again with this false gospel. They were telling them, you know, you're gonna have to keep the law if you expect, stay saved. None of this grace alone stuff. Galatians three, one, Paul says, "You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?...Are you so foolish?" He went on to say, "Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain, if indeed it was in vain?" Beloved, this is why we, like Paul, must defend the gospel against all those who would seek to distort it. And there are so many subtle distortions out there today. That's why Jude said we are to "contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints." He went on to say, "For certain persons have crept in unnoticed." This is a battle we must fight constantly, lest people, as Paul says, "receive; the grace of God in vain."

Again, let me just make it real practical. Let me remind you of some of these false gospels that's out there today. The prosperity gospel, I mentioned the permissive grace gospel, the New Age spirituality gospel, the gospel of my sexual preference, the gospel of interfaith dialogue, the black liberation theology gospel, the social gospel. In fact, I was reading the other day, Tim Keller, former PCA pastor and founder of The Gospel Coalition, and a prominent social gospel advocate, said this quote, "If you have white skin, it's worth $1 million over a lifetime. You have to say, I don't deserve this. I am the product of, and standing on, the shoulders of other people who got that through injustice." Then he says, "the Bible says you are involved in injustice even if you didn't actually do it." End quote. Well, first of all, the Bible does not say that. We're accountable for our own sins, not for the sins of others. Don't have time to get into it but look at Deuteronomy 24:16. And look at Exodus 18, I'm sorry, Ezekiel 18:19 through 22. Here's the problem with these subtle things that come out, especially as related to the social gospel, when social justice becomes the focus of the gospel, God's justice will inevitably be pushed aside. By the way, we don't want God's justice, we want His mercy. And that's what the gospel is all about. You see, man by nature, sees himself as deprived, not as depraved, as a helpless victim, rather than a guilty perpetrator. And the social gospel plays into all of this. It's constantly looking to accommodate man's ever-changing definition of social justice rather than focusing on God's righteous judgment. Suddenly the focus becomes trying to reconcile sinful man to sinful man rather than sinful man to a holy God. And so the gospel becomes much more social than gospel. Folks, we've been given the ministry of reconciliation, not reparations, which is a blatantly unbiblical concept. And everyone who believes they've been victimized with a social gospel thing, including the most sexually deviant, are lining up to somehow get their victim badge so that they can cash in on perhaps reparations, and they're already starting this in some states, or political power, whatever it might be. And by the way, once they gain power, mark my word they will outlaw the true gospel because it cannot coexist with the social gospel.

As a footnote, the allegations that the US is inherently racist; an inherently racist society designed to serve the interest of white supremacists. The idea that the police are intentionally brutalizing black people, that our country is intrinsically patriarchal; benefiting male oppressors at the expense of women, all those things, folks are lies. It's classic Marxism to incite class warfare; use race and economic status to divide and conquer. And of course, these types of things galvanize the support of all those who perceive themselves as being oppressed, and therefore entitled. And of course, the left needs them to somehow enforce their, their utopian goals of wealth redistribution and totalitarianism and all of these things. So chaos and fear and intimidation is all a part of that. So my point here is, this is the danger-- once you start getting a focus off of the true gospel and on something else, even though you may be well intentioned, it leads you in a very different direction. By the way, communism has consistently held to the belief that quote, "out of chaos comes cosmos." ""Cosmos a Greek word for "order." So what do you have? Well, let's have the chaos of an exaggerated pandemic. Let's absolutely destroy the country. Let's have these draconian measures to shut down everything and destroy the economy, because after all, poor people are easily manipulated by the government. And socialism always needs a permanent underclass in order to survive. They also need atheist allies in the media, and in the social media realm, along with the godless militia called Antifa and Black Lives Matter. They need political surrogates in positions of power to somehow support their lawlessness. By the way, all of this is to be expected. This is another whole topic, but prophetically, America will cease to exist as we know it, and will ultimately be absorbed into the globalist rule of the Antichrist. So what are we to do as Christians? Well, the answer is Colossians two, eight, for example, "See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of man, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ." You see, again, folks, remember, we are not part of this fallen world system, so don't get sucked into it.

My mind, as I was thinking about this, went to Paul's words in Ephesians two beginning in verse one, just think of this, "And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ, (by grace who had been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come, he might show the surpassing riches of His grace and kindness towards us in Christ Jesus." Beloved, that's the gospel. Never be ashamed of the gospel. The old gospel, the only gospel, the only gospel that will save. You know, Paul lived in an age that was far worse than what we're living in, far worse. Talk about people hostile to the things of Christ. But what did he urge the saints to do? Take up social causes in order to moralize ungodly men, to make them more just in their dealings with fellow man? No. He said things like "put on the whole armor of God, so that you will stand fast against the schemes of the evil one." "Stand firm in your faith." "Take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ." And here he's saying, I'm urging you "not to receive the grace of God in vain." The context of all these false gospels. In Second Corinthians 11, he's going to say in beginning of verse three, "But I am afraid that"--and beloved, this is my fear as a pastor for you--"I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. For if one comes and preaches another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully." In other words, I can't believe this, instead of rejecting these things, you're tolerating it. And here in chapter six, Paul is pleading with them, do not exchange the magnificent message of God's grace and reconciliation for some phony, distorted substitute that cannot save and cannot sanctify.

Now to be sure, professing evangelicals that are chasing these phony gospels, are I don't know, they're like a dog chasing his tail. Though they're fervent in their pursuit, they're on a fool's errand. And in the end, they will accomplish nothing, which was Satan's intention in the first place. Paul was delighted to be a co-laborer with God. He was defensive of the true gospel of grace.

Thirdly, he was driven by evangelism and discipleship. You will recall, by the way, in First Corinthians two two he said, "I determined to know nothing among you, except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." In a culture even more decadent than ours, that's what he preached. He knew that he wasn't called to be hip; he wasn't called to be trendy, or woke, or missional, or incarnational, all of these crazy things that you hear these days. He wasn't called to be relevant or innovative or creative. He wasn't called to be clever, culturally savvy, broad minded, entertaining, extreme, inclusive, and all of this type of stuff. And he did not found an organization called Jews lives matter and then lead people to somehow overtake Rome. He cared nothing about having a conversation, or a dialogue with people who are spiritually dead; deceived by doctrines of demons. Dear friends, he came as we must come to preach the word in season and out of season, the true gospel. Notice his zeal for evangelism and discipleship. He says, "Again, working together with Him, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain--For He says," and here he is, quoting Isaiah 49:8, 'AT THE ACCEPTABLE TIME I LISTENEDTO YOU, AND ON THE DAY OF SALVATION I HELPED YOU.'" Paul says, "Behold, now is 'THE ACCEPTABLE TIME,' behold, now is 'THE DAY OF SALVATION.'" You see, as the divinely appointed spokesman of the message of reconciliation, Paul understood the urgency of bringing the Gospel to sinners, so that they can see the grace of God, so that they could repent and be saved. That's what drove him. And he wanted to do that while that opportunity was still available. Just think about it. If he was urgent back then, how much more urgent should we be today? We don't know when the door will close. So he's saying don't be distracted, folks. Don't be deceived by these false teachers. Isaiah 55 Six "Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near." I think of God's call upon sinners prior to the to the great flood. You will remember that prior to that judgment the Lord warned the world; Genesis six three "'My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; nevertheless, his day shall be 120 years.'" And Noah preached for 120 years and then the season of grace came to an end. Dear friend, please hear me, you'd never know when the door to the ark of saving grace is going to be shut in your life. You don't know how long you're going to live. And certainly, we don't know how long it'll be before the Lord comes and shuts that door.

Paul understood this. So he says, "Behold, now is 'THE ACCEPTABLE TIME,....Behold, now is 'THE DAY OF SALVATION....'" Dear friend, let me ask you, are you driven by a consuming zeal to see other people come to saving faith in Christ? Or are you caught up in all of these religious sounding pursuits? The priority is defined in Colossians 1:28. And here it needs to be our focus, "We proclaim Him." Okay? I love it when God makes things clear to me. "We proclaim..." Dave, this is what I want you to do. When you preach to this congregation, I want you to proclaim me all right? Don't get off on that other silly stuff. I want you to proclaim me. So we proclaim Him and here's what you need to do. "Admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom so that we may present every man complete in Christ. For this purpose, I also labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me." Folks, he was delighted to be a co-laborer with God; he was defensive of the true gospel of grace; he was driven by evangelism and discipleship. And number four, he was devoted to a personal pursuit of holiness.

Notice verse three, and four, "giving no cause for offence in anything, so that the ministry will not be discredited, but in everything, commending ourselves as servants of God." The term commend carries the idea of to present as worthy of regard or of confidence. Our life is our letter of commendation, if you want to think of it that way. And as someone has well said, our life may be the only sermon some people ever read right? Or ever hear or ever see; what does your life preach? What sermon does your life preach? We're all too familiar with the immoral escapades of pastors and church leaders that render themselves disqualified from ministry. Paul talked about this in First Corinthians nine verse 27. He said, "I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified." Folks, may I remind you that the world hates Christ and they hate all who belong to him. And therefore, the world is hyper-vigilant to find fault in Christians. The slightest indiscretion, the tiniest act of political incorrectness, the smallest sentence spoken in anger, will be magnified 1000-fold and put all over the internet right with your picture. Beloved, we're all in Christian ministry in one way or another and people are watching, you need to realize that. People are watching. And does your speech, does your dress, your conduct, your overall character, does it adorn the gospel, or does it tarnish it?

You know, as I was reflecting upon this, it occurred to me that I very seldom hear anyone described as a God fearing man or woman. You ever hear that? Very seldom. And I was thinking about it, most people have come out or have been around evangelical pragmatism that basically teaches that that we must become like the world in order to win it. The Spirit of God needs some help after all, and because, you know the gospel is so offensive we need to, you know, kind of tone it down, to help him out so that people can get saved. So we've got to be more relevant and attractive. The Church must reinvent itself it must adjust its gospel. It's got to adjust its message so that it's less dogmatic, more therapeutic, more tolerant, more entertaining. It must pander to the culture. It must take up social causes, even conformed to the culture. But whatever you do, don't ever oppose the culture. So most Christians in churches like that never mature. They're banished to an island of spiritual infancy. You will never hear in those kinds of churches any emphasis on the dangers of worldliness, the dangers of adopting the values of the world. The idea of not being conformed to this world as Romans 12 two tells us. Being separated from sin; you're not going to hear sermons on what it means to be Christ-like, what it means to be holy, godly. Most church leaders, in fact, are products of evangelical youth ministries, where the primary goal is to keep the kids entertained. Make sure they're having fun, so they keep coming to church, as if that's some measure of spiritual blessing and maturity. Kind of a religious version of hanging out at the mall. But whatever you do, let's don't get too serious. Let's don't get too biblical. You know, that can tick people off and then they won't come. So let's keep things light and superficial and funny and non- judgmental and inclusive. And what does that produce? Well, it has produced today pastors and church leaders that dress, talk and act like immature kids and the whole church, looks like a superficial youth group that we've all been around. I've had conversations with some of these pastors, and it's frightening. I love these guys. I hope they know Christ. But I can tell within a few minutes, their theological acumen is as shallow as water on a plate. They have no real spiritual maturity. They're undisciplined. They're like a worldly adolescent. What a contrast to Paul's admonition. First Corinthians 14:20, "Brothers, do not be children in your thinking." What a great statement. "Be infants," he says, "in evil, but in your thinking, be mature." And he describes sanctification in precisely these terms. In Ephesians 4:13 he spoke of mature manhood. Oh what a joy that is to be around men, and women, who are mature in Christ. Mature manhood--the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. I address this in my book "Seven Key Principles for Effective Ministry." If you'll indulge just a bit of a quote here. "It has been my observation that there exists a marked difference among evangelical pastors as it relates to character. There's a dissimilarity between the mediocre and the exceptional, the weak and the strong, the ineffective and the effective, the immature and the mature. Very few have what I would call a godly presence about them. By godly presence, I mean a man with a noticeable aura of godliness about him, both in and out of the pulpit. A man like Jesus, a man who possesses a palpable sense of humility, and love that draws you into His presence. A man who exudes spiritual strength, confidence, boldness, wisdom, and a noticeable fervency that marks him as a man of God, and a man on a mission. A man so lost in the wonder of the majesty of God, so filled by the divine presence that nothing in this world causes him to despair or tempts him to distraction. This is that rare man whose authority enters a room with him and commands respect without ever asking for it. I'm speaking of that extraordinary man who is quote, "full of the Spirit and of wisdom" Acts six, three. The qualifications that early saints were to look for in choosing the first deacons. Virtues not every man possesses. A man who, according to First Timothy 4:12, "in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity, shows himself as an example of those who believe." What Paul called a quote, "man of God," First Timothy 6:11.

Well, Paul understood this, and this is why he was so careful not to cause any offense that was unnecessary to cause people to stumble. He didn't want to do anything that would distract people from the gospel in his life. You know, the gospel is offensive enough without us throwing gas on the fire, right? And people are looking at us. He was devoted to a personal pursuit of holiness. Second Corinthians seven one, he says, "Let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God." Paul summarizes this so beautifully. And so practically, let me read just 10 verses here. What he told Titus in Titus two beginning in verse one, just look how practical this i is when you're thinking about pursuing holiness in your life. He says, "But as for you," he's talking to Titus now, a young pastor. "But as for you, speaks the things which are fitting for sound doctrine." Let that be your focus. Again, if I can add this, don't get off on all that other stuff. "Older men are to be temperate, dignified, sensible sound in faith, in love, in perseverance. Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subjected to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored." By the way in most churches, if you were to preach that passage, you'd clean out most of the church. He went on to say, "Likewise urge the young men"-- young guys hear this, "to be sensible; in all things, show yourself to be an example of good deeds, with purity in doctrine, dignified, sound in speech, which is beyond reproach, so that the opponent will be put to shame, having nothing bad to say about us." And he added this, "Urge bondslaves to be subjected to their own masters in everything, to be well pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that they will adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in every respect." "Adorn"-- "kosmeo" in the original language. We get our word "cosmetic: from that. It means to make something more attractive with an ornament or with color. That's what our lives are to do; to adorn the gospel of God.

Well, finally, Paul was disciplined in the face of suffering. And here we see the bittersweet realities of serving Christ. We're all aware of this. Moreover, we see the most important virtue that is worthy of commendation and that is: steadfast endurance. Empowered by the Spirit of God to faithfully withstand extreme hardship and stress. Notice what he says, "in much endurance"-- "hypomone" a term that is used throughout the New Testament to describe that inward fortitude, that is necessary to bear up under extreme adversity, under unfair treatment. It's the idea of triumphant, patient, endurance in suffering, empowered by the Holy Spirit. He was disciplined in the face of suffering. It's the Spirit empowered ability, according First Corinthians 15:58 "to remain steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord."

Now, I want you to notice as we wrap this up this morning, Paul gives nine examples. And there's three sets of three here that serve as commendation, frankly, to the integrity of this person, and of his ministry. Set one just describes general pressures beginning in verse four, he says, "in afflictions," that's referring to those spiritual and physical, emotional types of things that we encounter that cause us to suffer for Christ and hardships. A term that is used to describe being deprived of necessities, just necessities to live. "In distresses," a term that describes being constricted; squeezed into something and you feel like there's no way out; an oppressive situation.

Set two he gives some specific examples. "In beatings"-- the term is used to describe the beatings from a fist or from a rod. It's also used to describe the lashes from a whip. "In imprisonments." Oh my goodness, if you knew anything about the prisons in those days, talk about squalor. They were filthy, beyond description. And then he says, "in tumults." A term referring to riots and mob violence, like we see today.

The third set speaks of hardships that he willingly endured. He says "in labors"--the idea of hard, strenuous labor, especially with Paul to somehow support himself. "In sleeplessness, in hunger." You know, there was no Motel Sixes back then. Inns were these vermin infested brothels, dens of debauchery. So he was sleepless, he was in hunger.

Notice how he responded to all of this beginning in verse six. First of all, "in purity." I mean, here's a man of God; a man with godly integrity, a God-fearing man. Might I add, a man with a godly presence about him. Also "in knowledge." It carries the idea of having a deep grasp of theological truth. "In patience"-- I mean, think of all of the nut jobs he had to deal with over the years in ministry, and he was patient with them. Oh, that God would hurry up and teach me patience. "In kindness, in the Holy Spirit, ingenuine love." Love being the first of the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22. Number seven, or verse seven, "In the word of truth"-- referring to the purity of the gospel. That's what he preached, the whole counsel of God. Then he says, "in the power of God." Not in the power of his own flesh, in the power of God; by the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and the left." Later on in Second Corinthians 10, he's going to speak of the divinely powerful weaponry that we have been given for the destruction of demonic fortresses; fortresses of lies, and of course, they are primarily the word and prayer.

And then he describes the inevitable paradox of ministry that you can all identify with. And everyone that's that serves Christ can understand this. And you have to always ask yourself, am I going to be committed to being faithful or popular? Because you can't be both. So, you have to decide which one you want to be. He chose to be faithful obviously. So, he says in verse 8, "by glory and dishonor." You see the paradox. "By evil report and good report; regarded as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown yet well known, as dying yet behold, we live; as punished yet not put to death, as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things. Dear friends, as you serve Christ, you will find that over the years, two lines will form behind you. One will be long, the other will be short. The long line will be those that hate you and everything about you and would love to see you dead. And the short line will be those that love you, because they love Christ. You've got to be motivated by the short line, not the long line. That's what was going on with the Apostle Paul.

I love that last phrase. He says "as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things." When I read that the other day, I was meditating on the passage, my mind went to as it often does, a chorus that I used to sing as a little boy. That's why our music is so important; it's to be didactic. The Spirit of God uses that. The little chorus, the lyric says this, "He owns the cattle on 1000 hills, the wealth in every mine. He owns the rivers and the rocks and reels, and the sun and stars that shine. Wonderful riches more than tongue can tell. He is my father, so they're mine as well. He owns the cattle on 1000 hills. I know that he will care for me." What a wonderful truth dear friends.

Dear Christian, our God reigns, our Redeemer lives. He's coming again. Be delighted to be a co-laborer with God. Be defensive for the true gospel of grace, be driven by evangelism and discipleship. Be devoted to a personal pursuit of holiness so the Spirit of God can use you and bless you. And be disciplined in the face of suffering; for the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. Amen? Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. They speak so directly to our heart. Lord, there's so many voices out there vying for our attention. Oh, Lord, help us to stay focused. To not be distracted in our simple devotion to God through Christ. Thank you for the glory of your grace and all that it means to us. I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

So we come now to Second Corinthians chapter five and verse 21. And I've entitled by discourse to you this morning, "The Greatest Problem in the Universe Resolved." Let me read the text to you. "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." My friends, deception is deadly, especially as it relates to the gospel. A false gospel will literally destroy a nation. And we are seeing that happen in the days in which we live. I could give you many of examples of false gospels that contribute to this, but I wanted to begin with one to provide a contrast to the true gospel that we will examine in more detail here in a moment. And that false gospel is that of the social gospel that is preached by black liberation theology. Let me give you some background here. According to black liberation theology, Jesus is the savior, to liberate black people from the bondage of white people, not from the bondage of sin. For them, Jesus was not the Lamb of God who came to take away the sins of the world, but rather, he was a revolutionary who sought to free his people from Roman bondage. That gospel is all about victimhood and oppression between men. Salvation is all about equality and social justice and the mission of the church is to affect political change. It's essentially a religious version of Marxism. The experience of oppression is their authority, not the scriptures. It is a man-centered rather than a God-centered religion. It's humanistic and pragmatic to the very core, it's about man and his needs, not God and his glory. The message of Christ, they say, is black power. In fact, Dr. James H. Cohn, one of the preeminent and predominant intellectuals, that gives voice to all of this, elucidates this theme, he says, quote, "It is my thesis, that black power, even in its most radical expression, is not the antithesis of Christianity, nor is it a heretical idea to be tolerated with painful forbearance, it is rather Christ's central message to 20th century America." He described black power as, quote, "complete emancipation of black people from white oppression, by whatever means black people deem necessary," end quote. He added this, quote, "The black intellectual’s goal is to aid in the destruction of America as he knows it." Similarly, and more forcefully, another one of their voices. Dr. Hayward Henry, who, by the way, wrote a book, maybe you've heard of it" Toward a Religion of Revolution," says this, quote, "Black Power is not the antithesis of Christianity, it is Christianity." I remember a number of years ago when I heard of a man by the name of Barack Obama, I'd never heard of him. I knew he served on the Illinois State Legislature. I had a relative who also served in the legislature, and I called him up and I said, "Do you know anything about this guy, I see that he was wanting to run for president." And of course, he knew him very well, knew his wife as well. And I got lots of information. And anyway, I thought, well, I want to find out what this guy believes theologically, because as a theologian, naturally, that's the first place I'm going to go. And by the way, that's first place you should go. So I found out that he went to a church that teaches you guessed it, black liberation theology. In fact, his pastor Jeremiah Wright, has said, quote, "There will be no peace in America until whites begin to hate their whiteness," and on and on it goes. Well, I thought, oh my goodness, I mean, this is the stuff, I knew it was out there, but, you know, surely a guy like this would never be president. I mean, this is the old socialist, Nicaraguan Sandinistas of the 1960s that modeled the Cuban revolution. This is the same stuff. And by the way, if you study critical race theory and Black Lives Matter, you will see that this is at the core of what they believe. In fact, Alicia Garza, one of the three militant feminists that founded Black Lives Matter said this, quote, "Black Lives Matter affirms the lives of black, queer, and trans folks, disabled folks, black undocumented folks, folks with records, women and all black lives along the gender spectrum. It centers on those that have been marginalized within black liberation movements. It is a tactic," now catch this, "to rebuild the black liberation movement."

Well, it should be no surprise that in 2011, then President Barack Obama issued an executive order that required all federal agencies, government workers, even our military, quote, "to promote diversity and inclusion through mandated training courses." And what sounds innocent was, in fact a very sophisticated scheme to indoctrinate federal officials with a virulent strain of identity politics that's rooted in critical race theory, which is an extension of black liberation theology. For them, all of the problems of the world are the result of systemic racism. And if you read their material, they will say white supremacy and white privilege permeates all our institutions, policies, culture, all white people are racist, whether they realize it or not all white people must confess this or be punished, the American system must be torn down and rebuilt. And folks, this is what fuels Antifa and the Black Lives Matter criminal movement. And I might also add this is that the core of the platform of the progressive Democratic Party. This is what's being taught in our public schools. And in our universities. In fact, if you look at the mug shots of a lot of the people that are arrested, in the Antifa, demonstrations, you will see they're public-school teachers.

Well, I applaud President Trump for issuing an order to, quote, "cease and desist from using taxpayer dollars for the dissemination of critical race theory." Maybe you've heard about that. On the news the other day, the order directs all of the federal agencies to begin the process of "identifying and eliminating all contracts or other agency spending related to any training on critical race theory, white privilege, or any other training or propaganda effort that teaches or suggests either one, that the United States is an inherently racist or evil country or two, that any race or ethnicity is inherently racist or evil."

Well, of course, as Christians, we're all opposed to any kind of injustice, any kind of so-called racism, any kind of in inequities or hatred. Nor do we harbor grievances against other people. We don't keep a record of wrongs; we don't take revenge. But dear friends, I would submit to you that there's a far greater evil in the world and certainly in our country than social injustice. Much of which is grossly exaggerated and demonstrably false. The greatest problem is sinful man's need to be reconciled to a holy God. But fortunately, there is a solution and that's the gospel of Jesus Christ. Of course, lots of people laugh at this and they say all don't talk about sin and hell, all of those antiquated ideas, that Jesus somehow died for sinners. My goodness, that's absurd. As some have said, that's cosmic child abuse, nobody believes that. And we would never serve such a God. God is a God of love. For many people, everybody goes to heaven--universalism. Man isn't depraved, he's deprived, and if you will give him more stuff, if you will treat him better, then his true nature will manifest itself. Final part of that statement I agree with. So we need to defund the police, stop incarcerating people, change the environment; basically give people reward without responsibility, and on and on it goes, you know the drill.

But dear friends, as we look at the word of God, we see that sin is the very cause of the curse upon the world. Sin is man's innate inability to conform to the moral character and desires of God. What we see is that sin is lawlessness, as John tells us, it is high treason against the Most High God; we have all offended our holy God. And it's not only a failure to obey God's moral law, but it also includes just living as if that law doesn't even exist. Certainly, it's a violation of the foremost commandment that we are to "love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength," and that God has revealed himself in the Bible. We read in Scripture that the wrath of God, Jesus said, abides upon all those who do not believe in him as the only Savior of the world. And that the wages of sin is death, eternal death. So the message people need to hear today is not how to be delivered from social injustice, the social injustice of man, but how to be delivered from the righteous justice of God. And the only remedy is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Folks, if you get that wrong, it's like building a skyscraper on sand. Eventually, the whole thing will collapse in a heap of ruin. But sadly, that's what has happened. Over the years, the true gospel has been hijacked by other forms of gospel like the one I've just demonstrated to you. Far too many professing evangelicals have taken up this this bogus social justice movement rather than being ambassadors of Christ and the true gospel. I like the way John MacArthur put it quote, "That's precisely how evangelicals in the mid-20th century became obsessed for several decades with positive thinking, self-esteem and psychotherapeutic methodologies. After that it was marketing savvy and promotional strategies. By the beginning of the 21st century, it was post-modernism, repackaged and aggressively promoting itself as the emerging church movement. Today," he goes on to say, "critical race theory feminism, toxic masculinity, intersectional theory, LGBT advocacy, progressive immigration policies, animal rights, and other left wing political causes are all actively vying for evangelical acceptance under the rubric of social justice." He went on to add, "evangelical leaders are beginning to employ the same rhetoric and rationale of victimhood versus oppression that is relentlessly employed by secularists who advocate for all kinds of deviant lifestyles and ideologies. It is a worse form of worldliness than Christians in earlier generations ever contemplated." End quote.

Well, dear friends, I pray that we are all woke today, but not in the traditional use of the term. I pray that we are all woke to the deceptive ideologies of false gospels, including the social gospel, and the social justice movement, which by the way, offers no guarantee of salvation; no guarantee of forgiveness and all it will do is continue to promote further division and discord and violence. You will never be able to appease these people. But I pray you're woke to the true gospel, and here it is before us. Here it is in a sentence, "He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." All of the narcissists and politicians and peoples of the world will fight amongst themselves until the day they die. And their children will take up their causes. And there will be no end to the strife. There will be no peace until the Prince of Peace returns. Think about it, what happens when all these warring factions die, as they will. All their histrionics and rioting and looting and posturing will be instantly forgotten. And their noble causes, real or perceived, will evaporate like morning mist before the sun. I wish I could stand before the world today and say, "Don't you realize that you all stand guilty and condemned before a holy God? Unless you repent and ask Him to save you, you will perish in your sin. But God has provided a way for you to be reconciled to Him through faith, and the Lord Jesus Christ."

Now, this inspired text also provides the answer to what I'm calling the greatest problem in the universe. And that problem is simply this, how can a holy God forgive sin? And still be just? How can that happen? Of course, we have the answer here before us. And in this text, you will notice three magnificent truths. Actually, you'll see more, but I'm going to give you three magnificent truths as they relate to the Father, and as they relate to the Son; each of these form the bedrock of the Gospel--the only truth that can not only save sinners from their sin, but transform them; completely change their disposition; make them new creatures in Christ.

First of all, I want you to notice regarding the Father, number one, we see the sovereignty of his grace in reconciliation. Notice the very first two words, "He made." This is of course speaking of the Father. We know that because earlier in verse 18, he says, "Now all these things are from God." And there Paul was referring to the divine work of regeneration that occurs at conversion. "Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ." You see, folks, this was the Father's plan all along. There's no such thing as a Plan B with a sovereign God. It's always plan A. And his plan was to rescue fallen creatures from sin and death, to remove the barrier of sin that separated them from him, and to restore us to a right relationship with him. That was his plan all along. According to the Father's eternal, electing purposes before creation, he set his love on certain individuals solely because of his good pleasure, not because of any merit of their own. We read in Revelation 13 eight that "from the foundation of the world" he wrote the names of his elect in the "book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." By the way, this technically is called the doctrine of unconditional election. Paul said this in Second Timothy one nine, he "saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity." A phrase that literally means "before time began." Folks, had he not chosen us, we would have never chosen him because we were dead in our trespasses and sins. "There is none righteous, not even one," Romans 3:10 tells us. All of us are sinful. In fact, as we look at Scripture, we see that all that we are, and all that we do are fundamentally offensive to a holy God. And the reason why that sounds so offensive to so many people is because they have a very low view of God and a very high view of themselves.

Isaiah tells us in Isaiah 64, beginning of verse six, "For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment." He went on to say, "There is no one who calls on Your name." Again, as we look at Scripture, we see that before a man comes to Christ, he is hostile to God. He is alienated from God; he is separated from God. His spiritual ears are deaf, his spiritual eyes are blind. His heart is deceitful, above all things, and desperately sick. A heart of stone, cold and unresponsive. And then on top of all of that, we are told that "the god of this world," referring to Satan, "has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ." Second Corinthians four, four. Once again, remember man cannot affect his reconciliation by doing something, it is solely a work of God. And it was accomplished in the person of Christ through the efficacy of his blood. This was the Father's eternal purpose according to Ephesians 3:11, which he carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord.

You know, I find such great comfort in this. I've often thought I could never be an Arminian pastor, because I think I would just go, I don't know, shoot myself, I suppose. Because salvation is not up to me, it's up to God. What a heartbreak that would be to spend your life preaching the gospel, and see people die and you think, as I've heard, Arminians say, "Oh, if I'd only done this, if I'd only done that." And that's not to say we should be passive, but folks, ultimately, we can trust in a sovereign God to accomplish his good pleasure that he decreed in eternity past. Acts 13:48, amazing text; there we read, "When the Gentiles heard." By the way, that's referring to here that salvation was now offered to them, "they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord; and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed." Oh, I'm so thankful for that. What an amazing passage, and each one of us, who know and love Christ, and have believed in him, have experienced that very thing.

So again, in verse 21, we see, first of all, the sovereignty of the Father's grace in reconciling sinners. Secondly, we see the justice his holiness demands. Look at the verse yet again, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." You see, this resolves that great problem, as I mentioned earlier, of how can an infinitely holy God, forgive sin and still be just, because all sin must be punished? Otherwise, there's no justice. And how could his justice ever be satisfied? Because to be sure, sinful man deserves that punishment, he cannot atone for his own sin. So God's holy justice could not be satisfied, apart from a holy ransom. And only by his provision, could such a remedy be accomplished. God could not deny his own justice. And in the incarnation, and sacrificial death of his son, we see his justice being satisfied. You see, dear friends, nothing but perfect righteousness could ever satisfy perfect holiness. So the father had to provide a way to appease his own wrath against sin. And so what did he do? He made "Him," referring to his own beloved son, "who knew no sin to be sin." Now, this was all set into motion in the garden, as you will recall. Because of sin, Adam and Eve lost their innocence and it was replaced with guilt and shame. And what did they do? Frantically, they tried to soothe their conscience by covering themselves with the fig leaves of their own efforts, but it was all in vain. And God cursed them and all who would come from them. Yet although Adam and Eve should have died on that day, God set into motion, his mercy and his grace. We read, "and the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them." What an interesting statement. You see again, man could never cover his sin with his own efforts. So God had to do something; man's best efforts would never be good enough to satisfy divine justice. So a substitute needed to die, to cover sin, to satisfy the demands of God's holy justice. And with that, we see the first sacrifice occurring, a shadow of a coming Redeemer that would one day make atonement for sin. And I can almost see the faces of Adam and Eve on that day, the astonishment when they look down and they saw the blood on the ground when they witnessed the very first death, an innocent death, when suddenly they saw that crimson stain that was required for their sin. And of course, all of that was a picture of an innocent lamb that would one day come, that would one day spill his precious blood as a substitute for all who placed their faith in him. Thus, the glorious story of redemption was set into motion that day, a plan that God had sovereignly ordained before time began. And all through Scripture we see the scarlet thread of redemption, don't we? It is woven into every story. It is the theme of every song and what a glorious thought to know that, though our sins may be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.

So we see the Father's sovereign grace to reconcile sinners in the justice his holiness demands. But thirdly, will you notice the marvel of his infinite love? I mean, folks, can there be any greater love than this--than to offer your son to save rebellious sinners like you and like me? I mean, I cannot fathom such a sacrifice. "Yet God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." Romans five beginning in verse eight, the apostle Paul says "God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Folks, this is fundamental to the gospel. This is at its very core. We read, for example, in First John four, beginning in verse nine, "In this, the love of God was manifested toward us, that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this as love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." And likewise, in Ephesians, chapter two beginning of verse four, Paul says, God is rich and mercy, "and because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, He made us alive together with Christ." Oh, dear Christian, consider this: we're it not for that infinite love, we would still be in a state of spiritual death, like many of our family members, and many of our friends and all the wicked people of this world. I think of what Paul said in Romans three, beginning verse 14, he speaks of those in spiritual death, as being those whose "mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, destruction and misery are in their paths and the path of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes." But dear friends think of this, because of the divine work of regeneration that occurs at conversion, suddenly, we are raised from spiritual death to spiritual life, having died and been resurrected with Christ and made a new creature in Christ. This is the good news of the true gospel; the only gospel that can save men souls, the only gospel that can deliver men from the bondage of sin and transform hearts as opposed to false gospels like the social gospel. And frankly, just rearrange the deck furniture on the, on the Titanic. It's all they're doing.

Well, let's turn our attention now to three marvelous truths pertaining to the Son. Notice, first of all, the sinless purity of his person. "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf." Now, this is a startling statement. And deliberately so. Of course, we must understand what he's saying here. Some will say, well, because the same word for "sin" can be translated in Hebrew as "sin offering." Paul is here using a Hebraism. Now to be sure Jesus was a sin offering. But I would submit to you that linguistically and grammatically and contextually, it makes no sense whatsoever. The Greek word translated "sin"-- "hamartia,” we get hamartiology, the study of the doctrine of sin, from that word--that word is never used any place in the New Testament, translated "sin offering." We don't see it anywhere. So why would you do that here? Moreover, the same term, "hamartia" is used twice in the same sentence. So you would think that the word means the same both places. Sin offering would make no sense. I mean, read it. He made Him who knew no sin offering to be sin offering on our behalf. Makes no sense whatsoever. And finally, Paul was using the word "sin" here to contrast the word "righteousness." He's basically saying he made him to be sin that we might be made righteous. So none of that makes any sense. Others will argue something that is far more heretical. They say that Paul is saying that Christ became a sinner on the cross. Folks, that is pure heresy. Christ was God in human flesh, he was utterly holy, blameless, he was the spotless Lamb of God. It's beyond the realm of imagination even, that God, who according to Habakkuk, 1:13, "whose eyes are too pure to approve of evil," that God would make his own beloved Son, a sinner? That's incomprehensible. It is blasphemous to think that somehow, the Lord Jesus Christ would lose his righteousness on the cross, and take upon himself our corruption and guilt, and become a transgressor like all of us. According to Hebrews 4:"W5, we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin." Why? Because according to chapter seven and verse 26, of Hebrews, he is, "holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens." No, no dear friends, what we see here is that "He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin." We see that this is referring to imputation-- a very important concept. The father treated him as if he were a sinner, by charging to his account, the sins of all that he had given to him in eternity past. You see, imputation is, it's really that judicial reckoning or sometimes we use the word "forensic." A forensic transfer of one person's sin or righteousness to another. That's what's going on here. By the way, you'll will never see this in Roman Catholic theology, the concept of imputation. Because if it were there, the whole system would fall apart; the works righteousness, we got to keep doing something because nothing was imputed to us. But dear friends, a great exchange took place on the cross of Calvary--Christ took our sin and gave us his righteousness. Isaiah 53, that we read earlier, beginning of verse four, "Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him, stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was pierced through for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him." But dear friends, nothing about His sinless character changed on the cross. As a man, as our representative, Christ "knew no sin," as we read here. He was a perfectly sinless substitute, a man who lived a perfectly sinless life, fulfilling every aspect of the law perfectly. Unlike the slaughter of an innocent lamb in the old covenant sacrificial system, according to Hebrews 9:14, Jesus offered himself without spot to God. When John the Baptist saw him, what did he say to the people? "Behold, the Lamb of God." That's who Jesus was. John MacArthur said this, "He was personally pure yet officially culpable; personally holy yet forensically guilty. But in dying on the cross, Christ did not become evil like we are, nor do redeem sinners become inherently as holy as He is. God credits believer's sin to Christ's account and his righteousness to theirs."

Dear friends, we not only see the sinless purity of his person, but secondly, the selfless love of his sacrifice. And here we can go to other passages of Scripture that speak to this. I think of what Paul said in First Timothy two, beginning of verse three that Christ "gave Himself as a ransom for all." Can you imagine that? He gave himself. And Jesus himself said in John 10, in verse 18, "No one has taken it," referring to his life, "away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative." And Peter said in First Peter 2:24, "He bore our sins in His body on the cross." The idea that he willingly did that, incomprehensible. Absolutely astounding. And in First Peter 3:18, we read, "Christ died for sins, once for all, the just for the unjust." And of course, you will recall this was what fueled Paul's testimony. This was why he was so devoted to serving Christ. This is why he had such a zeal for evangelism. It was because of Christ's love for him. Remember, in Second Corinthians five, verse 14, he said, "For the love of Christ controls us. Having concluded this, that one died for all therefore all died, and He died for all so that they who live might no longer live for themselves but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf." It is absolutely staggering that our sinless Savior voluntarily bore our sins, on the cross in his body; that he willingly endured the wrath of God that we deserve. You will probably like me when I was a little boy, I shouldn't say as a little boy, because I still sing it, especially with my grandkids, we sing the little chorus, "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so." Great doctrinal truth there. To think that Jesus loved those who hated him. In John 13 one John says of Jesus, "Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end"--"eis telos" in the original language. It means "infinitely", "to the ultimate extreme", "eternally," "completely." Jesus spoke of this himself in John 10:11. He said, "I am the good shepherd; and the good shepherd gives His life for the sheep." Paul reminds us of this in Ephesians, chapter five, verse 25. He says that "Christ loved the church, and gave Himself for her." And then that great passage in Romans 8:35, and following. Paul says, "Who will separate us from the love of Christ?" The answer is nothing. Nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Beloved, I hope these truths animate your heart to praise and motivate your will to serving Christ.

So we not only see the sinless purity of his person and the selfless love as of his sacrifice, but finally, the saving merit of his substitution. This is such a great doctrinal truth. Again, notice, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." You see on the cross, God punished Jesus, as if he had lived our lives of sin. So that God could treat us as if we had lived his life of perfect holiness. I don't mean to be in any way sacrilegious, but folks, what a deal. It's just amazing. And of course, this is pictured in the Levitical sacrifices instituted under the Mosaic Covenant.

Will you join me for a minute, I want you to go with me on just a brief journey back into the Old Testament. Let's go back about, I don't know, roughly 3500 years ago. Two years after the Exodus, the exodus was in 1445 BC, God gave the law to Moses. And one aspect of that law is recorded in the Book of Leviticus. Don't worry, we're not going to go through Leviticus this morning, but I want to remind you of something here, because a key theme of the book of Leviticus is the presence of God. And that's confirmed by the fact that that idea was used 59 times and the phrase "before the Lord." "Before the Lord" literally in the Hebrew is "before the face of Yahweh"--a signifying presence. And Leviticus answers a very important question, and that is, how can the holy presence of God dwell in the midst of a sinful people? And how can we ever enter into that presence? Well, the answer is that we see in the Old Testament and in the sacrificial system, that sinners had to make sacrifices to the Lord to atone for their sin, so that they could be rendered acceptable in his presence. Now, not all of the sacrifices made atonement for sin, but certainly the most dominant one that did speak to that was Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. There the high priests would enter into the most holy place, according to Leviticus 16:17, "to make atonement for himself and for his house, and for all the assembly of Israel." Now, remember, atonement literally means to provide legal or moral repayment for a fault or an injury. And atonement always requires two things: satisfaction and substitution. Satisfaction for the offended holiness of God accomplished only by an acceptable substitute for the guilty party. Now, let me remind you of this, this is fascinating history that we see, especially as it relates to Yom Kippur, described in Leviticus 16 and 17. Let me tell you what the high priest would do during that time. The day would seem to begin like every other day with the offering of the morning sacrifice, which would include the burnt offering of a one-year-old lamb. Then the high priest would move methodically through the ceremonies that God had prescribed on the Day of Atonement described in Leviticus 16 and 17. Aaron was required, for example, to remove his normal priestly garments, he had to wash, he then had to put on the prescribed special garments that God required to allow him to enter into the Holy of Holies. He would then secure the necessary sacrificial animals, he had to have a bull for his own sin offering, and he had to have two male goats for the people's sin offering. He also had to get two rams--one for Aaron's and then the other for the people's burnt offering. And then the next thing that he would do would be to slaughter the bull for his own sin offering. Now mind you, these sacrifices were deliberately gruesome. There was blood absolutely everywhere. This was because God wanted to provide a graphic reminder of the hideous nature of sin and that there is no forgiveness of sin apart from the shedding of blood before entering into the Holy of Holies. With the blood of the bowl, Aaron had to create a cloud of incense and the holy of holies that would cover the the Mercy Seat. The mercy seat--the hilasterion--the Septuagint tells us--the place of propitiation, which was the lid that was on top of the ark of the covenant that held the violated law, the Shekinah glory of God hovered above the mercy seat. And the mercy seat was that dividing line that prevented sinful man from entering into the presence of God. And only when that blood was spilt there, was that allowed to happen. And all of that was symbolic, of course. And so he would create a veil to dim the glory of God that was there, lest he lose his life. And it's interesting when he entered into the holy of holies, he had to pass through three areas first in the tabernacle, later on in the temple. As a footnote, as indicated in Hebrews 4:14, this was symbolic of Jesus, our Great High Priest, who passed through three heavens, after making the final and perfect sacrifice of himself. He went first through the atmospheric heaven, and then through the stellar heaven, and finally, into the very abode of God.

Then the high priest would take the blood; he went through the door into the outer court through another door into the holy place. And finally, he would disappear behind the veil into the Holy of Holies. And once inside, he would take some of the blood of the bull and sprinkle it on the mercy seat. And he would do this seven times. That was the place of propitiation. And there dear friends, the justice of God was temporarily appeased. Once again, because all sin must be punished. There, atonement was made for the sins of the people. And then lots were cast for the two goats. One goat would have to be slaughtered. And the other would be the scape goat that we'd be driven out and loosed into the wilderness. The goat to be slaughtered was the goat of the people’s sin offering that was then sacrificed. Its blood was taken into the Holy of Holies and applied to the mercy seat where the blood of the bull had been applied. And then the second goat, the one that was kept alive, had the sins of the nation symbolically placed on its head. And then it was driven from the camp to some desolate place, from which it would never be able to return according to Jewish tradition. That goat was led to a high cliff and pushed backward over the precipice to prevent him from ever returning to the camp. Now dear friends, those two goats symbolized propitiation, and expiation. To "propitiate" means to appease the righteous wrath of God against us. First John 4:10, "God loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." And to "expiate" means to remove the guilt of sin. So the goat slaughtered, symbolized propitiation, and that you had an innocent substitute that was slaughtered to appease the wrath of God against the people. And then the one that was sent into the wilderness, symbolized expiation--the permanent removal of the guilt of our sins. And what we see is by sprinkling the sacrificial blood of one substitute on the mercy seat, imputation occurred. Imputation of sin into a second substitute. The priests then atone for the sins of the people. What a magnificent picture of what Christ did on our behalf. You see, he was the only substitute that could do this on our behalf. And here by the way, we see the doctrine of justification by imputation, when he, through Christ declared us to be righteous because "He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God."

You see beloved, Christ, Jesus offered himself in our place to both propitiate--that is appease the righteousness of God that we deserve--as well as expiate--remove the guilt of our sin from us. God alone covers or erases, he blots out our sin from his sight through the blood of Christ. That's what God told Isaiah in Isaiah chapter six, verse seven, "Behold, your iniquity is taken away." Second Corinthians 5:19, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting our trespasses against us." And therefore the author of Hebrews instructs us saying, in chapter nine, verse 11, "But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation, and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, He entered the Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption."

Dear friends, what we've reflected on here today is the old gospel. And I might add, it is the only gospel. If someone asks you and I hope they will, "what is it that you believe is a Christian?" You tell them, "I believe that God made Jesus Christ who knew no sin, to be sin on my behalf, that I might become the righteousness of God in Him. And you young people, I want you to hear me this morning, should the Lord tarry beyond the years of my pulpit ministry, here at Calvary Bible church, and somebody else take my place, as probably will happen, even though we don't know--if that man or any other man dares to stand in this pulpit and preaches another gospel, let him be accursed. And you take that man and you remove him from this facility, before he can finish his blasphemous sermon. Because we've got to stand upon the truth. This is the only gospel that will save. You say, "oh, that will never happen, the pylons of truth have been driven so deep over the years." Let him who thinks he stands take heed, lest he fall. It has happened many times. Look at some that were once great denominations, the Methodists, the Baptist. We've got Southern Baptists today that I wouldn't allow to teach Sunday school. Not that they're all that way, but there are some. Presbyterians, some wonderful Presbyterian brothers and others are absolute heretics. And on and on it goes. Princeton, Yale, Harvard, all of those Ivy schools were founded on the true gospel. They were dedicated to training men that would preach exactly what I'm telling you here today. And now look at them. They are thoroughly apostate. Oh, dear Christian, may we all bow in breathless adoration before the Lord our God, and thank him for his marvelous work of grace through the Lord Jesus Christ. And may we all be faithful in carrying that torch; in our families, amongst our friends and future generations. May we all celebrate the great exchange that took place on the cross. Amen? Let's do that. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. May they bear much fruit in our hearts for your glory. And if there be anyone here today that knows nothing of what it means to be reconciled to you through faith in Christ, Oh, Lord, would you overwhelm them with such great conviction that they will have no rest until they bow their knee before the cross and plead for the mercy that you will so instantly lavish upon them. May today even be the day that they experienced the miracle of regeneration. We thank you, we give you praise, in Jesus name. Amen.

Will you join me by taking your Bibles and turning to Second Corinthians chapter five. In the providence of God, we have now arrived at verses 18 through 20, that we will examine this morning, under the heading, "Reconciling the World to God through Christ." Before I read the passage, perhaps I can frame it this way--given the skyrocketing violence in our country through the domestic terrorists, foolishly described as protesters, we see more and more people arming themselves out of fear that the government is going to be unable to protect them, maybe not even unable but unwilling to protect them. And so gun and ammo sales, if you've read anything in the news, you see that it's just skyrocketing. Many of the ammunition manufacturers say they're as much as three years behind; it's just amazing to see what's happening. But dear friends, may I say to you, and please hear this, we face a far greater danger than what we see burning down our cities, and in our government. And that danger is Satan and his minions that basically fuel all of this. For "our struggle," the apostle Paul says, "is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers against the powers against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." And from the outset, I want to remind you that my responsibility before God, and therefore unto you, is to equip you, not entertain you. My responsibility is to prepare you and to train you, not to boost your self-esteem, or in any way rouse you to social and political change. That has nothing to do with the gospel. That has nothing to do with the plan of redemption and our great commission. I am called to frankly help you put on the whole armor of God, right? And learn how to wield the "sword of the Spirit," which is the word of God, as Paul tells us. Second Corinthians 10, beginning of verse three, he says this, "For though we walk in the flesh"-- in other words, that we have human limitations--"we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses." And our divinely powerful weaponry, as we see in that passage and others, is the word and prayer by the power of the Spirit. He goes on to say, "We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ."

Dear friends, our ultimate mission is evangelism; to preach the gospel that men and women, boys and girls will come to a saving knowledge of Christ. So we must understand what the gospel truly is. And unfortunately, we live in a day and age where the gospel has been so distorted, it bears little resemblance, in many churches, to the New Testament gospel that Jesus and the apostles preached. Many people today, many Christians, do battle in the flesh, not in the Spirit, and they wield a plastic sword against a formidable enemy with weak arms. We must do better. And by God's grace, we will. The subtitle of Shepherds Fire, which is the ministry that I have to pastors and church leaders, is this, "proclaiming the unsearchable riches of Christ." For indeed, they are unsearchable, right? They are unfathomable when we contemplate them. Paul said in Ephesians, three eight, "Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles, the unsearchable riches of Christ." Oh, dear friends, I trust that you share that kind of awe, that kind of enthusiasm. In fact, Job said in Job five, verse nine, "Who does great and unsearchable things, wonders, without number." And indeed, when we look and see all that God has done, in creation and so forth, the things are wondrous, they're unsearchable.

But perhaps the most unsearchable miracle of all, is the miracle of reconciliation, whereby he breathed life into the spiritual cadavers, gave us the ability to see the horror of our sin, the glory of the cross, and he saved us by his grace and made us new creatures in Christ, that we might one day enter into the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy. And this is the theme of our text this morning. In Second Corinthians, chapter five, beginning of verse 18, under the inspiration of the Spirit, the apostle Paul says, "Now, all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ, and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God."

Dear friends, herein is the glorious good news of the gospel news that is so desperately needed in a world where it seems like all we hear is bad news, right? It gets to a point where you don't even want to turn on the news, because it's so depressing. But here, the inspired apostle reveals how God has a plan, and he has a purpose in redemption, and how we have a high calling to preach this gospel of reconciliation. And you might want to ask yourself from the outset of our time together this morning, what is my highest calling in life? Is this indeed the priority and the passion of my life? Or does it come up way down on the list, if at all. Paul said in Romans one, verse 15," I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who were in Rome. For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, "BUT THE RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH." And similarly, in First Corinthians one, verse 17, we read, "For Christ did not send me to baptize," Paul says, "but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, so that the cross of Christ would not be made void. For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who were being saved it is the power of God." Sadly, down through the course of redemptive history, ever since the church was established at Pentecost, we have seen Christian people, churches, that are ashamed of the gospel, the gospel of reconciliation, and therefore they ignore, for example, Paul's testimony in First Corinthians 1:22, where he went on to say, "We preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness." You would think that he would have caught on to pragmatism; my goodness, quit preaching that if people think it's so foolish. No, no, no, no, this is what I'm going to preach. And here's why, "but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greek, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God."

Now, the truth of what God has really done to reconcile sinners to himself, is indeed horribly offensive to fallen man. In fact, our text this morning, as you will see, will either hardened hearts or soften hearts. People will either resent what the Word of God has to say or they will cherish it, one or the other. They will either argue against it or they will accept it by faith. But for the apostle Paul, the truths that are contained herein were the very fuel that caused his heart to burn with passion to preach the gospel; a fuel that could not be extinguished, even by the most severe forms of persecution, and death. And the same can be said of countless millions who have been reconciled to God. They are about the business of the ministry of reconciliation.

I was thinking about this--the great reformers of the Protestant Reformation, which happened around 1517 through about 1648 or so, taught the true gospel. And in order to do that, they used five basic theological principles, called the Five Solas, Latin phrases or slogans, and you can see them around our worship center here: Sola Gratia, by grace alone, Sola Christus, through Christ alone, Sola Fide, by faith alone, Sola Scriptura, by Scripture alone, and Soli Deo Gloria, glory to God alone. And we see these great doctrinal distinctives in our text this morning, where God's great work of reconciliation is described; a reconciliation, catch this, that occurred on the cross. Here, we see how that barrier was removed between sinful man and a holy God. That barrier being the guilt of our sin and the punishment of God's wrath. He bore our sins in his body, and accomplished peace. Paul speaks of this in Romans five, verse 10. He says, "For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only this, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation."

Now, as we examine our text this morning, I want to use these five Solas as headings and you will see them emerge from the text as we go through it. First of all, I want you to notice Solo Gratia--reconciliation is by grace alone. Notice verse 18, at the very beginning he says, "Now all these things are from God." Well, what "things" is he referring to? Well, what we read in verses 14 through 17, just prior to this text, he's speaking, he's referring to the divine work of regeneration that occurs at conversion when a believer is raised from spiritual death to spiritual life, having died and been resurrected with Christ and made a new creature in Christ. He's referring to that magnanimous, unmerited love of Christ that changed his perception, his identity and his character; the glorious reality that Christ came to this earth, not only to pay the penalty for my sin and your sin, but also to establish an intimate living, eternal union with us, whereby we are in Him, and He is in us. So he says, "Now, all these things are from God." By implication, you had nothing to do with that.

Think about this, all things of our new creation. We contributed nothing to it, because frankly, we had nothing to contribute to it. Moreover, we were incapable of making any spiritual contribution, because we were spiritually dead. Well, then, how can a man or a woman respond to the gospel invitation? Well, the point is, he can't, she can't, unless the Spirit of God, through the power of regeneration breathes spiritual life into that corpse, because all things are from God. In the miracle of regeneration, God causes the sinner to see the horror of the sin, to see what Christ has done and to believe in utter desperation by the power of the Spirit. He causes us to voluntarily submit to the gospel invitation. May I ask you, dear friend, why did you respond positively to the gospel invitation when you heard it, when your friends and family members did not? Why was that? Was it because you were smarter than they were? Was it because you were a more spiritual person than they were? Folks, if that were the case, you would have reason to boast and you could not say with Paul, "Now all these things are from God." You would have to say now all these things are basically from God but I also made my contribution to. Because after all, grace merely facilitated my salvation, but it was not absolutely necessary for it. Grace only made salvation possible. But it was up to me to exercise my free will to believe so I took the initiative in my salvation, not God.

By the way, this is the freewill heresy of the British monk Pelagius, that was condemned by the council at Ephesus in 431 AD, and a number of other councils. In fact, this is the most condemned of all the heresies by numerous councils, more so than any other heresy. And his doctrine of free will became known as Pelagianism. Perhaps you've heard that theological term bantered around. He emphasized human ability and free will, rather than depravity and sinfulness. So Pelagians believe, for example, that it is possible to live without sin; that the effect of Adam's sin on his descendants was simply a bad example. So all people are free to obey or free to disobey apart from God's grace; man can initiate salvation on his own apart from God's intervening grace. And there's a hybrid of that called semi-Pelagianism, which maintains that, yes, grace is necessary, but that the free that the will is free by nature, to choose whether or not to accept it, when that grace is offered. So again, man is the one that must take the initiative in salvation, and then God must help him along on the way to be saved.

And then there's yet another version of it. I have many dear friends who will believe this. And it's not necessarily as much a heresy as it is just a wrong understanding of soteriology. That's called Arminianism. They would argue that God provides salvation-in that he takes the initiative by providing salvation, but having made that available, that plan available, he leaves man to his own devices to choose to respond a right to God's plan. So God and the believer cooperate together in attaining salvation. And then, of course, there is another view, which I think is the biblical view, it's sometimes called Augustinianism, or Calvinism. It's reformed soteriology that we believe here at Calvary Bible Church. And it basically says this, that God brings man to Christ for salvation. That the power and the glory all belong to him and to him alone. That salvation is all of grace. You might think of it this way-- to the Pelagians, They would say that the natural man is well. To the Armenians, they would say that the natural man is sick. To the Augustinians or the Calvinists, we would say the natural man is dead. That's a simple way of putting it. RC Sproul said this, "The grace that is considered in all semi-Pelagian and Arminian theories of salvation is not efficacious grace." Efficacious is kind of a big word, it means to affect, to benefit, to cause something to actually happen. "Rather," he says, "it is a grace that makes salvation possible, not a grace that makes salvation certain. Therein the great difference. In the parable of the sower, we see that regarding salvation, God is the one who takes the initiative to bring salvation to pass. He is the sower. The seed that is sown is his seed corresponding to his word and the harvest that results is his harvest. He harvests what he purposed to harvest when he initiated the whole process. God doesn't leave the harvest up to the vagaries of thorns and stones in the pathway." Sproul goes on to say, "It is God, and God alone, who make certain that a portion of his word falls upon good ground. A critical error in interpreting this parable would be to assume that the good ground is the good disposition of fallen sinners-- those sinners who make the right choice, responding positively to God's prevenient grace." "Prevenient" means preparatory. "The classical reformed understanding of the good ground is that if the ground is receptive to the seed, that is sown by God, it is God alone who prepares the ground for the germination of the seed."

Well, indeed, as James says, In James one beginning of verse 17, "Every good thing given and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation, or shifting shadow and the exercise of," catch it, "His will." Not our will, but in "the exercise of His will, He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among His creatures." Beloved, the only reason any of us ever believed the gospel, ever responded in repentant faith is because God in His sovereign election, set his love upon us in eternity past. And then in time, he took the initiative to change the disposition of our heart, that we might voluntarily believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm always so deeply humbled by that. You must understand that in election, God demonstrates his resolve to save sinners. And that is what actually happened at the cross of Calvary. These are truths that Armenians and Pelagians would deny. J. I Packer said this, quote, "For Arminianism, salvation rests neither on God's election, nor on Christ's cross, but on man's own cooperation with grace, which is something that God does not himself guarantee." My, my, that's no gospel at all too me. That's not good news. If salvation rests on me, I'm in trouble.

Notice again, our text in verse 18, "Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ." "Reconcile," the Greek term "katallasso"-- it means to restore to a place of fellowship by removing an offense that had destroyed that fellowship. It speaks of the removal of hostility, and the restoration of "shalom," of peace.

Now, I want you to notice, who is the one doing the reconciling? It is God, it is not man. Beloved, you must understand that in the true gospel, we see that man cannot affect his reconciliation by doing something. It is solely a work of God, accomplished by the person and the work of Christ, through the efficacy of his blood. Man is unable to do anything to remove the hostility that God has toward his sin. Instead, you might think of it this way; man passively receives the gift of reconciliation through the atoning work of Christ on his behalf. Man cannot cause himself to be born again. He cannot raise himself from spiritual death. Think of Lazarus. There was Lazarus, laying in the tomb, wrapped in grave clothes, stiff as a board, reeking of the stench of putrefaction. Did he have the faculties to cooperate with Jesus' command to come forth? Did he contribute anything to his resurrection? Well, obviously he did not, not until God gave him life. Then he came forth. Yet you hear something different in many gospel presentations. I've heard it many times oh, it's like a man that's drowning in the sea, and we have to throw him the lifeline of the gospel, but he's got to grab it. And so then you have to have altar calls and manipulative stories and 48 verses of "Just as I am" and the organ and all this stuff to get the mood going so that people will finally grab that line and be saved. But folks, a corpse can't grab anything. And that's what Scripture tells us--that we are spiritually dead. We are hostile to God. We are alienated from him. Our spiritual ears are deaf, we are blind. Our heart is deceitful, above all things and desperately sick. It's called a "heart of stone." It is cold, it is unresponsive, and on and on it goes. And if that isn't bad enough, we read that the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers. Why? To keep them from seeing "the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ", Second Corinthians four four. But the Word and the Spirit gives life dear friends, that is the glorious news of the gospel. So regeneration must always precede faith if I can put it that way. Sola Gratia, reconciliation is by grace alone. We don't initiate reconciliation, beloved, we receive it. John MacArthur said this, "Reconciliation does not happen when man decides to stop rejecting God, but when God decides to stop rejecting man. It is a divine provision by which God's holy displeasure against alienated sinners is appeased, his hostility against them removed and a harmonious relationship between him and them established. So indeed, we see Sola Gratia, reconciliation is by grace alone.

But also notice in verse 18, we read, "God reconciled us to Himself through Christ." there's Solus Christus-- reconciliation is through Christ alone. We must understand that only Christ could satisfy the righteous demands of a holy God. Only Christ could appease his wrath. That is propitiation, meaning satisfaction or placation. It's his sacrifice alone, that propitiated God's holy wrath against us making reconciliation possible. First, John 4:10, "In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." Indeed, he alone is the mediator between God and man. Colossians one, verse 20, God chose through Christ, "to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven. And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you and His fleshly body through death, in order to you present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach." Oh, beloved, this is staggering. This is good news beyond anything you can imagine.

Likewise, in Ephesians, two beginning of verse 13, Paul says, "But now in Christ Jesus you who were formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace, and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by having put to death, the enmity." Folks, this is what happened at the cross.

But what you also notice in verse 19, God gave us the ministry of reconciliation. This is another way of describing the Great Commission. He goes on to say, "Namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation." So here again, we see that Christ is the agent of reconciling; we are united to Christ saving faith; we are in Christ. In fact, earlier you will recall in verse 17, in Paul's testimony, he says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." And therefore, because of that, every believer enjoys an intimate, living, eternal union with Christ whereby we become one with him.

But notice the content of our message of reconciliation. And here's where the rubber really begins to meet the road, as we might say. In verse 19, "Namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself." Beloved, this is what we celebrate in worship, and this is what we preach to the world. But we must be careful. Paul's use of the word "world" is used by the Universalist to argue that God's death reconciled all mankind, without exception. Perhaps you have run across these people. Everyone goes to heaven. Very, very popular view. They will also use John 1:29, where John the Baptist declared of Jesus, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world." Well, there it is, they say, he paid everybody sin. They will use John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." And they will point to John 4:42. And First John 4"14, where Jesus has called, quote, "the Savior of the world." John 6:51, Jesus declared, "The bread which I will give for the life of the world is My flesh." First Timothy two, six, "He gave Himself as a ransom for all." Hebrews two nine says that by the grace of God, "He might taste death for everyone." First John, two, two, "He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the world." And I'll explain that a little more in a moment. Well my goodness, when you look at those verses, it seems like there right. You paid everybody sins, everybody ought to go to heaven. And certainly a superficial reading of these passages, especially when you don't compare them with other passages of Scripture, seem to indicate that very thing; that Christ paid the penalty for everyone's sin. The problem is, what do you do with hell? Why call anyone to repentance, if everybody's going to be saved anyway. Why preach the gospel if Christ satisfied God's wrath for everyone? Now, obviously, we know that can't be true, that there is a hell. Jesus said in Matthew 7:23 that I read earlier, he will declare to false professors, "I never knew you, depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness." Sounds like some people didn't get their sins paid for right? Revelation 21, verse eight, "But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death."

So how do we answer the Universalist? Ah, but I'm glad you asked. You must understand that the terms "world" and "all" and "everyone" are used to describe mankind in general. They are used to speak of all men without distinction. But not all men, without exception. Big difference. For example, I had a conversation not too long ago with a Universalist and he brought up First John two two, "He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the world." And he wanted me to explain that. And I asked him, "Well, what is the context of all of this, and along with a lot of other things?" Well, he really had no answer for that. And that's what happens; many times people pull these verses out of context. And well, there it is. Well, the context here is that John is writing to saints who had been snookered by false teachers who embraced Gnosticism. And the Gnostics were saying that the only ones that could be saved were the initiates that had the secret knowledge. Likewise, many Jews thought that they were the only ones that could be saved. Certainly not those Gentiles, certainly not those wicked rulers of Rome. So John is refuting this kind of exclusivism. Christ died for Jews and Gentiles. He died for Gnostics. He died for barbarians, for kings and for paupers. So the whole world, that phrase refers to mankind in general. All without distinction, but not all, without exception. He's referring to, as John said in Revelation seven, nine, "A great multitude, which no one could count from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues." So it is in this sense, that God in Christ is reconciling the world to Himself. And what is the barrier that has to be removed in order for that to be accomplished? Our sin. and that's why he goes on to say, "not counting their trespasses against them." I've got a little note "hallelujah." Aren't you glad he's not pulling up the list and saying, "Are you kidding me?"

He goes on to describe in verse 21, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God and Him." And folks, when did this happen? On the cross of Calvary, Christ's death actually atoned for the sins of all whom the Father had given him in eternity past. His death actually, not potentially, expiated the sins of those who would believe--the elect of God. By the way, the word the word "expiate" in Greek it means "out of" and it speaks of him taking our guilt away; it's been removed. But you must understand that there can be no expiation apart from propitiation, you understand that? Our guilt cannot be removed until God's wrath has been satisfied. That's the point. But indeed, on the cross, he was our substitute. And Peter said in First Peter 2:24, that he bore our sins in his body on the tree. Beloved, the efficacy, that is the effectiveness of Christ's atonement, is not based upon the decision of the sinner to repent and to believe. Boy, if that was the case, none of us would ever be saved. Something actually happened at the cross. We can go all the way back to Isaiah 53 and verse five and read what happened, "But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. Folks, there is no potentiality there. We don't preach, "well, Christ made your salvation possible. And now it's up to you to complete the process." I hope you don't preach that? No, we declare to sinners, "Christ died for you." Only a perfect, efficacious atonement provides a salvation that has already been accomplished; nothing more needs to be added. It is a gift to be received by faith alone. Charles Spurgeon said this, "We say Christ so died, that he infallibly secured the salvation of a multitude that no man can number." Can't you just hear him thundering this across the audience there in London about 150 years ago?

"We say Christ so died that he infallibly secured the salvation of a multitude that no man can number, who through Christ's death, not only may be saved, but are saved, must be saved, and cannot by any possibility, run the hazard of being anything but saved." Now that's the gospel. J I Packer said this, "God's saving purpose in the death of his son was not a mere ineffectual wish, depending for its fulfillment on man's willingness to believe, so that for all God could do, Christ might have died and none be saved at all." He goes on to say, "The Bible sees the cross, as revealing God's power to save, not his impotence. Christ did not win a hypothetical salvation for hypothetical believers; a mere possibility of salvation for any who might possibly believe, but a real salvation for his own chosen people. His precious blood really does save all. Its saving power does not depend on faith being added to it. Its saving power is such that faith flows from it. The cross secured the salvation of all for whom Christ died." Oh, what a magnificent truth this is. This is the gospel, we preach; that God in Christ, as Paul said, reconciling the world to himself not counting their trespasses against them. Solas Christus; reconciliation is through Christ alone.

Again, if I can put it this way, his atoning sacrifice, his work on the cross, was efficacious only for quote, "Those whom the Father had given Him," John 17, nine. Those whom God determined from all eternity past to believe on the Son Ephesians one four, "He chose them in Him before the foundation of the world." Revelation 13 to eight, "and their names have been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." People don't like this. We have a rabid commitment to self-determination. We don't like a God that is fully in control, do we? Well, you do once you come to Christ, and you rejoice in it. Jesus declared, "I am the good shepherd, the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." And then he added, "I lay down My life for the sheep." Romans eight beginning of verse 32, "God did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all." He went on to say God's elect, those whom He justifies. So dear friends, what a comfort to know that "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them," verse 19. But please understand, reconciliation could never take place, apart from the forgiveness of sins, because it is sin that caused the separation to happen in the first place, right? And therefore we can sing with David, "How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered! How blessed is the man whom the LORD does not impute iniquity," Psalm 32, one and two.

Now, notice again, in verse 18, God gave us the "ministry of reconciliation," verse 19, "He has committed to us the word of reconciliation." The word "word" there is "logos" in the original language, as opposed to the Greek term mythos. It's a synonym for the gospel. It is the word of truth. And here we see Sola Scriptura; reconciliation is by scripture alone. You see, we understand all through Scripture, that it is God's word, that is the sole infallible source of authority for Christian faith and practice. It is not the Bible, plus tradition. The word of God is central to our life, it's central to our faith, it's central to our worship. James 1:I8, "In the exercise of His will, He brought us forth by," what? "The word of truth." Romans 10:17, "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ." Paul said to the Thessalonian believers in First Thessalonians 2:13, "For this reason, we also constantly thank God, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe." I remember when that happened to me, and it's still happening, as it is with you, if you know and love Christ. Well, obviously, there's something else here. The gospel is freely offered to all, but sinners have to respond in faith in order to be saved. We see that here as well.

And here is number four Sola Fide; reconciliation is by faith alone. Verse 18, again, "God gave us the ministry of reconciliation." Again, we have to call sinners to repentance, we have to preach the gospel, so that they will believe. Verse 19, "He has committed to us the word of reconciliation." Verse 20, "Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, to be reconciled to God." Now it's common for people to ask, "well, how in the world can a person respond to the gospel invitation if he's spiritually dead?" Very fair question. And as we've answered before, it's by the work of the Spirit. It's regeneration: the sovereign act of God whereby he imparts spiritual life to a sinner, again causing that sinner to voluntarily respond to the gospel in repentant faith. You see, regeneration is the cause, not the consequence of saving faith. You will recall in Second Corinthians four, Paul speaks of regeneration in terms of suddenly being able to see the light of the gospel; that's regeneration. When God saves the sinner, the Spirit's work causes these blind eyes to suddenly see what they could not see before; to suddenly perceive the light of Christ and all of his glory, resulting in saving faith. But God had to take the initiative. Well, then people will say, "Well, how can man be held responsible for his unbelief? If God is sovereign over salvation?" Well, I've heard that before. And usually the chin is up and the chest is out, and it's like, explain that one to me. Have you heard that before? Of course, there's a sense of, you know, if you believe that, well, then God's unfair, you know, that's the idea. Well, how do you answer that? Well, the answer is real simple. God doesn't say God's sovereignty and man's responsibility run parallel all through Scripture. They never intersect. We see it all over scripture. But you know what, they are perfectly compatible in the mind of God, even though they are an inscrutable mystery to us. By the way, as soon as you try to explain it, you cease to be biblical.

In fact, in Romans chapter nine, we're told to not even ask that question. There we read, "Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, 'Why did you make me like this,' will it? Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use, and another for common use?" Obviously, we are the clay pot; we have no capacity to even really ask the question much less understand it. We accept it by faith, we see it all through Scripture. "Well, I want nothing to do with a God like that,” I’ve heard that before. And all I have to say is well dear friend, if that's the case, you must understand that you will have an eternity to curse him in the solitary confinement of hell, for what you believe to be his injustice. And I hope that's not the case. All I can do is beg you, as Paul says, "on behalf of Christ, to be reconciled to God. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved." He will forgive your sins, He will make you a new creature in Christ. By the way, this is what the church is to do. We get all these things of what churches are supposed to be about--we're to be ambassadors of Christ, ministers of reconciliation, begging sinners on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God. This is our great commission--to make disciples and to teach them to obey all that Jesus has commanded them. We have the ministry of reconciliation. We're not to be, I don't know, social justice warriors, for example, that's where many churches have gone, as if they can somehow appease that crowd, which is absolutely ludicrous. We have the ministry of reconciliation, not the ministry of reparations, which is utterly absurd, and totally unbiblical.

Oh, dear Christians, we have a glorious calling because we serve a glorious God. We have the ministry of reconciliation. I hope you take that seriously. I hope that is your calling, your ministry.

Well, you're probably wondering, our time is almost gone. Aren't we going to get solar day of glory in there? O yes, we're going to do that real quickly. Soli Deo Gloria. Reconciliation is ultimately for glory to God alone. Notice again, back to verse 18, "Now all these things are from God." Whenever I think of that, I think of how Paul for 11 chapters, explains the depravity of man and the glory of God in justification. And at the end of that, he says, in that glorious benediction; that glorious doxology in Romans 11:36 He says, "For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen." Beloved, God is the originator. He is the sustainer. And the goal of all things that exist; everything comes from him, everything is preserved by him, and everything ends in him. And it's for this reason that even in that text Paul ascribes to God not merely glory, but he says, "the glory"; the supreme glory, the glory of redemption. Then he says, "Amen." What a fitting conclusion to Paul's arguments and explanations of the plan of redemption. We see this as well, by the way, in First Corinthians eight six, Paul says, "There is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things, and we want exist for Him; and one, Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him." Beloved, we exist for him, not for ourselves.

And even in the Old Testament, God spoke through his servant Ezekial, in Ezekiel 36:22. He says, "'It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for My holy name." He went on to say, "I will vindicate the holiness of My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord, when I prove myself holy among you in their sight.'" Dear Christians please hear this, we are not central in God's plan of salvation. He is. Ultimately we are incidental to it. The whole plan of redemption in creation is the glory of his name that is uppermost in his plan and in his purposes of salvation. It's a humbling thought is it not? The ultimate purpose of election to salvation is according to Ephesians, one six, "the praise of His glorious grace." He went on to say in verse 11, "Having been predestined according to His purpose, who works all things after the counsel of His will, to the end of that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory.

Oh Child of God, we are ambassadors of Christ, begging people, as I'm doing today--if you don't know Christ, please be reconciled to Him, by placing your faith in Christ, your only hope of salvation. And dear Christian, is this the passion and priority of your life? Or do you merely live for yourself? Moreover, when you present the gospel, is it the true gospel of reconciliation anchored in the atoning work of Christ? Or is it some man-centered, watered down cotton candy version that exalts man and diminishes Christ that promotes works at the expense of grace that promotes free will, at the expense of God's glory. I trust our time together this morning has indeed equipped you with the truth. I hope your sword has been sharpened, and you will be willing to wield it by the power of the Spirit. And I trust you've also been encouraged by the truth as I am. Therefore with Charles Wesley, we can pray "oh for 1000 tongues to sing, my great Redeemer's praise the glories of my God and King, the triumphs of His grace. My gracious master, and my god assist me to proclaim to spread through all the earth abroad, the honors of your name." Let's pray together.

Father, we're always profoundly humbled when we look at the great truths of your gospel. Thank you for reconciling us unto yourself. Thank you for the hope that is ours in Christ. If there be one here within the sound of my voice, I pray that you will save them by that grace even as you have us. We commit it all to you knowing that ultimately your purposes will be accomplished. And for this, we rejoice with exceeding joy. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.

What a privilege we all have to be able to look into the Word of God and to be able to worship together in freedom. Let's hope that that continues. It's certainly under threat. Will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter five. If you haven't been with us, we make our way vers- by-verse through every book of the Bible, whatever we're studying, and this morning, we come to verses 16 and 17 in Second Corinthians five.

Before I read it to you, let me remind you of the context here. And also, to let you know that I want to make this imminently practical for each of us for indeed this is a verse--or these two verses that we're going to be looking at--are very timely, given what we're seeing in our world today. In the course of defending his integrity against the scurrilous slander of the false apostles that had entered into the church of Corinth and gained popularity, Paul has just stated in verse 15, how the love of Christ controls him. And he is astounded at the reality that Christ died on behalf of his sins, bore his sins in his body; that Christ died for all who died in Christ on that day, and therefore all who were raised to walk in newness of life. So he's overwhelmed with this magnanimous, this unmerited love of Christ, for him specifically.

And then he says this in verse 16, "Therefore from now on, we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." Last week, as I heard our president give his speech at the Republican National Convention, there was a part of me that wished that he would have preached this passage. You laugh because you know, that would never happen, right? He said many wonderful things, very inspirational things, many things that are true, many things that are important to protect our country, to maintain our economic prosperity. But I was thinking of what Jesus said in Mark eight. "What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of Him when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angel." As I say, I want you to understand the power of this passage as it relates to our lives right now.

Let me take you to some things that I know you're seeing. It's all around us in our culture. We are witnessing a socialist takeover of our country. Sometimes you say, Well, where have these people been? Where they come from? I'll tell you where they've come from; from our colleges, and our universities, and our apostate churches, and our cultural Christianity churches that refuse to teach and preach and apply the truth. I heard just this morning, John Ratcliffe, the Director of National Security describe the tremendous threat of communist China and some of the things that he was allowed to say, in public; obviously concealing enormous amounts of truth. He was talking about the enormous influence that China is exerting on our government officials, congressmen and senators, and women in their various districts. The enormous influence that they are exerting over our electorate to make sure that Joe Biden gets elected--frightening. Folks, this is Lenin's Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 that spawned the Communist Party. This is the same type of stuff. If you don't believe me read your history. These are the brown shirted hooligans of the nationalist Socialist German students League of 1933, Germany. One thing we learned from history is that we never learn from history. You notice that? You know, in Scripture, we're told in Ephesians 5:11, that we are not to "participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness." But we are to "expose them." And I want to expose some of these things, to make sure you have a biblical perspective of what's going on and so that we can apply even this passage. Especially I want you young people to hear this. I am frightened for the kind of world my grandchildren are growing up in, and what they will experience in the days to come. Today we see Antifa thugs destroying cities, attacking people, even in our capitol, you saw them attacking people coming out of the convention, even one of our senators Rand Paul and his wife. They tell us that America is an evil country, that capitalism is an evil system, that the Constitution and Christianity are evil tools of white supremacy. And today, we see growing numbers that find their identity in being a social justice warrior; foolishly believing that their ideologies that are going to somehow bring in a glorious utopia, despite the fact that that has done just the opposite historically every place it has been tried. Of course, social justice is rooted in postmodern ideology is derived from things like intersectionality, and radical feminism and critical race theory. All ideologies that are not just antithetical, but hostile to Christianity. Wherever these things have been applied, millions of people have died. Social justice is really a deceptive label, it should be called socialist injustice. The theme needs to be "you make it we'll take it." We have Black Lives Matter thugs entering restaurants, intimidating people to raise their fist in apparent solidarity with them, screaming "white silence is violence." Basically saying if you don't agree with our ideology, then you need to be canceled. By the way, every totalitarian regime that has ever existed started this way. Black Lives Matter has become a religious cult based on exaggerated claims of systemic racism, and racially motivated police brutality, although all of the statistical metrics say otherwise. So we watch so-called protesters loot and burn, vandalize and murder, while leftist governmental leaders watch on with smug satisfaction. And of course, the answer to all of this is to elect them, give them the power, defund the police and replace them with social workers. Reparations, which if you read this, it's a laundry list that should terrify every law abiding, taxpaying American. It's basically reward without responsibility. It's an attempt to gain political power. In fact, these people really leverage the sin of covetousness in the 10th commandment, to gain political power and to seize wealth from those who they have deemed it to be their oppressors. A vicious lie based upon revisionist history that appeals to the naive and the gullible; lies that need to be challenged but are canceled by a well-organized system of intimidation and propaganda with a complicit media. And folks, you must understand, and we know that Satan is temporarily allowed to be the god of this world until the Lord takes back what is his, but until that happens, these things are going to continue. And ultimately, they're coming for us. They're coming for our church. Don't be naive.

Of course, there's a stark difference between even the parties that we see today. We see for example, the Democratic Party. It's almost--like I listened to some of these things--and it's like some evil foreign country has invaded us. You have people that advance the idea of it being morally okay to kill unwanted, unborn babies. That is so incomprehensible to me. I can't even put it in words. They embrace the most deviant forms of sexual immorality and sexual perversion, major planks in their party platform. Evils, according to Scripture, that are such an abomination in his eyes that he describes, for example, in Leviticus 18, how he vomits out nations the practices those things. Obviously, no Christian could ever vote for such a party. John MacArthur said the other day, something to the effect that the Democratic Party has adopted Romans one as their platform, I thought that was a good statement. He also said this in something else that I read from the Daily Wire, quote, "We have literally watched this play out in living color, with Jerry Springer narrating, as our culture has sped down the exact path of spiritual decline Paul outlines in Romans one. Hollywood, hip hop, shock radio, and host of other pop culture obsessions, helped by mainstream media and the secular academy have indoctrinated recent generations to accept and even encourage every imaginable kind of depravity, and radical," quote, "alternative lifestyle," end quote.

Dear Christian friend, you must understand that the stark difference even between the Democratic and the Republican Party pales into utter insignificance in comparison to the difference between any of those groups, and the kingdom of God. We are citizens of another kingdom. That's why we feel like aliens here, right? We serve the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, we are part of his body, the church. Every church that honors him, as we try to do here at Calvary Bible Church is a celestial outpost of an eternal kingdom that is not of this world. We are a people who have received a word from another realm and who long to leave this earth at God's appointed time. And when we meet together to worship, we do so because an unfathomably glorious God has summoned us to do so; to worship him, and to hear from him through the stammering lips of his servants. My friends, please understand regardless of party, politicians and government can never solve the problems of our world. At best they can do is protect us from evil. Right now, they're not doing a very good job of it. Man's only hope, here this, is in Christ. Only Christ can change the heart. And this is the message of the gospel. This is the message America needs to hear. If I were running for president, which obviously I would never do. And I say this humbly, I have a much higher calling. This would be my platform, and it would be yours. Bottom line, dear friends, you are either in Christ, or you're out of Christ.

Let me tell you what the Bible says about those who are out of Christ. In other words, you have never yielded your life and repentant faith to the Lord Jesus Christ. You've never been saved. Okay? If you're out of Christ, according to Colossians 1:21 You are "alienated and hostile in mind engaged in evil deeds." You're "separate from Christ," according to Ephesians 2:12, "having no hope and without God in the world." Ephesians 4:17 and following says, you walk in the futility of your mind being darkened in your understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in you because of the hardness of your heart. You are controlled by your flesh, according to Romans eight five "For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit." The life of an unbeliever is dominated by his or her fallen nature with which they were born, they live under the authority, under the bondage of their flesh that binds them in their thoughts and their desires. Such as according to Galatians 5:19 and following: "immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and the things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God." If you're out of Christ, according to Ephesians, two beginning in verse one, you are "dead in your trespasses and sins." You walk "according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience." You live "in the lusts of your flesh, indulging the desires of your flesh and of the mind, and are by nature children of wrath, even as the rest." Second Peter one, I mean two verse 10, says that you "indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires." Philippians three and verse 19, you're among those whose "end is destruction, whose God is your appetite and whose glory is in your shame." You set your mind on earthly things.

I want you to contrast that horror with the remedy that bridges that estrangement, which is called union in Christ. Ephesians two, verse 13, we read, "But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ." What a magnificent truth. And that's what Paul is saying here in Second Corinthians 5:17. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away, behold, new things have come." These people that are apoplectic with rage, protesting all of the stuff that you see, my heart aches for them, because they need Christ, and they don't see it. America doesn't have a skin problem and has a sin problem, right? People want justice, but they don't understand the justice of God. Otherwise, they would cry out for his mercy and be saved. And this, frankly, is what must be preached from pulpits today. People need to have a sobering recognition of the terrifying separation that exists between a holy God and fallen man, which makes union with Christ an indispensable necessity for salvation.

Well, with that little introduction, these are the magnificent streams of saving grace that flow from the well of truth that's in our text here this morning. I want you to see that salvation changed three things in Paul's life. And we can, all of us who know and love Christ, we all identify with this. It's real simple salvation changed his perception, his identity and his character. Notice closely the text verse 16, "Therefore," and here he is referring back to verses 14 and 15. He's just overwhelmed by the love of Christ who bore his sins. The reality that Jesus died for all without distinction, but not all without exception.

Jesus’ atonement was not a potential propitiation, but an actual propitiation for him and for all who trust in Christ. "Therefore," he says, "from now on, we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way, no longer." So number one, we see that salvation changed his perception. Notice closely he says, "From now on we recognize." "Recognize "—“oida” in the original language, it means "to know or to perceive." We don't perceive anyone according to the flesh anymore. The flesh referring to sinful humanity, whereby we're blinded by sin and by Satan. You see his conversion changed his ability to discern between that which is true, and that which is false. You might say it gave him a new set of lenses with which to see himself and to see the world and certainly to see Christ. No more seeing things through a hopelessly biased, self-serving, superficial, depraved criteria, as he once did. And you know, what's really ironic here is the false apostles were judging him in that same way that he used to judge Christ and Christians. Really interesting to think about that. But now he saying, he's talking about being recognized according to the flesh. You see, before Paul's conversion--remember, he was saw the self-righteous Pharisee who judged Jesus according to the flesh, and that's why he says, "even though we have known Christ according to the flesh," in other words, that's how I used to see him, through the eyes of my flesh--Paul saw Jesus as a messianic pretender, as a phony, a fraud, an enemy of Judaism, as a blasphemer who deserved to die. In fact, he, along with others, saw his crucifixion as evidence of that very thing. Because the cursed are going to be killed by God, even on a tree. Deuteronomy 21:22, "If a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree..." And so this is what Paul's thinking about, who Jesus was; as many people today. He hated all who belonged to Christ. In Acts 26 verse nine, and following, he said this, "So then, I thought to myself that I had to do many things hostile to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. And this is just what I did in Jerusalem; not only did I lock up many of the saints in prisons, having received authority from the chief priests, but also when they were being put to death, I cast my vote against them. And as I punished them often, in all the synagogues, I tried to force them to blaspheme; and being furiously enraged at them, I kept pursuing them even to foreign cities." You might say that Paul was a radical Jewish protester of his day. He was the king of cancel culture in his day. And of course, this is typical of unsaved people because they only know Christ according to the flesh. You ask the average person who Jesus is, people who are not in Christ, will not be able to give you an accurate answer. In fact, I read a new survey conducted by LifeWay Research, and released by Ligonier Ministries, that revealed that 52% of Americans, and 30% of Evangelicals say they believe that Jesus was a quote, "good teacher," but he was not God. In another part of the survey, 65% of Evangelicals agreed with the statement, quote, "Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God." Folks, anybody that believes that is unregenerate. You can't be a Christian and believe that. It's like calling yourself a geophysicist and believing that the earth is flat. Jesus repeatedly claimed that he was God. He was, by his own admission, the great "I Am" of the Old Testament, thus bearing the Old Testament, divine name of Yahweh. John 17 five, "Now," Jesus said as he goes to the cross, "glorify Thou Me together with Thy self, Father, with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was. Repeatedly the apostles spoke of him as "Our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus." Indeed, he is the Creator, the one who upholds all things by the Word of his power, the coming King of kings, the judge of the living and the dead and so on and so forth. A man simply cannot be in Christ and deny the deity of Christ.

Well, that was Paul's problem. He was religious, but he wasn't in Christ. But when he was converted, God opened his spiritual eyes. And that's why he says "yet now we know Him in this way, no longer." So salvation changed his perspective, as it does everybody who comes to Christ. His ability to look beyond his own preconceived biases, and ignorance was blown away. He can now see people in Christ through the lens of truth.

But secondly, it changed his identity. And here's where it gets even more exciting. Verse 17. "Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he's a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." I mean, think about it. Saul of Tarsus, as he was called, prior to his conversion, found his identity in being a Christ hating Pharisee. And of course, that determined his character. He was a self-righteous fool. He felt fulfilled, even virtuous, in destroying Christians. But on the road to Damascus, what happened? Suddenly, the Lord of glory revealed himself. And all of a sudden, Paul, the apostle, got a new identity. At that point, he was in Christ, which radically changed everything about him; everything about his character. Now he's a new creature in Christ. And many today find their identity, for example, in being a social justice warrior. They're considered to be the woke, which unfortunately--and I'm gonna say this kindly--t's really a synonym for being deceived. Sadly, Satan has provided other sources of identity that can determine your character. For example, gender identity-- what an amazing thought. You can now choose your sexual orientation. If you don't identify with your biological gender when you were born, you now have, and I did a little research on this, I found anywhere from 56 to 112 variations of gender identity you can choose from. ABC News listed the 56 Facebook genders, I'll give you just a few of them: a-gender, androgynous, bi-gender, cisgender, gender queer, non-binary, trans female, trans male, and on it goes. Of course, it's all absurd. And of course your identity is based upon your desires, they will tell us your attractions. And whenever you're attracted biblically to something that God forbids--"epithumeo," the term that is used is translated "lust." But they will say that your identity is based upon your desires, and that determines your sexual orientation. In fact, the American Psychological Association's definition of sexual orientation is this quote, "Sexual orientation refers to an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic and/or sexual," here it is, "attractions to men, women, or both sexes. Sexual orientation also refers to a person's sense of identity based on those attractions, related behaviors and membership in a community of others who share those attractions." I was reading the other day in the Washington Post. There was an article that caught my eye. It said "Advice to Parents on Raising a Happy and Healthy LGBTQ Child." I’ll just quote one little section. "Parents aren't always aware of their child's sexual or gender identities." By the way, I watched all three children of mine, being born and there was no doubt as to what their gender identity was. "Parents aren't always aware of their child's sexual gender identities, especially when they are young. And their identities are in many ways just emerging. This is why family members should consider that any child might be LGBTQ."

Dear Christian, these people need Christ. That's the only thing that can give them a proper perspective of life, of themselves, of others and certainly of Christ. Now Paul is saying here that everything about him changed when he was placed in Christ, a new identity. The believer’s union with the Lord Jesus Christ is such a precious doctrine. I have written on it, maybe some of you have read one of my books on it. Because indeed, he is our representative. He is our substitute; he is the sacred mediator of all of the blessings of the redeemed. According to one of my esteemed professors, Dr. Richard Mayhew, our union with Christ is, quote, "The source of every spiritual blessing we receive from the Father's election in eternity past to the Son's redemptive life, death, burial and resurrection, all the way to the glorification of the saints with Christ in heaven. And I love the way Charles Spurgeon put it, "There is no joy in this world like union with Christ. The more we can feel it, the happier we are, whatever our circumstances." Think about it, and I think I have this available for you to look at. For we have been "crucified with Christ." Galatians 2:20. We have "died" with him, Romans six, eight, We have been "buried" with him, Romans six, three. We have been "raised up with Him to walk in newness of life," Ephesians, two, five through six. And we have been "seated with Him in the heavenly places," Ephesians two, six.

Dear friends, when we behold the marvel of being in Christ, we find ourselves just adoring God's provision of new life in the Spirit, which is summarized so comprehensively by John Murray. Here's what he said, "Union with Christ has as its source the election of God, the Father, before the foundation of the world, and has its fruition in the glorification of the sons of God. The perspective of God's people is not narrow. It is broad and it is long. It is not confined to space and time; it has the expanse of eternity. Its orbit has two foci: one the electing love of God the Father and the counsels of eternity, the other, glorification with Christ and the manifestation of His glory. The former has no beginning, the latter has no end." And he went on to say, "Why does the believer entertain the thought of God's determinate counsel with such joy? Why can he have patience in the perplexities and adversities of the present? Why can he have confident assurance with reference to the future and rejoice in hope of the glory of God? It is because he cannot think of past, present or future apart from union with Christ." Knowing that we are able to consciously commune with our ever-present Savior, who can sympathize with our weaknesses, who has been tempted at all things even as we are, yet without sin, it's just a reality that boggles my mind, and delights my soul.

And with these truths resonating within our heart, we can better understand Peter's poignant words in First Peter one eight. He said, "Though you have not seen Him you love Him. And though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy, inexpressible full of glory." Dear Child of God, this magnificent mystery, once again, is the foundation of all of our spiritual blessings. And this is what Paul is saying. And that's why your walk with Christ is so important. And when you come to Christ, you're so dramatically changed. Rather than seeing Christ as a means to an end, as many people do, when they hear the Gospel, you suddenly discovered that Christ is the all-sufficient and all, glorious end in and of himself. We are in Christ; he is in us. In fact, Christ is esteemed in such a way that when he describes this, we see him talking about it, even in his high priestly prayer to the Father. Remember, he's preparing to endure the agonies of the cross on your behalf and mine. And he says this, he prayed, "that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in you, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me. The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and the loved them, even as You have loved Me." John 17:21 and following.

You see, it is impossible to fathom the gulf that exists between our holy God, our Creator, and his sinful creatures. For the Son of God to purchase our redemption; to be willing to marry such a wretched bride, is just unfathomable. It's like he looks, and he sees me and says, yeah, there is a rebellious, mean, selfish and submissive, ugly one. I want to marry that one. That's what he did. There was no merit in me. There was no merit in any of you. It's the glory of the gospel. It's amazing. Nevertheless, the intended unity that we have with him was decreed before the foundation of the world and it was this very unity that occupied the heart of the Lord on the eve of his crucifixion. It's just amazing to me to think about it. And that this is recorded in Scripture, a certain proof that He wants us all to apprehend, accurately; the nature of this mystical union, and all that it means to the redeemed. Again, it was his desire for his bridal church to relish the profound implications of this everlasting marriage. That she might enjoy the staggering benefits of what it means to be in Christ. This is at the heart of Paul's doxology recorded in Ephesians, one, three, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ." That little preposition "in", "in Christ" signifies the deep wonder of Christ being more than just with us, more than existing outside of us, but rather he is one who is in us, and we are in him. One who is more than just our Sovereign King and our risen Savior, our Lord and Master, our teacher, and friend, and so forth; although he is all of those things. But to be in Christ is not some mystical form of pantheism whereby we are absorbed into the wholeness, which is God. It's not at all what Scripture teaches. Nor is it a physical union taught as some of the Sacramentarians would teach where Christ somehow enters men physically when they participate in some rite or ceremony, like Roman Catholic, transubstantiation, or whatever. Nor is it a union of essence, where somehow, we lose our humanity and become one with God and absorbed in Christ. I've heard those things before. But rather dear friends, to be in Christ is an expression of inter-connectedness, whereby we share a common spiritual life with him. For "we have died and our life is hidden with Christ in God," right? Colossians three, three. He is "our life”, Colossians three, four. And he "lives" in us Galatians 2:20.

Scripture reveals some amazing truths about this nature. I've summarized them for you, so that you can look at quickly as we move along here. Union with Christ is a supernatural union authored by God. "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him." John 14:23. But it's not only a supernatural union, it is a vital union by which Christ becomes our very life. Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me."

But it is also an organic union, in that with Christ, believers form one body, the church, and we respond to Christ as the head. Colossians 1:18, "He is the head of the body, the church."

It is also a spiritual union in that Christ dwells within us, by the Spirit, who is the "Spirit of Christ", First Peter 1:11. "For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body... and we were all made to drink of one Spirit," First Corinthians 12:13.

But also, and this is very important, it is a legal union; in that Christ is our representative head who has made us the beneficiary of his substitutionary work of salvation, Romans five eighteen, "So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men. Whereas through the one's disobedience, the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One, the many will be made righteous."

Ah, but dear friends, it is also a mysterious union, in that it has no analogy in human experience. Colossians 1:27, "God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." And finally, it is an everlasting union that can never be severed. Romans 8:38 and following, "For I am convinced," Paul says, "that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord." And as we look at Scripture, we see various figures that the Spirit of God uses to help us grasp this unfathomable mystery. We are "married to Christ," Romans seven four. We are to Christ as a bride is to the bridegroom, Ephesians 5:22 and following. We are "branches of the true vine," John 15, one through 11. We partake of Jesus, the "true bread of heaven," John 6:51. We are" the body" and Jesus is ""the head Ephesians 1:22 and following. We are a spiritual building, quote, "joined together and growing into a holy temple in the Lord," Ephesians 2:21.

Folks, the implications of these descriptions are staggering. Not only with respect to how they relate to the doctrine of salvation, but with respect to how they cause us to live out this union, in our everyday life; in our gospel proclamation, in our worship, in our service, and all of our relationships with other believers. And even the unsaved world. And I stand in awe when I reflect upon the glorious reality that the Christ came to this earth not only to pay the penalty for my sin, but also to establish an intimate, eternal union with me, where I become one with him. My head blows up. I trust you share my amazement, as well as my eternal gratitude, for what Christ has done. You see, folks, this is my identity, I hope it is yours. I am in Christ--that's changed everything.

It changed Paul's perception, his identity and finally his character, verse 17. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." The little adjective "new"--"kainos" in the original language, means "unseen," "of a kind not seen before," is the idea. It's new in quality, not in sequence. This is the miracle of the new birth. This is the miracle of regeneration. "Palingenesia", we're born again. It is that instantaneous, supernatural impartation of spiritual life to the spiritually dead, where he causes us to raise from death unto eternal life. A miracle that is beyond our comprehension. So what Paul was speaking of here is a radical departure from his whole life, a dramatic change has taken place between his "pre" versus "post" conversion experience. There is a total restructuring of who he is. All of the biased, selfish, ignorant, sinful perspectives, of ourselves, goes away when we are in Christ. All of our biased perspectives of the world and other people, all changed. David Garland said it this way, "The new heaven and new earth and the complete transformation of believers remain a future hope. But for Christians, they are so certain to be fulfilled, that their lives are controlled by this new reality that still awaits consummation for individuals to become a part of this new creation. They must choose to be in Christ."

Beloved, you must understand that what validates true saving faith is a changed life. Not some profession, not some prayer, not some ritual that you did once upon a time when you were sprinkled or baptized or whatever it was that happened. But a changed life. As I say, "you say you're an apple tree, let's see the apples", right? If you're a new creature in Christ, the old things pass away the new things come. At the moment of our new birth we are made new creatures. And that sets into motion, this process of sanctification, whereby the Holy Spirit that dwells within us gradually conforms us into the likeness of Christ. Jesus said in John 3:64, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and what and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." You see the life of a Christian, someone who is in Christ, is characterized by being able to overcome the wicked influences of this fallen world system. It includes a newfound hatred for the things that we once loved, and a love for the things that we once hated. All of you who know Christ can identify with this and tell your stories. The Spirit plants within us new desires, new loves, new passions, new inclinations, new beliefs, new values, so that we manifest the fruits of the Spirit--love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, as we read in Galatians, five. Moreover, with the disposition of the soul so radically changed, what's fascinating is God's desires become our desires, Psalm 37:4. He causes us, as Paul said, in Romans 6:17, to "become obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which we were committed." For indeed, "If you know that He is righteous, you know that everyone also who practices righteousness, is born of Him," First, John 2:29.

Well, dear friends, does this describe the longing of your heart? Does this describe the essence of your character, the trajectory of your life? Or are you merely, as so many are, a cultural Christian? A Christian in name only, going with the flow. You don't really find your identity in Christ; you find it in all the other things that are out there in this world that is passing away.

I want to close with a quote from Charles Spurgeon, the great English preacher. He said this about 150 years ago in London. It spoke to my heart I hope it will to yours as well. He said this, "But what is it to be born again?" In other words, to become a new creature in Christ? "Well, I've already said that I cannot tell you how the Spirit of God operates upon the unregenerate making them to be new creatures in Christ Jesus. I know that He usually operates through the Word, through the proclamation of the truth of the gospel. So far as we know, He works upon the mind according to the laws of mind by first illuminating the understanding. He then controls the judgment, influences the will and changes the affections. But over and above all that we can describe, there is a marvelous power which He exerts, which must remain among the inscrutable mysteries of this finite state, even if we can never comprehend it. By this power, such a wonderous effect is produced, that a man becomes a new man, as much as if he had returned to his native nothingness and had been born again in an altogether higher sphere. The new nature is created within him. Although the old nature is not entirely eradicated, it will ultimately be destroyed, but it is not destroyed at first. Yet a new nature is born within the man, A nature which hates what the old nature loved, and loves what the old nature hated. A new nature, which is akin to the nature of God." Dear friends, you're either in Christ or you are separated from him. And I plead with you as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ that if you're outside of Christ, and you feel that conviction, you simply must come to Christ in repented faith. Because unless you repent, and trust in Christ as your Savior, you will remain separated from him forever. You say, "Well, I don't believe in those things." I'm sure you don't, and you won't believe it until you humble yourself and when you become placed in Christ, you will see it in ways you never have before. You may think it's all fine now to be outside of Christ. And it's no big deal. But it won't be that fine in that day when Christ casts you into hell and banishes you forever, from the blessings of the kingdom of God. So I plead with you come to Christ, and watch what he will do in your life, both now and for eternity.

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that speaks so directly to our hearts. I can only pray that your word will soften hearts. Even here today. We know that it will either soften or harden and that's up to your sovereign purposes. But Father, you have asked us to pray, you have asked us to repent. And that's what we do this day. Take your word, make it powerful. Change even the lives of the redeem that we might walk more in fellowship with you. That others might see the transformation that you have wrought within our souls by the power of your Spirit. For it's in Jesus name that I pray. Amen.

Thank you musicians for helping us express the doxologies of our soul here this morning. We now come to a time where we open up the Word of God. And we find ourselves this morning in Second Corinthians, chapter five; we're going to be looking at verses 11 through 15. If you have not been with us, we go verse by verse through whatever epistle, whatever passage we are in. And in the providence of God, this is where we are today. I've entitled my discourse to you this morning, "The Fear of the Lord." Before we look at this, I want to frame our thoughts a little bit and just express to you how thankful I am, that you are willing to come here and humble yourself before the preaching of the word. It's a very rare thing, frankly, these days. I was noticing last week, the Democratic National Convention featured a person named J, MAI, the letter J and then capital MAI, who expresses himself; actually, he prefers the pronoun "they" or "them." He is a quote "black, Vietnamese, transgender, non-binary, gender transcendent, mermaid, queen-king. Who was also a licensed minister in the progressive National Baptist Church. Of course, his big thing was we need to abolish the police, abolish ICE, abolish prisons and all kinds of other absurdities. Folks, this is evidence of what happens when a person, and frankly a people, have been given over to a reprobate mind, as Romans describes. A mind that can no longer function, a depraved mind that is irrational. And I don't say this to in any way humiliate that person, but to let you know that here's a person that needs our prayers, because this guy needs Christ, as we all do. But I'm thankful that by God's grace and his mercy, we don't have a mind that doesn't function. We've been given the mind of Christ. And we've been given the Word of God. And so we find ourselves once again, immersing ourselves in his Word.

You know, when Paul came to Corinth, that wicked, vile, immoral city, what did he do? He preached Christ and him crucified. So that's what we're gonna do once again today. Remember the context of the passage, in which we find ourselves. The false teachers had infiltrated the church at Corinth, as they will always try to do in every church and every denomination, and every college and seminary that tries to take a stand for Christ. And as they came in, the first thing they wanted to do is to insult the apostle Paul, who founded the church. He was no longer there; he had been there for about 18 months. Now he's gone, and they are doing everything that they possibly can to assault his integrity, to frankly, deny his apostolic authority; to distort his message and his motives for ministry. In fact, you will recall in chapter 12, Paul speaks about this thorn in the flesh, that was a messenger from Satan; we believe referring to one of the kingpins of that group. Paul asked three times if the Lord would remove it, and remove this person, but the Lord said, No, "My grace is sufficient for you." For power is perfected in weakness. And Paul understood that. But what we see here in this passage is Paul defending himself for the sake of the truth that he preached, as well as for the sake of the unity of the church. Because certainly if the people began to follow these characters, the church would splinter. Left unchallenged, these scurrilous assaults against the Apostle Paul would cause the people to lose confidence in him, to lose confidence in his message. And of course, that's always Satan's strategy, right? To get you to doubt and to wonder...I don't know. So much of this epistle is devoted to Paul defending his integrity as an apostle of Jesus Christ. And certainly, that's the context that we have here. And I might also add that here we see power being perfected in weakness, okay? Which will have application to all of us who love Christ.

Now you will recall in verses nine and 10, that we looked at the last time we were together, Paul stated that his ambition in life was to be pleasing to the Lord. And he added, "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad." So now we come to the text before us that we will examine. Notice, beginning in verse 11, "Therefore," he says, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade men, but we are made manifest to God; and I hope that we are made manifest also in your consciences. We are not again commending ourselves to you but are giving you an occasion to be proud of us, so that you will have an answer to those who take pride in appearance, and not in heart. For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are of a sound mind, that is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for him who died and rose again on their behalf."

Now, Paul, knowing that his ambition was to be pleasing to the Lord and knowing that one day he would stand before the Lord--he would be rewarded for his service--we see three virtuous priorities emerge from this text. You might say, in order to be pleasing to the Lord, Paul had to do three things that you will find have application, frankly, to all of us. Number one, he had to defend his integrity for the sake of the gospel. Secondly, he had to unify the church under the banner of truth. And then number three, he had to live for Christ in light of his astonishing love.

Now you will remember, the inspired apostle admonishes all of us in First Corinthians chapter four and verse 16, "Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me." Powerful statement, "be imitators of me." And in chapter 11 and verse one, he says, “Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ." In Philippians, chapter three and verse 17, "Brethren, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us." So, folks, what we have here is a pattern to live by; a model of Christian living and Christian service. So, bear that in mind.

So, you might say in order to be pleasing to the Lord, he must number one, defend his integrity for the sake of the gospel. Now, mind you, he did this with great reluctance. Now, let's look at the text closely. He begins by saying, "Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord..." let's pause here for a moment. It's a powerful statement. The grammar in the original language helps us understand what he's referring to. First of all, let me tell you what he's not referring to. He's not referring to the fear of God's judgment upon unbelievers that's inspired by the Lord. Like those who, according to Romans two, five are stubborn and "unrepentant heart are storing up wrath for themselves on the day of wrath and revelation to the righteous judgment of God." That's not what he's referring to here. Nor is he referring to some kind of an all-consuming angst or terror regarding the nature of God, as Moses did, and the children of Israel, remember, at Mount Sinai when Moses said, I am full of fear and trembling, although it indeed it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. But what Paul is referring to here, when he says, "Knowing the fear of the Lord" is this, he has a reverential awe, that is directed toward the Lord. He has a humbling sense of adoration for who God is, and that's what animated his heart to praise and to worship and to serve the Lord come what may? This is what would cause him to write to all of us in Second Corinthians seven one, "beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God." Beloved, is this the attitude of your heart? Do you fear the Lord in that way? Was that in your heart and your mind when you came into this place to worship him this morning? I hope it was. In Psalms 22, verse 23, we read, "You who fear the Lord, praise Him." Certainly, that's what we're doing here today. In contrast to the ungodly, described in Romans three, beginning in verse 14, "'WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS; THEIR FEET ARE SEIFT TO SHED BLOOD, DESTRUCTION AND MISERY ARE IN THEIR PATHS, AND THE PATH OF PEACE THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN. THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.'" Dear Christian, do you fear the Lord? Do you have a soul captivating wonder of God's intrinsic glory; the very glory that resides within you and waits its full expression one day, when we see Him face to face, does this motivate who you are as a person; that you long to see the perfections of God manifested in his works and his word, and in his people and your family? In your life? Are you looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave Himself for us? Folks, this is what drove the Apostle Paul.

"Therefore," he says, "knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade men." The term persuade, "peitho," in the original languages, a verb better rendered here, "we seek the favor of" now he's not talking about persuading people with the gospel, the truth of the gospel. Sometimes you hear this passage wrongly used in that way. That's not what he's talking about. He's talking about persuading them with respect to the truth of his apostolic credentials; of his personal integrity, the sincere motives of his heart. And notice he persuades them, he says, in the fear of the Lord, because he knows the Lord knows his heart. He knows that he will one day have to give an account before the Lord. And thus, he goes on to say, "but we are made manifest to God." In other words, his conscience is clear. And he knew--God knew--what is true character, what his true motives, and conduct were all about. Can you say that of yourself? I hope you can. Frankly, this is an extension of what he said earlier in chapter one and verse 12. He said, "For our proud confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness in godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, but in the grace of God, we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you." And so again, he's saying "we persuade men, but we are made manifest to God; and I hope that we are made manifest also in your consciences." He's essentially saying this, "Come on, folks. I was with you for 18 months, and you can all give testimony to the radical change in your lives, when you place your faith in Christ. You know what happened when you embrace the truth? Now, can you honestly say in your hearts, that I'm a fraud, really? I appeal to your conscience, not to what others are saying, but to your conscience."

You will recall his statement in Second Corinthians four two, "We have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the Word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God." Folks, very practically speaking, our lives will either adorn the gospel of God, or they will detract from it. Those who know us best will know what is true of each of us. I might ask you to ask yourself, what would others say about my life? Do you conduct your life in holiness and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, but in the grace of God, as Paul said. Or is that not something you really ever think about that much? And you renounce the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the Word of God, but by the manifestation of truth, does that describe you? Or do you have a secret life that you wish nobody would ever know? Thinking foolishly that God doesn't see it? Well, sadly, I know many professing Christians that, frankly, I don't want to around unsaved friends. I really wouldn't want them to know that these people claim Christ. They are like those described a second Timothy three. They're lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, they hold to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power.

Well, not so the Apostle Paul. So, to be pleasing to the Lord, he had to first of all defend his integrity for the sake of the gospel. But secondly, he had to unify the church under the banner of truth because these characters were raising up another banner for them to follow. You see, men and women of godly integrity will not only be committed to defending the gospel, but also committed to defending the unity of the church, the Body of Christ, under, as I say, the Banner of Truth, not the banner of culture. But the banner of the gospel that the world hates. It's interesting, I keep hearing a new term, because I'm hearing new terms all the time these days, right? I don't even know some of the language that's being used anymore. But you've heard the term cancel culture. And I'm beginning to understand what that's all about. Of course, frankly, as Christians, we were used to that; we should be. Cancel culture, I looked it up, "public shaming and withdrawing support of people or organizations that do or say something you find objectionable or offensive." Well, as a result of that, what we see is many churches; many, Christians caving into the mob, and beginning to erect another banner, under which they will march, maybe it's the rainbow banner of the LGBTQ perversions or the Black Lives Matter banner, or the feminist banner, or whatever it is, there's so many satanic movements out there today. And certainly, those three that I just mentioned, are as wicked as they come. And of course, nothing is more offensive than the gospel. So naturally, Satan is going to want to cancel it. You know, he's been trying to do that from the beginning. And the way he does that primarily is through false teachers, false doctrine. But we're thankful that Christ is promised to build his church, right? I rejoice in that. Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life."

And again, that's what Paul preached when he came into Corinth, and you see what happened there. And what has happened down through the centuries, and what has happened to us. But frankly, dear friends, when a church follows the wrong banner, or Christians follow the wrong banner, they forfeit divine blessing, they forfeit their effectiveness when they get divided. You will recall at First Corinthians one and verse 10, Paul addressed the issue of factions, remember that, when we studied that? Right off the bat, he lets him know, look, I know what's going on. And he's trying to stress the importance of humility and unity. He said, there in that text, "Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there'll be no divisions among you, but that you be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment. For I have been informed concerning you, my brethren, by Chloe's people, that there are quarrels among you. Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, "I am of Paul' and I of Apollos,' and 'I of Cephas,' and 'I of Christ.' There was all this sectarianism going on within the church. And of course, factious divisive people will develop fierce loyalties on their own and they will begin to promote themselves and other people, other agendas. That's why, in First Corinthians, Paul described them as being "puffed up"; six times he used that phrase. "Puffed up" referring to, you're filled with self-promoting pride. You love to grandstand like politicians that we see all the time. They're puffed up. They were acting as well, like spoiled infants, demanding their own way. In chapter three verses one through four, he said, "You're still fleshly," which means your worldly, your unspiritual, you're pursuing your own ends. He went on to say, "For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men?" referring to unsaved people. "For when one says, 'I am of Paul' and another, 'I am of Apollos," are you not mere men? And later on in chapter 11, he says that every church is going to have some selfish factious divisive people in it from time-to-time people. He says, "In order that those who are approved may have become evident among you," verse 19 of chapter 11. In other words, the Lord will use that wickedness, that bickering among people to contrast those who are humble, and the spiritual leaders that are there, people of integrity and so forth. So, Paul knew their immaturity, he knew what was going on there. And he knew how the false teachers were playing into that. He knew their proclivity to sectarianism to, to cliques to factions, and of course, Satan knew it as well. So, he inspires these false teachers to turn folks against Paul. So, he has to defend his integrity for the sake of the gospel and the unity of the church.

And notice what he says in verse 12, "We are not again commending ourselves to you." Now, obviously, he had been accused of that. That's why he's saying that. He had been accused of tooting his own horn, as we might say, in our vernacular, making himself a hero of every story. So that's what hypocrites do. The only thing Paul boasted about was his weakness. Remember? Chapter 11, verse 30, he says, "If I have to boast, I will boast of what pertains to my weakness." You see, he wanted to magnify the power of God that was work; it was at work in and through Him. And when the Lord declined his request, to have that thorn in the flesh removed from him, Second Corinthians 12 Nine, the Lord says, "'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.'" So, Paul said this, "Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me."

So again, verse 12, "We are not again commending ourselves to you, but are giving you an occasion to be proud of us." In other words, I want to give you a legitimate basis to rally to my defense, if I can put it that way. I want to bolster your confidence in my spiritual integrity so that you will have an answer for those who take pride in appearance and not in heart. And there he takes a shot at the false apostles, self-righteous hypocrites. So many passages that speak to that. You remember what Jesus said, regarding the Pharisees and scribes, Matthew 23, beginning of verse 27. He called them "whitewashed tombs, which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they're full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness." He went on to describe them as those who outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. You might say they were all sizzle, but no steak. Like we see in so many people today. Everything from pastors to politicians, we see this; people that tout themselves to be paragons of virtue and justice, when in truth they are sexually deviant, greedy, power hungry, liars. But not so the Apostle Paul. What we see here is that he was controlled by the love of Christ in verse 15. He was passionately devoted to the truth. But of course, the enemies of Christ hate the truth. They hate anybody that believes the truth. And so they call them crazy. That's what they did with Paul. And we see that here in verse 13. Notice what he says, "For if we are beside ourselves it is for God; if we are of a sound mind, it is for you." What a curious statement. What's he talking about here? Beside ourselves? Well, the Greek verb "existemi." It's very interesting. It literally means, "to be beside oneself; it carries the idea of being out of one's mind. That's the idea. And that's how Paul's accusers judged him; that he was out of his mind. He was crazy. As we might say he was irrational. He was mentally deranged, and therefore he can't be taken seriously.

You will recall Paul's passionate testimony of his conversion and the transforming power of the gospel when he stood before King Agrippa. The Roman governor Festus was standing there and he heard what Paul was saying. And in Acts 26:24, he says with a loud voice, "'Paul, you are out of your mind! Your great learning is driving you mad." And I love what Paul said in response in verse 25, "I'm not out of my mind, most excellent Festus, but I utter words, of sober truth. To the natural man, the things of the Spirit are foolishness, and he cannot understand them. For he was spiritually appraised. Paul wasn't insane, he was merely passionate for God's glory. He had his zeal for evangelism. So he says, "For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God;" In other words, look, I'm a steward of the gospel of God. I have a blazing zeal for the glory of God that cannot be extinguished. Then he adds, "If we are of sound mind," which literally means sane, or mentally healthy and behaving responsibly--"if we are of sound mind, it is for you." Again, we know that God has given for example, Pastor, teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ--Ephesians four. He goes on in verse 12, to say until we all attain to the unity of the faith. That was Paul's passion, not only the unity of the faith, but also of the knowledge of the Son of God to a mature man. And later on, he explains why. "As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming." You see, Paul was uncompromising. He was indefatigable in his proclamation of the truth, there was nothing that could stop him, because he knew that the gospel is the only thing that can save sinners. And it's also the only thing that can unite saints together in a church. Oh Child of God, is this the passion of your heart? Jesus said, "If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and he must take up his cross daily and follow Me." Folks do you follow Christ or man? Do you carry the banner of Christ, or culture? Do you have the mind of Christ or the mind of man? Do you fear God? Or do you fear man?

Well, Paul was committed to defending his integrity for the sake of the gospel and unifying the church under the banner of truth. But finally, to live for Christ in light of his astonishing love. Notice what he says, "For the love of Christ controls us." I think the old King James has" constrains us." The Greek term, "synecho." It speaks of a force that propel, a pressure that results in action. You might say, Paul, in light of this verb, Paul was compelled by an overwhelming reality. There was something that motivated him. And he tells us what it is--"For the love of Christ controls us having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died." What's he referring to here? He's referring to the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, bear with me a little bit, we're going to plunge into some of the ocean depths of theology. I don't have time to get real deep, I need to be brief, I need to be succinct. I'm probably going to leave far more questions unanswered than answered. But I want you to bear with me and think about these things, so that you can understand what drove the apostle. Certainly, what drives me more than anything else. And I hope what drives you. And ultimately, he's saying here it's the atonement.

Now, if we look at atonement, biblically we understand that atonement required two things. It required satisfaction and substitution. There had to be satisfaction for the offended holiness of God. And that's why Jesus is called "the propitiation for our sins." "Propitiation," the term that means "to satisfy." The Greek term "hilasmos", it basically means to appease the wrath of God. So not only must there be satisfaction, but there also has to be substitution for the guilty party.

And as we understand the gospel in Scripture, we see that as sinners, we all stand liable to punishment. But by God's grace, he has provided a substitute the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus has been judicially accounted a sinner in our stead, as our substitute and the infinite offering he made suffices in our stead to satisfy the righteous demands of a holy God, the one that we have offended. That's why Christ had to die in our stead. So, when we, by faith, place our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as our only hope of salvation, our sins are not only forgiven, but we are also declared righteous. So why did Christ have to die? To reconcile sinners to a holy God. To put it simply; this is the gospel. This was what was so overwhelming to the apostle Paul; this is why he was so devoted to Christ. His heart was absolutely overflowing with gratitude for Christ's love for him. Christ's love for him was the motivating force of his life, the dominating theme of his songs. He was driven by the reality that Christ--and I want you to catch this--was his personal substitute and sacrifice. He was driven by the fact that Christ died for him, specifically, on the cross. Verse 14, he says, "having concluded this, that one died for," which could be translated in the place of "all,"-- "therefore, all died;" verse 15, "and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf."

Now, here, we plunge into some deep, rich, profound theology. I want you to notice what he says, "One died for..." "hyper" in Greek meaning in the place of, "all." Okay, this is where he begins. In other words, he was the substitute and satisfaction for all and then he goes on to say, for all who died in him, well, that's interesting. And we know according to second Corinthians 5:21, that "God made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf." Why? So that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Now, when it comes to this word "all," some will say he died in the place of everyone who will ever live. Well, if you believe that, then you have to either say that you agree with universalism, that therefore, everybody is going to go to heaven, or you're going to have to say, my goodness, must have been an deficient and an impotent atonement. Because most people reject Christ as their substitute and Savior, and they will be required to pay for their own sins, in an eternal hell. So, help me understand this. So who are the "all" ? Paul answers the question, they are the "all" who died in Him, verse 14, one died for all, therefore all died; ultimately a reference to all who place their trust in Christ.

And to understand this better, I'm going to take you to just one passage in Romans six. If we look at Romans six, one through four, for example, you will see that we have "died to sin," an amazing concept. And when we look at that text, we see that that's in the "aorist" tense in the original language, which speaks of something that has happened in the past, once and forever. That there was any event that took place, once in the past. And what is that event? We died to sin. What an amazing concept. We died to sin. When we placed our faith in Christ, you must understand at that point we ceased to exist in Adam, and we became alive in Christ. Therefore, in verse four, Paul says, "We have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead, through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life." And so what we see here is Christ is only the substitute for those who by grace, through faith, died in Christ. Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me." Now, if we stay in Romans six, Paul tells us who these people are. Who are these people that died in Christ? Well, we could go for example, to his salutation in Romans one, six, he's referring to "the called of Jesus Christ." Okay? Verse seven, those" who are beloved of God...called as saints." He's referring to specific individuals. If we were to go to chapter eight, we would read more about who these people are. They are the ones whom God foreknew and predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son. In other words, the elect of God. You go to chapter nine, and see that he's referring to those whom he chose to have mercy and compassion.

The point is, dear friends, Christ knew specifically, each person for whom he suffered and died. Even at the end of verse 15, he says, "He died and rose again on their behalf." On whose behalf? On the called, the elect of God. Ephesians, one four, "He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world." Verse five, "He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of his will."

Now, you ask the average Christian, "For whom did Christ die?" And the response will typically be "everybody, you know, for the whole world." So, in other words, what you would be saying is that Jesus paid the sin debt for everyone, when he died on the cross. Well, yes, that's what he did. Okay. Well, then why would Jesus speak more of hell than heaven? Why would there be people in hell? Why would you call people to repent, or you're going to die in your sins, if your sins have already been paid for? How do you explain that? Why it must have been a rather unsuccessful atonement. Most Christians will say, "Well, yes, he died for the whole world, for everyone, but his death did not really guarantee the salvation of anyone in particular, but rather his death on the cross removed an obstacle and made salvation possible for all men in general." Okay. Well, if that is true, then Jesus’ death on the cross was merely an act whereby he accomplished a potential salvation, not an actual salvation. So, the sins of sinners had been atoned for potentially, but it is not actual unless they activated by faith. Well, if that's true, then both heaven and hell are filled with people for whom Christ died. The only difference is that those in heaven somehow made the right choice. You see where it begins to go. I told you it's going to be a little complicated here. Just bear with me some. So, you're telling me that Jesus was only a potential substitution and satisfaction. You're telling me that God intended nothing specific at the cross. Moreover, nothing specifically was accomplished at the Cross affected by his death that there was no real benefit in his death for anyone in particular, or just one in general. And that's what people will say, and many people will say, Well, yes, his was a general ransom. Salvation does not directly depend upon a divine decree and subsequent act of God, but on man independently exercising, his free will in believing. So, you're telling me that the atoning work of Christ is ineffective unless those who are spiritually dead, somehow activate his grace. I mean, Jesus must be a forlorn, frustrated impotent savior, somehow knocking on the door of man's heart, hoping that somehow that spiritually dead person, whose blind, and at enmity with God, who has no fear of God, will open up the door and let him in. That's what we hear in a lot of evangelism today. In other words, God is pacing the throne room of heaven, hoping spiritually dead people will somehow cause themselves to be born again.

Folks, if that's the case, evangelism is nothing more than a political campaign where we try to get people to decide for Christ. And we present Christ as the one who offers himself as a candidate. Well, I would humbly submit that this is part of the error in the doctrine of salvation that's known as Arminianism. They would have us believe that the atonement is unlimited in extent, but limited in power. When in fact, I believe the Bible teaches just the opposite, that it is limited in extent, and unlimited in power. You see, under Arminian theology, the atoning work of Christ, is incapable of saving us unless you allow him to do so by cooperating with him. So ultimately, man, not God, is sovereign over salvation. So, Christ's death on the cross has made the option of salvation available. It has removed an obstacle of our inability to save ourselves, but now it's up to you. But beloved, I would humbly submit to you that what Christ said on the cross is "It is finished." Something happened at the cross. Jesus satisfied the wrath of God, for all that the Father had given him in eternity past. Something actually happened at the cross, not something just potentially happened. That's why we sing "Long my imprison spirit lay, fast bound in sin and nature's night. Thine eyes diffused, a quickening ray, I woke the dungeon flamed with light. My chains fell off, my heart was free, I rose went forth and followed Thee." Dear Christian, if I can put it this way, we were all saved 2000 years ago. He knew who we were by name. This is John 10:11, "I am the good shepherd." Jesus said "The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." Verse 14, "I am the good shepherd and I know", referring to I have an intimate relationship with, my own. And my own know me." Verse 15, "I lay down my life for the sheep." Later on in verse 26. And following Jesus told the unbelieving Jews, "You do not believe that because you are not of my sheep." And then he says this, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me and I give eternal life to them. They will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father who has given them to Me is greater than, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. And I and the Father are one." By the way, at that point, that message was so wonderfully received that they picked up stones and tried to kill Jesus. It's still not a popular message is it?

Folks, this is the love that humbled and motivated the Apostle Paul, he understood that the names of the elect were written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world--Romans 13, eight and other passages. There's no ambiguity here. I want you to think of it this way. Christ volunteered for the work of redemption, with the full knowledge of those whose names were written in the Lamb's book of life, and they would therefore be the reward of his ransom. John 17 that we read earlier this morning. Before his death, Jesus prayed to His Father, quote "for all whom the Father had given Him." Jesus is going to the cross. That's who he's praying for, "All whom the Father had given Him." That through His death, they would be granted eternal life. You see, folks, here's where I'm going with all of this. This is what I believe the Bible teaches, the atonement is not a potential salvation for all, it is an actual salvation for the many. For the bridal church, it is limited in its extent, but it is unlimited in its power to save to the uttermost. Paul understood this Romans 8:29, "For whom he foreknew," a term that literally means "for loved with an intimate love,"-- "those whom he foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son." Verse 30, "And whom He predestined, these He also called and whom He called, these He also justified, and whom He justified, these He also glorified. Ephesians 1:11, "We have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose, who works all things after the counsel of His will." So, for whom did Christ die? Well, He died for his chosen possession, his holy offspring, those who were "bought with a price" for, First Corinthians 6:20. I mean, surely he knew whom he was purchasing. John 17:9, "I pray for them. I pray not for the world, but for them which Thou has given Me. For they are Thine." Verse 19, "For their sakes, I sanctify Myself." Folks, he didn't die for no one in particular, but for those whom the Father had specifically given to him. Ephesians 5:25. And he gave himself for his bride, the church. I mean, do you really think Jesus had no idea who he would be marrying?

Well, indeed, this plan includes specific persons. Now, I'll be the first to admit, there's many things we don't understand when we start looking into the inscrutable mysteries of God. In fact, I was thinking about this, this morning, when I was on my front porch where I love to spend time with the Lord as the dawn breaks. I looked down and there was one of those little fuzzy caterpillar guys, and he was coming up the thing and I was watching him and I was thinking, you know, there is an amazing chasm between that little creature that God made and me. I know things that I mean, he's too ignorant to even know he's ignorant. It's impossible for him to even fathom what I know and understand. And then I was thinking, you square that by some infinite number, and that's me compared to God. There's so much that we don't understand about a God who loves us with an infinite love. He does tell us enough to motivate us and to humble us. And I can't think of anything more humbling than to know that Christ, paid for my sins, knowing who I was on the cross of Calvary.

Beloved, if I could summarize it this way, in eternity past, the father ordained a plan to demonstrate his infinite love for his son by providing for him, a chosen bride. And he chose them by name. And he recorded that their names in a book of life. Elect sinners hostile to him. Desperately in need of forgiveness and transforming grace. A vast multitude of human humanity, pledge to the Son, a gift of the Father's love, a pledge that was also sealed by the Holy Spirit, a promise and in time, in the miracle of salvation, the Father would irresistibly compel those sinners to voluntarily exercise their will and repent of their sins and believe in his Son. And central to this whole plan of inner-trinitarian love, and for his glory, was the Son's death. He had to be a perfect substitute for each specific sinner whose name had been written in that book of life, in order for them to be reconciled to a holy God--"the ones to whom thou hast given me," as Jesus says. Yes, in some sense, Christ has appeased the wrath of God temporarily for every human being, thus allowing them to live, to hear the gospel and to respond. But the efficacious effect of the atonement is only for those who trust in Christ as Savior. And according to his eternal purposes, that will only be the elect that will respond and be saved. Oh child of God, never think of the cross in general , vague terms. But remember that he died specifically for sinners. He bore your sins and mine in his body. He died for us, personally.

And this is what motivated the Apostle Paul. This was the love of God, that motivated him. Friends, the cross actually saved specific people. That's the point. and never say, well, I could not have gained my salvation apart from the cross. No, no, no, please don't say that rather, say, Christ gained my salvation for me at the cross. With this brief overview of the doctrine of the atonement, we can better understand what Paul says in verse 14, "For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this.." in other words, here it is, "that one died for all, therefore all died, and He died for all so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him, who died and rose again on their behalf."

As I close this morning, I want to share something from my heart, one of the hardest things in the world to do is to preach funerals, for people who you know are unsaved. But I might add, it's also very hard to preach funerals for people who you just really don't know if they were saved or not. Because they really have no basis to claim that they've been born again. And when I prepare for funerals, one of the things that I have to do is compile information about the deceased from the family, in order to give a fitting eulogy. So I interview the family members. And I can't tell you how many times I will hear from the family about their Christian relative that has deceased. They will say things like well, "oh, yeah, well, he was a good man; he loved his family, loved to hunt and fish. Worked hard. Had a great sense of humor. Look out if he ever got upset." And then you hear all the funny stories and things that people want to share. And I understand some of that. Or "well, that's a good woman, yeah, she was a great woman; loved her family would do anything for those kids and grandkids. Fantastic cook. Loved to sew, loved to read. Love those game shows on television. Never met a stranger. You know, everybody liked her." Oh, yeah. And here goes the stories. And I always want to be careful, but I will always say to them, "You know, I'm curious. You said that your loved one was a Christian? How would you describe his or her love for Christ, their walk with Christ." And time and time again, I will see people look at me with a blank stare as if they don't know what to say. And typically they'll say something like, "well, oh, yeah, well, she belong to such and such a church, yeah. Gotta love that gospel music, used to sing in the choir years ago. Yeah, he used to go to such and such a church. And yeah, he was a member up there. And he did such and such in the church." Or sometimes I'll hear, "Well, he, you know, he wasn't much organized religion, he liked to worship in the great outdoors, you know, that type of thing." Folks, how tragic to live for yourself and leave that kind of a legacy. Contrast that to a man or a woman who fears the Lord, who is so awestruck over the fact that the Lord gave himself on the cross, to satisfy the righteous demands of a holy God that you could not satisfy. And to be so overwhelmed with that, that everybody knew what type of person you were. I want to have a eulogy prepared for me and for you where people the first thing they would say is, "oh, that man loved Christ, and the love of Christ controlled him. He had but one goal in his life, and that was to live for the glory of God by preaching Christ, and him crucified and presenting his body as a living in a holy sacrifice, acceptable to God." Oh Child of God, the only thing that matters in life is living for Christ. And you're never going to really live for Christ unless you're absolutely overwhelmed by his unmerited love on your behalf when he bore your sins, specifically in his body, on the cross, as our Savior.

Well, my role this morning is not to bring you to Christ, but to bring Christ to you. And having done so I hope that you will cast yourself wholly upon him, if you don't know him, and receive his pardon and his peace. But for those of us who know and love Christ, may will truly be able to say with the Apostle Paul, "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain."

Father, thank you for the great truths of your word. May they bear much fruit in our hearts, for our good and for your glory. And for those who do not know you, I pray that you will overwhelm them with such conviction that today will be the day that they will cry out to you for salvation, knowing that ultimately, you are the one that drew them unto yourself, gave them the gift of faith and caused them to be born again. So Father, to that end, we trust in you. We give you praise; we give you thanks in Jesus name. Amen.

Indeed he is the Prince of Peace. This world will have no peace until the Prince of Peace returns. In the meantime, we will live our lives for him. In the providence of God, we now come to Second Corinthians five, verses 9 and 10. If you will take your Bibles and turn there, Second Corinthians chapter five, we're going to look at verses 9 and 10.

Having just celebrated the certainty of the resurrection, the Apostle Paul says this, "Therefore, we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad."

I recently read an article this last week by a man named Ryan Berge. The title of the article was "On LGBT and Women's Equality: Stark Statistical Reality is Coming for White Evangelicals." That heading caught my eye. Let me read just a little of what he said because it fits in well with where we're going with this text this morning as we look at what the Apostle has to say. The writer said quote, "Evangelicalism is on a collision course with a culture that is rapidly liberalizing on two areas that define evangelical theology: their view on homosexuality, and the role of women in the life of the church. A tradition quite literally named for its ability to bring new people to the faith is finding that task harder each passing year as the doctrines of the tradition move further out of step with the country at large." He went on to say, "In 2008, just one in three white evangelicals between the ages of 18 and 35, believed that same sex couples should have the right to be married. Beginning in 2012, though acceptance of gay marriage jumped from 36 to 56% in just six years. There's a reason to believe the writer went on to say that two thirds of young evangelicals now disagree with their Church's position on this issue. When it comes to women," the writer says, "women taking on leadership roles, support for women's equality among evangelicals under the age of 35, has also exploded. A poll conducted by Denison University political science, Paul Jupe. In March 2020, found that just 12.4% of the youngest evangelicals objected to the idea of a woman preaching in the pulpit during a worship service." Well, my purpose here this morning is not to address issues of homosexuality, which is an abomination in the eyes of God. And thankfully, there is hope for all sinners, all of us regardless of what the sin might be, nor am I here to talk about women preachers and authority in the church, which is something that God clearly forbids. God's divine principle for subordination and authority is to reflect the inner Trinitarian relationship that exists between God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But my purpose, with this illustration, and I could give many others, is to merely demonstrate how most so-called Christians do not have as their ambition. to be pleasing to God. They fear man more than God and they seek to please man more than God or please themselves, because their spiritual authority is not the word of God so they can understand the will of God, but rather it's the word of man. This writer went on to say, quote, "One of the dominant understandings of how churches attract new members is referred to as religious economy theory. In this view," he says, "churches are equated with businesses. Each provides a product to a potential audience. If the product is palatable, it will see an increase in quote 'sales,' expressed as church attendance. If the Church does not meet the needs of consumers, attendance will dwindle, and the church will go out of business. From this perspective," he says, "the evangelical church is selling BlackBerry's while Apple has just begun shipping iPhones." Interesting insight.

Sadly, this is true in this age of pragmatism where many people believe that man, rather than God, is in charge of salvation. And so therefore, we've got to do everything we can to somehow get people to like us so that they will like the gospel. Paul warned about this in Second Timothy four, you will remember, beginning of verse three, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and they will turn away their ears from the truth and they will turn aside unto myths." Well, folks, we are there. Most professing Christians are Christians in name only; they really know nothing of what it is to be in relationship with the living Christ. Their lives bear no resemblance to Christ. Moreover, many people today embrace a gospel that bears no resemblance to the true gospel. To this end, Paul said in Galatians, one and verse nine, "if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed. For am I now seeking the favor of men or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bond servant of Christ."

Dear Christian, let me ask you this morning, what drives you as a person? What is the real ambition of your life? If we could look at how you spend your spare time, and how you spend your monies, we would get a pretty clear picture of that right? Is your ambition to please God or to please yourself, or to please other people, your friends, your colleagues? Well, as we examine this text this morning, and other texts that are associated with it, we will answer two questions. Number one, what does it mean to be pleasing to God? And then secondly, why is it important to be pleasing to God? I pray that it is your heart's desire to be pleasing to God. Friends, this is what separates the hypocrite from the true Christian. The hypocrite strives to please himself, and others, while a true believer strives to please God, because he wants approval from God, not from man. And if this is your ambition, God is going to pour out blessing in your life. And if it's not, you will forfeit blessing in your life, and you will live under a cloud of divine chastening because he chastens those that he loves.

So let's begin by examining the language that Paul uses here in the text. He says, "Therefore, we also have as our ambition," the word "therefore"--it could be translated, "that is why." Of course, the question would be therefore what is why? Well, he's referring to the reality of death that will usher us into the presence of Christ that he's been describing in the previous verses. Notice at the end of verse six, he says, "knowing that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord--for we walk by faith, not by sight--we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord." That is why also, we have also our ambition. Well, let's stop there for a second. "Philotimeomai" in the original language. It's an interesting term; the word ambition. It means a cherished goal, a lofty desire, a noble ambition. That's the idea. We see it used in some other passages in Romans 15, verse 20, we read, "I aspired," there's the same word, "I aspired to preach the gospel, not where Christ was already named, so that I would not build on another man's foundation." First Thessalonians four and verse 11, "But we urge you, brethren, to make it your,: here it is, "ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to your own business and work with your hands."

So again, back to verse nine. "Therefore, we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent," in other words, whether resident in this physical body, or absent from it, "to be pleasing to Him." In other words, to be pleasing to Him imperfectly on Earth, or perfectly in heaven. So let's answer this first question by looking at this text and some others. What does it mean to be pleasing to God? You might recall that he urged the Ephesians in Ephesians 5:10, to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. That's what we need to do. That's what we're doing here this morning. I think of the passage in Hebrews 13, where the prayer is that, "that the Lord will equip you in every good work, to do that which is pleasing to the Lord," and so forth. Now, the idea of being pleasing to God, as seen in other passages of Scripture, for example, in Colossians 3:20--kids listen to this very carefully, I heard this a lot when I was a young child growing up--"Children," ah, "be obedient to your parents in all things for this as well pleasing to the Lord." Likewise, in Philippians, four, verse 18, Paul described the financial gift that they gave him in support of the ministry as an "acceptable sacrifice, well- pleasing to God." In Titus, chapter two and verse nine, Paul urged the slaves "to be subject to their own masters in everything, to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that they will adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in every respect."

And he urged the saints in Rome, you will recall in chapter 12 and verse one, and I want to camp on this text for a few minutes, "by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and a holy sacrifice, acceptable to God"--that's the idea of being pleasing to Him--"which is your spiritual service of worship," Romans 12:1. In that text, when he says, "to present your bodies," the word "present," is a Greek term that is used in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament. It was a technical term used to describe a priest placing an animal on an altar for sacrifice. And what are we to present, not an animal, but our bodies, the totality of who we are, not just this physical shell in which our soul abides, but the sum of all that we are the sum of our humaneness.

It's interesting when you think about it, worship has always included sacrifice, but the form of sacrifice changed under the New Covenant, you will recall and the Old Covenant, the sacrifices were always dead, right? They offered dead sacrifices. Under the New Covenant, the sacrifices are living. And under the Old Covenant, you would make a sacrifice. Under the new covenant, you would be a sacrifice. And that's what the text is saying. So we are to be a living sacrifice. "Living" suggests the voluntary nature of the act, we are to continually make a decisive and deliberate choice to voluntarily surrender every aspect of our life to God. That's what he means by "a living." And then he says, "a holy sacrifice." In this context, "holy" means to be set apart from sin, to be set apart from the world, from our dreams, our ambitions; from our own agenda, our selfish passions, and to be set apart unto the Lord. This speaks of a total voluntary surrender of all that we are. But even as Old Testament animals were to be without spot and blemish, so too, we must present ourselves in the purity of holiness and purity of heart; a heart solely devoted to the glory of God. And this is the kind of sacrifice therefore, that is, as Paul says, "acceptable to God." That's what's pleasing to him.

And how do we do this? Well, he goes on to say, in verse two, "And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind transformed," the Greek term "metamorphoo;” we get our word ""metamorphosis from that. And it connotes a change in outward appearance that reflects an inner nature, like like that of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. And of course, this is the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the agent of regeneration and transformation. And he is the one that animates this outward transformation, by an inward transformation of our mind. He changes our desires, our thinking, our attitudes, our disposition. That's why in Second Corinthians three and verse 18, Paul said, "we all with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord," referring ultimately to seeing Christ in Scripture. What's happening? Well, we "are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." Beloved, you cannot present yourself as a living and holy sacrifice that is acceptable to God, while at the same time allowing the world to make you look and act like it; by allowing the world to conform you into its image. Moreover, you cannot be a living and holy sacrifice, unless you are allowing the Word of God to renew your mind so that there will be this transformation, where the inward part of who you really are, as a believer clothed in the righteousness of Christ, will manifest itself. Those things cannot happen unless you're guarding yourself against the world, and all that it teaches, all of the lies.

By the way, this is why so many so-called Christians embrace, for example, just the unimaginable corruption, and satanic lies of the liberal leftist that we see; all of the stuff on the media. This is why they will embrace a social justice gospel, Black Lives Matter, the feminist movement and all of the women preachers stuff. This is why people will embrace the Word of Faith cult that is just kind of taking over the world. They see nothing wrong with any of this. Now, how can that be? Well, in most cases, they're not even born again. And to the natural man, the things of the Spirit are foolishness. And Paul says, and they cannot understand them, because they're spiritually appraised. But many are truly believers. Why don't they get this? Well, the answer can be seen in many passages, but certainly right here, they are not presenting their bodies as a living in a holy sacrifice acceptable to God. They've allowed the world to squeeze them into its mold. They refuse to allow the authority of the Word of God to saturate their minds so that they have the mind of Christ and live consistently with that. Because friends only when your mind is saturated with the Word of God, will you automatically do the will of God. Many pastors today are nothing more than entrepreneurs, or entertainers, not divinely called and gifted pastor teachers. I was thinking about this--my mind went to Jeremiah six. The context there's the false teachers and all of the deceptions that they were preaching to Israel, and Jeremiah says, well, actually, God says this through his prophet, Jeremiah six, beginning of verse 14, "'They have healed the brokenness of My people superficially, saying, 'Peace, peace.'" In other words, you're good with God, everything's good. Everything's great. You have nothing to worry about. "'Peace, peace,' but there is no peace. "And he says this, "'Were they ashamed because of the abomination they have done?'" The answer is, “'They were not even ashamed at all; they did not even know how to blush. Therefore, they shall fall among those who fall; at the time that I punished them. They shall be cast down,' says the Lord." Instead, we are to be as people, and certainly as pastors, men and women who according to Colossians 1:28, "proclaim Him," the Lord Jesus Christ, "admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ." Not that we may get them to like us, oh we hope that they do; but that they might be presented to Christ complete. That's why in chapter three and verse 16, he tells us, tells us to, "Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in our hearts." This is why Jesus prayed before he went to the cross, Father, "Sanctify them in the truth, Thy word is truth." In other words, it's only your word that can cause them to be conformed into my image.

Practically speaking, dear friends, you must expose yourself on a consistent basis to sound teaching. You should always be reading something. There should never be, oh, "I don't like to read"--learn to like it. We're in war, we're in a war. Whistling "Jesus Loves Me," and parading around and coming to church and thinking that God is going to bless you and use you--we have got to have soldiers of the cross and you cannot be a soldier unless you train. And you must train yourself by getting into the word, studying the Bible, listening to expositors, reading, learning, applying these things. You will never be "a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship," as he says, unless your mind is constantly being renewed by the Spirit of God, and he uses, as his instrument, his word. So, get disciplined. Start reading.

By the way, notice the result at the end of verse two, "that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect." The word "prove" it's carries the idea of putting something to the test, and it being approved. You see, only the renewed mind can know and live the will of God and thus prove, or in other words demonstrate it, and thus give glory to God. That's the point. And his will, if you'll notice, is good. It's acceptable. It's perfect. And beloved, when his will becomes our will--our living and holy sacrifice--guess what? We will be pleasing to Him. That's the point. Why? Because it is an expression of his very nature.

Similarly, in Colossians, one beginning in verse nine, Paul says this, "we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be," catch this now, "filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding." Why? "So that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects." Doesn't say this there, but it's almost you could add the word, "duh." "Bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience; joyously giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light."

By the way, here we see Paul's ambition to please the Lord being manifested in his prayer life, right? If you want to see if you're pleasing the Lord, just examine your prayer life. What is that, like? What are you praying for? I think of the godly 19th century Scottish Minister Robert Murray McShane, he said, "What a man is on his knees before God, that he is and nothing more." Folks, there's perhaps no better gauge of a man's spiritual maturity, and desire to be pleasing to God, then his secret devotion to God in prayer. You show me a man or a woman who is lacks in private prayer and I will show you a spiritual infant that lives to please him or herself. But for the man or woman who has as their ambition, to be pleasing to God, prayer will be the very air that they breathe. Because they know that apart from Christ, they can do nothing. The praying for the sake of praying is meaningless. The real issue is what are you praying about? Are we asking the Lord to show us specific ways where I am displeasing you; show me ways where I can please you more; show me ways where I can just to put it real simply, make you happy, glorify your name. Or is the content of our prayers, basically, God helped me to get this and get that.

Philippians one beginning of verse nine, we see the same thing. Paul says, "And this I pray," okay, here's the content of his prayer, "that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ; having been filled with the fruit of righteousness, which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God." So again, folks, is this the priority of your life? Are these the types of things that you pray for in your life? So that you can say to your family, as Paul said to the saints in Philippi, in chapter three and verse 16, "Imitate me, even as I imitate Christ?" Can those who know you best say, "Oh, yes. my father, my husband, my wife, my daughter," whatever? "Oh, it's so obvious that it is their ambition to be pleasing to the Lord, we see it in so many ways." Or would they say, "You know, frankly, as nowhere on their radar." Their Sunday morning Christians, cultural Christians, therefore vulnerable to all of the deceptions of the world.

To get even more specific in First Thessalonians, four, beginning of verse one, Paul says, "Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you receive from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and," here it is, "please God (just as you actually do walk), that you excel still more." Folks, we don't ever come to a place where we've finally got it. I mean, there's always more ways that we can please him and he gets specific here. He says, "For you know what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God," you young people, you're wondering what is God's will for your life--here's one passage you need to underline, you need to copy and you need to put it on your mirror, where you see it every morning when you brush your teeth, which I hope you do every morning. "For this is the will of God," he says, "your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you know how to possess his own vessel and sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles, who do not know God." But again, dear friends, you simply cannot be pleasing to God if you do not know his Word, and therefore know his will. And if you don't obey what you know to be true, in this case, especially in the realm of sexual immorality.

Turn to Second Peter chapter one. And I believe it will be on the screens here for you as well. Beginning in verse two, Peter says, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord." I love that phrase, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you." It carries the idea of "I'm praying that the grace and the peace of God will come to you in unending and abundant streams, I just want it to be lavished upon you." That's the idea. And how? Well, it comes "in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence." That term "excellence" carries the idea of just living in a sense of breathless adoration over the glory and the excellency of Christ. He goes on to say, "Now, for this very reason also," and here we have a little list here, ways to be pleasing to God, he says, "applying all diligence"--in other words, there needs to be a sense of urgency here, this is important--"applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge." A term that refers to biblical doctrinal discernment, so that you have the mind of Christ; so that you think biblically about things, and you don't get snookered by people who know error better than you know truth. "And in your knowledge, self-control"-- refers to self-restraint, self-discipline, to make our bodies subject to our mind. "And in your self-control, perseverance." Boy, we live in a day where we need perseverance, don't we? The idea here of perseverance is having the ability to resist temptations and to endure trials. He goes on to say, "in your perseverance, godliness"--a term that is almost forgotten in our world today. The term literally means a reverence for God, a reverence for God, true worship. I want you to be diligent about adding these things now. "And in your godliness, brotherly kindness"--speaking of affection for God and affection for others--"and in your brotherly kindness, love." Especially love for other believers.

And then he says, "For if these qualities are yours, and are increasing"--not just stagnant, they're growing, they're increasing; it's a sign of life, right? "They render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you." You want to have assurance of salvation, look at your life, match it up against these things. He says, "For as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble"--the idea of falling into doubt or despair or fear--"for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ will abundantly be supplied to you." In other words, these virtues will serve as a way of giving you assurance of salvation. That you look at your life, you see these things growing within you; this is your desire, your passion, and you're enjoying what it is to be pleasing to God.

Well moving quickly, this was Paul's ambition, but we'd have to answer the second question which he does here. Why is it important to be pleasing to God? Well, if we looked at all of the passages, we would see things like well, it's important because of all that Christ has done for us his mercy, his grace, his love for us, that he has lavished upon us. The abundance of blessings that he has given us, the promise of resurrection, the promise of eternal life. But also verse 10 he says, "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad."

Beloved, please hear this, man is not autonomous. He doesn't just live on his own. He will ultimately answer to a sovereign God who created him. God has made it clear in his word that a day of reckoning is coming. And all men will stand before their Creator to give an account of every thought and every deed. By the way, that is why it's so important for churches to be considered essential during the so-called pandemic. I forget exactly the words that John McArthur used in something that he that he spoke about, but it was something like this--it's infinitely more important to be about the business of rescuing souls from hell than rescuing people from the flu. Indeed, a day of judgment is coming, Hebrews four verse 13, we read that there "is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." And in chapter nine, verse 27, "And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment." Revelation 22 verse 12, "'Behold,'" Jesus says, "'I am coming quickly and My reward is with Me, to render to every man according to what he has done.'"

Now all believers, whose bodies are raised from death and Hades, according to Revelation 20 and verse 13, will stand before the Lord Jesus Christ, at what is called the Great White Throne Judgment. You read about this in Revelation 20. Helpless, they will stand before the Lord Jesus Christ. They will stand there in their sin, with heaven and earth, having fled away, no place to hide, and they will hear the verdict on their life which is guilty, absolutely horrifying. And then the sentence of eternal judgment will be carried out, and they will be thrown into the lake of fire, which is also called the second death. Jesus says they will be cast out into the outer darkness. In that place, "there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth," Matthew eight and verse 12. The passage is so frightening. It speaks of a place of outer darkness, that is the furthest removed from the light of God's glory. And a place of just inconsolable grief, continuous torment, the solitary confinement of an eternal hell. By the way, if you're here today, and you've never wholeheartedly embraced Jesus Christ as your Savior, this is your destiny. And so I plead with you to come to Christ in repentant faith to believe on him. For this reason, according to Acts 17 and verse 30, "God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed," referring to Christ, "having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead." But the context here is that of a believer. Then Second Corinthians five, the judgment of the believer is far different, obviously, than that of an unbeliever. When Jesus returns, he will evaluate our life and reward us according to our works, that is referring to our earthly service for his glory, as you will see. He's not going to judge us according to our sins. You see that penalty was already paid in full on the cross, right? We can celebrate that. Ephesians, one beginning of verse seven, "In Him, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished on us. There is therefore now no condemnation, to those who are in Christ Jesus." Romans eight one. But we all will be judged, in other words, we're going to be evaluated on the basis of why and what we did for the glory of God. And this is called the judgment seat of God or the judgment seat of Christ. Two passages that speak to this.

Let's look at the one here again in Second Corinthians five verse 10. "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad"-- referring to what was worthless, or of poor quality or of low standard, not bad in the sense of evil. Jude 24 says that Jesus is the one who will make you "stand in the presence of His glory, blameless with great joy." I got that word underlined, highlighted and you know-- "blameless with great joy." Oh, how we celebrate that. Psalm 103, verse 12, "As far as the east is from the west, so far, has He removed our transgressions from us."

By the way, this refutes the giant projector doctrine boy that scared that "we-willy-wink-em" when I was a kid. I heard some preachers preach on this; I remember one time it was a camp. And it's this idea that you better watch out because one of these days you're gonna have to stand before the judgment seat of Christ. There's gonna be this projector and everybody you know--the Lord, everybody's gonna see all the stuff you've been doing. I mean, that was terrifying. It probably made me a better boy for a while, you know, but it's also unbiblical. All right? There was some bad theology there too. I was thinking, Okay, if that's the case, Wait a minute, I thought there was no more tears in heaven. I mean, there's going to be some serious tears in heaven if they show me but anyway, it's ridiculous. Second Timothy four, verse eight, we read, "in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness," Paul says "which the Lord, the righteous judge will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all who have loved His appearing." And every believer loves his appearing, those that truly know Christ. But again, like in Romans 14, verse 10, "we will all stand before the judgment seat of God." And because the Father has given all authority to the Son, John five; that authority, the one that will be the judge, will be our precious Lord, Jesus Christ.

Now, it's interesting, the Greek word for judgment is "bema," a raised platform that was used for athletic events or in the political arena where an authority figure would stand and be elevated to a "bema seat" to judge competitions, and award the winners. Even in legal cases, you will remember, Pilate judged Jesus and he was on a bema, he was on a bema Seat, Matthew 27. There he would render the decisions. So let's look at another passage here in light of this, it's so exciting. Turn to First Corinthians 3:10. Again, I think it'll be on the screens here for you. And here's where Paul gives further explanation concerning Christ's evaluation of good and bad worthless deeds. Speaking to believers, he says in verse 12. "Now, if any man builds on the foundation," referring to Christ in the Gospel, "with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay straw, each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work." You see, here we see that believers, all believers, are continuing to build upon this foundation of the gospel. It was originally laid by the apostles, in chapter, or in verse 10, he says, "But each man must be careful how he builds on it." And here in verse 13, "...each man's work will become evident..." So think of it this way, we are all part of the church, we are all part of building upon this foundation of the gospel laid by the apostles. And I might add that if the gospel--if the truth of the Word of God is not your foundation, your life and your family will collapse in ruin. Jesus made this clear in Luke 6:49, he says that you will be quote, "like a man who built a house on the ground without any foundation; and the torrent burst against it, and immediately it collapsed, and the ruin of that house was great." So believers are the builders in Paul's little analogy here.

But Paul's point is simply this, some of our works will have lasting value, and will endure the testing fire of divine evaluation and some won't. God-centered service that we render in the strength of the Holy Spirit for the glory of Christ, will be of great value. Man-centered service offered in our own strength, for our own glory will have no value. Verse 13, "...each man's work will be become evident; for the day will show it because it has to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work." And even as fire is used to purify metal, it is also used symbolically in Scripture. And we see that here; the consuming fire of divine omniscience and divine holiness will test the purity and the value of our service to Christ. And practically speaking, anything we do that is just done in the flesh, for people to notice us; or anything that's done based upon man's wisdom, those types of things will be of no value. God wants us to build with the very best materials, he wants us to give of our very best, not give our leftovers, not give some cheap imitation. Not see Church and the body of Christ is something that's kind of you know, you can take it or leave it, rather than a priority. No cutting corners, no winging it in Christian service. Wow, how I hate that. The Sunday School teacher that prepares on the way to church, the musician--and I'm glad we don't have this--the musician that didn't prepare at all. You can tell it. He wants us to build things right. With quality workmanship according to his divine standard for the church. He wants us to use our gifts and our opportunities to love and to serve and to worship the Lord Jesus Christ with the right motives.

But notice something else in verse 12. He says, "Now, If any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay straw, each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it because it has to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work." Now, good works here are the building materials. Now be very careful here, we are not saved by good works. We're saved by grace alone, through faith alone. Good works do not earn our salvation. Good works prove our salvation. That's the idea. Every believer according to Ephesians 2:10 has been "created in Christ Jesus for good works." Not because of good works, but for good works, "which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." Colossians 1:10, "We are to bear fruit in every good work." Now, what's fascinating here is Paul describes two different categories of building materials: gold, silver, precious stones. These would have been valuable, noncombustible materials that would stand the test of fire. And then wood, hay and straw. Less valuable materials: combustible materials that would not stand the test of fire. And because most of the dwellings in the ancient Mediterranean cities were thatched structures, thatched roof structures, on top of clay combined with wood and hay, which is grass and, stubble--which is straw--and because the climate was hot and dry, fire was a serious problem in that day. And this analogy may have been quite vivid to the Corinthian believers in particular, because in 146 BC, much of the city was destroyed as a result of the Roman conquest. Later on, in about 44 BC, Julius Caesar rebuilt it, but it is likely that many of these ruins, the remains of these buildings, were still evident in various parts of the city where structures had been burned, and only noncombustible materials would remain. And that would have been more of the wealthy homes, the government buildings, pagan temples, and so forth. And we know that many of them were made of marble and granite, and some of them even had gold and silver and jewels embedded in the walls and so forth.

In fact at the "bema" it's interesting, he's not going to only evaluate what we did, but why we did it. Paul speaks of this in First Corinthians four. Remember, in verse four, he says, "For I am conscious of nothing against myself, yet I'm not by this acquitted; but the one who examines me is the Lord. Therefore, do not go on passing judgment before the time, but wait until the Lord comes who will," catch this now, "both bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men's hearts; and then each man's praise will come to him from God. So to be sure, anything that is done for the purpose of self-promotion, anything that is done out of self-interest or self-gain or applause; anything that's done lacking in love, that's just wood, hay and stubble.

But Paul goes on to describe how Christ grants these rewards in verse 14, again, "If any man's work, which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. It's as though there's two kinds of workers in the church, those who build with quality materials and those who use inferior materials. But all those who build, which includes every believer, will be rewarded for what they did by the power of the Spirit. We're not sure what all these rewards might be, perhaps a reference to those who came to Christ as a result of our service. And we all have a part to play in those things; faithful teaching, living, all of those things, they shall be, quote, "our crown of exultation," Second Corinthians 1:14. First Thessalonians 2:19 says, "For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not even you, in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy."

My what a joy it will be, someday, to be able to see people in heaven that somehow by God's grace, he used me, and used you to bring them to faith in Christ; my what reward. And perhaps it will include some degree of ruling with Christ. We know that, from what Jesus said faithful service in this life affects our position in the coming Kingdom, according to Luke 19:11, through 27, some will be granted more ruling authority than others. We can't be sure what all the rewards will be. They're going to be magnificent beyond our ability to fathom. But our works that are done in the flesh, or based on wrong doctrine or whatever will be burned up. He will suffer loss Paul says, But he himself will be saved yet so through fire. In other words, he himself will escape the fire of judgment as if someone just kind of pulled him out of the fire. The phrase "so through fire," was probably a metaphor like a "brand plucked from the burning," as we read in Amos 4:11.

And since we will stand in the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy, evidently, we're not going to experience any remorse over our loss of reward. We just don't know all of these things, but what we know is the Lord is watching and he is going to reward us. Nevertheless, we want to do everything we can to build with the very best materials for the glory of God and be workman that do the very best we possibly can. First John two verse 28, "Now little children, abide in Him, so that when He appears, we may have confidence and not shrink away from Him in shame at His coming." Second John 8, "Watch yourselves, that you do not lose what we have accomplished, but that you may receive a full reward." Colossians 2:18, "Let no one keep defrauding you of your prize." The context there promoting legalism and other forms of false doctrine.

Well, dear Christians, in summary, get serious about your ambition in life. Get serious about being a person that wants to be pleasing to the Lord. Ask yourself, am I using my gifts for the glory of Christ? Am I serving Him? Are there any areas in my life that are displeasing? Husbands, wives, sit down together and talk about this, sit down with your family? Think this thing through, so that one day we can hear from the Lord, "Well done, good and faithful servant." Amen? Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these great truths. Again, by the power of your spirit, animate our hearts to be men and women, boys and girls who are bold for the gospel, because of our love for Christ; that our ambition will indeed be to please you in all that we do. And for those that do not know you, Father, again, I would just beg you to bring such overwhelming conviction that today would be the day of their salvation, that they would humble themselves before the cross, seeing the horror of their sin, in the inevitability of judgment, and cry out for that mercy that you will grant so instantly. So Lord, we commit this to you, that in all things Christ might have the preeminence. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

As we watch our world, sink deeper and deeper into the abyss of depravity, isn't it wonderful to be able to come together and hear the glorious truths of God's Word and be reminded afresh that he is sovereign over all of his creation, he is still on his throne. He has a plan, he has a purpose, and it will be accomplished. And to know that somehow, we're a part of all of it. What an amazing thought. Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 13; we continue to examine this portion of Scripture, this gospel. We're going to be looking basically at the first eight verses, but this is the beginning of a series that I want to do that I'm entitling "Jesus Prophetic Discourse on the End of the Age." And here we will see Jesus telling his disciples what is going to happen because they're asking the question. And the context here is, he has made his final pronouncement of judgment against apostate Judaism. And he's given now a long explanation of what must take place prior to the end of the age prior to the establishment of his kingdom. We see parallel accounts in Matthew's gospel chapter 24, and 25, and Luke's gospel chapter 21. And we're going to see more of those details as well. And what's happening here now occurs on Wednesday of the Passion Week. The Lord is about to go to his death on the cross a few days later, on Friday. And we know that in Matthew 23, we have a record of Jesus's public sermon; a detailed denunciation of the false shepherds that stood right before him. Those false teachers, the scribes and Pharisees that really represented apostate Israel. And after pronouncing seven curses of divine judgment upon them, he concluded with one final, climactic pronouncement in verse 33, he said, "'You serpents, you brood of vipers, how shall you escape the sentence of hell?'" And then he gave a final warning in verses 34 and 36, promising judgment that would eventually fall upon them. And we know that in AD 70, that happened. 50,000 elite Roman troops marched upon Jerusalem, they immediately captured about 500 of the Jewish leaders, some of them, no doubt, that were in Jesus' presence. And they crucified them. No doubt, again, some of the scribes and Pharisees that he had just condemned. And then we know from history that the Romans slaughtered 1.1 million Jewish people. They took an estimated 100,000 captives and took them to Egypt, glutting the market with slaves. And so Jesus' words must have been shocking to the disciples. Luke tells us in chapter 19, verse 11, that they "supposed that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately."

So what is all this talk? He's been talking about his death, about his resurrection. And now, all of these things. And certainly, Jesus' triumphal entry just a few days earlier into Jerusalem, really heightened their expectations, but they failed to understand how all of that works together with Jesus' talk about death and resurrection. And as I think about it, like all of us, the disciples only heard what they wanted to hear and believe what they wanted to believe, without any regard for truth or reality. And in Matthew 23, we have a record of Jesus's terrifying response upon Israel with a farewell promise. In verse 38 he said, "'Your house,'" referring to the temple, "Your house is being left to you desolate.'" But in verse 39, he said, "'I say to you, from now on you shall not see Me until you say, "BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!"'" Well you notice, Jesus did not say unless, but rather, he said, "until." And therein is the glorious hope, because there is a future conversion that awaits the Jewish people; a time of genuine repentance, a time that has been carved into the granite of divine sovereignty. But Jesus gives us no hint as to when the interval of time is holy indeterminate. He simply says "until." And he used the very text the multitudes quoted a few days later, or a few days earlier, the triumphal entry when they said, out of Psalm 118, verse 26, "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord." And when Jesus returns the next time, as we have read in our scripture reading, we know that it will be very different. And at that time, what was once said in ignorance, and in unbelief, will be said, with full knowledge and genuine faith.

Zechariah speaks of this in his prophecy in chapter 12, beginning in verse nine. "'And in that day I will set about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.'" Indeed, a day is coming when a remnant of Jewish people will join us in singing, Amazing Grace; won't that be a wonderful day?

The Apostle Paul spoke of this as well in Romans 11, beginning verse in verse 25. He reminds us that there is a "partial hardening that has happened to Jerusalem, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.'" And so after his scathing denunciation of their phony religious system; their hypocrisy, their corruption, and after his ominous prediction of the temple's demise, he concludes with a message of hope, and then quietly withdraws from the presence of the multitudes there on the temple area.

And obviously, this prediction of judgment on Israel's temple would have aroused great suspicion and intense desire, on the part of the disciples, to understand what in the world are you talking about? What will be the nature? What will be the duration of this time of desolation? When is this going to happen? And what do you mean you shall not see me until we say blessed it is he who comes in the name of the Lord? Didn't we just say that? Their Messiah King had just passed final judgment upon their nation, upon their temple. The disciples are confused. And so now what happens, if you can imagine, Jesus and his disciples leave the Temple Mount, go down across the Kidron Valley, and they begin to ascend up the Mount of Olives. And it is at this point that Jesus gives what is called his Olivet Discourse.

That brings us to our text here, in Mark 13, beginning in verse one. "As He was going out of the temple, one of His disciples said to Him, 'Teacher, behold what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!' And Jesus said to him, 'Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left upon another which will not be torn down.' As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew were questioning Him privately, 'Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are going to be fulfilled?' And Jesus began to say to them, 'See to it that no one misleads you. Many will come in My name saying 'I am He' and will mislead many. When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be frightened; those things must take place; but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will also be famines. These things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.'"

Now, much of what I have to say this morning is going to be largely introductory to what we are going to study over the next several weeks. But I want you to think about this, many people, if not most people, scoff at the existence of a creator god. Most people scoff at the idea that he is infinitely holy. Most people laugh if you tell them that the one true God, the God of the Bible, is sovereign over all of his creation; that he is actively involved in history. Most people think that is absurd. They will laugh if you tell them that he is going to come one day and judge the nations, as well as individual people. Most say that God, if he exists, isn't involved in history. Either he doesn't exist, or at least he's uninvolved, therefore, for most people, history is cyclical. It's just an endless cycle of meaningless existence fueled by the process of evolution. There is no purpose. There is no plan, there is no destiny. We are merely sophisticated germs that came into existence by accident. And we have evolved over billions of years by random chance. That's what our children have been taught for years in our public schools. That's what most people believe. There is no design because there is no designer. There is no creator and therefore there is no judge. There is no one to whom we are accountable. There is no ultimate and eternal consequences for anything that we do. So let's just eat and drink, be merry, for tomorrow we die. This is Satan's great lie. It certainly appeals to man's depraved nature. And collectively, the masses of the world believe this type of deception, causing people to actually think that that's the truth. If you get enough people to believe a lie, it becomes the truth. Quote, unquote.

The biblical Christian worldview is very different. History is not cyclical, but God controls history; history is linear, there is a beginning there is an end. The one true God is the Creator, the Sustainer, and the consummator of all things. He is currently moving history toward a final destination, one that he sovereignly decreed and ordained in eternity past. And his plan is to ultimately bring glory to himself in ways that we can't even begin to comprehend. And that plan absolutely cannot be thwarted. And this plan is delineated in his revelation to man, which is the inspired, the inerrant, the infallible, authoritative, all-sufficient Word of the living God, recorded in the canon of Scripture--the Bible. And therefore, the unfathomably complex order, design and functionality of the natural world screams the fact that there must be an intelligent creator, there must be one that sustains all of these things. And therefore, that same one, is the one that will consummate all things. And for those who believe God doesn't exist, or if he does, he's not involved in history, obviously, the Bible is nothing more than a book of myths. And the gospel is foolishness. And the hundreds of Bible prophecies that have been fulfilled, literally, are merely coincidental.

My friend, if that is you, God calls you a fool. Indeed, the Psalmist tells us in Psalm 14 beginning in verse one, "The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God.'" It goes on to say "They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds; there is no one who does good. The Lord has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside, together, they have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one." These people have no fear of God; therefore they have no wisdom, spiritually speaking, down deep. They foolishly hope that if there is a God, their own perceived goodness will be enough to help them make whatever cut there is for salvation, that God grades on the curve and they've been good enough to beat out most other people. This is how the world lives, even many in the religious world. Indeed, the unregenerate know nothing of the one true God, they know nothing of the creation, of what Scripture says about that, of the person, the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, His true church. And so most of the world simply lives for itself. People are constantly pursuing the fleeting pleasures of this life. And eventually, like all of us, they are going to grow old. They are going to be diseased and decrepit. And then they will die in their unbelief and spend an eternity in hell. That's what God has said. In fact, Jesus tells us in John 3:36, "He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." And we know according to Hebrews nine and verse 27, that "it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes," what? "comes judgment."

But for those who by God's grace alone believe that history is linear, that God is ultimately in control of history, those people and I'm sure I'm speaking of those who are within the sound of my voice, will long to know all they can about his plan of the ages, and his plan for them personally. And they will search for every biblical insight available to them, so that they can know the season in which they live. They will be like the disciples who said to Jesus, "Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are going to be fulfilled?"

Now I wish to unpack Jesus' lengthy answer under seven headings over the next several weeks. Let me give you the headings. We're going to first of all see the temple's demolition. And then the signs of the end, the prospect of persecution, the abomination of desolation, the false Christ and prophets, the coming of the Son of Man, and the warning to be prepared. I'm taking them in the order that Jesus delineates them. And while we do not know a specific date when all of this occur, we can see how that the stage is being set, right now in our world, for the constellation of all of the prophetic signs to be manifested. So the bottom line is, we all need to be ready. And we all need to be excited. In fact, we need to be thrilled to know that all of this is going to come to an end and Jesus will be glorified. Aren't you tired of hearing him mocked so, it breaks my heart. So let's look at the text.

"As He was going out of the temple, one of His disciples said to Him, 'Teacher, behold, what wonderful stones, what wonderful buildings!' And Jesus said to him, 'Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left upon another, which will not be torn down.'" And here we come to the first little point in our outline, and that is, the temple's demolition.

You must understand that according to history, this was an amazing piece of architecture. Herod the Great had spent a fortune refurbishing the modest temple structure that had been erected many years earlier under the rule of Cyrus, remember when the Jews returned to Jerusalem from Babylon. And actually, the final touches were still being made during Jesus' day. The temple wasn't actually completely finished until AD 64, six years before it was destroyed; it was a magnificent building. They said that some stones measured 40 feet by 12 by 12 feet and weighed up to 100 tons. Can you imagine moving stones like that without cranes? The walls were luminous white marble that glistened with decorations of pure gold. Wealthy worshipers would contribute countless precious stones and priceless ornaments to adorn the walls. And the temple complex would accommodate many 1000s of worshippers and in it it had symmetrical porticoes and patios and colonnades and courtyards. The opulence of this edifice was absolutely mind boggling. In fact, its splendid grandeur, was even described in the Babylonian Talmud, stating, quote, "He that never saw the temple of Herod never saw a fine building." End quote. The eastern side, that would have been visible to Jesus and the disciples from the Mount of Olives--for those of us that have been there, you know exactly what it would look like. In fact, now, if you look at pictures, you see the Dome of the Mosque, you know, you're up hight and you're looking over, now the dome of the mosque is there, but that's the Mount of Olives, looking back on where the temple once stood. But they viewed this from the adjacent mountain, and they could see it glistening, especially in the evening. And I would say even more so in the morning when the sun would light it up. And sadly, however, this astonishing edifice that they viewed from the adjacent mountain had become a tragic symbol of apostate Judaism. And it was about to be destroyed, along with their apostasies.

And this led to Jesus solemn prediction recorded in Matthew, chapter 23, verse 38, that "'Your house is left to you desolate.'" And then in Matthew 24, verse two, "'not one stone shall be left upon another, which shall not be torn down.'" Can you imagine the shock and the confusion of the disciples. And history records that when the Romans attacked the Temple Mount, they set fire to the main temple structure, and the heat was so immense that the stones crumbled into powder. And the stones that we see there today were merely the the retaining walls of the temple. And then they sifted through all of the ashes to retrieve the fine jewels, the gold and the silver. And indeed, as Jesus promised, not one stone was left standing. The great Jewish historian of that day, Josephus, said that when the Roman army had finished, the temple area looked like "a wilderness that had never been inhabited." So the Messianic hopes of the disciples being dashed, they don't understand what's going on. And if their beloved temple is going to be gone, so too is the nation, so they're doomed. And I'm sure in their mind, they're thinking, no temple means no Messiah. And yet he's here. Undoubtedly, Malachi's prophesy in chapter three and verse one is ringing in their ears. There we read, "T'he Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant, in whom you delight, behold, He is coming,' says the Lord of hosts." But again, if you have no temple, you have no place for the Messiah to come, no kingdom.

Later on, when all of this happened, Jews understood this. They are still waiting to build their temple are they not? By the way, Malachi's prophecy was reference to the millennial temple, that the Lord himself will construct at his second coming and you see the details of it, described in Ezekiel chapter 40 through 48. So we read in verse three, "As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James and John and Andrew were questioning him privately. "Tell us, when will these things be and what will be the sign when all these things are going to be fulfilled?" Matthew 24 three adds this, "Tell us, when will these things happen and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?" Three questions, very appropriate questions. When will these things be? When are you going to destroy the temple? And are you going to miraculously rebuild it? I mean, is it going to happen next week, next month, next year? And how does all this fit into your talk about dying and resurrection?

The second question, what will be the sign of your coming? "Parousia" is the term that is used, which means "presence" or "arrival" or "manifestation". In other words, when are you going to ascend the throne of Israel as our messianic king, and the effulgence of your glory is going to beam forth? That's what we're waiting for. When is this going to happen? And what's going to be the sign of your "parousia"? And what will be the sign of the end of the age? The term "end" in the original language translates a compound word denoting an ultimate consummation, or a culmination, a completion of plot, of a planned series of events. In other words, what can we look for that will indicate that you will finally manifest your power and your glory as our Messiah? What sign? Tell us what it will be when this age of wickedness and rebellion is finally over.

Now, it's important to understand as well that the disciples thought that all of these mysterious events that Jesus was talking about would happened shortly and in quick succession, in a single continuum. They had no idea that he was going to leave; they had no idea of a church age that would intervene before his ultimate parousia. Again, Luke 19:11, The twelve, "supposed that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately." And you realize that even after the resurrection, just before Jesus ascended into heaven, the disciples asked in Acts 1:6, "Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?" So they could only comprehend a swift sequence of dramatic events that would culminate in this promised Messianic kingdom. So beginning in verse five, Jesus begins to answer their questions in reverse order. He begins by addressing the signs of his coming. And I again, he is using the term parousia, in the technical sense, referring to his second coming. And as we look at the combined records of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we see that there are six specific signs that Jesus gives them, and he calls them "birth pangs" in Mark 13 eight for example. These are the things that will occur just before his appearing: false messiahs, nations at war, natural disasters of epic proportions, persecution of tribulation saints, defection of, and betrayal by false believers, and interestingly, enough mass evangelism.

Now, as a footnote, these six signs have undeniable parallels with the seal trumpet and bowl judgments that are delineated in Revelation chapter six through 19. The seal judgments, we know from the text, will take years. The trumpet judgments weeks, the bowl judgments days and hours.

Now, a very important digression, because this comes up from time to time. After Jesus predicted the imminent demolition of the temple, he began to foretell events that would occur in the distant, not the immediate future. But some disagree with this. And they have what's called a "preterist" view, or maybe you've heard of Preterism; that comes from the Latin term, “praeter" which means past. And this interpretation of eschatology, and particularly the Olivet Discourse and the book of Revelation, would argue that the events referred to had already taken place or were taking place at the time of the writing. And that all of the eschatological passages describing the Tribulation and the return of Jesus were fulfilled with first century events surrounding the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. They insist that the timing indicators in the New Testament where words are used, like "near," "soon," "quickly," and "this generation," demand that Jesus had to return in just a short amount of time, maybe a few years or decades. There's a number of reasons why we rejected that view. I'll give you just a few samples of it so that you have some sense of it. And if you want to know more of the details of all of this, I'd be glad to refer you to other documents. But when you look at terms like "near," "soon," "quickly," you must understand that they're merely conveying the idea of imminence, which Jesus spoke of, for example, in Matthew 23:36, "'No one knows the day or the hour only the Father.'" Acts one seven, "'It is not for you to know, times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority.'" And every generation should live with the imminent expectation that these events could suddenly burst on the scene and regarding the phrase in Matthew 24:34, "'This generation will not pass away until all these things take place.'" That cannot be referring to the time of Christ. Why? Because there was nothing even remotely like the catastrophic global and cosmic cataclysms described in the Olivet Discourse and in the sealed trumpet and bowl judgments, none of that occurred. Nothing even close to that occurred in ad 70. There was no abomination of desolation, where an Antichrist appears and desecrates the temple and sets himself up to be God. How are you going to spiritualize all that away? There is no place where you see the sun being darkened, the moon will not give its light, stars will fall from the sky and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. You don't see any of that in AD 70. There is no sign of the Son of Man that will appear in the sky and then all of the tribes of the earth will mourn. And they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. None of that happened. There's no sending forth of angels with great trumpet and they will gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of the sky to the other. None of these things that Jesus predicted. No gospel being preached to all the nations, as we see here in verse 10. In fact, Jesus described this time as quote, this is in verse 19, "'A time of tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the creation, which God created until now, and never will.'" Moreover, the Preterist position would mean that the book of Revelation had to have been written before AD 67. But the consensus view in church history is that its writing occurred during the reign of Domitian, around AD 95. And so all of the signs predicted after the demolition of the temple, have to be distant future, way beyond the events of ad 70, as we will see.

Now, while certain aspects of each of these signs have occurred down through history, we've never seen anything like the severity and the scope of the staggering events that Jesus described, and others that go along with it, in other passages of Scripture. And, also think about this, Jesus says that these six signs are quote, "merely the beginning of the birth pangs." In other words, they're going to get far more severe and increase in frequency. We all understand that when a woman gives birth to a child. And so to claim that these events all take place in AD 70, simply does not fit the facts of this text. Again, think about it, birth pangs do not occur at conception. They do not occur at pregnancy, but just prior to birth. And so it makes no sense to apply this to the destruction of Jerusalem--an event that occurred at the very beginning of the church age. Paul reminds us that Christ will return as a "thief in the night" right? He's going to return suddenly, unexpectedly. And he uses the same figure of birth pangs that Jesus uses here. We see that this in first Thessalonians five, verses one through three. There we read, "While they are saying, 'Peace and safety!' then destruction will come upon them suddenly like birth pangs upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape."

So we still wait these labor pains that will culminate in the inconceivable and unprecedented catastrophes that Jesus describes. These dear friends, I believe, are pre-kingdom judges that will occur at the very end, during the time of Daniel's 70th week that we've studied in the past, just prior to Jesus second coming. And these are events consistent with the prophecies that are delineated there in Daniel's 70th week, and the pre-kingdom judgments as well, as I've said in Revelation six through 19, just prior to the Lord establishing his kingdom.

It's also important to understand, again, this is preparatory, I want you to get some theological understanding that frames what we're about to study. And that is this, although God's economy in dealing with Israel finds numerous fulfillments in the church, nevertheless, Daniel's 70th week is distinctively Jewish in context, pertaining to God's covenants with Israel. They cannot be describing something in the church age, I would argue. When Israel enters, according to Jeremiah 30, and verse seven, "the time of Jacob's trouble," that's a period of unprecedented oppression for Israel. The context describes Israel's final restoration, just before their Messiah returns as described again in Revelation six through 19. So Jesus clearly indicates in Matthew 24, verses 15 and 16, as well as Mark 13:14, that the 70th week prophecy of Daniel is to be the template of the chronological sequence of the beginning of birth pangs. These are pre kingdom judgments consistent with God's purposes and his plan for Israel, not the church. Daniel 9:24, "70 weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place." And while Israel has been set aside temporarily, as we read in Romans 11:11, through 15, the normal reading of scripture would make it clear that they will once again emerge; Israel will once again emerge as the object of divine intention, as he has promised. So today, we await to this. I believe now, just so that you get a sense of the premillennial dispensational position that we hold here at this church--one that is despised by many--I would argue that we're awaiting the translation of the church--the rapture of the church--the church to be snatched away, before the seven years called the Tribulation begins, or Daniel's 70th week. And the signs Jesus describes are secret events, again, analogous to a woman entering into labor and these events will increase in severity and rapidity until the Messianic Kingdom is birthed.

So typical of Old Testament prophecies, where God speaks in the second person, often addressing people who are not yet born, we see the Lord now answering these questions. And indeed, Jesus' answer speaks to all of us today, not just to them; all who will follow, but especially to those who will be alive at the time of his arrival. However, again, he doesn't answer their question regarding when, until Mark 13:32, and then he simply says, "But of the day or hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone." By the way, that passage does not mean that Jesus was not God--that somehow, he was stating that he was not deity but rather, we can see that during the days of his humiliation, in the days of his incarnation, we know that Jesus voluntarily limited his omniscience and the exercise of his divine attributes and his prerogatives. We see this in Philippians, two six, for example. He only knew what the Father revealed to him during his earthly ministry. But after his resurrection, the omniscience he possessed from eternity past was fully restored.

So we've seen number one: the temple's demolition being promised. Secondly, the signs of the end. Now, what are the six signs, these birth pangs, these pre-kingdom judgments that Jesus described? Well, today we're going to look at the first one. And that is in verses five and six, false messiahs; that there are going to be great deceivers and deceptions that will lead to the worship of the ultimate false teacher, false messiah, the Antichrist. Notice verse five. "And Jesus began to say to them, 'See to it that no one misleads you. Many will come in My name, saying, I" am He!" and will mislead many.'" And Jesus repeats this in verses 22 and following, "'For false Christs and false prophets will arise, and will show signs and wonders, in order to lead astray, if possible, the elect. But take heed; behold, I have told you everything in advance. '" And we know that they exist even today. And Satan does all kinds of false signs and wonders. I mean, think about the power of AI and what it is able to do. I think of Revelation 13, where the Antichrist even, is going to be wounded, and he's going to die. And it's interesting that God is going to raise him to increase the deception. So this is what is coming. And he extends this warning to all people, in chapter 13 of Mark and verse 37, "'What I say to you I say to all, "Be on the alert!"'"

Now, while false messiahs and false teachers have always existed--certainly they exist today-- and we are warned about them all through the New Testament, you must understand that their numbers are going to greatly increase, and their power is going to greatly increase at the very end of the age. Think of the future contact of this morning, context of this morning. Understand the chronology here of these events. By this time, the church has been caught up; the church has been raptured (First Thessalonians 4:17). We know according to Revelation 3:10, the Lord promised to keep the church from the "'hour of testing, that hour, which is about to come upon the whole world to test those who dwell on the earth.'" Imagine what's going to happen when all of the believers of the world suddenly disappear. It's going to be chaos beyond comprehension, confusion, people will be desperate for spiritual answers. And of course, that is always fertile soil for false prophets and false teachers. And sometime after the rapture, we know that the sealed judgments will begin to occur during the first three and a half years of what is called in a broad sense, the Tribulation, (Second Thessalonians, one six.) And it's interesting that at the beginning of the Tribulation, the Lord Jesus Christ will unleash the first Seal Judgment, we read about in Revelation six, one and two, which describes a pseudo peace, a false peace that will lull the world into an understanding of all that has happened. Lull them into a false sense of security; visions of Utopia will finally be promised and manifested, supposedly. Of course, this is the calm before the storm. And all of the deceptive charlatans that will arise during that time, to make a buck off of everybody's confusion, will actually pave the way and foreshadow the most vile, false Christ of all--the Antichrist. And even now the steady deterioration of societies is a real dilemma to the liberal elite who remain committed to classic Darwinian evolutionary theory and the vision that ultimately human progress is going to trend upward. Right? That's what we've been promised. And any idiot can look and see that that's not happening. And so since it's not happening, we have to have the elites to do social engineering to make it happen. And that's what we're dealing with now. And of course, this requires the superior wisdom of the liberal elite who must control the populace, who they consider to be ignorant rabble, especially, born again Christians. But after the rapture, again, imagine the chaos and even now man is desperate for a leader, right? Even in our country, we see all this chaos. The whole Biden/Trump thing, as if either one of them could ever deliver us from the abyss that we've entered into. Man is desperate for a leader. And mankind is predisposed to worshipping anyone that can offer them change we can believe in, remember Obama? That's worked out real well. Imagine how much worse it'll be dear friends. When the true church is translated into heaven. No more salt to slow down the decomposition no more light to expose it. Just darkness. David Larsen said, quote, "Problems on earth seem insurmountable. No human leadership seems competent to address the complexity of the issues. But demographic explosion with moral social, economic, ecological and political ramifications baffles the think tanks of the world, humankind's vaunted self-sufficiency, evaporates in the face of insoluble questions. The church, notwithstanding her frequent impotence and perennial failure, is now gone. And the salt and light she has afforded are missing. Homo sapiens are adrift, rudderless." End quote. Even now, the world needs a leader and how much more so in that day. The world is craving a political hero. One prominent Belgian diplomat and astute European strategist by the name of Paul-Henri Spaak. Put it this way, quote, "We do not want another committee. We have too many already. What we want is a man of sufficient stature, to hold the allegiance of all people and to lift us out of the economic morass into which we are sinking send us such a man be he God or devil, we will receive him." End quote. Paul Missoura, prominent European economist/banker commented on this leadership vacuum. And here's the prediction that he made. Quote, "The large number of government bureaus that will have their orbits in the atmosphere of our planet cannot be allowed the freedom to compete and comply, collide with one another. So, in order to control the diverse bureaucracies required, a Politburo will develop. And over this group organization, there is likely to arise the final and single arbiter, the master of the order, the total dictator."

Well, this is from a human perspective. Let me give you the truth from a divine perspective in Daniel's prophecy. Daniel chapter eight, beginning in verse 23, we read of this antichrist that is coming on the scene. There we read, "A king will arise, insolent and skilled in intrigue. His power will be mighty, but not by his own power, and he will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will; he will destroy mighty men and the holy people. And through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence, and he will magnify himself in his heart, and he will destroy many while they are at ease. He will even oppose the Prince of princes, but he will be broken without human agency."

As we look at biblical eschatology, we see that after the rapture of the church, according to Daniel 9:27, the prince to come, who is the Antichrist, will make a covenant with Israel, which actually will be the beginning of Daniel's 70th week judgment. And really the beginning of the Tribulation, not so much the rapture, but the signing of the covenant with Israel. And at that time, the Jews will finally be able to rebuild their temple on Mount Zion, something that they already have the plans for, they're just waiting, waiting to do it. And that will be the temple that the Antichrist will desecrate in the middle of the week, the middle of that seven-year period, three and a half years. But during that time, Daniel also tells us in Daniel 11, beginning in verse 36, "Then the king will do as he pleases," referring to the Antichrist, "and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods; and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." The Spirit of God gives us more through the apostle Paul in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse three, where we read, "Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless," referring to the day of the Lord, "it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God."

This is what's coming, dear friends. But there will be many that will come to saving faith during the time of the tribulation, after the rest of us have gone on to be with the Lord either through death or through the rapture. But he will not be able to deceive the elect of God, we're told, who will be saved during the time of the of the Tribulation. Jesus even said in John 10, beginning of verse four, that the sheep follow their shepherd because "they know his voice.'" Isn't that a wonderful statement? He went on to say, "'a stranger, they simply will not follow, but will flee from him, because they do not know the voice of strangers.'"

Oh, dear friends, in closing, all of this is going to happen but what we see today is the stage being set for it. The momentum is gaining with all of the deceptive teachers, religious teachers, philosophers, politicians. In fact, Paul says in Second Timothy 3:13, "But evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived." The level of deception in the world today is absolutely mind boggling, isn't it? I mean, you turn on the news, you don't know what to believe, all these conflicting things. Sometimes they'll show us a split screen and on one side, you'll see, for example, hundreds of 1000s of illegal people coming across our border, and the next screen, you'll hear some guy saying our border is secure. You know, it's just double-think, it's mind boggling. And with the the advent now of AI, and the internet, social media that can propagate lies by the billions instantly; corrupt politicians and educators and prosecutors and judges in the media, we don't know who to trust in the world. But we know who to trust outside of the world, and that is the Lord our God, whose has given us his Word. Remember, Satan is the father of lies, and God has allowed him right now, to temporarily rule this current world, until the Lord returns. So dear friends, may I challenge you--guard your heart, guard your minds, be people of the Word. Read it, study it, meditate on it. Speak it to your spouse, to your children, to your friends, feed upon the word of God, and God will protect your heart and your mind, in the midst of all of this wickedness, and he will encourage you because the reality is, Jesus is coming again. Jesus is coming again. I hope you're ready.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that give us some sense of even the particulars of what you're going to do and what you have done. But Lord, there's so much we don't know. And that's okay. You are God and we are not. And were you to even tell us, we wouldn't be able to comprehend at all. But we know what you have given us is sufficient. And I pray therefore, that we will rejoice in the major truths that we can be certain of, and that is that you are in control of history, and that nothing can prevent your plan from coming to fruition and in this, helps us to relax and to rejoice. And for those who do not know you truly know you as Savior, o Father, won't you bring such conviction to their heart that they will run to the foot of the cross and cry out for your undeserved mercy available through Christ our Savior? Bless us, encourage us, strengthen us and come quickly. We pray in Jesus’ name and for his sake. Amen.

We continue to make our way verse by verse through Mark's gospel. So, if you will take your Bibles and turn to Mark, chapter 12, we're going to be examining verses 38 through 44. And I've entitled my discourse to you, "Beware of Religious Phonies". That is certainly the theme of this text. And it is the goal of this exposition, to give you the discernment that you need to do exactly what the Lord Jesus tells us to do here in this text.

By way of brief context, Jesus is now less than two days from his crucifixion. He's been teaching and preaching in the temple court, and there's been many, many people listening; he has thoroughly embarrassed and humiliated those who have tried to embarrass him and humiliate him; namely, the scribes, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and so forth. They have been trying to trick him. They, of course, were the religiously elite and they were trying to demonstrate in front of all of the people what a fraud Jesus was, because ultimately, they wanted to kill him. And now I want you to get the picture in your mind. You're in the court of the Gentiles, there's maybe as many as 1000 people around and you've got the scribes and the Pharisees right up front for everybody can see them standing before him. And we read this in Mark 12: 38, "In His teaching He was saying: 'Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes, and like respectful greetings in the marketplaces and chief seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets, who devour widows' houses, and for appearance's sake offer long prayers; these will receive greater condemnation.' And He sat down opposite the treasury and began observing how the people were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large sums. A poor widow came and put into small copper coins, which amount to a cent. Calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; for they all put in out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned, all she had to live on.'"

I have a bit of a lengthy introduction that I think is important to help frame this passage. And so if you will bear with me, and then we will get exactly to these particular words. I've been in Christian ministry for about 40 years. And I've had to battle two formidable enemies. One within me and one outside of me. I've had to battle my own flesh, and I've had to battle Satan and his deceptions in the world. And only by the grace of God have I been able to gain any measure of victory in my life. And I think all of you can identify with this. And as a seasoned pastor, over the years, I have developed a very keen eye for spiritual danger that might destroy me personally, that might destroy my family, and certainly might destroy the sheep of the pasture that God has given me to shepherd. And every faithful pastor that has been called My God, not my man, especially older pastors, can attest to the profound danger of wolves in sheep's clothing of those that would preach and teach doctrinal error of those, that in very subtle and ingenious ways, do the bidding of Satan in his diabolical schemes. We see it in the culture, and we see it in many churches. And frankly, Satan does his greatest work not by doing something from the outside to the church but joining the church and destroying it from within.

But I would say that Satan's most diabolical, his most dangerous strategy, and his most effective strategy to thwart the purposes of God, is through the use of religious phonies. And that's what Jesus dealt with throughout his entire ministry with the scribes, the Pharisees the Sadducees. But they have always existed in various forms. We can go into the Old Testament, for example, and see examples of many heretics, false prophets, false teachers; I think of what Paul reminds us of in terms of the early heretics in Second Timothy three verses eight and nine, he spoke of Jannes and Jambres, who "opposed Moses," remember that? Men that oppose the truth, men of a depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith. We can go to numbers 22 through 25 and read about the false prophet Balaam. Earlier in our scripture reading, we read out of Jeremiah 23. For example, verse 16, says, "Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you. They are leading you into futility; they speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the LORD.'" We go on to read beginning in verse 31, "'Behold, I am against the prophets,' declares the LORD, 'who use their tongues and declare "The LORD declares," Behold, I am against those who have prophesied false dreams,' declares the LORD and related them and led My people astray by their falsehoods, and reckless boasting; yet I did not send to them or command them, nor do they furnish this people the slightest benefit,' declares the LORD."

Indeed, these were men that were self-appointed; they were not God ordained. Men that would twist the scripture in order to promote themselves, promote their own agenda. You can go into the New Testament; you see examples of this with the Judaizers. Remember in Acts 15 they're trying to mix law with grace, insisting the Gentile, for example, must be circumcised in order to obey the law of Moses and to be saved. In Galatians chapter one, verse six and following we read how they were teaching, quote, "a different distorted gospel." One that was contrary to what the apostles preached, and they were to be accursed. In Second Thessalonians, you read about false teachers that had confused the people thoroughly about the Lord's return. And then Colossae, Jewish legalists, that also embraced pagan mysticism and rigid asceticism, were polluting the church. It's what is commonly known as the Colossian Heresy. And Paul warned about this in Colossians, two and verse eight. He says, "See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ."

And that same warning goes to each of us today. You will remember in Revelation two, you had the warning against the Nicolaitans, in the church of Pergamum. And then in the church of Thyatira, you have, quote, "the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bondservants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols." Paul warned of this in First Timothy four beginning in verse one, "But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron." And then we are warned in Second Timothy chapter two beginning in verse 16, "But avoid worldly and empty chatter, for it will lead to further ungodliness and their talk will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus, men who have gone astray from the truth saying that the resurrection has already taken place, and they upset the faith of some." And then that familiar passage in Second Timothy, chapter three beginning in verse one, "But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revelers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth."

Peter warned of this as well. We read about it, for example, in Second Peter two beginning in verse one through verse two, in particular. He speaks of false teachers, and how they will "secretly introduce destructive heresies". He goes on to say that "many will follow their sensuality, and because of them, the way of the truth will be maligned." Beginning in verse 12, he speaks of them as "unreasoning animals...reviling in their deceptions" (v. 13) ...having eyes full of adultery that never cease from sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart trained in greed (v.14). He went on to say, "These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm, for whom the black darkness has been reserved. For speaking out arrogant words of vanity they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escaped from the ones who live in error, promising them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved." In other words, these false teachers are motivated primarily by sexual lust, that is immorality, by greed and by power. So, Titus says, or Paul said to Titus, I should say in chapter one, verse 16, "They profess to know God, but by their deeds, they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient, and worthless for any good deed."

I would submit to you that there are at least three general categories of false teachers that we need to be aware of. There's the heretic, the hypocrite, and the incompetent. And there's much overlap with these. When I think of the heretic, and I speak of that, I'm talking about apostates that speak things that are contrary to Scripture. These are typically self-appointed men, a lot of times women, they are predators in pulpits. They often have huge followings, and they're primarily entrepreneurs.

Jude gives a great summary of them. I won't read all of the passages--I'll just give you the designations. They are ungodly, morally perverted; they deny and distort the person work of Christ; defile the flesh. They're rebellious, they revile holy angels. They're dreamers, ignorant self-destructive, grumblers, fault finders, self-seeking, arrogant speakers. flatterers, mockers cause the division, their worldly-minded and without the Spirit. And he even says something that is especially important for us to remember, is that they creep into the church quote, "unnoticed". They creep into the church, unnoticed, they join our fellowship; seem like great people--smart, charismatic type people, they know the word. And then they begin to introduce these deceptions, satanic counterfeiters. Now, in that day, it was primarily referring to itinerant preachers that would do this stuff, but today, it's everywhere, especially with the internet, man-centered people, not God-centered. They preach a man-centered rather than a God-centered gospel. They speak a lot about man and his needs, not God and his glory. And you will see this for example, in the prosperity gospel, the social justice gospel, the LGBTQ gospel, the seeker sensitive gospel, the whole Ecumenical Movement, and so forth.

But not only do you have the heretic, but you also have the hypocrite. Of course, this would include all heretics, but it would also include those that teach sound doctrine. There are hypocrites that teach sound doctrine. Now all of us are sinners, but here I'm referring to that man who has a secret life that is dominated by sin. And his secret life does not match his public message. This man is ruled by life-dominating sin rather than the indwelling Spirit. This is what was going on with the scribes and Pharisees. They were not only heretics, but they were hypocrites. Not too long ago, a world-renowned evangelical minister and Christian apologist, a man by the name of Ravi Zacharias was exposed for his secret immorality; soon after that he died. So, you have the heretic and you have the hypocrite.

And the third one, maybe as dangerous as the two former ones, and that is the incompetent. This is typically the self-appointed, not the God-ordained or God-gifted man. This is the type of man that has a superficial grasp of theology, a superficial grasp of the word. The content of his sermons are as shallow is icing on a doughnut. And equally as malnourishing. Many times, when you listen to them preach, they just kind of ramble around, they have conversations with the people, you can tell they don't really know much about what they're talking about. And they tend to make the obvious, even more obvious. I've seen this so many times. These are men that are typically irreverent, they're undignified, they're overly casual and they’re as boring as watching paint dry. Many of them are entrepreneurs, entertainers, ear ticklers; they certainly don't meet the qualifications of an elder in First Timothy three and Titus one. For example, in Titus one, they're unable to meet this most important qualification, "holding fast the faithful word, which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he will be able to both exhort in sound doctrine and refute those who contradict." May I remind you that God has given the church, pastor teachers. According to Ephesians, four beginning in verse 12, we read that these pastors and teachers are for the "equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; so that we all attain to the unity of the faith"--referring to doctrinal unity--"and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful, scheming." And whenever you see a church that is easily carried away by every wind of doctrine, that falls into the trickery of men, the craftiness, the deceitful, scheming, you know that they don't have a pastor teacher. And you can quickly see the level of incompetence in these type of men by what they preach, how they preach. Typically, again, rambling, superficial, man-centered topical sermons. And unfortunately, many churches today are little more than religious social clubs, rather than the pillar in the support of the truth. This is so dangerous because what happens is congregations are banished to an island of spiritual infancy; they just don't grow. They don't develop any discernment. Therefore, they're vulnerable to the schemes of the devil. We're constantly warning our kids about things that are out there, what to look for, and how to combat that. Sadly, many churches don't get that from the pulpit. And often the problem is not even so much of in what they teach, but what they leave out. This is why so many evangelicals today have capitulated to the progressive ideologies that celebrate sexual perversions, transgenderism, critical race theory, abortion, all these types of things.

A recent article from The Gospel Coalition actually juxtaposes the lyrics of Taylor Swift with the gospel of Jesus Christ. I read in one article a few months ago, The Gospel Coalition published an article and then deleted it (it's still available at archive.org) that warrants nothing but mockery and scorn, the piece titled "Seven Things Christians Can Learn from Taylor Swift's Eras Tour," and aims to reveal how the pro LGBTQ anti-Christian secular pop icon, Taylor Swift's music tour is apparently fertile ground for Christian education." Folks, this is the kind of venom that comes straight from the fangs of the serpent. This is what heretics teach, what hypocrites teach, and many times what incompetent ignoramuses will allow in the church. It's devastating. And bear in mind that incompetent preachers are unqualified preachers. And by preaching, I mean, a clear and compelling exposition, explanation, application of the Word of God that is so convicting, that is so edifying, that is so encouraging, that all the listeners will know that they have been in the presence of the Most High God, and they will be forever changed because of what they heard.

In the Puritan era, pastors were considered physicians of the soul. Therefore, they needed to be what we would call board certified. A physician of the body today needs to be board certified, right? You don't want to go to a doctor that just decided one day, he wants to be a doctor; he's got to go through rigorous training. Well, that's the way it was in those days. In fact, it was illegal for a man to, what they would say ascend the sacred desk, which would mean come into a pulpit, without having first met the highest standards of his theological acumen, his grasp of the Word of God, his character. Where those that were great, and godly theologians could vet him and see that he was clearly gifted by God to preach with unusual clarity and conviction and what they called unction, which was Spirit empowered preaching that moves people to be able to understand and apply the Word of God and bring them face to face with God in his preaching. Well, today if you can fog a mirror you can preach, and that's about it.

Remember, when Paul went into Corinth, wicked, wicked, unbelievably wicked city. First Corinthians two we read, beginning of verse two, "I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God." Dear friends, the character, and the message of this kind of man will be validated by his likeness to Christ. And I like to call this a godly presence. I think I've included this, or they've included this even in your bulletin--as I have written elsewhere. "A gospel preacher with a "godly presence" is a man with a noticeable aura of godliness about him, both in and out of the pulpit--a man like Jesus; a man who possesses a palpable sense of humility and love that draws you into His presence; a man who exudes spiritual strength, confidence, boldness, wisdom, and a noticeable fervency that marks him as a man of God, and a man on a mission; a man so lost in the wonder of the majesty of God, so filled with the Divine presence, that nothing in this world causes him to despair or tempts him to distraction."

"This is that rare man whose authority enters a room with him, and commands respect without ever asking for it. I am speaking of that extraordinary man who is quote, 'full of the Spirit and of wisdom (Acts 6:3) ...This is that exceptional man who has such a great likeness to Jesus, that he actually emanates his power in ways that are mysteriously transcendent and profoundly influential. His godly presence comes only from the unrestricted rule of the Spirit of God in his heart...this is the kind of men that you want on your side when you go into battle." And I add that, "It is very rare to encounter a man who can simply open up the Word of God with divine authority and disappear behind quote, "the light of the glory of God in the face of Christ" (2 Cor. 4:6), and with convicting power bring men and women, young and old, into the presence of the Most High God."

Dave Harrell

I've only met a few men like that, and I would long to be one. But I want you to see this as a contrast to the type of heretics and hypocrites and incompetent pastors that we have today. And certainly, those three appellations describe this, the scribes, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. And for this reason, and now we come to the text in verse 38, Jesus is teaching, and he says, "'Beware of the scribes." "Beware"-- it means be vigilant, be on the lookout, proceed with attention; watch them carefully. I love the picture in my mind here. I mean, they're standing right in front of him, right? There are hundreds of onlookers. Notice he didn't say beware of false teachers. No, that would be too ambiguous. Beware of the scribe. It doesn't say this, but I would imagine he pointed at them. You know, on the news, when they say that a criminal has escaped from prison, and we need to be aware of them. What do they do? They show you their picture, right? Give them your name. They don't say "Hey, folks, you know, there's a criminal out there, it's really dangerous." You know, you'd be out for look out for him. "Yeah, we don't want to use his name or show his picture. We don't want to offend him, you know, but just beware."

Now don't you know, the atmosphere was electric here. And frankly, Jesus is throwing gas on a fire that's already raging. They want to kill him. You know, he made this warning before, Mark eight, verse 15. He says, "'Watch out! Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees,'"-- leaven being that which influences; beware of the damming and deadly influence of the Pharisees that will permeate your mind and your life and bring you to destruction. Matthew records this in Matthew 16, verse six, he says, "'Watch out and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.'" In verse 12, we read, "Then they understood that He did not say to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.'" This again, reminds me what Paul said about the false teachers Hymenaeus and Philetus in Second Timothy two, verse 16. And following, that their message, their talk will "spread like gangrene." It's deadly stuff. It's contagious. The incompetent, heretical, hypocrite speaks words that are toxic. They teach things that are contagious, your kids hear these things, they repeat these things, and on and on it goes. And sadly, every church is going to reflect its pastor ultimately as did the people of Israel reflect their leaders.

Now, the scribes and the Pharisees again, Jesus makes it so clear, you can't miss them. He goes on to say, "They walk around in long robes.'" In other words, they have some kind of ostentatious attire. Some even say that historically, they wore white silk. I can't verify that for sure. But the point is, whatever they wore, it set them apart. So, people knew, well there's a scribe and a Pharisee; no mistaking them. They also wore a shawl. They would all wear a shawl during prayer time and other religious acts in the synagogues, but evidently some of them even wore them in public to attract attention. And clearly this was a uniform that would set them apart. Those of you that have graduated from college or whatever, you know, how we have these cap and gowns, you got these ornate gowns, and you know, mine's kind of a little, it's not a cap, it's more of a beret type of thing. Imagine if I wore that around all the time--you know, I go to the grocery "o, there he is." I mean, that's what was going on. Religious phonies are always desperate to be noticed. And he says they "like respectful greetings in the marketplace." And course the respectful greeting was "Rabbi" and that's what they would do; they would kind of bow. Oh, they love to hear that, they thrived on recognition.

Jesus doesn't stop there, in verse 39, that they love "the chief seats in the synagogues." Now these would be the front seats in the synagogues where the rulers would sit. They would face the synagogue where they would be able to answer questions from the people and so forth. So, this was a place of prominence. Now, we're aware of this, I mean, we see this for example, at wedding receptions or ceremonies of state where the most important people, that are there at that particular event, will have a seat of prominence. Well, that's where these guys wanted to sit.

By the way, as a footnote, out of this came, what's called the "cathedra", a cathedra was a raised seat or a throne of a bishop in the early Christian basilica. And we also hear about it like, you know, the chair of a department, you know, that's the most prominent person in academia in a particular department. And we know, for example, the Pope, who supposedly infallible, often speaks "ex cathedra". That's Latin for "out of the chair." In other words, he speaks with the authority and the supposed rank of that particular office. And so, we see this when the Pope makes papal announcements on matters of faith and doctrine and morals and so forth. He supposedly has the final authority on those things, which is blasphemous beyond words. I was reading where Pope Francis formally approved letting Catholic priests bless same sex couples. So much what the Scripture says, which is a radical shift in policy that aimed at making the church more inclusive, while maintaining its strict ban on gay marriage. Well, you get the idea.

On a final note, in order to refute, this arrogant hypocrisy that surrounded this whole issue of the chief seats, and then later on the cathedra, that came out of that historically, we see that in the Protestant Reformation, pastors would come out from the congregation, in order to ascend the sacred desk; in order to come to preach, rather than being seated in some big chair up front, as if he's something important. And the reason for this is to demonstrate that the pastor is merely one of everybody else. He has a unique calling, but he's just like all of you. And the message is coming from the church, through this man, through the Word, and so forth, and certainly a practice that we observe here. And this wasn't the case with the religious phonies, they wanted the chief seats, they wanted to sit up here with the robes on so that you can all see them and "oh, wow, there they are." They love the "chief seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets." The banquet was the "deipnon" in the original language; an evening meal where guests would be invited. And it's interesting, that if you study it, the most important person would always be seated to the far left of these couches that they would reside upon and recline on. And that was because when you're at the far left, you could easily see the entire table without turning your head, you could just turn like this, you wouldn't have to be looking all around. And so, the most prominent place would be to the far left of the couch arrangement. That's what they wanted. They'd be reserved for the scribes and the Pharisees.

Verse 40, they also "devour widows' houses." Now this must have really rang a bell with the people because they were notorious for this. Let me give you some background, the scribes were the official administrators for widows' estates when their husbands died; to help them administer the inheritance. I mean, that's all that they had. And of course, your inheritance was very important to you. I mean, even as it is today for us, you know, you ladies if your husband passes away, you've got, you know, what the two of you had together, you have your inheritance. And the widows and the orphans and the Levites would have no inheritance apart from the provisions that God made for them. And so, we read, for example, in Deuteronomy 24, beginning of verse 19. God's provision for them you will remember this, "When you reap your harvest in your field and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, you will go back to get it; it shall be for the alien, for the orphan and for the widow." "When you beat," later on, he says, "When you beat your olive tree, you shall not go over the boughs again; it shall be for the alien, for the orphan, and for the widow. When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not go over it again; it shall be for the alien, for the orphan, and for the widow." So, this was a way of caring for people, very important, in God's economy. In Deuteronomy 24 verse 17, God condemns the leader, he says "You shall not pervert the justice due an alien or an orphan nor take a widow's garment in pledge." In other words, the administration of the law must be carried out equally among all of the people, including the most helpless in society.

D

Now, a little more background. Widows would therefore entrust their estate to the scribes to help them administer all of the transactions. But what the scribes were notorious for doing, was swindling them; getting them to set it up legally so that a portion of their inheritance would be allocated to them. This is what Jesus is referring to when he says that you "devour widows' houses." See, they had the legal knowledge to know where the loopholes were, how to set things up, just like our attorneys, you know, you go and talk to an attorney and they speak a different language, and you just have to trust them. But imagine if your attorney did this, and they set it all up legally, and then later on, you find out that much of what you had belongs to them. We read about the wickedness of this, for example, in Isaiah one, verse 23, "Your rulers are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and chase after rewards. They do not defend the orphan, nor does the widow's plea come before them." Don't you know that those who were guilty of this heinous crime, standing there in front of Jesus and all those people, were squirming in their robes? They were exposed once again. And probably some of the people were looking on them with disdain, because they knew that that's exactly what had happened; some of their loved ones.

Jesus goes on and he says, "And for appearances sake, they offer long prayers." You see their prayers were nothing more than a pretense to impress people with their spirituality, and with their theological acumen, so that you will trust me when it comes time for me to deal with your estate, et cetera, et cetera. Hypocrites are always looking for a platform on which to perform; always looking for the spotlight so that they can run in it, run underneath it, and take a bow. Jesus spoke of this in Matthew six, beginning of verse five. He says, "'When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have the reward in full. But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.'"

Jesus has so many scathing rebukes concerning these false teachers. In Matthew 23, verse 15, it says, "'Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel around on sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much as son of hell as yourselves.'" Boy, Jesus didn't mince any words, did he? Verse 23, and following, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law; justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. You blind guides who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel! Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also, Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside, they are full of dead men's bones, and all uncleanness. So, you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy, and lawlessness. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous and say, 'If we had been living in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them, and shedding the blood of the prophets.' So, you testify against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of the guilt of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence of hell?'" And what's sad, is repeatedly in Scripture, we see that these men knew the truth on so many error areas of doctrine matters, especially pertaining to Jesus, and yet they rejected that. Instead, they taught heresy. And because of their hypocrisy at the end of verse 40, we read what Jesus says, "'these will receive greater condemnation.'" I mean, folks, it's one thing to reject the truth with full knowledge, but it is all together something else to lead other people into deception. That is a heinous wickedness. Therefore, there is a greater condemnation. And sadly, we see this all the time. You see it in the word faith movement, in the prosperity gospel, the woke, LGBTQ, social justice gospels, these are all satanic schemes. These are all demonic conspiracies designed to malign the gospel; to eradicate Biblical Christianity from the planet, and to thwart the purposes of God and redemption. And for this reason, there's a "greater condemnation." "Condemnation"--"krima" in the original language. It speaks of a guilty verdict in a criminal case where the punishment is well understood, its execution. This is the terrifying fate of an apostate.

Psalm 146, verse nine, we read, "The Lord protects the strangers; He supports the fatherless and the widow, but He thwarts the way of the wicked." Let me camp for a moment on another passage that gives further light into this issue of condemnation. It's in Hebrews 10, verse 29. There the writer says, "How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled underfoot the Son of God." And that's what these men were doing. And what many people do today. "To trample something underfoot," it was an expression that describes the most extreme form of disdain and disrespect. It was as if you're saying, "you were so worthless and so filthy, you're like the dust under my superior feet." That's what they were doing to Jesus, as many people do today. I mean, what impudence to know what God has provided through His Son, and to know what the Son endured on behalf of sinners, and then to reject it, that's what the writer of Hebrews is speaking to. They would continually return to the sacrificial system of the old covenant that pointed to the sacrifice of Christ. This was just an inconceivable act of defiance, because the law of Moses was a shadow of the coming Redeemer, the one that fulfilled the law. And so, to see that, to understand that, and then turn your back on that-- I mean, how much severer punishments must that kind of blasphemy deserve? Not only do they trample underfoot the Son of God, but it says, and they have "regarded"--or you could translate that considered--"as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified." By the way he here is not referring to the apostate. This is how many people will interpret this passage who want to argue that a man can lose his salvation; that is an errant position, and it cannot be defended in this passage, rather the closest antecedent is the "Son of God." So, the "He" refers to Jesus and apostate has never been sanctified I'd proven by the fact that he regards the blood of the covenant as unclean so the "he" refers to Christ. In fact, in his high priestly prayer, John 17:19, you will remember that Jesus prays to the Father, saying, and "For their sake, I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth." In other words, he totally set himself apart to do the Father's will, by securing our salvation that we might be set apart unto God through faith in Him. And the point with all of this passage is this, it is utterly unfathomable to consider the Son of God as worthless, as filthy. And that's what they were doing. The one who poured out his blood, and became sin on our behalf, that we might have his righteousness--to come along and to hear these magnificent truths, and to hear Jesus speak of them, and to count it all is worthless. So, God views the apostate with the utmost disdain. If I can pause for a moment, I hope you are not among these people.

Not only did they trample underfoot the Son of God, and regard as unclean the blood of the covenant, but he says, they have "insulted the Spirit of grace." The Spirit of God has come into the world to convict the world of sin and righteousness and judgment. He has given us His Word; he's put the glory of Christ on display. He's revealed to us the truth of the gospel, and you're going to insult him by rejecting all of this. Verse 30, and 31, "For we know Him, who said, 'VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY. 'And again, 'THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE.' It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. I think back in Hebrews six and you don't have this text. But many of the people that were standing before Jesus had heard all of these things and Hebrews six verses four and following speaks about how they had "once been enlightened." In other words, they had once been informed, they had once been instructed about the gospel. This passage is not speaking to believers, it's speaking to unbelievers. They've "once been enlightened," it says that they've "tasted of the heavenly gift." In other words, they had basically enjoyed some measure of the gift of God through common grace. They had gotten a little flavor of the new life, of kingdom blessings. I mean, they had tasted it. They had sampled it, but they had never drank it in; they'd never been changed by it. They had never ingested him fully. It even says that you've been "made partakers of the Holy Spirit." In other words, these unbelieving Jews had shared in a common association of the Holy Spirit. They were exposed to the works of God; they were exposed to the Word of God. Some of them had may even been healed by His power. Some of them have may have eaten of the five loaves and fishes; they had experienced all these things, but they did not possess him. They were never truly born again. But the point is, to experience all of this, these people are hearing Jesus, the scribes are right here, the Pharisees are right here; to hear and to know and experience all of this, and then walk away from it? This is incomprehensibly offensive to our triune God. Oh, dear friends, the consequences of hypocrisy and apostasy.

Hebrews 10, verse 27, it's a "terrifying expectation of judgment, AND THE FURY OF A FIRE WHICH WILL CONSUME THE ADVERSARIES." Now, think about this, the horrors of the Roman invasions a few years later, would come upon these people. And yet, all of that pales in comparison to the eternal terror of hell.

Well, finally, in closing back to Mark 12, we read that Jesus "sat down opposite the treasury and began observing how the people were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which amount to a cent. Calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, 'Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; for they all put in out of their surplus; but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned, all she had to live on.'" Now, many use the story as an example of sacrificial giving; that she gave everything she had. But obviously, that is not what God expects. That's not what is taught and in Scripture. And frankly, such an interpretation is completely foreign to the narrative. Remember here, the context is that of warning, of judgment upon the corrupt religious leaders, who were deceiving people, especially widows, with the false promises of Jewish legalism. And basically, they were saying, like the prosperity teachers do today, "the more you give, the more you're going to get." And there's no indication here in this story, that this woman loved Christ, that she was a believer. There's no mention of the attitude of her heart. There's no commendation for the amount that she gave. There is no mention of any principle of giving in the whole story. Beloved, what this is, is an example of another person, a victim, that's been duped by the greedy religionists that God condemned with the harshest warnings. This poor lady. These were religious predators, and we have them today. Greedy phonies, that took her last cent. So don't use the story of the widow's mite as a lesson on stewardship.

By the way, biblically, God honoring giving is never determined by the amount, but by the attitude. It should be a joyful privilege, not an obligation, an act of worship in love, devotion to Christ. As we look at the New Testament, giving...I mean, a lot of people want to say, "well, you need to tithe." Tithing is not in the New Testament folks, that might be a nice principle for you to use, but you don't have to give 10%. Some people will argue, "yeah, you do, you got to give 10% of gross." Others will say "no, you got to give 10% of net." All of that is ridiculous. All of that comes out of the Old Testament. In the New Testament the principles could simply be described as we need to be sacrificial. We need to give generously, we need to give proportionately to our ability to give, we need to give voluntarily and regularly. We are commanded, for example, to put aside and save as we may prosper, First Corinthians 16 two. Second Corinthians eight three give "according to your ability and beyond your ability, they gave of their own accord." Second Corinthians nine seven, "Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart." That's how we give.

Folks, in closing, beware of religious phonies, heretics, hypocrites, and incompetent pastors and elders, church leaders that are self-appointed, they're unqualified. And one final note. Never attend a church that tries to be attractive and relevant to the culture. That is a very dangerous church. Those churches that are constantly trying to reinvent themselves; churches that adjust the gospel message, they have a commitment to be less dogmatic, more therapeutic, more tolerant, more entertaining. Never attend a church that focuses on taking up social issues. That is always a sure mark of defection. As I say, Jesus and the apostles didn't march around with the "Jews Lives Matter" banner. It was all about the gospel. Look for a church that will not conform to the culture but will lovingly confront it.

Look for a church whose pastor and whose elders are, and I've given you seven things that come out of one of the books that I've written. And I'll use this in closing--look for the pastor who is number one: consumed with God's glory. Number two: content with his suffering. Convinced of his calling, controlled by one message--which is the gospel Christ and Him crucified--confident with one method. And that is the in-depth systematic, expositional doctrinal preaching of the Word and committed to one end, which is presenting every man completed Christ. And confirmed by one power, namely the power of The Holy Spirit. All of this will be the opposite of the false teacher, of the religious phony. May God help us guard our hearts that he might be honored in us and through us and because of us, Amen.

Father, thank you for the truths of your word. Help us to grasp them, not only intellectually, but to embrace them with our heart that we might live consistently with them. We long for your blessing, We long to be salt and light. And for those that may not know you as Savior, O Lord, won't you please bring such overwhelming conviction to them even this hour, that they will run to the cross, and cry out in repentance and place their faith in the living Christ. By your power and for your glory, for it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

I trust that your hearts are indeed hungering for the Lord our God who reveals himself so clearly in his words. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark's gospel chapter 12, as we continue to make our way through it, verse by verse this morning. We will be dealing with the issue of "Who is Jesus Christ?" And this is what the Lord is dealing with in the text in verses 35 through 37. By way of brief context, Jesus knew that the Jewish leaders rejected his claim to be God, very God; they rejected his deity. They considered that to be blasphemy, worthy of death. In fact, the Jews actually believed that their Messiah would be a mere man; a human, being a descendant of Abraham, and David, but a great charismatic type of leader, great amount of power and influence, but not God in human flesh. And here Jesus asks the religious elite, a very important question. And the answer to this question is going to be irrefutable proof that he is indeed, God. As he said, let me read the text Mark 12, beginning of verse 35. "And Jesus began to say, as He taught in the temple, 'How is it that the scribes say that Christ is the Son of David? David himself said, in the Holy Spirit, 'THE LORD SAID TO MY LORD, "SIT AT MY RIGHT HAND, UNTIIL I PUT YOUR ENEMIES BENEATH YOUR FEET."' David himself calls Him 'Lord'; so in what sense is He his son?' And the large crowd enjoyed listening to Him."

Most people today deny the deity of Jesus Christ, and therefore they refuse to worship him, to obey him. We certainly see this in the cults like the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons. You see it in other false religions, like Islam, that believes that he was just a human prophet. And you see it in many apostate Christian groups that have so distorted the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, that it bears virtually no resemblance to who he really is, the true Jesus. And this is certainly true of most so-called Christians in our country. This week, I was thinking of our president who claims to be a Christian, a Roman Catholic. And I was reading that on January 28, he spoke at St. John Baptist Church in Columbia, South Carolina, an African American church. And the purpose, of course, was not to preach the gospel, because he has no clue what the gospel really is, but rather to bolster black support for his re-election. And at the end of the service, President Biden spoke from the pulpit saying, quote, "In my life, I've tried to walk my faith. Here's what I've learned. We're all imperfect beings. We don't know where faith is going to take us or when it's going to take us. But we can do our best to seek the light, the hope, the love. Where I come from, that's the power of faith."

Well, of course, this kind of frivolous drivel is typical of those who have no understanding of what genuine faith really is. They know nothing of the person and the work and the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. And certainly, we witnessed this in a profound way in the State of the Union address where we saw basically an angry, angry rant from a senile narcissist promoting the platform of the Democratic party that's rooted in ideologies that are nothing short of blasphemous to the Lord, our God. Tragic thing. You see, the issue is not "do you have faith?" The issue is, "in whom have you placed your faith? Who is the object of your faith? And why is he the object of your faith?" I wish the President would have quoted First John five beginning in verse four that reads, "For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world--our faith. Who is the one who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?"

So, the question before us is, "Who is Jesus Christ?" The world does not know, nor does it want to know. And Satan makes sure that most people do not know and do not care. Perhaps you've seen the "He Gets Us" marketing campaign that you see on, see it on billboards, TV ads, and so forth. I checked out their website, there's no Bible verses in it. It's a $100 million advertising campaign designed to quote, "rediscover the life and teachings of Jesus, the world's most radical love activist. That is our agenda at He Gets Us; to move beyond the mess of our current cultural moment, to a place where all of us are invited to rediscover the love story of Jesus." Wouldn't it have been nice that the purpose would have been to fulfill the Great Commission. The Jesus that they emphasize is the kind of Jesus the world wants; an idol that winks at sin and judges no one. John Lee, one of the primary organizers of the campaign said this, "Our goal is to give voice to the pent-up energy of like-minded Jesus followers, those who are in the pews and the ones who aren't, who are ready to reclaim the name of Jesus from those who abuse it to judge, harm and divide people." In other words, they want to present a Jesus that the world will love, that the world will follow. Something that obviously Jesus was unable to accomplish. Jesus even said in John seven in verse seven, "'The world hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil.'" And in Matthew 10, beginning of verse 34, Jesus said, "'Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to SET A MAN AGAINST HIS FATHER, AND A DAUGHTER AGAINST HER MOTHER, AND A DAUGHTER-IN-LAW AGAINST HER MOTHER-IN-LAW; and A MAN'S ENEMIES WILL BE THE MEMBERS OF HIS HOUSEHOLD.'"

In the frequently asked questions on the website, they asked this, "Who do you believe Jesus is?" And of course, the answer now is going to reek of the stench of wokeism. Here's the answer. "How did the story of Jesus the world's greatest love story get twisted into a tool to judge harm and divide? How do we remind people that the story of Jesus belongs to everyone? These questions are the beating heart of He Gets Us. We hope to remind everyone, including ourselves, that Jesus’ teachings are a warm embrace, not a cold shoulder. That he didn't let "pro this" and "anti that" opinions prohibit him from seeing the value in all people. He Gets Us invites you to explore Jesus' story, on your own terms and at your own pace." It goes on to say, "Our campaign comprises humble perspective, from a diverse group of Jesus fans and followers with a variety of faith journeys, and lived experiences, bound by a common desire." Don't you wish that their perspectives were derived from the word of God? Goes on to say that, "The common desire is to rediscover and share the compelling story of Jesus' life in a new way. The campaign exists to remind us of the example that Jesus set, while inviting all to explore his teaching so we can all follow his example of confounding, unconditional love. Because he gets us, all of us."

So sad, dear friends, there's nothing in the website about the gospel, which begins with the violated law of a holy God. The president of the marketing agency behind it says quote, "Ultimately, the goal is inspiration, not recruitment or conversion." Dear friends, Jesus did not come to this earth to be our example. He came to this earth to be our Savior. He did not come to this earth to be our inspiration. He came to this earth to be our Lord, our master our God because he is infinitely holy. He is not only a God of love, providing salvation for all who will place their trust in Him, but He is also a God of justice that requires that all sin be punished. The true Jesus said in John 3:36, "'He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.'" And yet there is no place that that is described.

It asks the question, in the Frequently Asked Questions section, "What is your stance on the LGBTQ plus community?" Now here, I wish that they would have said, "Well, our stance is God's stance; that unfortunately, for people that live that, who practice that, they will never enter the kingdom unless they repent of that. That that is an abomination, and we need to love people enough to warn them, and to point them to the forgiveness and the transformation that is in Christ." But no, here's the answer. "These are probably the most common questions we receive. And we understand why many of those who represent Jesus have made people in the LGBTQ plus community feel judged and excluded, and others in the Jesus community have simply ignored their stories and lived experiences. So let us be clear, in our opinion, Jesus loves gay people, and Jesus loves trans people. The LGBTQ plus community, like all people, is invited to explore the story of Jesus and consider his example of unconditional love, grace and forgiveness of others. No matter who you are, you are invited to explore the story of Jesus and consider what it means for your life." They failed to mention that in Leviticus 18, the abomination of homosexuality is sandwiched between the prohibition of child sacrifice and bestiality. They didn't mention that. It didn't talk anything about Sodom and Gomorrah, First Corinthians six, nine and 10, that says the people that practice these things will never enter the kingdom. The emphasis is always love, love, love, but no mention of holiness. In Revelation 21, in verse eight, we read that "the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons, and sorcerers and idolatersa and all liars, their part will be in the lake of fire that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." No mention of that. The true Jesus said, indeed, "'God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.'" But it also went on to say, in verse 18, of John three, Jesus said this, "'He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already.'" In other words, he stands condemned already, and "God's wrath remains upon Him," verse 36. And he goes on to say, "'because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men love the darkness rather than Light, for their deeds were evil.'"

My point with all of this illustration is to simply give you an example of how Christ's deity, and his holiness and His authority over all creation, has been replaced by a politically correct woke, sin tolerant Jesus that doesn't exist. My friends, what the culture needs, is a soul terrifying, sin destroying vision of the true Christ. In Isaiah six you will remember that Isaiah had a vision of the Lord Jesus Christ, lifted up upon his throne, and the serafim all around him. And he did not say "he gets me." He said, "Woe is me." My friends, these are doctrines of demons. These are clever, brilliant counterfeits. And for this reason, John warned in First John four beginning in verse one, "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God." Here's the test. "Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God." In other words, those that would never deny the true nature, and therefore the purpose, of Christ's incarnation. And then he contrasts this with "every spirit that that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world." You see, apostate evangelicalism, wants a Christian faith that will accommodate people that really want nothing to do with the true Jesus. And sadly, this is a damning example of inclusivism that is responsible for sowing countless tears among the wheat; weakening the church, weakening believers that are in the church, by putting so many unbelievers in the church, and therefore they have no discernment, no power, no sacrificial love for Christ and for his people, because they have no saving faith. As Paul said, in Titus one and verse 16, "They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good deed."

It is so sad to see people call Jesus Lord and yet they have no desire whatsoever of worshiping and honoring Him; obeying Him. Jesus spoke about this in Matthew seven, verse 21, when he said, "'Not everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven,'" that's the ones that will, then he will even do many astounding religious works, but never enter the kingdom. As he goes on to say in verse 22, and following, "'Many will say to Me on that day,'" the day of judgment, "Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name, perform many miracles?" And then I will declare to them, "I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS."'"

Beloved, I wish this morning to immerse you into the great depths of the identity of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One, so that we can contemplate the infinite perfections of his nature and His work of redemption. And I pray we will all humble ourselves before his Lordship, as together, we examine these profound and eternal truths concerning Christ. Before we look at the text, again, this is Wednesday probably, of the Passion Week. Jesus is literally hours from his crucifixion; he's teaching in the temple court. He has handily fought off the religious political elite, seeking to humiliate him. He has parried every blow of the devil, with the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; leaving them utterly defeated, but not contrite. And here we see the long suffering, love of Jesus as he boldly proclaims the only truth that can save, even to people who absolutely do not want to hear it and hate him for speaking it.

In Ezekiel 18, verse 23, we read that God takes no pleasure "in the death of the wicked." But he knows the wickedness of their hearts, that they're plotting to kill him, to embarrass him, to expose him, to challenge his authority. And he also knows that they refuse to acknowledge what they know to be true. Namely, that this son of a Nazarene ccarpenter, is in fact, the Messiah; the Anointed One, the son of David, the son of God. And again, may I underscore this reality, that truth that Jesus is God, is the quintessential truth of Christianity, the truth that separates Christianity from all other religions which are false. So just remember Jesus was and is, and will always be God, very God.

So here in Mark 12, as we come to the text, beginning in verse 35, Jesus is is challenging the conventional understanding regarding the nature of the Messiah. He says in verse 35, "And Jesus began to say, as He taught in the temple, 'How is it that the scribes say that the Christ is the Son of David?'" Matthew puts it this way in chapter 22, beginning in verse 41. "Now, while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question, 'What do you think about the Christ, whose Son is He?'" Literally what he's saying is, what is his pedigree, what his his genealogical record? What is his ancestry, from what Jewish line is he descended? And then the text says, "They said to Him, 'The son of David.'"

Now, this is a bit humorous. I mean, Jesus knew that they knew, but he also knew that they couldn't stand what they knew to be true. You see, the Jews kept meticulous records, genealogical records. They were destroyed in 70 AD when the Romans came in and obliterated the temple. But no one could hold any position of authority in Judaism without verification of their genealogy. Priests, for example, had to be descendants of Levi in order to serve. So, without question, the temple authorities had poured over the genealogical records that they hadm to check the veracity of Jesus outlandish, and frankly blasphemous, claim to be the descendant of David, making him the Messiah. And his claim to be all the more credible. If that was not the case, they would have long since exposed him as a fraud.

Now, I wish to remind you of the Old Testament background, that they were trying to disregard, that they were trying to distort in order to justify their rejection. But also, I might add, the source of the answer, they rightly gave, as you will see. And by the way, what's always interesting with people, is folks want to believe certain things, and they don't want to believe other things. And so they pick and choose in the Bible what they want to believe. But, for example, the concept of Christ, the Messiah, being the son of David, comes from the covenant that God made with David in Second Samuel seven, beginning in verse 12. There we read God, now speaking to David through Nathan, "'When your days are complete, and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you, who will come forth from you, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.'" Went on to say in verse 15, "'My loving kindness shall not depart from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. Your house, and your kingdom shall endure before Me, forever; your throne shall be established forever.'" Obviously, this was not a reference to Solomon. Also, they would have known Psalm 89, verses three and four, that further proves the Messiah would be from the line of David. There we read, "'I have made a covenant with My chosen; I have sworn to David My servant, I will establish your seed forever and build up your throne to all generations.'" Moreover, they would have known Ezekiel 37, from which we read earlier, especially verse 21. And following, there, the Holy Spirit speaks through the prophet Ezekial about the future of his covenant people. And he says, "'Thus says the Lord GOD, "Behold, I will take the sons of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and I will gather them from every side and bring them into their own land; nd I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel; and one king will be king over all of them; and they will no longer be two nations and they will no longer be divided into two kingdoms."''" And then he went on to add, "'I will deliver them from all their dwelling places in which they have sinned, and I will cleanse them, and they will be My people and I will be their God.'" And then in verse 24, he says this, "'And My servant David, will be king over them.'" This is a reference to their ultimate final, eternal King, the greater son of David, often called David, as a reference to the Messiah's ancestral name. He goes on to add, "'And they will all have one shepherd and they will walk in My ordinances and keep my statutes and observe them and they shall live on the land that I gave to Jacob My servant, in which your fathers lived and they will live on it, they, and their sons and their sons forever; and David, My servant shall be their prince forever.'" That ultimately will happen, oh, what hope we have in Christ dear friends. When Jesus returns, and he establishes His earthly kingdom, the New Jerusalem will descend from heaven, from the third heaven and hover over the earth, like a giant space module, like a glorious chandelier, suspended over the earth, illuminating the Earth with the glory of God. And this will be an interim kingdom prior to the eternal state where the Lord Jesus Christ will rule upon his throne. And his bride will be able to travel back and forth from the glory of city that Abraham anticipated. We read about it in Hebrews 11, verse 10, "for he was looking for the city which has foundations whose architect and builder is God." And that kingdom will be inaugurated by God, binding Satan. The tribulation martyrs will be resurrected, the sheep and the goat nations will be judged, the entire topography of the holy city will be changed. The millennial temple that is described in such great detail, in Ezekiel chapter 40, through 48 will be built, and the son of King David will rule and he will reign upon Mount Zion. And New Testament saints who constitute the church will reign with him. Folks, this is the long-awaited consummation of redemption, that has been the blessed hope of the saints down through the years. Jeremiah speaks of this in Jeremiah 23, beginning in verse five. where the Lord says, "'When I shall raise up for David's a righteous Branch; He will reign as king and act wisely and do justice and righteousness in the land. In His days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely; and this is His name, by which he will be called, the LORD our Righteousness.'"

Now, there's some of the Old Testament background, that these scribes and these Pharisees would have understood surely. But they hated to admit it because the genealogy of Jesus Christ could be traced back to David, making him the son of David, the rightful heir to the promised throne. And you will also recall that Matthew's genealogy validated the very same thing that indeed Jesus is the Son of David. Well, that being the case, which the scribes and the Pharisees could not deny, Jesus asked this penetrating question in verse 35. "'How is it that the scribes say that the Christ is the Son of David? David himself said, in the Holy Spirit,'" in other words, under the inspiration of the Spirit, "'THE LORD SAID TO MY LORD, "SIT AT MY RIGHT HAND, UNTIL I PUT YOUR ENEMIES BENEATH YOUR FEET."'" And there he's quoting Psalm 110, verse one, David himself calls him Lord, so in what sense Is he his son? In other words, how can the Messiah merely be a human descendant of David? And if you look more closely at Psalm 110 and verse one, we see something very interesting. It says, "The Lord says to my Lord: 'Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.'"

Now, to help us understand this, there's a distinction in the Greek translation of the Hebrew. That makes it clear. Here we see Yahweh, being the first Lord that You see, I believe, I have it underlined. I do. Yahweh, Jehovah, that's the covenant name of God, the first Lord in the phrase, "The Lord said to my Lord,"and the second Lord is "Adonai", a reference to David's Lord, the title name of the Messiah. Yahweh, remember, is the covenant name of God, the tetragrammaton, the four letters, the English translation is capital letters, and Adonai is a substitute for his covenant name. That's a title name, translated with capital or sometimes lowercase letters. So, David is saying this, Yaweh, Jehovah God, addressed my Lord, the Messiah, my ancestral son, the very Son of God, by extension, the Lord Jesus Christ, and here's what Yahweh said to my Lord Messiah, "Sit at my right hand until I make thine enemies a footstool for Thy feet." In other words, Yaweh promised his mediator, the Messiah--David's Lord, that he would give him the final and ultimate glory and majesty and power. This is a promise of preeminence that could only be given by God himself. So, Jesus is saying, since you agreed that the expected Messiah Christ would be the son of David, why would David call his own son, Lord? Mark 12:37, "'David himself calls Him, "Lord"; so in what sense is He his son?'" And the answer is, David's Lord is far more than merely his son, merely his descendant, no, no, he is also the Messiah. He is the Son of God, and they couldn't stand it. And by implication, what Jesus is saying to them is, "I am he--if you reject me, you reject David's Lord."

Now dear friends, please hear me, Jesus Christ is the Promised Messiah. He is the Son of God, the Son of David. Paul also expressed his eternal preexisted deity, you will recall and in Colossians, one, verse 15, where we read, "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation." He is the firstborn, the "prototokos", the preeminent one, the superior one. And the writer of Hebrews says this in Hebrews chapter one, beginning of verse two, "In these last days, God has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. And He is the radiance of His glory, and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power." I would plead with you, do not be like the Jewish elite and try to deny the deity of Christ. Over and over, he proved his deity. He had power over the seas, he had power over the wind, he had power over sickness and sin and Satan and death. And only willful rejection can possibly deny such an obvious truth. You see, friends, the issue in unbelief is not one of insufficient evidence, nor is it an issue of presentation. The issue is hardness of heart. People simply do not want to believe and how sad to see the response of the Jewish elite. Can't you imagine their response as he asked them this question? You know, like we would say down here, I mean, it was like a mule staring at a new gate. Didn't know what to say? Overwhelmed. There's silenced in their guilt before their Creator. In Matthew 22, verse 46 ee read, "and no one was able to answer Him a word, nor did anyone dare from that day on to ask Him another question." You know, truth will always silence error ultimately. To argue with truth is like spitting into a gale force wind. Ultimately, error will always yield to the omnipotent power of divine truth.

Notice in Mark 12:37, we read, "the great crowd enjoyed listening to Him." My how nice, what a clever man, what a clever man. You see, they heard him with their ears, but they did not hear him with their heart. Frankly, in a matter of hours, they would cry out, "Crucify Him." Can there be any better illustration of spiritual blindness than this? This is what Paul talked about in Second Corinthians four, four, "The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." I mean, when it is pitch black and somebody flashes a light and you can't see it, you are blind. Satan uses every means possible at his disposal to prevent people from seeing and understanding the truth and the astounding attractiveness of the gospel. He uses errant theology, false teachers, often they're unwitting. The dribble like I gave you a little bit ago--He Gets Us. All these deceptive schemes that appeal to man's fallen nature. In Ephesians four Paul says this about unbelievers beginning in verse 17, "Gentiles also walk in the futility of their mind being, darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them." And here's why, "because of the hardness of their heart; and they having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." I mean, these people witnessed countless miracles from Jesus. He manifested unparalleled love, and kindness and compassion before them. They marveled at his wisdom, they marveled at his command of Scripture. In fact, in John 7:46, we read what they said, "Never has a man spoken the way this man speaks." And when he asked his most bitter, bitter enemies in John 8:46, "'Which one of you convicts Me of sin?'" None of them was able to respond to his challenge. Indeed, he is holy, he is innocent, he is undefiled; "separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens", Hebrews seven and verse 26. Yet despite all of this, they rejected him.

This is illustrated as well in First Corinthians two and verse 14, you're familiar with the text, it says, "But a natural man,"--it could literally be translated, "a man of animal soul," "one led by lower animal nature", "a person that is ruled by his bodily appetites", he's estranged from divine life. In fact, in James three, verse 14, and following you read about it, it says, "you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant, and so lie against the truth. This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is not attached to this earthly, natural, demonic." Wisdom that is earthly, natural and demonic. The description, quite frankly, of the vast majority of our political leaders today that are in authority over us. "But a natural man", a man that is bereft of the indwelling Spirit and lives for himself and the things of the world, "does not accept" or literally, does not welcome the things, "of the Spirit of God." In other words, he rejects those things, he refuses those things, and here's why, "for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them." Here I'm reminded of Romans eight and verse seven, where Paul says, "the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so." Oh, what would we do were it not for the regenerating power of the Spirit of God? They are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised, spiritually judged, spiritually discerned. In other words, because they judge according to their depraved animal nature, they are unable to render a proper verdict, because they can't recognize the facts. Well, in light of this amazing scenario, I wish to address just two final subjects that I believe emerge from this text that are very practical to each of us.

First of all, I would encourage each one of us to number one, revel in his glorious character. I like that word, "revel". We don't use it much. It means to celebrate, to rejoice in, to delight in. This so sad, Jesus so clearly, and compellingly revealed himself to the people. And yet they turned away their ears from the truth and turned aside under myths. I'm reminded of Second Timothy two as I was meditating upon this passage this week, beginning of verse 24, we read, "The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses, and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will." Oh, dear friends, we revel in the glorious character of Christ, and what he has done for us in His saving work of redemption. And here we see Jesus, doing exactly what we just read about here. He is compassionately, but forthrightly presenting the truths of the gospel. And yet most of them remained incarcerated, captured by the ghoulish clause of Satan's deception. They refuse to believe that he was who he said he was, and proved he was. And oh what mercy is ours to know the truth, and what indescribably precious gift that we have in our faith that has come to us by the power of regeneration.

I'm reminded of James one and verse 17, "Every good thing bestowed and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation, or shifting shadow." And then he says this, "In the exercise of His will"--not my will--but, "in the exercise of His will, He brought us forth by the word of truth." Oh, dear child of God, we need to revel in his glorious character and be devoted to him. And be able to say, "Oh Savior, what a blessed thought, to know of your great love, yet, Lord, I pray for what I ought to live for you above."

That brings me to my second point for you. Just really, practically, not only should we revel in his glorious character, but I would challenge you to rediscover the implications of his Lordship, in your life. Even as David called him, "Lord", and therefore worshipped and obeyed him as Lord, so too, we must submit to him, as our Lord, as our Master. We should willingly and joyfully call him Lord, because he loved us and gave himself for us. For example, in First Corinthians six, verse 19, we read that our "body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God." Isn't it amazing? As I say so often, because it's such a powerful truth to me, he redeemed us that he might inhabit us. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God. He goes on to say, "You are not your own, for you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body." Think of the implications of that. Our master has laid claim to us, and rightfully so, how dare we dispute such a claim? In Romans four in verse 24, the Holy Spirit caused the inspired apostle to speak of him as quote, "Jesus our Lord." "Jesus", in other words, our Master, the one we obey. Can you honestly refer to him in such a way? We are to obey none besides him, for he alone has the right to rule in our life.

May I ask you is it your passion to offer him your very life? To love him more than even your own family? Your earthly goods, your personal ambitions? Is it the desire of your heart to labor for him, and labor to love what he loves, and hate what he hates; to train your mind, as I say, to love him. Is it the passion of your heart to flee from anything that would grieve Him; that would cause him to be sorrowful for what you are doing, and thus forfeit blessing in your life and even put yourself in a position of divine chastening. Is it the passion of your heart to patiently endure every trial? Trusting completely in his sovereign care. Is it the passion of your heart to consecrate all that you have to his service, to live in light of his return? To cherish him more than life itself? This is the stuff of the Lordship of Christ, dear friend. Do you love fellowship with the saints? Do love to serve the saints? To sing with the saints? Let me put it this way, does the name of Jesus stir your blood like nothing else? Does the thought of Jesus and his Word and his ineffable sweetness come stealing over your soul habitually, as you spend time with the lover of your soul? Do you long to see Christ face to face? Can you honestly say, "Even so, Lord Jesus come quickly." That's the stuff of the Lordship of Christ. Can you say with the Apostle Paul in Philippians, three, verse seven, "Whatever things were gained to me, those things I've counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ, Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ." Beloved, this is the stuff of the Lordship of Christ. And the result in your life is going to be one of great blessing and great power--come what may.

In closing, there are stories that abound regarding saints who claim Jesus as Lord and even in the face of persecution, they never flinched, they never bowed to another God. I think of those that were persecuted under Rome. The things the Romans did were unimaginably demonic and brutal. I think of Ignatius Theodorus, who's also called Ignatius of Antioch. By the way, he succeeded Peter, as the pastor at Antioch. He was seized by the Romans because of his faith in Christ Jesus as Lord and sentenced to be devoured by wild beasts in Rome. And as he passed through the cities, from Syria, all the way to Rome on the way to be delivered to martyrdom, he encouraged other believers all along the way. Let me give you a quotation of some of what he said, quote, "Now I begin to be a disciple. I care for nothing of visible or invisible things so that I made but win Christ. Let fire and the cross, let the companies of wild beasts, let breaking of bones and tearing of limbs, let the grinding of the whole body and all the malice of the devil come upon me. Be it so. Only may I win Christ Jesus."

I have a plaque that I put right here many years ago and it simply says, "we would see Jesus." Is that the cry of your heart? Polycarp, the venerable Bishop of Smyrna, asked to pray before he was burned. And what's fascinating is that he prayed with such fervency that his guards actually repented. And the Proconsul urged him, quote, "Swear and I will release thee. Reproach Christ." And here's how he answered, quote, "Eighty and six years have I served him, and he never once wronged me. How then shall I blaspheme my king who hath saved." 1000s of similar stories. Beloved, you will know that Christ is your Savior and Lord if your life proves that he is your Lord. If he is not your Lord, you need to seriously examine the veracity of your faith, because it is probably spurious. Those of you, who perhaps are like the Pharisees, who refuse to believe that Jesus is the Son of God, the only Savior of sin, I plead with you this morning as a minister of the gospel, that you trust in Him, that you will repent and place your faith in him before it's too late. And for those of us who have bowed the knee to Christ, as everyone will, either in triumph or in terror, may we all celebrate even more; all that he has given us. And pray that indeed, he will come quickly. But until he does, may we be found faithful in serving, worshiping, and honoring Jesus, our Lord and our Savior, amen? Let's pray together.

Father, the eternal truths of your word are always so penetrating to us. Whenever we examine them, we find our hearts being laid bare. And how thankful we are that there is grace, that there is mercy, that there is forgiveness at the foot of the cross. Lord, for those who perhaps only know you by name, but they don't love you as Savior, and obey you as Lord, may today be the day that you overwhelm them with such conviction that they writhe in misery until they come to you in repentant faith. And Lord for all of us, who are debtors to your grace, may we have a renewed spirit of joy and excitement as we anticipate all that is ours in Christ? For it's in his name that I pray, Amen.

It is absolutely astounding to me to realize that God has disclosed himself to us, his creation, not only in his creation, but also in his written revelation, the Bible and the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Folks, I hope and pray that you will never lose the wonder of these realities, especially now this morning as we look into his word that he has given to us. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark 12. We are still in verses 28 through 34, under the heading "God's Foremost Commandments." Let me read the text to you, Mark 12, beginning in verse 28, "One of the scribes came and heard them arguing and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, 'What commandment is the foremost of all?' Jesus answered, 'The foremost is, 'HEEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD; AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL., AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STENGTH.' The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these.' The scribe said to Him, 'Right, Teacher; You have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM; AND TO LOVE HIM WIITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL THEUNDERSTANDING AND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE'S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all bird offerings and sacrifices.' When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently He said to him, 'You are not far from the kingdom of God.' After that, no one would venture to ask Him any more questions."

The context here is the Temple Mount. Jesus is about to days...(audio not available).... lawyer of the Law of Moses, brilliant in the Old Testament scriptures in the rabbinic traditions. He steps forward now to take a shot at Jesus as the Herodians and the Pharisees had done previously, as well as those from the Sanhedrin. And as you will recall, the last time we were together, he had a baited question. And I gave you a three-point outline. We looked at the last two, I'll review them very quickly. The first two points were number one, we see the baited question, secondly, the indicting response. And then finally, the practical implications, which we will look at today. But let me give you a review to remind you what's going on here.

Under the heading the baited question, he says, "What commandment is the foremost of all?" Remember, the ancient Jews had a real dilemma. They believe there were 613 laws in the Pentateuch, and they know that they couldn't keep all of the laws. Plus they had all kinds of other traditions that they had added. And they divided them into heavy laws and light laws. So they had to come up with a solution. How can we impress God so that he will save us with all of these laws? And so what we need to do is at least keep the heavy ones; the essential ones. So the question that they debated quite often was, well, what's the foremost commandment of all? If we keep that one, then surely God will be impressed. And of course, that is the great error of works righteousness. But Jesus knew their motivation. They knew that he knew that that scribe and all of them were trying to discredit him. And he also knew that they had some really bad theology.

So he responded to the baited question, secondly, with the indicting response. He said, "'The foremost is 'HEAR, O Israel, THE LORD OUR GODE IS ONE LORD; ANDD YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.' The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these.'" Now bear in mind that the Jewish people were very, very familiar with what Jesus just said. In fact, they would recite that two times per day. And they even wrote it on parchment and put it in phylacteries, which were little leather boxes; they had one that would be strapped onto the wrist on the left side closest to the heart. And you can see Orthodox Jews today, they will wrap them around their arm and then they will have one on their head too and they will, Jewish men, will use these during morning prayer. And they would also place the written law here in a little box, "Mezuzah," which means "door post," actually. They would put that on their door post. And if you go to Israel today, you'll see this; if you go into a hotel room, if you go into a restaurant, wherever you go, you'll see a little box and inside of that is this law. In fact, it's always fascinating to me, even when you go into a restaurant, I remember one gal she was busy running in and out of the kitchen and every time she walked through the kitchen door, there was a mezuzah, and she'd kiss it like this. And her left arm was just going like this constantly. So the point is, they knew about all of this. It was the Shema, which is the Hebrew word for "hear." It comes from Deuteronomy six beginning of verse four "'Hear'", which by the way, is tantamount to obey. "'Hear, O Israel, the LORD is our God the Lord is one! You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might. These words, which I am commanding you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down nd when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.'" In other words, you must love the one true God perfectly, comprehensively, singularly with the totality of your being--that's the foremost commandment. Moreover, as you live that out, your children are going to ask what's going on here? Why are we doing these things? Why do we say these things?

By the way, folks, we all need to confuse our children with our godliness. So they will ask those questions. And then you can tell them, you can explain it to them. Now, of course, they didn't live this out as they should, as we examined the last time. And I believe that each of us struggle in this area as well. And so I wanted to take some time, and just write down some practical implications of what it means to love the Lord our God. And I came up with four, kind of overlapping realities, that I hope will be helpful to you. First of all, when he says that we should "love" him, realize that number one, this is a commanded love. This is not a suggestion. This is a command. In fact, in the Greek grammar, we see that the actions that will be performed in the future by the subject of the sentence must definitely occur. And that will only happen by the power of the indwelling Spirit.

Now, the question comes to all of us, how can God or anyone else, command us to love him? Or to love anyone for that matter? And that's a question that really comes out of a superficial understanding, a shallow understanding of the biblical term "love" as we see in Scripture. You see, we tend to think of love as an emotion. Like in romance, and of course, we use the term to describe everything from puppies to pizza, right? I mean, we love all kinds of things. But the term "love"--"ahavah" in Hebrew is from a root word "hav"--that which means to give or to care for or to have loyalty towards. So you must understand that the concept of love here doesn't describe how we feel, it describes how we act, how we behave, how we live, and who we live for. The Hebrew equivalent in New Testament Greek is "agapaó" or agape love; loyal, self-sacrificing love of choice, not emotion; even though many times emotion will be a part of that. I mean, think about it. Sadly, most romantic relationships are built upon a wrong understanding of love. I mean, think about most young people, they start to get to that age where they think about finding a mate, and all of a sudden, they get a quiver in their liver, and they can't talk, they can't breathe, the person's just so overwhelming to them. And they have this emotion of love, right? And I'm not saying that that's all bad, but when that's all it is, there's going to be problems. Most people fall in lust rather than in love. I was thinking about this and because of some things that happened last week, I thought I would check out the lyrics of one of the, evidently the most famous singer that we have today, Taylor Swift. I've never heard her, nor do I have any desire to hear her. But I thought I would check it out. And in fact, I heard that the idolatry of this woman is--the people are called “Swifties.” And I thought, well, that's really interesting. And I thought I would, by the way, I read a few things that she had said, and she's extremely hostile to biblical Christianity. A very woke, ungodly, young woman, I guess she's packs out stadiums all over the world. In fact, had a family member, that you wouldn't know, that had bought tickets for their family of $300 apiece, they bought four of them to go hear her in Chicago, and they said that they could sell them for $3000 a piece. So it's incomprehensible to me, that anybody would want to do that. But that shows you the level of idolatry and what the world wants. By the way, that it's such a testimony of what God does to a regenerate heart, it just changes our desires. You know I find that whole thing to be absolutely repulsive. It is repugnant to me, and to you. You know, it's like, I always think of my horses, they will absolutely run over you to get sweet feed and alfalfa hay, but you offer him a good steak, they want nothing to do with it. They have to have a change of nature. And that's what God has done with us.

Well, anyway, I was checking out the lyrics; I looked it up her number one song right now it's called "Is it Over?" And I read through the lyrics, they're too vulgar for me to recite. It's all about an immoral lover, who dumped one woman to fornicate with another woman. I mean, that's just the theme of so much of music that we have today. But that is a perfect example of a distorted understanding of love. A passion that's basically produced by sexual lust. And most marriages, sadly, are built upon emotion, rather than loyalty. They're built upon receiving, rather than giving; a kind of mutual manipulation rather than selfless devotion. It's kind of like walking up in front of everyone to be married and you're saying, to your wife to be or maybe your husband to be sweetheart, you make me feel so good. I'm just overwhelmed when I get around to you. And I'll tell you what, I'm going to give you an opportunity to keep making me feel that way for the rest of my life. Now, love is going to include emotion, but it shouldn't be built upon it. Because dear friends, biblical love that is commanded here is selfless. It is self-sacrificing. It is a conscious commitment to meet the other person's needs; to prefer yourself over or to prefer them over yourself. You don't marry someone so that they will meet your needs. That's not love. That's selfish manipulation. And eventually, that will lead to all manner of covenantal unfaithfulness.

I think of what Paul warned in Second Timothy three and verse two about men being quote, "lovers of self rather than lovers of God." Now, it's true that, again, there's going to be emotion here with love; we're going to have that in our love for God, but especially as we think about how it's distorted--rather than most people coming into a relationship, and saying, "I am devoted to you," it's more of a subtle sense of, "I'm devoted to me, and I'm gonna use you to make me feel good." Well, true love is the type of love that Christ gave to us. Did he not choose to set his love upon us even when we were wretched and depraved sinners? Romans five and verse eight that I read earlier, "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." We see this pictured in Christ's love for his bridal church; the supreme example in how we are to love Ephesians five, verse 25, and following "Husbands love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her." You know, when Christ gave himself up for me, there wasn't anything there worthy of his love. But it was a choice. Why did he do that? "So that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water, and the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body."

So friends, this is what God commands. This is the kind of love that he commands. A conscious commitment that enlists every aspect of our being. So first, our love is a commanded love. Again, a conscious, decisive, determined, self-sacrificing love of choice, not mere emotion. But secondly, it is a complete love. Notice in verse 30, "'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.'" Now, together, these terms describe the complete essence of man, and the focused, passionate devotion and desires and inclinations that we are to have toward God. In other words, our love shouldn't be some half-hearted, insincere, superficial, occasional kind of love, but a wholehearted, sincere kind of love; a deep love, a consistent love, with the totality of all that we are.

But I want you to notice something here. If we look at Deuteronomy six five that I read earlier, from which the Lord quoted, it says, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and might." Now mind you, these are overlapping shades of meaning, describing the totality of our personhood, as I described last time. But it's interesting, that Jesus, the Lord of the church, with full authority, adds something in his statement here and Mark 12:30, as well and as well as in Matthew 22:37. He said that we should love Him "with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind, and with all your strength." I find this interesting. "Dianoia" in the original language, the "mind" here, it refers to the intellectual part of us; our thoughts, our understanding. And the verb means literally, to reflect upon something to or to ponder, to pensively reflect or perceive. And it's interesting that only men and angels have the capacity to do this. You don't see your dog sitting out there in the yard contemplating the infinite perfections of the One who created him. He's just waiting for his next meal, right? But the mind is the seat of comprehension. It is where reason takes place. It is the wellspring of our emotions. Now think about this. The scribes and the Pharisees perceive themselves to be intellectually superior to everyone else. Especially the hoi polloi that was beneath them. And they did have a towering intellect. I mean, these are brilliant scholars--experts in interpreting the law, or so they thought, Now perhaps Jesus included the faculty of the mind to somehow demonstrate their ignorance and their indolence. We can't say for sure. But it's worth pondering in and of itself. Because they failed to understand the crucial role of the mind in loving God. And as I thought about this, it reinforced in my mind the importance of training my mind, to love the Lord. We read in Ephesians four, verse 17, that unbelievers "walk in the futility of their mind being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." And then he goes on in verse 23, talking about believer saying that we must be "renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth." So there's been a supernatural transformation here of a believer's mind. And we read in Romans eight beginning of verse six, "For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so. And those who are in the flesh cannot please God." So all through Scripture, what we see is that the mind must be transformed. It must be renewed, so that it can fully engage in loving God. It must be illumined, it must be trained, it must be disciplined, to love the Lord our God, and by the power of the indwelling Spirit. We have, as we read in First Corinthians 2:16, "the mind of Christ"--literally the understanding of Christ; the thoughts of Christ. It's a magnificent, miraculous work of grace that occurs in every believer, it is a spirit wrought transformation in the mind, in our thinking. That's why Jesus said in John 171:7, "'Father, sanctify them in the truth, Your word is truth.'" Because you see, it is the Scripture, by the power of the Holy Spirit , hat informs the mind. And the mind informs the conscience, which activates the will, which animates the emotions. Second Corinthians four, a familiar passage, beginning in verse four, we read, that "The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." In other words, unbelievers just live for themselves. They're absorbed in their own life; they're absorbed in the fleeting pleasures of life. That's why you see people constantly walking around like this. They're completely worshipping all the stuff that's on their phones, a form of idolatry. They live out their lives and suppress the truth of who God is. In fact, the Psalmist says in Psalm 10, verse four, "The wicked, in the haughtiness of his countenance, does not seek Him. All his thought thoughts are, 'There is no God.'" There's no God, I don't need to worry about all that stuff. And so they will worship someone like a Taylor Swift, and mock God, as she does, and so many others. And we see this played out in so many ways, I think of the whole DEI, woke world in which we live. It's just insane. Somebody told me the other day that woke stands for "willfully overlooking known evil." Kind of a good way of putting it. I added my own twist to DEI, "demonically, empowered insanity." That's what we see. That's the way the world thinks.

So indeed, the god of this world "has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God." But he goes on in verse six and says, "God, who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness,'" which he did at creation, "is the One who has shown in our hearts to give the Light, of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." Beloved, that is the power of regeneration, when he raises us from spiritual death to spiritual life, changes everything about us and makes us a new creature in Christ. Dear Christian, rejoice in the transformed mind, but learn to train your mind to love God. "Set your mind on the things above," Colossians, three, two, "not the things that are on the earth." Romans 12 two says that we are to be "transformed by the renewing of your mind." Transformed comes from a Greek word "metamorphoó" where we get the word metamorphosis, and it's in the passive voice, which means it's the renewing of your mind that's going to cause a metamorphosis to occur. And what is that metamorphosis? The metamorphosis is so that you, as a new creature in Christ, will manifest that reality on the outside, so that everyone can see it. It's just the opposite of the phrase right before "do not be conformed to this world," which literally means do not let the world squeeze you into its mold, where you begin to look like it. In fact, the term there for, conformed, "syschēmatizō" is, it means "a masquerade." Don't let the world out there cause you to unwittingly wear a masquerade that is inconsistent with who you really are on the inside, as a believer; as one clothed in the righteousness of Christ. Don't let that happen to you, but rather "be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Dear friends, when that happens, we can say with Paul that "I count all things to be lost in view of their surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord."

Oh, I trust that you know him. And I must ask you, are you disciplined in training your mind to love God? May put it a little bit differently, perhaps? How often do you find a quiet place and just contemplate the glory of God? How often do you do that? I would argue that most Christians couldn't do that for more than about a minute and maybe two. You ever sit down and think, God, where did you come from? Immediately your head begins to explode. Right? God you've said in your word that you are the self-existent, pre-existent, uncreated Creator of the universe, oh, God, as I reflect upon that all I can do is bow before you. How often do you reflect, reflect upon his attributes, his goodness, his grace, his mercy, his love, his faithfulness, his wrath? How often do you think about his holiness, which is the all-encompassing attribute of God describing his hidden glory, that attribute that portrays his infinite otherness. His incomprehensible transcendence; the consummate perfection and moral purity of his eternal character. How often do you think about Christ as your Redeemer? The one who came to this earth in the incarnation, who went to the cross to bear the sins of all who would trust in him; to give you forgiveness, so that you could be reconciled to a holy God through faith in him? How often do you think about what Christ did in the past? What he is doing in the present? And what he's going to do in the future? How often do you think about your union with Christ? As Paul said, in Galatians, 2:20, to think that "I have been crucified with Christ." So now, "it's no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me." The life that I live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loves me and delivered himself up for me. How often do you just sit there and think about that? Reflect upon that? Peter said in First Peter two seven that Christ is "precious," for those who believe. Is he precious to you? How often do you think about what Peter said, in Second Peter one, beginning of verse three, that he "has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness." We set and just think about what some of those things are. Or as he went on, to say that "He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them, you may become partakers of the divine nature." My there is at least an hour's worth of contemplation right there. Folks, my point is, this is what it looks like to train your mind to love God. I mean, think about it, in First Peter 1:12. We read that these are things "into which angels long to look." Don't you think we ought to as well?

One of my favorite books is entitled "Meditations and Discourses on the Glory of Christ." It was written by John Owen, 17th century Puritan theologian, he was the academic administrator at Oxford University. Let me read what he had to say, just a small portion, and you'll have to bear with me with some of the old English. He said, "God's glory is incomprehensible, and His praises are unutterable. That real view which we may have of Christ and His glory in this world, by faith, however, we can obscure that knowledge which we may attain of them by divine revelation, is inexpressibly to be preferred above all other wisdom, understanding or knowledge, whatever. So it is declared by whom, who will be acknowledged to competent judge in these things, yay, doubtless sayeth he. I count all these things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord. He who does not so has no part in Him." He went on to say, "The revelation made of Christ in the blessed gospel is far more excellent, more glorious, and more filled with arrays of divine wisdom and goodness, than the whole creation and the just comprehension of it, if attainable, can contain or afford. Without the knowledge hereof, the mind of man, however priding itself in other inventions and discoveries, is wrapped up in darkness and confusion. This, therefore, deserve the severest of our thoughts, the best of our meditations and our utmost diligence in them." End quote.

So this is a commanded love. It is a complete love garnering the totality of our being, including our mind, I might even say, especially our mind. But thirdly, it is a covenant of love. Were it not so, it would be impossible for us to love him, even as poorly as we do. Let me give you the big picture so that you understand what I'm saying here. You will recall that in Genesis 12, one and two, God promised Abraham that he would have many descendants, and that they would become a great nation and that they would mediate blessings to all the families of the earth. And then later on in Exodus 19 and 20, God gave Israel a bilateral, conditional, nullifiable covenant--unlike the Abrahamic covenant--it's called the Mosaic Covenant, the Mosaic law. And this was the means through which Israel could stay connected to the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant, not a means of salvation. And then later in Second Samuel seven, verses 12, through 16, God made a covenant with David, promising him a kingly line that would rule Israel, and ultimately rule over all of the Earth, as we read in Zechariah, 14 nine and Isaiah nine, six through seven. But God also knew that he had to do something to fallen humanity, to change their nature, so that they would truly love him with all of their heart and obey him willfully, with all of their heart, their soul, their mind, their strength. And so he made a new, unconditional, unilateral, irrevocable, eternal covenant, whereby he would enable and empower people, including Gentiles, to do just that. We read of this, for example, in Jeremiah 31, beginning in verse 31, "'Behold, days are coming,' declares the LORD, 'when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,' declares the Lord. And of course, there he's referring to the Mosaic Covenant, the only covenant that was conditional and nullifiable and temporary. But he goes on to say, "'But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,' declares the Lord, 'I will put My law within them on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD' for thy will know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,' declares the Lord, 'for I will forgive their iniquity and their sin I will remember no more.'"

Now, while the Mosaic Law was "holy and righteous and good," as we read in Romans seven and verse 12, it did not enable people to love the Lord with their whole heart. But the New Covenant did , and this required the regenerating power of the Spirit, as we read in Ezekiel 36, beginning in verse 26, God says, "'Moreover, I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.'" And of course, the New Testament presents Jesus as the Son of David. He was the mediator of the new covenant, and the only one who can bring new covenant blessings to people who have faith in him. And that's why at the Last Supper, Jesus explicitly linked his death with the new covenant. That's why he said in Luke 22:20, "'This cup that is poured for you is the new covenant in My blood.'" And believers today in the church proclaim the New Covenant as we preach the Gospel. Paul said in Second Corinthians three, six, God has made us "sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the spirit." "Of the letter," referring to the superficial, external, legalistic conformity to the law that was supposed to somehow make a person see their sinfulness. That's why God gave the law. But instead, it promoted a spirit of self -righteousness to them. Worse yet, their externalism prevented them from joyfully obeying the most basic requirement of the law, the foremost commandment to love God perfectly, and their neighbors as their selves.

So here's the good news of the gospel. Because of God's covenantal love for us, the Lord Jesus Christ, through the agency of the Spirit can transform our hearts so that we can love God and our neighbor, albeit imperfectly, until we enter into heaven, and the last vestige of our unredeemed humanity will finally and forever be removed. But between now and then, as we read earlier, in Romans five, verse five, we read that "the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us." And because of his infinite love, and grace expressed in the new covenant, we see that he is the one that first loved us, so that we could love him. And John summarizes this perfectly as we looked at briefly last time, we were together in First John four verse 19. "We love," why?, "because He first loved us. If someone says, 'I love God' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen." In other words, the point with all of this is a genuine, wholehearted love for God must be initiated by God Himself. We are incapable of doing that. It requires the regenerating work of the Spirit of God within us to cause us to be born again. This is what the Jewish leaders, the Jewish people, did not understand, but needed to hear.

And this leads us to a fourth reality about what it means to love God. Not only is it a commanded love, and a complete love and a covenant of love, but it is a confirmed love. Think about this, what is the test that proves our sincere, wholehearted love for God? What is it that validates the joy and the satisfaction that we have in him? What is it that really proves that he is the priority of our life? That we are living for him that we are serving for him and not just ourselves? Well, the answer is very clear here in the second commandment, that's why he says in verse 31, "'The second is this, YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these.'" Remember, while this was a direct quote from the Mosaic law that they claimed to revere, as recorded in Leviticus 19 And verse 18, the rabbi's taught something different. And I went into this in great detail last time, but let me just review it quickly. They taught that you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. Jesus described this in Matthew five and verse 43. Remember, the Jewish rabbis were very selective in their interpretation and application of the law. That said, You shall love your neighbor as yourself, Leviticus 19:18. But instead, they did, really four things. Number one, they ignored the meaning of love--"ahavah"--the loyal sectors, self-sacrificing love of choice, not mere emotion. Secondly, they defined neighbor in the most narrow terms so that they could justify their prejudices and my were prejudice. Plus, they ignored the last phrase "as yourself." And instead, number four, they added "and hate your enemy;" the pretty bold distortion of Scripture. And again, they did this because they arbitrarily extrapolated certain passages out of the Old Testament scriptures; like passages referring to exterminating the Canaanites, and the imprecatory Psalms, and so forth, to somehow justify themselves. But what they deliberately failed to understand, in all of those illustrations, in the Old Testament, is that there is a huge difference between personal injury and divine justice.

And this is worth me camping on again for just a few minutes in applying this. God's judgments and his curses that we read about in Scripture were judicial acts of an infinitely Holy God. And they have no application to us in terms of our own personal injury, and somehow redressing individual grievances and offenses. And so therefore, it is absolutely absurd to think that we can apply the actions of divine justice as an excuse to hate and to kill other people that have offended us. And some will argue, Well, wait a minute, you know, we're told to love our enemies. If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat, turn the other cheek, return good for evil, and forgive those who mistreat us. But again, bear in mind that those commands and virtues are aimed at the mortification of personal pride that seeks retaliation for a personal offense. They have nothing to do with the abdication of justice and the vindication of righteousness that God alone can do with Jesus commands, with respect to loving our enemies, must be balanced with the whole idea that he is the sole and holy avenger of those who are violently opposed to him.

Now, I know that people will ask therefore, in light of all these things, is it appropriate for Christians to defend themselves when they are attacked? Very important question in this violent culture in which we live, where criminals have more rights than victims? Well, the answer is, well, of course it is. Of course it is, even if it means arming yourself. I mean, that's common sense. Jesus even said in Luke 22:36, "'Whoever has no sword is to sell his coat and buy one.'" I mean, self-defense and self-preservation is an innate mechanism in all of us. We see it in our immune system, we see it in how we naturally respond to things. If somebody comes up to you and does this, you immediately back away and put your hands up. If somebody gets too close to your face, you back away and your eyes blink. I mean, it's just the way we are built. You don't have to teach a young mother or a young father, that they need to protect their baby when somebody comes and grabs it. All right? It's just a natural response. When it says love our neighbors as ourselves, again, it's referring to anyone who is in need; families, for friends, and we have to love them enough to protect them. And it's absurd to think that if your enemy breaks into your home or does something to hurt you, that you just kind of let them do whatever they want. It's absurd to say that Jesus taught that Christians cannot defend themselves from evil people. In fact, Jesus said "'Greater love has is no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

Now I want to elaborate on this just a little bit more. Remember that after the flood, God introduced capital punishment, through the force and ultimate threat of government, because human life is valuable. We're made in the image of God. And we read in Genesis nine beginning of verse five, for example, "'Surely I will require your lifeblood; from every beast, I will require it. And from every man from every man's brother, I will require the life of man. Whoever sheds man's blood by his blood shall be shed. For in the image of God, He made man.'" And of course, we read in Romans 13 and verse four, that government is "a minister of God, to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil."

In fact, as we study it, war is an extension of capital punishment designed to protect innocent people, or restrain evil, to maintain social order. Otherwise, you have anarchy. And we've seen evidence of that, especially in the last several years in our country. But you must bear in mind that the government, while it's there to protect you, while we do have police, and sheriff's deputies, and military, they're not going to be there when you really need it, and you have to call 911. You're going to have to protect yourself. Most of the time, it's going to take them a while to get there, right? Of course, you have to protect yourself.

Now back to the issue of love. You see, loving your neighbor, is what validates your love for God. And what a testimony in this "me first" world in which we live. John 13:35 Jesus said, "'By this, all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.'" And indeed the world is going to hate us. Second Timothy 3:12, "Indeed," he says, "all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." But again, we must love them for the cause of the gospel. Even though we may have to protect ourselves from them, if they attack us or our family. And remember, as Jesus said in Matthew five, beginning of verse 10, "'Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, who falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.'" We've all experienced that, right? And if you haven't, you're going to as you serve Christ, and stand up for him; that's just part of being in a fallen world. Those are personal injury types of things; that's where we turn the other cheek and so forth. But he goes on to say, "'Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.'" What a wonderful promise right? The Lord sees, the Lord will reward.

So dear friends, what does it mean to love God and to love your neighbor? Just bear in mind that this is a commanded love, a complete love, a covenant of love and a confirmed love. And you want to ask, "does this describe me?" How do people who know me best describe me? Well, as we close, so sad, the scribe who heard Jesus answered in reply, "Right, Teacher; You have truly stated.'" In other words, your theology is correct Jesus. Verse 34, "When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, 'You are not far from the kingdom.'" You're not in the kingdom, but you're not far. That's the point. Dear friend, it's one thing to embrace accurate theology. Hell will be filled with people with accurate theology, but it is all together something else, to embrace the lover of your soul, the Lord Jesus Christ, and to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength. The hypocrite merely gives lip service to true worship. And that's why the prophet Isaiah quotes the Lord in Isaiah 29:13 "These people draw near with their mouths and honor me with their lips but have removed their hearts far from me."

So in closing, I would challenge you, train your mind, discipline your mind to love the Lord your God. If you want to know other ways that you can do that, I'd be glad to sit down with you. There are certain exercises that I, you know, it's the same thing with your body, right? You know, if you just sit around and don't do anything and eat sugary foods and processed foods, you know, you're going to be horribly out of shape. And the same thing is true, as a believer, you've got to learn to discipline yourself for the sake of godliness. That's how you really love the Lord your God more and more, and your neighbor as yourself. And may I challenge you as well to just target people that are in your sphere of influence, so that you can love them better, right? So that you have an opportunity for evangelism and pray for them. Pray for them. Pray for those opportunities. And when the Spirit of God gives those opportunities to you, and he will, pray that you will have boldness and patience and love enough to enter in through that door, and give them the truth of the gospel that they might be saved.

Let's pray together. Father, we rejoice in the eternal truths of your word. And I pray as always, that our hearts will be soft and tender to these truths. That we might hear them and heed them, so that we can love you more and love others more. Because Lord, we know when we don’t, we forfeit your blessing in our life. Moreover, we can really place ourselves under a cloud of divine chastening. So, Lord, we pray, that by the power of your Spirit, you will change us according to the truths of your word, for Christ's sake, and it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

As always, it's a great joy to be able to minister the word of God to you. And we continue in our verse by verse examination of Mark's gospel, Mark chapter 12, verses 28 through 34 under the heading "God's Foremost Commandments," And this will probably take a few Sundays to really examine closely and apply. Let me read the text to you, Mark 12 beginning in verse 28, "One of the scribes came and heard them arguing, and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, 'What commandment is the foremost of all?' Jesus answered, 'The foremost is, "HEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD; AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH AALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIMD, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.' The second is this, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF." , There is no other commandment greater than these.' The scribe said to Him, 'Right Teacher; you have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM; AND TO LOVE HIM WITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL THE UNDERSTANDING AAND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE'S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.' When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, 'You are not far from the kingdom of God. 'After that, no one would venture to ask him any more questions."

Wicked people, especially those in power, can accurately be described as narcissistic control freaks. They absolutely cannot tolerate any dissent. And we see this certainly in progressive liberalism of the Democratic Party, their weaponization of every governmental department, both state and federal. They seek to control everything with their nefarious deceptions, and they propagate those deceptions through the media, through public schools, Hollywood entertainers, athletes. And worse yet, they criminalize righteousness, and legalize unrighteousness. And, of course, it's all part of God's judgment on America. God has given our country over to a worthless mind to pursue its iniquities and experience the consequences of them. And of course, these satanic schemes are not new to our country. And they also exist all around the world. But these things have existed countless times in every generation with every nation down through redemptive history. But you must understand that the religious leaders of apostate Judaism in the first century, were equally as immoral and corrupt as our political authorities are today in America; they absolutely hated the gospel message that Jesus preached. Moreover, they hated the fact that he was becoming far more popular than them. They were jealous. They were fearful of losing power, and prestige. Furthermore, they despised him because he exposed their hypocrisy and their ignorance of Scripture. So, they conspired together to defeat him.

You will remember earlier when Jesus healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath, and he publicly embarrassed the Pharisees. In Mark three verse six, we read, "The Pharisees went out, immediately began, conspiring with the Herodians against Him, as to how they might destroy Him." And in our text this morning, we see them, shall we say, huddling together to run another play? If I can use a football analogy. I mean, it's fourth and long and time is running out here. So, they've got to do something. In fact, Matthew gives us this in his account. Chapter 22, verse 34, "But when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered themselves together. One of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, testing Him, 'Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?'"

Now, the historical context here; Jesus is about roughly two days from the cross. First, the Pharisees and the Herodians came to him to try to discredit him in the eyes of the people by asking him if it was lawful to pay the poll tax to Caesar. And then after the Pharisees and the Herodians, got finished then Sadducees come together with a baited question concerning the resurrection. Again, trying to make him look stupid. And now a scribe who was a scholar, a lawyer of the Law of Moses of the Old Testament of the rabbinical traditions--a scribe steps forward from the Sanhedrin and tries to take a stab at Jesus. And over the next few weeks, we're going to examine what happened here, under three headings, number one, we are going to look at the baited question. Number two, the indicting response. And then number three, the practical implications.

Let me give you a little hint about this. What does it really mean to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength? What does it mean to love your neighbor as yourself? Who is your neighbor? Does this include your enemies? How are we to love our enemies? For example, how do we love a self-loathing, sociopathic transgender, who comes in to a Christian school and starts killing children? How do you love that person? How do you love a demonic gangbanger that breaks into your home and threatens to rape your wife and your daughters? And kill your family? Are we to turn the other cheek? How do you love a terrorist? How do you love corrupt politicians that are trying to enslave us under a totalitarian Marxism? Does loving your enemies mean that you cannot protect your family? Does it allow us to be armed? To defend ourselves? If we are to love our enemies, why would God require Israel to exterminate the Canaanites? What about the imprecatory Psalms? Where David calls down judgment on evil people? That doesn't sound too loving. For example, why would David say in Psalm 139, beginning in verse 21, "Do I not hate those who hate You, O LORD? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? I hate them with the utmost hatred; they have become my enemies." How do we understand those passages in Scripture? Where God states that he hates and abhors sinners? Seems to be a contradiction here. Why would Jesus use a whip and run money changers out of the temple precincts? I mean, how do we balance righteous indignation with loving our enemies? Well, these are the kinds of things that we need to understand. And many of them are addressed in this text as well as many other that help us understand what Jesus is saying.

Now let's look closely at the text. But remember now, the Sanhedrin believed that Jesus was a heretic, that he was a satanically empowered person whose message was contrary to the law of Moses. That's how they saw him. So they wanted to ask him a question that would put him at odds with Moses and thus betray him as a heretic. That way he could be discredited in the eyes of all of the people.

So, we come first of all, to the baited question. Notice verse 28, "One of the scribes came and heard them arguing and recognizing that he had answered them well, asked Him, 'What commandment is the foremost of all?'" Now, we must understand some of the historical background here. This was a hotly debated question among rabbis in that day. Rabbis were absolutely infatuated with what they considered to be a crucial exegetical tool called "Letterism." And since there were 613 letters in the Hebrew text of the 10 commandments, as recorded in Numbers, the consensus among the rabbis was that there were 613 laws in the Pentateuch book. And they were divided into 365, negative prohibitions and 248, positive affirmations. But with all these laws, they were faced with a dilemma. How can you obey all of them? And of course, as we understand Scripture, the answer is, you can't. That's why you need a Savior. That was the purpose of the law. Psalm 19 seven says that, "The law of the LORD is perfect, restoring the soul." And Paul said in Galatians, three beginning of verse 23, "Before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law being shut up to the faith, which was later to be revealed. Therefore, the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith."

Well, they didn't understand any of this. They didn't want to understand it. So what did they do? Well, they divided the laws into two categories, "heavy laws" that were absolutely binding and then "light laws" that were less binding. And while there is no direct reference to this categorization in Scripture, there are allusions to it. In Matthew 23, for example, Jesus said in verse 23, "'Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.'"

Now, we also, in order to understand this passage of Scripture, must put ourselves in the mindset and see the world through the eyes of a legalist. And we must bear in mind the deceptive nature of legalism, which is really nothing more than external adherence to the law of God with no intimate love for him. In fact, RC Sproul put it this way, quote, "Basically, legalism involves abstracting the law of God from its original context." He went on to say, "The legalist isolates the law from the God who gave the law. He is not so much seeking to obey God or honor Christ, as he is to obey rules that are devoid of any personal relationship. There is no love, joy, life or passion. It's a rote, mechanical form of law keeping that we call 'externalism.'"

Now, bear in mind that all false religions teach some form of works-righteousness; some method in their system that would help a person merit salvation. And this was true of apostate Judaism in the first century. And frankly, we see it a lot today as well. I mean, they believe that one could earn his or her salvation by keeping the laws. So, to be sure, externalism, even today as we see it--this legalism--provides an illusion of spirituality. It makes you feel as though you're spiritual, when in fact, you might have no love for God at all.

So again, the ancient Jews were in a real dilemma here; how can you keep all of the laws? So they came up with a great solution. And this is how they thought, to kind of paraphrase it, they would say, well, let's impress God, by at least keeping the heavy laws, the essential ones, along with all kinds of other manmade traditions that they had come up with, that would be kind of easy to keep. That way you could kind of make sure that the scale is going in their favor, that the good is outweighing the bad. That's how they saw it. So they also had another problem with all of this and that is okay. Which is the most essential commandment. If we're going to focus on that one, what commandment is the foremost? Because if we can know what that commandment is, and we keep that commandment, then perhaps we can make the cut, like the rich young man in Matthew 19:16, that quote, "Came to Jesus and said, 'Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?'"

So knowing the scribe's motivation here, in the crowd, knowing what he was up to, knowing his bad theology, Jesus responds to the baited question with secondly, the indicting response. Verse 29, "Jesus answered, 'The foremost is, 'Hear, O ISRAEL! THE LORD UR GOD IS ONE LORD AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH. The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these.'" Now, this was all very familiar to the Jewish people. I mean, this was central to their worship. This was a central affirmation of Judaism. And frankly, it should be for all of us as well, as we will see. God gave this command to Moses as the Israelites were about to enter into the promised land. I read it in our scripture reading earlier. Let me read it again. Deuteronomy six beginning in verse four, it says, "'Hear, O Israel!'" "Hear", the Hebrew word is "šāma." And Hebrew lexicography tells us that this is tantamount to the concept of obey, especially in the context of covenantal loyalty. "'Hear, O Israel! the LORD is our God, the Lord is one!'" So, this emphasizes the absolute exclusivity of Israel's God, "Yahweh our God is the one and only Yahweh." That's the idea. "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul with all your might. These words which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." In other words, what he is saying here is, you are to love the one true God perfectly, comprehensively, singularly with the totality of your being. That's why he says, "with all your heart." The heart would be considered the conscious self, the inner core of who we are. "And with all your soul," the term carries the idea of the core of our personal existence; all the vital things that drive us and our desires; the seat of our emotions and will. And it's often translated "life" or "person" or "being" or "self."

Then he adds this "with all your might." could be translated with all your strength, the exertion of your mental and physical abilities. And by the way, these are overlapping terms. They're not different entities within us. So, together these terms describe the complete essence of man; the focused passionate devotion, our desires, our inclinations, all that we must use to love God. The foremost commandment therefore requires wholehearted devotion, undivided allegiance to the Lord our God. And we need to think of it this way--our love for him and his covenant demands are to be the dominant and passionate interest of our life. Even in this text it is to be the most fundamental of all truths that parents teach their children. So much so that this needs to dominate much of your conversation with your children. And parents, I challenge you to that end. But you say, "my this is impossible, how could you possibly do this?" Well, that's exactly God's point with the whole thing. You can't. I think of Ecclesiastes seven and verse 20, "There is not a righteous man on earth, who continually does good and who never sins." It's got my picture right next to it. And yours is right there, too. You see, the purpose of God's law was to demonstrate man's inability to keep it. It was never meant to be a means of salvation. As I read earlier, in Galatians 3:24, it is "our tutor, to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith." This is reminiscent of what Jesus said in his Sermon on the Mount in Matthew five and verse 20. He said, "'For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.'" And then he concluded that sermon with his summary statement in verse 48, "'Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.'"

You know, when I hear that I have to cry out like the sinner, the publican, in Luke 18, "God be merciful to me." Or think of the story of the rich young man in Matthew 19, that I mentioned earlier. Remember, he left Jesus defeated because he couldn't earn his way into heaven by keeping the law, nor could he buy his way into heaven.

By the way, the Jews believed that rich people had a better chance of getting into the into the kingdom, because they had more money than other people, therefore, they could purchase more sacrifices, and they could give more money to the temple treasury. In Matthew 19:23 and following, "Jesus said to His disciples," in that context, "'Truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.' When the disciples heard this, they were very astonished, and said, 'Then who can be saved?' And looking at them, Jesus said to them, 'With people this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'" So Jesus gives the scribe, along with his hypocritical, murderous cronies, a very indicting response to the question concerning the foremost commandment, and basically, he's saying, again, you must love the Lord your God, perfectly, comprehensively singularly with the totality of your being. And at another time, I'm going to elaborate on that greatly.

But then he follows up with a second commandment. And this one is utterly contrary to not only what the Jewish Rabbis taught but was also the antithesis of how they behaved. In verse 31, "'The second is this, Jesus said, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these.'" I mean, folks in an economy of words, Jesus just popped their elitist, self-righteous bubble. Now, it's interesting, while what Jesus said was a direct quote from the Mosaic law that they claim to revere, recorded in Leviticus 19 and verse 18, the rabbis taught something different. Here was their version, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy." Jesus confronted them on this, for example of Matthew five, verse 43 and following, "'You have heard that it was said, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.'"

So here in Mark 12 and verse 31, Jesus exposes their hypocrisy. "'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBO AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these." In fact, in Matthew 22, in verse 40, we read, "'On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.'" Let me give you a little refresher course on the Law. There is a twofold summarization of the law in Scripture, the one that we are looking at here in Jesus' response. You are to love God and love your neighbor. And then there's a tenfold summarization beyond the twofold and that is the Decalogue--that is the 10 commandments--the tablets of stone, the Mosaic law given to Moses on Mount Sinai; Exodus, 19, and 20. Sometimes also called the Old Covenant; if you keep these laws, you will be blessed. If you don't, you will be judged. The first three in the Decalogue are how to love God perfectly, then you have the Sabbath, and then the last six how to love your neighbor. And then we typically say that there is what's called thirdly, a manifold summarization of the law, the words of the covenant in Exodus 24 and verse seven. That's the entire Book of Leviticus, great detail and expansion of the law. And what was interesting is, all of that was written down and it was placed in a receptacle on the side of the Ark of the Covenant, along with the tablets of stone that were inside the ark. We read about this in Deuteronomy 31, verse 26, "Take this book of the law and place it beside the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord your God, that it may remain there as a witness against you." You see, folks, once again, the purpose of the law was to expose sin in the light of the divine standard of righteousness stated in the foremost commandment and manifested in the second.

So, Jesus told the scribe and all of his co-conspirators "on these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets." In other words, the entirety of the Old Testament scripture hangs on these two commandments to love. We must understand that all other commandments are derived from these. They point back to these they are summed up in these. That's why Paul said in Romans 13 and verse eight, "He who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law." William Hendriksen, said this quote, "This twofold command, love for God and for the neighbor, is the peg on which the whole law and the prophets hang. Remove that peg and all is lost for the entire Old Testament with its commandments and covenants, prophecies and promises, types and testimonies, invitations and exhortations, points to the love of God, which demands the answer of love in return." John summarized this perfectly in First John four beginning of verse 19, “We love because He first loved us. If someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he's a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen."

You see, friends, a genuine, wholehearted love for God must be initiated by God Himself. We are incapable of that. This requires the regenerating power of the Spirit of God, that work whereby he causes us to be raised from spiritual death to spiritual life, he opens our eyes and, in our hearts, and he gives us the gift of faith and conversion, and so forth. And therefore, according to Romans five and verse five, when this happens, the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. And then because we truly love God, by the power of the Spirit, albeit imperfectly, that love manifests itself in our determined decisive commitment to love others. But as we read in this text "we love because He first loved us." This is what the Jewish leaders needed to hear, what the people needed to hear, what we all need to hear. Dear Christian, don't miss this. Here, Jesus states, the two greatest commandments. The quintessential commandments these "summum bonum" or highest, the greatest, ultimate good; the standard of divine righteousness in which all moral values are included, and from which they all derive. This is so important, but we all fall short, don't we? And therefore, we need mercy. We need grace. We need forgiveness, we need a righteousness that is not our own. Therefore, we need a savior. That's why the Spirit of God was sent right? To convict the world of what? Sin, righteousness and judgment.

Now think about it, the Jews were fastidious in keeping certain laws and traditions. And like every legalist, they were fooling themselves into believing that somehow they were able to impress God, when in fact, in their hearts, they had no real love for God. I mean, folks, this is externalism. And this may be speaking to some of you, I don't know your heart. But you need to examine your heart. There are so many Christians today that are all sizzle, but no steak. A lot of smoke and mirrors, a lot of hollow hypocrisy.

Now, it's interesting as you study Judaism, in that ancient day, in particular, I mean, they took prejudice and sectarianism to new levels. I mean, if I can use a baseball analogy, there's T-ball, there's little league, there's college ball, there's minor leagues, and there's major leagues. This is major league prejudice; major league hatred of anybody that wasn't in their group. In fact, the Romans accused them of hating the whole human race. It's not a very good reputation. Now, what's interesting is they defined "neighbor" in the narrowest terms possible to accommodate their disdain for other people. In fact, in a similar incident that's described in Luke 10, verses 25 and following, the scribe’s final reaction is recorded in verse 29. It says, "But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, 'And who is my neighbor?'" And then you remember, Jesus responded to him, gave him the story of the Good Samaritan. Remember, you want to know who your neighbor is, let me tell you a little story. And you know, the guy is hurt, he's wounded. The priest, the Levite, that passed by Samaritan comes along and helps him. And at the end of that passage, Jesus tells the guy, "Go and do the same." In other words, your neighbor is anybody that's in need. Doesn't matter if it's your enemy or who he is. But for the Jews, "neighbor," only referred to their preferred group. They hated everybody else. I mean, they hated the Gentiles in ways that you can't imagine. And they let them know it. They hated the half breed Samaritans; they wouldn't even walk through their region. And if they did, they'd shake the dust off their garments and off their shoes; made a big scene of the whole thing. They hated even other Jews. They hated the Jews in Galilee; "can any good thing come out of Nazareth?" Remember? They hated tax collectors. We read this in the New Testament. They hated prostitutes. They hated the poor. They hated the diseased and the disabled, because they felt like they were really sinful people. That's why they were experiencing what they were experiencing. Basically, anybody outside of their favorite group.

One of the sects of Judaism was a monastic sect that lived on the edge of the Dead Sea. They were called the Essenes. That's the region--I've been there, some of you have as well--it's where we found the Dead Sea Scrolls. The Essenes lived there. And here's what they taught, quote, "Love all that God has chosen and hate all that he has rejected. Love all the sons of light, each according to his lot in God's community and hate all the sons of darkness." Now, it's remarkable to see how Jewish rabbis came up with all of this. They were very selective in their interpretation and their application of the law, and again, Leviticus 19 verse 18, that Jesus is quoting here it says, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF." But the rabbis really did four things. The first thing they did is they ignored the meaning of love; in Hebrew, "ahavah." It comes from a Hebrew root, "ahav," which means to give. And the Hebrew equivalent by the way in the New Testament, and the Greek is "agapaó"; the agape love. A self-sacrificing love of choice, not necessarily of emotion. So they ignored the meaning of love.

Secondly, they defined "neighbor" in the most narrow terms they possibly could. And they ignored the last phrase "as yourself." That's a pretty indicting phrase, right? Love your neighbor, just leave it at that. Don't say as yourself, I mean, good grief, I really love myself, I'm not gonna love you like that. And then, worst of all, they added "and hate your enemy." Notice the entire verse in its context, Leviticus 19:18, it begins this way, "'You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the LORD.'" They also ignored other passages, I won't take time to list them all, but other passages that really broaden and help define "neighbor" in that whole context in Leviticus 19, which includes even loving your enemies. For example, in verse 16, God says, "'You shall not go about as a slander among your people, and you are not to act against the life of your neighbor,'" verse 17, "'You shall not hate your fellow countrymen in your heart.'" Verse 34, "'The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself.'" Isn't it interesting how we can conveniently pick and choose those passages of Scripture that help us justify what we think and what we do?

One of the stated principles of the Pharisees is as follows and I quote, "If a Jew sees a Gentile fallen into the sea, let him by no means lift him out fence, for it is written, 'Thou shall not rise up against the blood of thy neighbor,' but this man is not thy neighbor." I mean, folks, this is this is prejudice on steroids, right? You see a Gentile is drowning, let him drown. He's not your neighbor. Now, how did they come up with this nonsense? Obviously, Satan is the father of lies. But what Satan loves to do is take certain aspects of truth and twist it, distort it. And before you know it, you've got a total deception. What they did is they would arbitrarily extrapolate certain Old Testament texts, and then adapt them to themselves personally to justify their prejudices. For example, in Deuteronomy 23, beginning of verse three, we read, "'No Ammonite or Moabite shall enter the assembly of the LORD; none of their descendants, even to the 10th generation, shall ever enter the assembly of the LORD, because they did not meet you with food and water on the way when you came out of Egypt.'" So they would let's take this passage and then also take the passages like Deuteronomy seven where the Israelites were told to absolutely exterminate the Canaanites and slaughter the Midianites in Numbers 31. You could read about the rejection of the Amalekites and the Moabites in Deuteronomy 23. So they're taking these things, and you know, if God could do this, you know, I guess there's room for some real hatred here. Make sense to me, don't you? Then what about the imprecatory psalms? The cursing psalms like Psalm 69, beginning of verse 22, "Pour out Your indignation on them, and may Your burning anger overtake them. May their camp be desolate; may not dwell in their tents. For they have persecuted him who You Yourself have smitten, and they tell of the pain of those whom You have wounded. Add iniquity to their iniquity, and may they not come into Your righteousness. May they be blotted out of the book of life, and may they not be recorded with the righteous." Let's add that to our column here. Or Psalm 139 verse 21, "Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? I hate them with the utmost hatred; they have become my enemies." But you see, what they fail to understand is the difference between personal injury and divine justice. God's judgment and curses on the wicked were and are judicial acts of an infinitely holy God and they have no application to us personally when we are injured. When we have wounded pride, they have no application in redressing an individual offense. God's purpose, for example, in eradicating the Canaanites was to cleanse the land from the most vile satanic savages that have probably ever walked on the face of the earth. I don't have time to take you into the types of things that these people did. But this was divine justice. This was a judicial act of God meted out by a holy war where he used his people to accomplish his purging purposes. God wanted to protect his people. He wanted to preserve for himself a righteous seed, from which the Messiah would come.

You read about this, like in Leviticus 18. But it is absurd to think that we can apply the actions of divine justice, or even the judicial law of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth and somehow use them as an excuse to hate, even kill those that we do not like. I mean, that's God's justice, not mine. Romans 12 verse 19, "Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God , or it his written, 'VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY,' says the Lord. 'BUT IF YOUR ENEMY IS HUNGRY, FEED HIM, AND IF HE IS THIRSTY, GIVE HIM A DRINK; FOR IN SO DOING YOU WILL HEAP BURNING COALS ON HIS HEAD.' Do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good."

But what about the imprecatory psalms? Those imprecations, those calling for God's judgment on the wicked, like you would see in Psalm seven in Psalm 69. And I believe Psalm 35. Maybe in Psalm 109, I forget all of them. Well, those were motivated, dear friends, by David's passion for the glory of God. Not out of some frustration and vengeance for his own personal injury. I mean, this was righteous indignation. We read about this like in Psalm 69, beginning in verse nine, "For zeal for Your house has consumed me, and the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on me. When I wept in my soul with fasting, it became my reproach." You see, the imprecations, were statements that stipulated the kind of divine judgment that was necessary to befall upon those who violated the treaty. And here David calls upon the Lord for justice, for deliverance from the hands of these wicked people. And he calls upon God to be faithful to his covenant promises that he gave to Abraham, for example, in Genesis 12. And his motivation was not some kind of petty personal vindictiveness. For in this context, David is suffering as a representative of the Lord. His motivation for divine retribution upon unrepentant sinners is ultimately for the glory of God, not for the glory of David. Now, some will argue, "Well, hey, wait a minute now we're supposed to love our enemies, turn the other cheek, return good for evil; forgive those who mistreat us and so on." Yes, indeed, that's all true. But you must understand that those commands and virtues are aimed at the mortification of personal pride. That's the purpose for those, not the abdication of justice, or the vindication of righteousness. Jesus commands with respect to loving our enemies must be balanced with his role as the avenger of those who are violently opposed to him. They got all of that twisted around; conveniently so.

Once again notice Psalm 139, beginning of verse 19, "O that You would slay the wicked, O God; depart from me, therefore, men of bloodshed. For they speak against You wickedly, and Your enemies to take Your name in vain. Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord? And do not loathe those who rise up against You? I hate them with the utmost hatred; they have become my enemies." See, again, this had nothing to do with personal animosity or personal spite, but zeal for God's glory. This is righteous indignation. This is not personal revenge. Would that we all have such hatred for the ungodly who dishonor God. But folks, there is no room for this, when it comes to those who dishonor us. In fact, David went on, in that very context, to ask the Lord to examine his heart, he went on to say, "Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me and know my anxious thoughts; and see if there be any hurtful way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way."

So we come to the question, how are we to respond to the wicked who persecute us? We are to love them. Matthew five, verse 43, "'You have heard it said, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.' But I say to you love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.'" The Greek term "agapaó," the term for love, is the love of choice, not mere emotion. It is a purposeful act of the will that chooses to love and to seek the highest good for another person, even if we don't like them, even if we can't stand being around them, even if they are wicked and vile. That's the idea of having a burden for the lost.

By the way, in the Greek, words for love are much more distinct. There's really four different words there is the "philia" love, the brotherly love that we would have towards another friend; like the love that I would have for you, or that you would have for me. And then there's the "storge" love. That's the kind of love that we would have towards a family member. I love my family in a different way than I love you. And you would be the same way. And then there's the "eros" love. That's the the love of romance that leads to sexual love. There's only one person in the world that I love that way, and that is my wife. And then there's the "agape" love. Love that is passionate and unwavering in its commitment to seek the highest good for another person, regardless of who they are. And this is a love of the will, not necessarily a love of emotion, where you've got all kinds of warm fuzzies. But always a love of action, not a love of abstraction. That's why you see all of the verbs in First Corinthians 13. Proverbs 25, verse 21, you see the action of love, "If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; For you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you."

I might also add that here in Matthew five verse 44. The verb is in the present imperative, which means it is to be a continuous attitude of benevolence, a continuous attitude of goodwill. It has to be a continuous desire to treat another person in a way that would hopefully bring them to saving knowledge of Christ, even those who hate us. And it implies meekness, does it not. It implies gentleness and implies humility. And this is indicative of kingdom citizens. That's why Jesus would say to the scribe, you know, you're close, but you're not in the kingdom yet. That's the point. This is the type of love that patiently endures evil; extinguishes thoughts of revenge. This is the type of love that starves those cravings of pride that would demand vengeance. Spurgeon put it this way, "Love and self-denial for the object loved go hand in hand. If profess to love a certain person, and yet will neither give my silver nor my gold to relieve his wants, nor in any way deny myself comfort or ease, for his sake, such love is contemptible. It wears the name but lacks the reality of love. True love must be measured by the degree to which the person loving, will be willing to subject himself to crosses and losses; to suffering and self-denials. After all, the value of a thing in the market is what a man will give for it. And you must estimate the value of a man's love by that which he is willing to give up for it."

As we wrap this up this morning, I want you to notice also what love includes. Matthew 5:44, "'Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.'" "Father, I don't like this person. Biblically, I have no reason to respect this person. This person is vile, this person is wretched. This person is utterly enslaved by their sin. But I plead with you to lavish your love upon them and by your mercy. Save them by your grace, even as you have saved me." Is that your attitude towards your enemies? That's what loving them looks like. It even includes praying for our wicked immoral, godless, Christ hating leaders. I mean, we have some of the most vile leaders in the history of the world, in charge of our country today.

Paul says in First Timothy two beginning in verse one, "First of all, then, I urge you that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgiving be made on behalf of all men." And then he adds this, "For kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity." In other words, we're to pray for their salvation. And we can also pray that God would protect us from them. Remember, Stephen, when he was being stoned, in Acts seven? He said, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." I mean folks, that's the work of the Spirit in a person. What did Jesus say on the cross in Luke 23. "'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.'"

I might also add you realize the blessings that God will lavish upon you when you love your enemies in this way. This is so encouraging to me. Matthew five, verse 10, Jesus said, "'Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you, because of Me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.'" It's an amazing thought, isn't it? God sees all of that he knows all of that, but our attitude is to be one of love, that prays for these people and does everything it can to bring them to a place of saving grace.

So in closing here, Jesus responds to the scribe and all of his cronies standing around with a message of condemnation. And then it's interesting verse 32, "The scribe to said to Him, 'Right, Teacher; you have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM; AND TO LOVE HIM WITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL TH EUNDERSTANDING AND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE'S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all burn offerings and sacrifices." In other words, he's affirming that. I mean, what else could he say, right? Even though in his heart, it's like that's not at all consistent with really who I am.

Then I love what Jesus says here, verse 34, "When Jesus saw that he answered intelligently, He said to him, 'You are not far from the kingdom of God.'" You're not in the kingdom, but you're not far from it. By the way, isn't it ironic the scribe comes to pass judgment on Jesus, and Jesus flips it around and passes judgment on him. It's an amazing thing. There's a lesson to be learned here too, by the way. Folks, you can have precise doctrine and be as lost as a goose in a hailstorm. The only thing that you must embrace beyond right doctrine is a wholehearted love for Christ.

Then it says, "After that no one would venture to ask Him any more questions." Well, this was a hard pill for them to swallow. But I hope you will see that there is no place in our life for hatred for prejudice, for personal vengeance. We are to love the Lord our God, the God of the Bible, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; the one and only true God, perfectly, comprehensively singularly with the totality of our being. And love our neighbors, as ourselves, including our enemies. And certainly, we cannot do that perfectly. So we need a Savior, and hallelujah, we have one right?

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. As always, when we hear them, we find ourselves being convicted. But we also find ourselves being deeply encouraged. We are humbled by the love that you have lavished upon us and help us, by the power of your spirit, to love you and to love our neighbors, including our enemies as we ought. For the glory of Christ, in whose name I pray. Amen.

I would encourage you to take your Bibles and turn to Mark's gospel chapter 12. If you've not been with us, we go through various books of the Bible verse by verse so that we don't miss out on a single word of what God has revealed to us. And this morning, we find ourselves in Mark 12, verses 18 through 27. And after we look at this text, I'm gonna take you as well, to some passages in First Corinthians 15, from which we have just read, let me read the passage here, Mark 12, beginning in verse 18, "Some Sadducees (who say that there is no resurrection) came to Jesus, and began questioning Him saying, 'Teacher, Moses wrote for us that IF A MAN'S BROTHER DIES and leaves behind a wife AND LEAVES NO CHILD, HIS BROTHER SHOULD MARRY THE WIFE AND RAISE UP CHILDREN TO HIS BROTHER. There were seven brothers; and the first took a wife and died leaving no children. The second one married her, and died, leaving behind no children, and the third likewise; and so all seven left no children. Last of all the woman died also. In the resurrection, when they rise again, which one's wife will she be? For all seven, had married her.' Jesus said to them, 'Is this not the reason you are mistaken that you do not understand the Scriptures, or the power of God? For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. But regarding the fact that the dead rise again, have you not read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the burning bush, how God spoke to him, saying, 'I AM THE GOD OF ABRAHAM, AND THE GOD OF ISAAC, AND THE GOD OF JACOB'?I He is not the God of the dead, but of the living; you are greatly mistaken.'"

Here we witness a great example of the power of religious hypocrites in powerful places weaponizing theological error to discredit Jesus in the eyes of an adoring crowd. And they use a false presupposition to humiliate him. And this is very common. I've dealt with it over the years, I'm sure you have as well, where people misinterpret or they misapply some passage of scripture, and then they confront you with the teaching that they believe in order to discredit you. And of course, their motive is not to learn, to better understand the word of God, but to humiliate you. That's what's going on here.

Now, you need to understand a little bit about Sadducees. They were the wealthy religious aristocrats in charge of the temple. They oversaw everything that happened in the temple, the sacrifices and so forth. They made up the high priests and the chief priests and they had the ruling majority, even in the Sanhedrin, and they were often cooperative with Rome. They were also positive toward Hellenism, they did not believe in the resurrection, they did not believe in an afterlife. They did not believe in angels or a spiritual world; did not believe in predestination, the sovereignty of God. Nor did they believe in a coming Messiah. They rejected virtually everything, interestingly enough, that the Pharisees believed. In fact, Luke speaks of this in Acts chapter 23, beginning in verse six, "But perceiving that one group were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, Paul began crying out in the Council, 'Brethren, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees; I am on trial for the hope and resurrection of the dead!' As he said this, there occurred to dissension between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor an angel nor a spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all."

Now, as you are aware, Jesus now is in the court of the Gentiles, just basically two days before his crucifixion. There's a large crowd that is gathered all around to watch what is going on; there has been a series of attempts to humiliate him. And Jesus, of course, has threatened the power base of the Sadducees because he drove out the money changers, which really upended their lucrative business enterprise in the temple precincts. So, he has humiliated them. Therefore he had to go. A couple of days later, he would be crucified. And so the tactic here is to somehow discredit him in the eyes of the adoring crowds. Especially by presenting to Jesus an impossible dilemma concerning a supposed resurrection. The problem is the theological basis for their question was errant. And they were too ignorant and deceived to understand it.

Now, to make this very practical, this is common, we've seen this down through history where one group will attack their political rival by claiming they reject, frankly, a demonstrably false presupposition. We see that in our culture today, they present this false presupposition concerning for example, critical race theory or transgenderism or the woke insanity. And they confront you with that, and then criticize you for not agreeing with them, or they accuse you of committing some fabricated crime. We saw this very clearly, for example, in the Russian collusion hoax against Donald Trump, or we've seen it like when the parents stood up against the school board, because they were upset with the indoctrination that was going on in the school, and they were called domestic terrorists. And so we're familiar with this type of thing. So this is not something isolated. And so what we have happening here, as we've seen, in our culture is you have one group of people weaponizing whatever resources they have to destroy someone else. And the Sadducees used this nefarious strategy--use the people in powerful positions, to first of all, promote false accusations and then deceive the public, discredit their political rival, then indict them, incarcerate them, and if possible, execute them.

Now, it's also very important for me to pause for a moment and help you remember that this is not taking Jesus by surprise. This is not taking God by surprise. In fact, as we look at Scripture, we see that God has ordained to allow this very thing to happen to his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, while evil men put Jesus on the cross. This was all part of God's plan. Because Scripture makes it clear, for example, in Revelation 13 and verse eight, that the Lamb of God was slain before the foundation of the world. And Peter said in his sermon in Acts two, verse 23, that, "This man," referring to Jesus, "delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God." I mean, this is absolutely astounding when you think about it, the Son of God died to purchase the salvation of those whom God had chosen, according to his uninfluenced, eternal plan. And this is all part of that plan. We read of this, for example, in Ephesians, chapter one beginning in verse three, it says that, "He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world." He goes on to say, "In love, He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ who himself, according to the kind intention of his will." And Paul made this clear as well in Second Timothy one in verse nine, where it says that he, "saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was granted us in Christ Jesus, from all eternity." Literally, in the original language "before time began."

Of course, all of this is part of the gospel that Jesus taught, and it was infuriating to many of the people in his day. Frankly, as it is today. In fact, whenever you bring up in many circles the doctrine of election and predestination, you see people getting upset because they simply find that to be abhorrent. It's interesting, in John six, Jesus clearly articulated those great truths--the doctrines of sovereign grace in salvation, often disparagingly labeled as "Calvinism." In fact, it was so offensive, as we read in verse 65, of John six, when Jesus said, "'No one can come to Me unless it has been granted him for the Father.' As a result of this, many of His disciples withdrew, and we're not walking him with him anymore." And of course, these doctrines are highly offensive to people that do not understand the gospel. So they invent their own version of how it all is supposed to work, and makes man, not God, sovereign over salvation, making God's will subject to man's will, and so forth.

Now, some important background here regarding the resurrection. The Pharisees and the Jewish people rightly believed in both a national as well as a personal bodily resurrection. And by the way, what I'm about to say is absolutely true. And this should exhilarate each one of us to know that we have a resurrection waiting for us. They believed a national resurrection was consistent with the promises of God and the Abrahamic Covenant and the Davidic covenant, which would include the coming of the Messiah. You will recall Ezekial's vision of the valley of dry bones in Ezekiel 37, beginning of verse 11. Then Ezekiel said, "God said to me, 'Son of Man, these bones are the whole house of Israel; behold, they say, 'Our bones are dried up and our hope is perished. We are completely cut off. 'Therefore prophesy, and say to them, 'Thus says the Lord God, "Behold, I will open up your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves, My people; and I will bring you into the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord, when I have opened up your graves and caused you to come up out of your graves, My people."'" This, by the way, will also include spiritual regeneration. He goes on to say, "'I will put My Spirit within you and you will come to life and I will place you on your own land.'" The prophet Isaiah said, likewise, in Isaiah 26, verse 19, "Your dead will live; their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, for your dew is as the doom of the dawn, and the earth will give birth to the departed spirits."

So there's reason to believe, as they did, in a national resurrection, but they also believed in a bodily resurrection. For example, in Exodus three and verse six, the text that the Lord uses, we read, "'I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.'" Present tense. Not I "was," but I "am." And the clear implication is that these men are clearly dead, but they are still alive in the Spirit. And God is still their God. Job speaks of a resurrection as well, and Job 19:25 and following, "As for me," he says, "I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will take His stand on the earth. Even after my skin is destroyed, Yet from my flesh; I shall see God; whom I myself shall behold, and whom my eyes will see in not another." David spoke of this as well in Psalm 16, beginning in verse nine, "Therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoices; my flesh also will dwell securely, for You will not abandon my soul to Sheol; nor will You allow Your Holy One to undergo decay. You will make known to me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; in your right hand, there are pleasures forevermore." Psalm 49, verse 15, "God will redeem my soul from the power of Sheol, for He will receive me. In Psalm 73, beginning in verse 24, "With Your counsel, You will guide me and afterward receive me to glory." Psalm 139, verse eight, "If I ascend to heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there." Isaiah 25 and verse eight, "He will swallow up death for all time, and the Lord God will wipe tears away from their all faces, and He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth; for the Lord has spoken." Let me give you one more, in Daniel 12 and verse two, "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt."

Moreover, I might add that in the Old Testament apocryphal writings and the Talmud, which was the primary source of Jewish law and theology, also conveyed the same resurrection promises. And they were familiar with all of this--the Pharisees, the Jewish people. So they believed in a national, as well as a personal, resurrection. I might also add that the Pharisees had some wacko ideas about the resurrection that they derived from other Jewish sources, not from Scripture. And whenever you deviate from the Word of God, you come up with wacko things right? MacArthur speaks of this. He says, quote, "For example, the consensus among the Pharisees was that people would be raised with the same infirmities, defects, characteristics, and relationships they had when they died." That's not very comforting, is it? He went on to add, "Many also believe that all Jews would be raised in Israel, some even arguing that there were tunnels all over the earth, through which the bodies of Jews buried elsewhere, would roll to Israel," end quote. Well, obviously, none of that is true.

Now, here's where it gets interesting. Of course, the Sadducees rejected all of these things, including the Old Testament texts that I read, because they believed only in the Pentateuch. Which they erroneously believed made no mention of a bodily resurrection from the dead. They did not understand the implication of Exodus three, and verse six, as we will see. So for them, Sheol, the opposed abode of the departed dead, was the final resting place for people that die. All that lived on was one's legacy or one's reputation, or one's posterity. So they believe that you just need to live life to the fullest. No afterlife, no punishment, no reward. Just live it up. And this was the same attitude of the unrepentant inhabitants of Jerusalem many years earlier, when they scoffed at the prophet's warnings concerning God's judgment upon them. And Isaiah reproached the people for participating in wild parties when they should have been mourning in repentance. They're trying to anesthetize the reality that God's judgment is upon them, and that it is coming. They did not want to listen to that. So we read in Isaiah 22, beginning in verse 12, "'In that day the Lord God of hosts called you to weeping, to wailing, to shaving the head and to wearing sackcloth. Instead, there is gaiety and gladness, killing of cattle and slaughtering of sheep, eating of meat and drinking of wine: let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we may die.'" So this attitude is nothing new. And I would submit to you, sadly, that it's probably the attitude that some of you have. Certainly this is consistent with most people's attitude. Most people scoff at the idea, for example of an eternal hell of eternal punishment. And most people will say, Well, if there is a God, whoever he or she might be, I think that my good has outweighed my bad. So I'm quite certain he'll grade on the curve and I'll make the cut. That's how people think. Paul dealt with this in Corinth, First Corinthians 15 as we read earlier, beginning of verse 32. He said, "If the dead are not raised, LET US EAT AND DRINK, FOR TOMORROW WE DIE." That's what the people were saying. And he's quoting this passage out of Isaiah. He went on to say, "Do not be deceived: 'Bad company corrupts good morals.' Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God, I speak this to your shame."

Now with this background, let's look more closely at the text for a few minutes. I want to do so under two headings that I hope will be helpful for you. Number one, we're going to see the insoluble dilemma and number two, the infallible solution. Again, now let's visualize the situation. Jesus has horribly offended the Pharisees, the Herodians that came against him and now the Sadducees. He's just making sure that everybody is really upset with him in leadership. People are standing around in the court of the Gentiles and then here comes the Sadducees. And with their garb it’s real obvious who they were. And the Sadducees don't walk, they kind of glide. So they glide up to Jesus and they confront him. And here we see first, the insoluble dilemma, verse 18, "Some Sadducees (who say that there is no resurrection) came to Jesus, and began questioning Him saying, 'Teacher'"--notice the flattery there, "'Teacher, Moses wrote for us that IF A MAN'S BROTHER DIES and leaves behind a wife AND LEAVES NO CHILD, HIS BROTHER SHOULD MARRY THE WIFE AND RAISE UP CHILDREN TO HIS BROTHER.'" Now let's pause for a moment. It's important that you understand the background here, where this came from, out of Deuteronomy 25, verses five and six concerning what's called a "Levirate marriage." "Levirate" comes from the Latin "levir" which means husband's brother. Here's the background with that, and why God put this in the law. Because the perpetuation of a man's name, as a member of the covenant people, was so important, along with the property inheritance in the family; it was important that that name should be passed on. And so we read God's word in Deuteronomy 25, beginning in verse five, "When brothers live together," in other words, most of the time, they would all live on one estate, okay? "'When brothers live together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a strange man. Her husband's brother shall go into her and take her to himself as wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her." So in other words, a brother dies, leaves his wife, no child, the other brother, who would have to be one that is single--and as we read another passage, he couldn't divorce his wife and do this, nor could he marry his deceased brother's wife, and have her live with him and his existing wife--but he would then go into her and take her as his bride. And then it says, "It shall be that the firstborn whom she bear shall also assume the name of his dead brother, so that his name will not be blank blotted out from Israel." This is not without precedent, you may recall in in Genesis 38, the story of Tamar. Remember, she was a widow, and she acted wickedly. She played the role of the harlot, she tempted Judah, when his son Onan failed to fulfill his duty, and was impregnated by him and so forth. I might also add that if there was no unmarried brother available, to marry, the widow, another close relative, would be required to fulfill the levarite responsibility. This was the case of Boaz, as you will recall, who married his relative Elimelech's widowed daughter-in-law, her name was Ruth. So that's the background here.

So the Sadducees come up with this insoluble dilemma. It goes on, or they go on to say, verse 21, "'There were seven brothers; and the first a took wife, and died leaving no children. The second one married her, and died leaving behind no children; and the third likewise; and so all seven left no children. Last of all, the woman died also. In the resurrection, when they rise again, which one's wife will she be? For all seven had married her.'" In logic, this is called "reductio ad absurdum"-- reduction to absurdity. And it's a device that basically is an attempt to prove the fallacy of a presupposition by showing that its logical consequences are utterly absurd and/or contradictory. That's what's going on here.

By the way, I always have to smile at this to think of the arrogance of ungodly people. To think that somehow, they can fool their Creator; that they can trick him. Truly, this is a fool's errand. Now Jesus knows their wicked motivation. He knows what they're thinking. And in response, he's going to demonstrate two errors. Number one, he's going to demonstrate that they were ignorant of both the content and the correct interpretation of the scriptures, which they were supposed to be the experts that knew more than anybody else. But secondly, he is going to prove that they know nothing about the power of God in their lives. By the way, there's an important lesson to be learned here. Both faults, characterize most people, even many evangelicals. I mean, think of the heretical teachings that are out there today, by people who simply do not understand the scriptures, therefore they do not understand the power of God. They're unsaved; the Spirit of God does not dwell within them. And as a result, you get the social gospel, you get the prosperity gospel, you get the continual compromise with the LGBTQ abominations, and on and on it goes, I think of all the professing Christians whose character and conduct cannot be distinguished from most rank pagans. Think of Titus one and verse 16, "They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good thing." That's what's going on here with the Sadducees.

So first, we have the insoluble dilemma. Now we have secondly, the infallible solution. Notice how Jesus responds to them by asking a question. Verse 24, "Jesus said to them, 'Is this not the reason you are mistaken, that you do not understand the Scriptures or the power of God?'" You know, I have to smile at this. Folks, this is how you deal with theological error. You deal with it forthrightly, and authoritatively based upon the word of God. And again, he's going to expose two fundamental issues. Number one, you are ignorant of both the content and the correct interpretation of the Scriptures, and you know nothing of the power of God in your life. Talk about humiliating. I think of how Paul dealt with this with the false teachers in his day, as we should even in our day. He describes it in Second Timothy three false teachers, phony Christians, he says, "But realize this, that in the last days," referring to the time between Christ's first and second coming, "difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure, rather than lovers of God." By the way, now, he's describing people that are in the church. And he goes on to say, "holding to a form of godliness"-- they claim to be followers of Christ, and they have all the outward trappings of Christianity. But then, he says, "although they have denied its power;" that is the power of the indwelling Spirit, to save and to transform to sanctify. And he says, "avoid such men as these." The term "avoid" literally means to shun, to stay away from them, have no part with them.

By the way, the list that he just gave is also consistent with Paul's list in 2 Timothy 3:6, and he describes how they conduct themselves, "For among them," he says, "are those who enter into households and captivate weak women." Literally childish women, of which he must have been aware of some that were susceptible to this in his day by the false teachers. They're "weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses." In other words, they're ruled by their emotions. They're ruled by their lusts, not the truth of the Word of God; "always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." Of course, this is a huge problem in the church today as it was then, as it was in the first century. The Pharisees and the Sadducees were also a part of this in apostate Judaism, and many today are like that they fill pulpits, they will even fill stadiums, they will teach in seminaries and they often use the same tactics misinterpret, misapply scripture and try to discredit those who differ with them.

Dave Harrell

Now, I want you to notice Jesus' response here. And this is one, frankly, that we can all use. He says, "'Is this not the reason you were mistaken. “Let me pause, "mistaken" is from "planao," in the original language. It means to wander, to go astray, or to be misled from a proper belief or a course of action. In fact, we get our English word planet from this term. He's basically saying you guys are way off base, alright? Forthright, right to the point. It's like, Hey, you're mistaken, way off base here. He says, "'You do not understand the Scriptures or the power of God." By the way one leads to another. If you don't understand the Scriptures, if you don't understand the gospel, you will never be saved. And if you're not saved, the Spirit of God will not dwell within you. You will have nothing to restrain your flesh, and you will operate in the flesh and one day you will perish in your sins. So he confronts them. And he does so by disproving their error from Scripture. Not from just his opinion, but from Scripture. Now, don't you know a hush must have come over the crowd at this point. It's like, I can't believe Jesus said that to the Sadducees. And can't you imagine the look on the faces of the Sadducees? I imagine, you know, steams coming out their ears, you know the veins in your neck or bulging, and they're biting their teeth and they're wanting to get to this guy.

So now Jesus responds to the insoluble dilemma with an infallible solution. And he says in verse 25, "For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like the angels in heaven." I might add also Luke's account of this in Luke 20:34, Luke, for the word "they,"... for when "they", Luke uses a Hebraism, "sons of this age." "For when the sons of this age rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but they're like the angels in heaven.'" Clear, concise, authoritative. Also, it's fascinating is it not, I mean, there's no marriage in heaven. No need for procreation in heaven, no need for the appropriate ways to enjoy sexual activity, none of that will be there. No need for a living illustration of Christ's covenantal love for his bridal church, because we're there. No marriage in heaven is probably a great relief for some, some are probably saying, "Oh, thank you, Lord." For others like me, I think Oh, Lord, as wonderful as it is with my dear wife, I'm sure it's gonna have to be a whole lot better for me to enjoy heaven, right? A lot of us are that way. And rightfully so. But that's because we can't imagine the bliss of sinless glory, being in perfect relationship with God, with the angels, with perfected saints and all of that. And also, isn't it interesting, he says, "like the angels in heaven." I mean, this is a not-so-subtle refutation of their rejection of the afterlife, right? I mean, they didn't even believe in angels, the existence of angels.

And then Jesus supports his statement with Scripture. And he does so in vintage rabbinic practice. He says in verse 26, "But regarding the fact that the dead rise again." Again, now he's refuting their notion that the dead don't rise, even though that's the illustration that you're giving, because the dead do rise. It's also interesting, I might add that the word "rise," in the original language is in the passive voice, which is very significant. It indicates that resurrection is not something automatic, but it is the result of the active power of God; a reality that they cannot fathom, because he's already said in verse 24, "You do not understand the Scriptures or the power of God."

So he says, "But regarding the fact that the dead rise again, have you not read in the book of Moses." Now let's stop. In the Pentateuch, the only section of Scripture that you believe, have you not read this? He says, "in the passage about the burning bush." I mean, everybody knows that one right? "How God spoke to him saying, I AM THE GOD OF ABRAHAM, AND THE GOD OF ISAAC, AND THE GOD OF JACOB'. He is not the God of the dead, but of the living; you are greatly mistaken.'" You see, this is at the very heart of the Pentateuch--that Yahweh is the living God who has made a covenant with his people; a commitment through Abraham, even through Moses. One that will last through time and eternity. Again, he says, "I am." It didn't say I was. I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So how could dead men consider Yahweh to be their God and worship Him worship him as such if they were not still alive spiritually, if there was no afterlife, if there was no resurrection. It's like, end of discussion. In fact, Luke 20 gives this account beginning of verse 39, "Some of the scribes answered and said, 'Teacher, You have spoken well.'" I mean, they gotta save face in front of the crowd right? "'Teacher, You have you have spoken well.’” And then it goes on to say, "For they did not have courage to question Him any longer about anything." You know, I get that.

Now, I want to take you to First Corinthians 15 for a few minutes. Because this is so important, more truths on the resurrection. We're going to look at verses 20 through 28. Just kind of in a brief way, let me give you the context, as we read earlier in our scripture reading. Verses 12 through 19 is where the apostle delineated seven absurd theological consequences that would occur if believers were not raised from the dead, like Christ. If we do not believe in a bodily resurrection, then Christ would not have been risen, the preaching of the gospel would be meaningless, faith in Christ would be worthless, all who witnessed the resurrection and all who preach it would be liars, all men would die in their sins, all former believers would have eternally perished, and finally Christians would be the most pitiable people on earth. In other words, the Christian life would be a charade; t would be a sick, ridiculous joke. But in verse 20, he says, "But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep," referring to the righteous dead whose spirits have gone on to be with the Lord, but whose body awaits the composition, in the resurrection, they are asleep--"koimao" in the original language. It's often used to describe believers who have died. First Thessalonians 4:14 speaks of those who have "fallen asleep in Jesus." And then later on in verse 16, they're identified as the "dead in Christ." Second Corinthians five in verse eight, "I say, and prefer rather to be absent for the body, and to be at home with the Lord." And you will recall, as well, that Christ comforted the thief on the cross, Luke 23, verse 43, when he said, "'Truly I say to you, today, you shall be with me in paradise.'" So this is a fascinating statement here, that Christ is the first fruits of those who are asleep in him. Now, this does not mean that Jesus was the first person to be resurrected from the dead. The scriptures give us other examples of that. But what it's referring to is, that unlike Jesus, all those people died again. Only Christ himself was the one that was raised never to die again.

Now fascinating this idea of "first fruits." In Leviticus 23 and verse 10, we read how God commanded his covenant people to do something very important before they harvested their barley crops. They were required to bring a representative sample of the harvest to the priests as an offering to the Lord. This was called the first fruits. And this symbolized the consecration of the whole harvest to God, and it was a pledge of the harvest to come. So Christ's resurrection is the first truths. In other words, it is the first installment of a harvest that already exists. And what is that? It's the harvest of the elect. And He speaks of those who have falling asleep. They're going to be considered the full harvest. So this is exciting. Think about this. Paul is saying that Christ's resurrection didn't occur somehow in isolation as if it had no impact on the rest of the harvest. No, no, no, no, he was the first fruit of the rest of the harvest that already existed. You don't bring a first fruit if nothing else exists, right? And that existing crop was, and is, the elect of God that existed in eternity past. You know, I think of this when I think of our departed loved ones, I can still see my mom and dad that sat right over there that are now with the Lord. We all have loved ones that are with the Lord. Isn't it comforting to know that they are asleep in Christ Jesus. Their spirits are alive yeah, their bodies are dead. And although their soul is in heaven, their body, which is in the case of my parents, bodies were fatigued and a bit diseased and disabled. Remember how mom used to say, I just feel like I'm all used up. I'm beginning to feel more and more that way, aren't you? Their bodies are in the grave. Or for some people, their bodies are scattered all over the earth. But one day, the DNA that was a part of that decomposed body will recompose by the power of God and they will wake up in unimaginable power and glory and be united with their glorified soul. Death is the great symbol of sowing in Scripture. First Corinthians 15:42, "So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown a perishable body, it is raised in imperishable body; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body." Beloved, the implications of the resurrection of Christ exceed the importance and the power and the potential of all other events in the universe. It can only be rivaled by the actual creation of the universe. You see, when the resurrection body of Christ Jesus existed, as it exists, I should say even now. Within it contains the supernatural source of eternal life, the power of God's universal kingdom, it's unimaginable and a mystery beyond our capacity to understand. He dwells within His redeemed. As I say, He has redeemed us that he might inhabit us, and we exist in him. Colossians three and verse three, our life is "hidden with Christ in God." Paul says, "If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead," Romans 8:11, "dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you." You see, dormant within the resurrection body of Christ, was the seed of resurrection glory for all whom the Father had given him. And the magnificent truth of the gospel is that if you are united to Christ and saving faith, you are like, if you will, a nuclear warhead that is ready to explode in unimaginable power and glory, by the power of God in whom you are united. And what a precious and profound comfort that should be to each one of us. That's why Paul says in Second Corinthians four beginning in verse 16, "Therefore, we do not lose hope, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." Therefore, we can rejoice with the writer of Hebrews in chapter 11 and verse one, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." You see, in Christ, we have been given a new kind of existence. His body was made perfect, no longer subject to weakness, to disease to death, but able to live eternally. He put on immortality. And like his, our resurrection body, will also be raised imperishable in glory, in power, a spiritual body as we read in First Corinthians 15.

So we will be given a body like Christ, one that is fit for heaven, no longer subject to sickness or disease, or the shame of sin. No longer easily seduced by the temptations of the world that our flesh so naturally wants to gratify. So the power contained in the resurrection body of Jesus was infinitely powerful. For it houses in it, the omnipotent power of Creator God, and one day we will behold His glory. And you know, when we do, he will look like us as a human being. From his glorified body will emanate the effulgence of the celestial majesty. The resplendent glory of the light of his shekinah will blaze forth like the brilliance of the sun. And again, to think, Christ is the first fruits. In other words, he is a precise sample of the coming harvest, which means our resurrection bodies will be like his in many ways, minus the incommunicable attributes of God that are his alone, Beloved, may I make it real practical to you the next time you see the corpse of a believing loved one, look beyond that decaying body, and see the glory of that glorified saint. Focus on the transformation from the corruptible--that is the passing away--and the incorruptible that will take its place.

And next Paul goes on to explain the profound implications of Christ's resurrection on all who are united to him in faith. He says, "For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ, all will be made alive." There's two men, there's two acts, there's two consequences. Adam was the head of the old creation, Christ is the head of the new creation. He is the first born from the dead. In other words, Colossians 1:18, He is, in other words, the preeminent one, the one of highest rank, the firstborn, the "prototokos" was the ranking son who received the right of the inheritance from the Father. And Christ possesses the right of all of the inheritance over his creation. He existed before the creation, and he is exalted in rank over it, because he is the pre-existent, self-existent, uncreated Creator of the universe.

Two men, to acts, two consequences. Romans five, verse 19, "For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous." In other words, when Adam sinned, he represented all humanity, therefore, his sin was reckoned to all his descendants. But the last Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ, radically reverses all that the first Adam initiated. And today we await, not only our personal resurrection, but the world to come. And notice what he says in verse 22, "in Christ, all will be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ's at His coming." So Paul goes on to describe the rest of the harvest of which Christ was the first fruits, and he says, "each in his own order." "Order"-- "tagma", a military term, used to describe the arrangement of troops, there's order here. And here we see, once again, that God is both orderly, he is purposeful in all that he does. And here we learn that the resurrection harvest comes in, in three stages at Christ's coming, "Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ's at His coming." The first stage will be those who have come to saving faith from Pentecost to the rapture, and they will be joined by living saints at the rapture. First, Thessalonians four verse 16, When the Lord himself it says, "descends from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore, comfort one another with these words."

The second stage of those who will be raised from the dead refers to those who come to faith during the Tribulation, as well as the Old Testament saints, they will be raised to reign with Christ during the millennium. You read about this in Revelation 20 and verse four. Daniel spoke of this in Daniel 12 two, "Many of those who are asleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgraced and everlasting contempt."

And the third stage are those who died during the Millennial Kingdom, they will probably be instantly transformed at death into their eternal bodies, and so forth. The only people left to be raised will be the ungodly, that occurs at the end of the millennial kingdom, at the Great White Throne Judgment of God, Revelation 20, which will be followed by an eternal hell. Acts 24:15, "There will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust." And John says in John five and verse 29, that there will be a "resurrection of life" and a "resurrection of judgment." So let's rejoice in certain promise of our resurrection. Paul speaks of this in Romans eight, verse 23, "We ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. For in hope we have been saved." Aren't you thankful that even though now we groan, and sometimes we groan loudly, we do so in hope of what God has in store for us.

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. May we not only understand them, but may we apply them. May they govern our thoughts, our behavior. May they animate our hearts not only to further study of your word, but Lord, to worship, so that we may enjoy the absolute fullness of all that we have in Christ. And Father, for those that really do not know you as Savior, maybe they are religious, maybe they've even made a profession of faith, but they really have no love for Christ. They have no burden for the lost, no hunger for the Word, no hungering and thirsting for righteousness. Lord, they're still ruled by their flesh. Oh, Lord, won't you by the power of your spirit, bring conviction to their heart, that today they would repent and cry out for you to save them through faith in Christ and by his grace. We pray all have these things in the precious name of Jesus, our Savior in our Lord. Amen.

This morning I would like to speak to you about the Satanic power of religious hypocrisy. And we see this emerging from our text this morning, found in Mark chapter 12, if you will turn there; Mark chapter 12, verses 13 through 17. Before I read the text, and we examine it, may I remind you of something that we tend to forget. And that is what the Apostle Paul admonishes us to do in Ephesians six, beginning in verse 11, he says, "Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places."

Satan's schemes are as ingenious as they are deadly. And we are witnessing the consequences of his schemes not only in the culture in which we find ourselves, but even in ostensibly evangelical churches. In fact, today is America's most celebrated pagan worship service. It's called the Super Bowl where over 100 million people will be watching. I understand that the average ticket cost is about $10,000. This is the ultimate distraction from the difficulties of life. People's lives that will end up in death, and eternally they will either find themselves in hell or in heaven. Screaming fans can watch fabulously wealthy, athletic entertainers, frankly, try to advance a pigskin over opposing lines. It's really rather funny when you think about it. And I understand that the halftime shows are typically vulgar and immoral, I would certainly never encourage you to watch it. Shield your children from these things. But there you will be entertained, I'm sure by musicians and dancers, skilled in celebrating the immoral values of the world that is passing away in divine judgment. I guess it's fitting that it's being held this year in Sin City. Well, indeed, Satan tempts our depraved hearts, with irresistibly delicious delicacies that promise life, but will only deliver death. In fact, we read in Proverbs chapter 14, verse 12, "There is a way which seems right to a man but its end is the way of death." And perhaps his most powerful weapon to accomplish his schemes is through the religious hypocrite. Men and women that seduce the naive and often the desperate with deceptions, and they do this under the pretense of sincerity and integrity, and truth.

You know, this began in the garden when Satan tempted Eve. You will recall in Genesis three one that "the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field, which the LORD God had made." And you will recall that he appeared to her alone; she was vulnerable to seduction, unprotected by Adam's experience and counsel. And portraying himself as a beautiful emissary of enlightenment, he then caused her to doubt God's word, to question the goodness of his will and offer her another, more accurate and more appealing interpretation of what God had said. How sad to think that God will restrict you from partaking of all the good pleasures of the garden. Surely you misunderstood him because he knows that in the day that you eat from that forbidden tree, your eyes will be opened. And you will be like God, knowing good and evil. And sadly, she was convinced that she was doing the right thing. So, she disobeyed God; she believed a lie. And the rest, of course, is history.

And this kind of deception continues to this very day. False teachers, often unwittingly, and sometimes wittingly, deceive undiscerning people that are ruled by the lusts of their heart, causing them to believe the schemes of the devil. Whether it's the greedy deceptions of the prosperity and social justice gospels, or perhaps the gross immoralities of the alphabet cult. Or the insanity of the liberal woketards or the buffoonery and corruption of our current administration led by a senile old man; whatever it is, dear friends, it all comes from the father of lies. And those lies, the schemes of the devil, always appeal to the lusts of fallen flesh; to those who love darkness rather than light. And again, one of Satan's greatest allies in his assault on the purposes of God, are religious hypocrites; pretenders whose actions belie their stated beliefs, and values. The apostle Paul warned us of this in Second Corinthians 11, verse 15. "Therefore," he says "it is not surprising if his servants also disguised themselves as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their deeds." And as we will see this morning, we are not left without resource. In this battle, we have the word of God, we have the gospel--which is the power of God unto salvation--we have the sort of the Spirit, his word that can effectively parry the blows of the enemy. In fact, Paul reminds us of this as well in Second Corinthians 10, verse 3-5, he says, "For though we walk in the flesh." In other words, though we have human limitations, "we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ." And in our text, this morning, we will see this satanic power of religious hypocrisy, again, a power that we often underestimate, even in our own lives. And we do so to our own peril. To be sure, we must always be suspect of our own spirituality, as Jesus warned the naive and overconfident disciples when he found them sleeping in the garden in Matthew 26:41. He says, "Keep watching and praying, that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is,” What? "Is weak." This is especially crucial given the growing hostility of genuine Christianity here in the United States. As rare as that is, indeed, America has sown the wind of wickedness and it is now reaping the whirlwind of divine abandonment. I think if God would judge his chosen people Israel so harshly throughout redemptive history, what will he do to nations that mock him?

So, let's examine the Satanic power of religious hypocrisy, as it is revealed in our text here in Mark 12, beginning with verse 13. "Then they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Him in order to trap Him in a statement. They came and said to Him, 'Teacher, we know that You are truthful and defer to no one; for You are not partial to any but teach the way of God in truth. Is it lawful to pay a poll-tax to Caesar, or not? Shall we pay or shall we not pay?' But He, knowing their hypocrisy said to them, 'Why are you testing Me? Bring Me a denarius to look at.' They brought one and He said to them, 'Whose likeness and inscription is this?' And they said to him, 'Caesar's.' And Jesus said to them, 'Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.' And they were amazed at Him."

This text is very instructive in helping us understand the character and conduct of religious hypocrites. And I might add that because of the internet in our day, they flourish like maggots on roadkill, along with all of their deceptions. And I wish to examine this section of scripture under three headings. First of all, we will see that hypocrites make unholy alliances to undermine the truth. Secondly, hypocrites masquerade as emissaries of truth, to promote deception. And finally, hypocrites lay traps to discredit their enemies and advance their agenda. And I trust you will examine your life under the light of divine scrutiny, and that we will all grow in spiritual integrity and discernment.

So, first of all, in our little outline, let's look at this issue of hypocrites making unholy alliances to undermine the truth, verse 13. "Then they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Him, in order to trap Him in a statement." Now friends, this is a great example of the little saying "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," right? I mean, the Pharisees and the Herodians despised each other, and yet they're coming together in this situation. It'd be similar to liberals and conservatives today or even worse yet the astounding antithesis between liberals and authentic Christians. Think of this, the Pharisees were fastidious keepers of religious law-- though a lot of it had been invented by themselves--but the Herodians couldn't care less about the law of God. The Pharisees were fervently loyal to Israel, the Herodians were fervently loyal to Rome. They were basically sycophants of Caesar, not Yahweh. And you might remember that Herod Antipas was not even Jewish, he was half Idumean. In other words, he was an Edomite that comes from the Hebrew Edom, which is, which means "red," a description of its founder, which was Esau, the elder son of Isaac; Jacob being the younger son. So he was half Idumean, but he was also half Samaritan, whom the Jews considered to be unclean pagans. And Rome allowed him to rule after his father, Herod the Great's, death. And he was, at this time, the current governor of Galilee and Perea. The Pharisees wanted a descendant of David, the Messiah, to ascend to the throne, but the Herodians wanted Herod. But despite their differences, the Pharisees and the Herodians both had one thing in common, and that was their sheer hatred of Jesus.

You will remember earlier when Jesus healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath, the Pharisees were absolutely infuriated. In Mark three verse six, we read that, "The Pharisees went out and immediately began conspiring with the Herodians against Him, as to how they might destroy Him." Of course, the Pharisees were furious, because Jesus exposed their religious hypocrisy, their corruption, and the Herodian saw Jesus as a rival to Herod the king. But they both understood that they had no authority to execute Jesus; only Rome could do that. However, Rome wouldn't even arrest him, much less execute him simply because Jesus embarrassed the Jews or disagreed with their theology. So they had to trap him somehow; trick him into saying something that would cause Rome to believe that he was an insurrectionist. After all, just a few days earlier, 1000s, probably hundreds of 1000s were hailing him as their Messiah. Moreover, he had come into the temple, and run out all of the money changers and occupied its precincts. Astounding.

But here again, we see how these hypocrites make unholy alliances, to undermine the truth. By way of contrast, Jesus never sought common ground with his enemies. Never. Nor should we, Jesus and the apostles never once sought to "build bridges," as you hear people say, they built walls. Those walls were built with the mortar of doctrinal precision. People say today well, doctrine divides, absolutely it does. That's what you want. It divides between truth and error. The eternal destiny of men's souls depends upon the truth. This is the deadly deception of ecumenism that we see today. The attempt to somehow find unity among people of faith, whatever that means, despite their heretical beliefs. Historically, the cause of Israel's failure, and God's judgment upon them, was because they tried to blend the worship of Yahweh and being obedient in their own ways to the Mosaic law with the pagan idol worship of their culture. We see this today in evangelical pragmatism where many churches will say, you know, in order to win the world, we must become like the world. We must become more attractive, more relevant, more therapeutic, less dogmatic. Got to be more entertaining. And then the world will like us and buy into our gospel light. I was reading about a place called Life Church in Edmond, Oklahoma; the third largest church in America, like 30,000 people going there. And they're advertising a Super Bowl Sunday, a tailgating party, themed church service where the pastor will exegete Superbowl commercials. We see ostensibly evangelical churches inviting Muslims and Roman Catholics and prosperity cult preachers and social justice preachers. Even perverted pedophile, drag queens and sodomites to come speak to their people. Second Corinthians six verse 14, we read, "Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever?" And he goes on to say in verse 17, "'THEREFORE, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE,' says the Lord. AND DO NOT TOUCH WHAT IS UNLCEAN.'" In other words, we are never to partnership, never, somehow, build a bridge with some other religious organization, or participate in any kind of a religious event with those who deny the authority of Scripture, and in any way distort the gospel.

I touched on this briefly, I believe the last time we were together, that this is why we would never attend a homosexual wedding, which is no wedding at all in God's eyes. But it is a blasphemous mockery of the covenant of marriage between one man and one woman, ordained by God, to illustrate the covenantal love that God has through Christ for his bridal church. I mean, we would never want to not only make people comfortable in their sin, but to join in a celebration that taunts God. It's inconceivable. Paul says in Ephesians 5:11, "Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them; for it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret." Our response to those kinds of things, and there are many, but especially the homosexual wedding thing, should be like Lot's response that Peter described in Second Peter two beginning in verse seven. There we read that Lot was "oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them,)" that is living in Sodom, "(felt his righteous soul tormented day by day at by their lawless deeds.)" He saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day by day, by their lawless deeds, that's how we should be in anything that dishonors the Lord. So again, Jesus and the apostles never ever made any kind of unholy alliances with apostates to somehow accomplish the purposes of God. You never see Jesus saying to the Pharisees, Hey, guys, look, I know I've been a little tough on you guys. I tell you what, we need to find some common ground here, right? I mean, after all, we're all after the same thing, you know, to experience the love of God and to help people. And I know we've got our differences on things, but let's just find the most common denominator of everything so that we can work together rather than work against each other. Instead of that, Jesus simply unleashed the gospel and let it do what only it can do. This is why Jesus said in Matthew 10:34, "'Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to SET A MAN AGAINST HIS FATHER, AND A DAUGHTER AGAINST HER MOTHER, AND A DAUGHTER-IN-LAW AGAINST HER MOTHER-IN-LAW; AND A MAN'S ENEMIES WILL BE THE MEMBERS OF HIS HOUSEHOLD.'"

Well hypocrites not only make unholy alliances to undermine the truth, but secondly, they will masquerade as emissaries of truth to promote deception. Notice what happens here in the text, verse 13. Then they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Him in order to trap him in a statement." This is the Sanhedrin, no doubt, here sending them, and "They came and said to Him, 'Teacher, we know that You are truthful.'" Luke's account in Luke 20 verse 21, we read, "'Teacher we know that You speak and teach correctly.'" "Correctly" comes from the Greek word "orthos," which means accurate, we get our word orthodox from that. So they're really buttering him up here. Not only do we know that you are truthful, but they say "'and defer to no one; for You are not partial to any but teach the way of God in truth.'" And I'm sure the many people that are standing around are saying, well, yeah, that's what we think too. But oh, such insincere, saccharin flattery. It's sickening. What a setup and to thin-- that they would think--that the Lord is going to fall for this. Of course, they knew the people thought all of this, and the you've got to win the people if you're a hypocrite. Plus, they would communicate to the people, or this would communicate to the people that you know, like you, we too are seeking the truth here.

We must always be on guard for this kind of hypocrisy. I've seen it so often down through the years. And often these people are winsome, knowledgeable, talented, charismatic, in the sense of their personality, their interpersonal style of relating many times; they're even orthodox. But they will have some aberrant twist in their theology somewhere. And quickly, you'll see them garner a following. But gradually, little by little, issues begin to emerge, you'll begin to hear strange stories about what's happening with them and other people, divisions begin to develop. And gradually, a once hidden agenda of control and manipulation becomes increasingly obvious. I've seen that happen in our church. And then there's conflict. Boom, things begin to blow up. Many times, there's moral failure associated with all of that. Paul warned about this in First Timothy five verse 24. He said, "The sins of some men are quite evident, going before them to judgment; for others, their sins follow after." In other words, there's somewhere you can tell "no way, we can see this deal a mile away." But others, you have to wait and then you begin to see what's really going on. Again, we've had that in this church. We may even have some of that going on right now. I'm not aware of it, but it probably is and eventually, it'll surface. I've been here almost 30 years. I know how these things work, so do the other elders. In fact, Paul said that this is inevitable in churches, First Corinthians 11, beginning of verse 18, "When you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you; and in part I believe it." And here's why, "For there must also be factions among you, so that those who are approved may become evident among you." In other words, God uses factions, he uses hypocrisy in the church, to reveal those who are spiritually mature and trying to honor Christ, versus those who are not. And this is especially a difficult situation when a pastor or a church leader is involved. Because my friends, the pulpit has no place for cowards, for charlatans, for entertainers, for entrepreneurs, and certainly not for hypocrites. Jude spoke of this beginning of verse 12, "These are the men who are hidden reefs in your love feasts when they feast with you without fear, caring for themselves; clouds without water, carried along by winds; autumn trees without fruit, doubly dead, uprooted; wild waves of the sea, casting up their own shame like foam; wandering stars for whom the black darkness has been reserved forever." And certainly, this is a perfect description of the religious leaders of Israel, who were trying to trap the Son of God.

Now back to our text. These hypocritical Pharisees and Herodians are masquerading now as these emissaries of truth. They're trying to promote their own deceptions. They're serving their father, the devil, who is master of all of this, like the phony Apostles in Corinth. Remember, Paul described them in Second Corinthians 11, beginning of verse 13, "For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore, it is not surprising if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their deeds."

So, they approach Jesus, "oh wonderful teacher who defers to no one. You who are impartial to anyone, but only teaches the way of God in the truth, like us." And this brings us to the third point, and that is, hypocrites lay traps to discredit their enemies and advance their agenda. You see what they must do is publicly humiliate and discredit the Lord Jesus Christ, while at the same time portraying him as an insurrectionist rebelling against Roman authority. That's what the whole motivation is here. Notice in verse 14, they asked the question, "'Is it lawful to pay a poll-tax to Caesar or not? Shall we pay or shall we not pay?'" Oh, this is ingenious. Satan is a genius in his schemes. Now, the Jews had to pay a variety of taxes to Rome. And it was deeply humiliating to them. Frankly, it was forced idolatry. They hated it. But the worst tax of all, was the poll-tax. It was also called the head tax, the "tributum capitis." And it required one denarius per year--that would be about one day's wages. It was payable by all males 14 through 65. And we believe that they had to even pay for their wives as well. But the poll tax was different than all of the other taxes, taxes on things like property and agricultural yield of crops they had, they had sales taxes and toll taxes and duties on agricultural goods and all kinds of things. But this was especially reprehensible to the Jews. And that's why the Pharisees and Herodians picked this one. Notice they didn't say, Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, but rather specifically pay a poll-tax to Caesar? Why was it reprehensible? Well, number one because of denarius, which was a silver coin, bore the image of the emperor, Tiberius Caesar, along with inscriptions claiming divinity. Of course, this is idolatry. This is a violation of the second commandment, that you are not to make or bow down or serve a graven image. They're being forced to do this.

But the second reason why it was so reprehensible is because the clear implication of this tax was simply this-- that Caesar owned them; that they were his possession. Not Yahweh's. And just for this reason that the Jews wouldn't even carry a denarius. So this was a hot button issue. In fact, 25 years earlier, in about AD six, a Galilean named Judas founded the Zealots to revolt against Rome, quoting from the wars of the Jews two, comma 118, from Flavius Josephus, who was a first century Jewish Roman historian. He wrote this, this was written about AD 75. Here's what he said, "Under his administration," and this was referring to Coponius, who was the Roman procurator, at that time, "under his administration, it was that a certain Galilean whose name was Judas prevailed with his countrymen to revolt, and said that they were cowards if they would endure to pay a tax to the Romans, and would after God, submit to mortal men as their lords. This man was a teacher of a peculiar sect of his own, and was not at all like the rest of those their leaders." We read about him as well in Acts 5:37. There we read "Judas of Galilee, rose up in the days of the census and drew away some people after him; he too, perished and all those who followed him, were captured." By the way, one of Jesus's disciples was Simon the Zealot, and he belonged to this movement prior to coming to Christ. It's also worth noting that this highly offensive taxation led to another revolt against Rome, between AD 66 and 70. And it was put down by the Romans in AD 70, when they utterly annihilated Jerusalem.

So, knowing how the Jews despise Roman taxation, their question to Jesus was quite a setup. You know, think about this, if Jesus says, "Well, you need to pay it," then Jesus would be promoting idolatry, and he would lose favor with the people. But if he said, "don't pay it," and Herodians would label him as an insurrectionist and would report him to Rome. So, either way he loses. But I have to laugh at this; like all narcissistic hypocrites, they thought they could outsmart God. One thing you will discover in seasoned hypocrites, is they are a legend in their own mind. In fact, you will see this all the time with people who are in power. No matter how stupid they may be, they think they're smarter than everyone else. We deal with this on a regular basis in our modern politics. We've got people in positions of authority that are dangerously dumb. I don't say that to be unkind. I mean, they're intellectually challenged. And when you listen to them, you think, how could anybody be that stupid? Worse yet, how could anybody be that stupid to vote for these people?

Dear friends, let me put it to you practically, because we all have to guard our hearts with this. You may think that you are pulling the wool over other people's eyes. And you may be very effective in doing this, but know this, the penetrating eye of divine omniscience can see right to the very soul of your being. You are not fooling God. He knows your every motive. And you think of the doctrine of divine omniscience, and we see biblically that he knows everything that is actual and everything that is possible. There has never been a time where he lacked knowledge, where he lacked information. John 2:25, "He Himself knows what is in man." Hebrews 4:13, "There is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." And the Psalmist puts it this way in Psalm 139, verse four, "Even before there is a word on my tongue, behold, oh Lord, you know at all." So, in verse 15, we read, "But He, knowing their hypocrisy." In other words, he knew their motive, he knew what was going on. "Said to them, 'Why are you testing me?'" Luke's account in Luke 20 and verse 23, we read, "He detected their trickery." And Matthew's account in chapter 22, verse 18, he "perceived their malice." So, Jesus said to them, "'Bring me a denarius to look at.'" He didn't carry one. Most of the Jews wouldn't carry one, they are not going to carry a little image of an idol around with them. Probably it was only the Herodians that had some and so they had to find one or here's one. "'Bring me a denarius to look at.' They brought one. And He said to them, 'Whose likeness and inscription is this?' And they said to Him, 'Caesar's.' And Jesus said to them, 'Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.' And they were amazed at Him." Well, that's an understatement, right? Can you imagine being there? I mean, to argue with him would have required them to favor one of either of those sides, if they were to argue in favor of paying it, then they indicted themselves. If they said that, well, no, you shouldn't pay it, then all the people would be against them. So Jesus just flipped the whole thing on them. And I'm sure that people realize that they were no match for Jesus intellectually. Reminds me of the little saying "better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt." Right?

And it's also interesting to think about this; this dialogue took place in the public arena of the Court of the Gentiles. So everyone heard it. Everyone's hearing this. And yet you don't hear anybody in the crowd say, "Excuse me, Rabbi." No, nobody's gonna say anything. Luke's account, says this in chapter 20, verse 26, "And they were unable to catch Him in a saying in the presence of the people; and being amazed at His answer, they became silent." Matthew 22, verse 22. "And hearing this, they were amazed, and leaving Him, they went away."

Now, there's an important lesson here that needs to be learned if I can digress for a moment. Jesus clearly teaches that we must pay our taxes to a secular government, even though much of its policies are wicked. When Jesus said, "Render to Caesar," the term "apodidomi" in the original language literally speaks of the repayment of something owed. So you owe them this. And what is it that is owed? Well, they're providing for you: peace, safety, protection, infrastructure, roads, bridges; for us electrical grid, and on and on it goes. Paul spoke of this in Romans 13, beginning in verse one, "Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God. Therefore, whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves. For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good and you will have praise from the same; for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil. Therefore it is necessary to be in subjection, not only because of wrath, but also for conscience' sake. For because of this, you also pay taxes, for rulers are servants of God, devoting themselves to this very thing. Render to all what is do them: tax to whom tax is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor."

Now, much of what our governing authorities do, is reprehensible in the eyes of God. And we have to expect this. I mean, these people are at enmity with God, they're spiritually dead. They're acting consistently with their depraved nature. They're ruled by that. Ephesians I'm sorry, Romans chapter eight, and verse five. Paul describes him as "Those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh." He goes on to say in verse seven, "the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so. For those who are in the flesh cannot please God." So naturally, our fallen leaders are going to act consistently with their depraved hearts and how Satan works in them to accomplish his purposes to thwart the purposes of God. Nevertheless, civil authorities are ordained by God. It's an example of God's common grace, I think, where we would be if we didn't have any governing authority, right? If you want to get just a little sample of what it might look like, look at liberally controlled cities today and you see the anarchy, you see drug addicts and sexual perverts and criminal gangs and homeless encampments; unimaginable filth, syringe needles laying around. That's why a lot of you have moved here to Tennessee, right? But where government and sanity and the rule of law prevail, we as citizens are protected. And we can live in peace and in varying degrees of prosperity. Peter spoke of this as well, First Peter two beginning in verse 13, "Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether to a king as the one in authority, or to governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and the praise of those who do right. For such as the will of God that by doing right, you may silence the ignorance of foolish men. Act as free men and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil but use it as bondslaves of God." In other words, willing slaves of God. "Honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, honor the king." I mean, the only time we can ever rebel against civil authority is when they force us to do something that God forbids or forbids us to do that which God commands. And for this reason, we're even commanded to pray for those that God has placed in authority over us. Paul spoke about this in First Timothy two beginning of verse one, "I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men." And then he adds this "For kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity." And I pray often that God will protect us and our children from the exceedingly wicked authorities that he has placed over us to accomplish his purposes, in ways that we can't fully understand.

Now you have to wonder, if the Pharisees and Herodians really heard what Jesus said, When they were trying to trap him, again, "'Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's,'" and then this last phrase, "'and to God the things that are God's.'" Now, they may have had to have thought this through, as I have thought it through. But here what we see is the ultimate authority speaks with ultimate authority. All right. I want you to notice again in verse 16, he says, "'Whose likeness,'" it could be translated image an inscription, '"is this?' And they said to him, 'Caesar's.' This is so powerful in light of what is happening here. I mean, think about this--God is the only and ultimate sovereign and we as human beings are made in his image. Therefore, it is God, not man, who possesses the only rightful claim on his image bearers. Therefore, by implication, as James Edward states, quote, "If coins bear Caesar's image, than they belong to Caesar. But humanity which bears God's image, belongs to God." So, let's render to God the things that are God's. And how do we do that? Well, by obeying the supreme commandment to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength, love our neighbors as ourselves. And only by God's grace, can we even begin to do that? Romans 12, beginning of verse one, "Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and a holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect." In other words, don't allow the world to impose its values on you, in such a way as you begin to look like it and act like it and think like it. But rather, by the renewing of your mind, let there be a metamorphosis, where who you really are in Christ begins to be manifested more and more.

So, we want to ask ourselves, does any of this apply to me? Are you an actor? Are you a pretender? Do you just come here to church on Sunday, and you say some spiritual things, and you claim to be a follower of Christ, but in reality, you don't really love him. You don't really have any desire to honor him in your life, to be a holy living sacrifice, to give glory to God. Are you and here I'm going to use the quintessential hypocrite example. Are you a Judas Iscariot? The prototypical pretender, the greatest of all phonies, like all hypocrites. Judas was motivated by self-will for the purpose of self-aggrandizement and self-promotion. I mean, he was a skilled hypocrite. I mean, none of the others in the group could see it, right? He was callous in his hatred of Christ. In fact, he was so proficient in his masquerade that Matthew says that all of the disciples responded to the Lord's chilling announcement that one of you are going to betray me by saying, is it I, Lord? And even Judas said, according to Matthew 26, is it I, Rabbi? You want an example of the power and the insanity of sin. Solomon described this perfectly in Ecclesiastes nine three when he said, "The hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives." I mean, Judas knew that Jesus knew about his plan to betray him. Because Jesus had made that clear in his earlier statements, but Judas was so hardened in his hypocrisy, and his hatred of Christ. He didn't care. The only reason he chimed in with the other disciples by saying, "Is it I, rabbi?" was to somehow keep up the appearance of being like everyone else, with no care of how God saw him.

I want to close this morning with just some pastoral thoughts to you. Okay? Some things that I thought would be helpful, just very briefly, with respect to hypocrisy, because we all have to guard ourselves against it. I want to give you five concepts number one hypocrisy can thrive in any soil.

Beloved, a hypocrite can thrive in a godly church, as well as an ungodly church. In fact, I would argue that the more Christ honoring the church, the more skilled the hypocrite. And they will form alliances with other hypocrites within the church, to promote themselves, to promote their agenda. Guard against that beloved.

Secondly, hypocrisy breeds increasingly worse sins. I mean, sin always goes from bad to worse right? Never the opposite. Hypocrisy is like cancer that weakens the entire body. Cancer never comes in and says, you know what, this organ is enough, we'll just stay here. No, it will metastasize and go on and on. And that's what happens. Hypocrisy gradually sears the conscience and makes us more susceptible to even greater and more destructive sins. I mean, think of the Pharisees in Luke 12 one Jesus said, "'Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.'" And as you know, leaven is what you put in bread; it permeates through a process of fermentation. And in Scripture, it's used to describe influence, corruption, defilement, sin. And that's what happens; hypocrisy begins to ferment in you, shall we say. It permeates your life. It permeated the lives of the scribes and the Pharisees to a point that they would murder an innocent man--

their Messiah. Thirdly, hypocrisy believes public piety outweighs secret sins. The hypocrite merely gives lip service to true worship. We see this in the Lord's words in Isaiah 29:13. "Therefore, the Lord said, 'These people draw near with their mouths and honor me with their lips but have removed their hearts far from Me.'" Hypocrites love to find the spotlight so that they can go run and take a bow in it. This is what the Pharisees did with their religious garb, their public prayers, setting in the chief seats, demanding people to respect them. I might add that self-promotion is always a certain sign of hypocrisy. The humble will be willing to serve God in obscurity but not the hypocrite.

Fourthly, hypocrisy seers the conscience and predisposes the soul against heartfelt repentance. I mean Judas is a classic example of this, was he not? Jesus gave him every opportunity to repent, and he never did. He remained unrepentant and determined, the same with the scribes and Pharisees. They saw all of Jesus's miracles, all of his teaching; they heard that and yet they attributed his miraculous works to Satan. As a result, God judicially sealed them in their unbelief.

And finally, hypocrisy will attack and abandon anyone who can see through its masquerade. Consider the scribes and the Pharisees. They were absolutely apoplectic at the very name of Jesus, because he exposed them. Jesus saw right through them. In fact, he reserved his most scathing rebuke for their hypocrisy. But rather than humbling themselves in brokenness and repentance, they determined to kill him. The hypocrite is always on duty, to avoid detection, and he will attack and abandon anyone who dares to unmask him. This, my friends, is the Satanic power, of religious hypocrisy. May we all guard ourselves from it. May we all cultivate within our hearts, devotion to God. Live it out in private worship, and public service, but be willing to do that in absolute obscurity, for the glory of Christ knowing that he sees and he will reward. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that have such power in our hearts. May we all respond with obedience, knowing that you love us and you want us to experience the fullness of all that is ours in Christ Jesus. And Lord for those that perhaps are convicted under the weight of what has been said, I pray that you will bring them to a place of true brokenness and repentance and reconciled them to you in genuine saving faith. We thank you, we give you praise. In Jesus name. Amen.

As believers, we simply will not grow in Christ apart from the systematic, in-depth teaching, preaching and application of the Word of God. And therefore, we will forfeit many of the blessings that could be hours. With that in mind, we return once again to the study of His Word by looking at Mark's gospel chapter 12. For those of you that, perhaps have not been with us, we go through various books of the Bible verse by verse so that we don't miss anything. And we have been in Mark 12 now, the Gospel of Mark and now we come to Mark 12, having taken a little bit of a detour into Isaiah five to better understand what Jesus is saying in this text. This is the third and final part of a little series that I've entitled "Judgment Upon the Failed Vineyard."

Let me remind you of the context here; it is now Wednesday before his crucifixion, the Lord Jesus Christ has cleansed the temple; purged it of money changers and other nefarious characters. This has infuriated the Jewish leaders. He has also been preaching the gospel, refuting the works righteousness system of apostate Judaism of that day. And as a result, the chief priests and the scribes and the elders, were attacking him. In chapter 11, verse 28, they say, "By what authority? Are you doing these things or who gave you this authority to do these things?" And of course, his response, humiliated them in front of all of the people, and as a result, they stood self-condemned before the judge of heaven and earth. And because of their deliberate, conscious rejection of the truth, Jesus judicially sealed them in their unbelief, extinguishing forever in the light of divine revelation, that they might endure the eternal darkness that they loved.

So this brings us now to chapter 12. Jesus is speaking to a crowd that has surrounded him. It would have been literally hundreds of people, including the religious leaders, that are trying to trap him. They want to arrest him; they want him dead. And with that, we read in verse one of Mark 12, that Jesus, "began to speak to them in parables. 'A man PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT, AND DUG A VAT UNDER THE WINE PRESS AND BUILT A TOWER and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey. At the harvest time, he sent a slave to the vine-growers, in order to receive some of the produce of the vineyard from the vine-growers. They took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Again, he sent them another slave, and they wounded him in the head, and treated him shamefully. And he sent another and that one they killed; and so, with many others, beating some and killing others. He had one more to send, a beloved son; he sent him last of all to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.' But those vine-growers said one another, 'This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours!' They took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the vine-growers and will give the vineyard to others. Have you not even read the Scripture? THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER STONE; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES.' And they were seeking to seize Him. And yet they feared the people, for they understood that He spoke the parable against them. And so they left him and went away."

As we look at the parable, we can see very clearly what Jesus is referring to here. The slaves that were sent and mistreated and killed depict the prophets of God from Moses all the way to the last Old Testament prophet John the Baptist. The "son" that was killed refers to Jesus, the Son of God. And the "vineyard," as we've studied over the last couple of weeks out of Isaiah five, refers to the house of Israel and the men of Judah, his delightful plant--Isaiah five seven. And the journey really symbolizes that period between God's original dealing with the descendants of Abraham, the transformation of the people into a nation, the covenantal expectations of them through the Mosaic Law, the rebellion and the divine dispersion that he caused to occur all the way through the arrival of the Messiah, the incarnate Son of God, the Lord Jesus, that stood before them. And the harvest that he expected was the spiritual fruit of godliness. Because he had called the people of Israel to be the ones that proclaim the true God. And all of this was illustrated by his miraculous works, even in their midst. They are the ones that were to reveal the Messiah, the anointed one, who would be the savior of the world. They were to be God's "priest nation." As God told Moses on Sinai, in Exodus 19, six, "'You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests, and holy nation.'" A priest is a mediator between God and man and all of Israel was to serve as that mediator for God to the rest of the world. But as you know, they failed miserably. They rejected Christ. And this parable is therefore a graphic picture of the outrageous wickedness of not just Israel, but the religious leaders, the vine-growers, given the responsibility to care for God's vineyard, Israel.

And in verse one, as we come here, Jesus quotes the Parable of the Vineyard from Isaiah five that we've studied in great detail the last couple of weeks, and there you find a summary of God's lament over the rebellion of his people and the specific categories of sin that brought about his judgment upon them, and the same kinds of things Jesus accused them of. And this parable really parallels what we see in Isaiah five, Let me remind you of the six woes of Isaiah five--the categories of sin that kindled his wrath against them. There was first of all, the sin of covetousness, the avarice, greedy materialism. Secondly, the sin of dissipation; self-indulgence that really resulted in a refusal to contemplate the works of God and creation and history and redemption. The sin of mockery; they dared God to judge them. They shook their fist in his face. The sin of perversity where they called good, evil and evil good. This included by the way, the sin of homosexuality, that's an abomination to God. We read about this, for example, in Isaiah three and verse eight, and following, "For Jerusalem has stumbled, and Judah has fallen, because their speech and their actions are against the LORD, to rebel against His glorious presence. Their expression of their faces, bears witness against them, and they display their sin like Sodom, they do not even conceal it, Woe to them, for they have brought evil on themselves." And then there was also the sin of self-deification; the height of arrogance, the text says, "they were wise in their own eyes." They knew more than God, so they did their own thing. And finally, the sin of corruption; dishonest drunken leaders that could be bribed to advance the agenda of the wicked. And together, variations of this list of wickedness continued to characterize Israel even through the days of the Lord Jesus.

Now let's look more closely at the parable. Again, verse one, "He began to speak to them in parables: 'A man PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT, AND DUG A VAT UNDER THE WINE PRESS AND BUILT A TOWER.'" And you will recall that this demonstrates that there was thorough preparation and protection of this precious vineyard of Israel. He lavished his love upon them and blessed them with supernatural endowments and resources. Nothing was left to chance. Nothing more was to be desired in that land in which he placed them. And he expected his people to produce good grapes; grapes of righteousness, if you will. But the harvest was that of "beusim"-- the inedible sour berries that had to be discarded. And what a graphic picture of the vile nature of Judah's corruption. And now here it is, even in this first century, Jesus dealing with it again. He goes on to say in verse one that he rented out this vine grove to "the vine-growers and went on a journey."

Now this was a common practice in that day, even as it is today, there are tenant farmers that work the fields of other people and then they would share in the harvest. Verse two, "'At the harvest time he sent a slave to the vine-growers, in order to receive some of the produce of the vineyard from the vine-growers.'" But then notice what happens, "'They took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed.'" I mean, this is shockingly outrageous. The people that are hearing this would be flabbergasted. They would be overwhelmed. I mean, this is not only a violation of the contractual arrangement, but this is this is despicably cruel. But the violence gets even worse. Verse four, "'Again, he sent them another slave, and they wounded him in the head and treated him shamefully. And he sent another. and that one they killed; and so with many others, beating some and killing others.'" I mean, this is an amazing display of patience, and sacrifice on part on the part of the one that owned the vineyard. He kept sending slave after slave to collect what was rightfully his. In the parallel account in Matthew 21, verse 35, we read, "'The vine-growers took his slaves and beat one and killed another and stoned a third.'" Now as you can see, the allegory here is building to a climax of sheer rage over such atrocities. Jesus is leading them exactly where he wants them to go. They are being set up. No rational person could excuse the violent reaction of the vine growers. I mean, no one could excuse that. But now the story reaches just the pinnacle of drama. Rather than being justified and sending armed forces to annihilate the wicked tenants, the owner takes an incredible risk by sending his beloved son, notice verse six, "'He had one more to send, a beloved son; he sent him last of all to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.''" Excuse me, this unexpected response would be considered equally outrageous to Jesus audience. No doubt they were saying, "my what a stupid thing to do. I mean, look what has happened, you're not going to send your son--you know what they're going to do to him." But the owner sends his son and they treated him as everyone would expect verse seven. "'But those vine growers said to one another, 'This is the heir; come, let us kill him, kill him, and the inheritance will be ours!'" Now I might add that this was consistent with the laws of that day, they would have understood that land that is unclaimed for three years, reverts to the people that have been working it and they become the owners. So verse eight, "'They took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard.'" In other words, they didn't even give him a decent burial. Unbelievable. Now, the scribes and the Pharisees would have been horrified with such ungrateful criminal behavior. And this is exactly the reaction that Jesus wanted them to have. However, as we will see, they did not realize at first that this whole story was an indictment against Israel in general, and them specifically.

So, to the astonishment of the listeners, the owner of the vineyard sends his beloved son hoping that they would respect him, that they would listen to him. As I reflected upon this, my mind went to the Mount of Transfiguration where, with Jesus, Peter, James and John together, saw Moses and Elijah. And then you will recall in Mark nine, seven, a cloud formed overshadowing them. And a voice came out of the cloud. "This is my beloved Son," what? "Listen to Him!" LISTEN to Him. But "He came to His own," John 1:11, "but those who were His own did not receive him." And sadly, some of you will hear the glorious truths of the gospel and see the infinite perfections of the person and work of Christ, and yet you will not receive him.

I'm also reminded of the time when Jesus would be arrested and made to stand before the corrupt high priest. And this would have happened just a couple of days later. He would hear all of the insults against him. And according to Mark 14, beginning in verse 61, it says that "Jesus kept silent and did not answer. Again, the high priest was questioning Him and saying to Him, 'Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?' And Jesus said, 'I am; and you shall see the SON OF MAN SITTING AT THE RIGHT HAND OF POWERE AND COMING WITH THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN.'"

So again, in the story, they did not listen to the son; had no respect for him. Verse eight, "'They took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard.'" And then Jesus brings it to a climax and says, in verse nine, "'What will the owner of the vineyard do?'" Matthew adds this in his account in Matthew 21, beginning in verse 40. "'Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-growers?'" Now, what he is going to record is what the religious leaders said. "They said to Him, 'He will bring those wretches to a wretched end and will rent out the vineyard to other vine-growers who will pay him the proceeds at the proper seasons.'" And I imagine after they said that they're, you know, prancing around high five, and you know, we will nail that guy, or those guys, right? And then "Jesus said to them," in Matthew's account, "'Did you never read the Scriptures.'" I Imagine you could have heard a pin drop at that point. "'Did you never read the Scriptures? THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME TE CHIEF CORNER stone; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES'?" Mark puts it this way, in verse nine, "What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the vine-growers and will give the vineyard to others." And Luke gives us even more clarification of what went on there. In Luke 20, beginning of verse 16, Jesus says "'He will come and destroy these vine-growers, and will give the vineyard to others.'" And then it says this; see now they're catching on. "When they heard it, they said, 'May it never be!'" The strongest way of putting a negative in the language. Suddenly they realized they were the ungrateful, ungodly vine-growers deserving of death that they had just pronounced upon themselves. Imagine the look on their faces. And then Jesus looked at them. Folks, you got to put yourself there. Can you imagine the Son of God looking at you? Jesus looked at them, eyeball to eyeball. What then, is this that is written:" He said, THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNERSTONE. Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; but whomever it falls, it will scatter like dust.'" Mark expresses the same thing in verse 10. "'Have you not even read the Scripture: THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES.’” There by the way, Jesus is quoting a messianic psalm, Psalm 118, verses 22 and 23, pointing them to the reality of his Messiahship. Like the cornerstone of a building, whose perfect symmetry and strength was crucial for the construction and the stability of a building so too the Lord Jesus Christ is the cornerstone of the kingdom of God.

You will remember later on at Pentecost, Peter would proclaim to the same murderers what is recorded in Acts four beginning in verse 10, "let it be known to all of you, and to all of the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead...'He is the STONE WHICH WAS REJECTED by you, THE BUILDERS, but which BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone. And there is salvation in no one else for there is no other name under heaven, that has been given among men, by which we must be saved.'"

So indeed, the Jews inspected the cornerstone, but he didn't measure up to their selfish needs. They wanted a deliverer from Rome, not a deliverer from sin, like so many people today. They wanted to blesser, not a savior. They wanted someone to make them happy, not holy. They wanted a life of success and prosperity and fulfillment. Because after all, God exists for me, right? Rather than I exist for him, they rejected the cornerstone. It's interesting, in his first epistle, Peter said, this in First Peter two beginning in verse six, "'BEHOLD, I LAY IN ZION A CHOICE STONE, A PRECIOUS CORNER stone, AND HE WHO BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.' This precious value, then, is for you who believe; but for those who disbelieve, 'THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE VERY CORNER stone and A STONE OF STUMBLING AND A ROCK OF OFFENSE'; for they stumble because they are," catch this now, "They are disobedient to the word And to this doom, they were also appointed." Meaning they were fixed conclusively, and authoritative ly as a consequence of their own unbelief. Paul describes those who are united to Christ as those who can rejoice. He said this in Ephesians, two verse 19, "You are no longer strangers and aliens, but are fellow citizens, with the saints, and are of God's household, having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone."

So, Jesus trapped the scribes and the Pharisees, causing them to literally pronounce judgment upon themselves. And once they realized that they had condemned themselves, notice their reaction. It was not one of repentance, verse 12, "And they were seeking to seize Him, and yet they feared the people, for they understood that He spoke the parable against them. And so, they left Him and went away." And because they rejected the cornerstone, Matthew tells us this, what Jesus said, in Matthew 21 verse 43, "'Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it.'" I believe this is a reference to the church of which Jesus Christ is the cornerstone, as well as a future remnant of believing Israel. This is the only vine able to produce the fruit of the kingdom. Jesus said, "'I am the vine, you are the branches, He who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit. For apart from Me, you can do nothing.'" Peter says this in First Peter two nine referring to the church as "A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God's own possession." Holy nation refers, it's literally a people that are set apart. They're divinely separated from the world, to have intimate fellowship with God. And eventually we know that the kingdom promises of Israel in the Old Testament will be literally fulfilled when the Jewish people finally embrace their King in saving faith. Romans 11:25 through 29 makes this abundantly clear. And at his second coming, they will finally receive their Messiah, Zechariah 12 and verse 10, and Zechariah 14 and verses eight and nine speak of this, and then he will finally establish his kingdom on earth for 1000 years and so forth.

But Jesus went on to offer further condemnation. Matthew records this in Matthew 21 verse 44. He says this, "'And he who falls on the stone will be broken to pieces; but on whoever it falls, it will scatter him, like dust.'" My friends herein is the eternal tragedy of those who reject Christ and fall upon him, so to speak, in rejection again. As I said, In First Peter two eight where he quotes Isaiah 8:14, he describes Christ as "a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense." Well, isn't that the truth? All you have to do is present Christ to people and see how offended they are. It goes on to say why. "For they stumble because they are disobedient to the word, and to this doom, they were appointed." And indeed, the Jews fell upon that stone by crucifying him. But all who refuse to repent and bow the knee to Christ will eventually be as the text says, "scattered like dust." Think of it this wa, those who fall on the stone will be crushed. But those upon whom the stone falls, will be pulverized. This is judgment.

Here we're also reminded of Daniel's prophecy, if I can take you there just for a moment. Remember, the prophecy of the 10 toes of the iron kingdom. It's described in Daniel two--we've studied that before--verses 41 and following, that points to 10 future kings that will eventually come about during the rule of the Antichrist; they will control the territory of a revived Roman Empire during the 70th week of judgment upon Israel, that Daniel describes in Daniel 9:24 through 27. That will be a future seven-year period of pre-kingdom judgments that will end with sin's final judgment, and Christ's reign of righteousness, the return of Christ on the establishment of his millennial rule upon the earth. But in that passage in Daniel two verse 44, we read this. "'In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed, and that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. In as much as you saw that a stone was cut out of the mountains, without hands and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold, the great God has made known to the king what will take place in the future; so the dream is true and its interpretation is trustworthy.'" The symbolism of a stone cut out of the mountain without hands, clearly indicates divine origination, and clearly the kingdom of God will not replace will not only, I should say, replace every vestige of all preceding kingdoms, but it will utterly destroy them. That's my king and that's the kingdom that I'm longing for. I hope you share in that.

So here in Mark 12 one through 12, Jesus pronounces judgment upon the failed vineyard. And I wish to help you see a little bit more of the wickedness of the leaders of that day and draw some parallels with contemporary evangelicalism. As Solomon said in Ecclesiastes one nine "there is nothing new under the sun." There, we can go for a few minutes to Matthew 23. Jesus unleashed a scathing denunciation on these false shepherds. I want to give you first of all, just five, briefly, five characteristics of false religious leaders. They had them then, we've got them now.

First of all, we see in Matthew 23, number one that they are self-appointed, not God ordained. Verse two, "The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses.'" You see, the Jews understood that the chair of Moses was a reference to divine authority. Moses was God's spokesman. He was the law giver. He was divinely appointed. He was divinely ordained, he was divinely gifted to be able to say to the people, "Thus saith the Lord." But they have seated themselves in the "chair." "Chair"-- "kathedra"--we get cathedral from that, originally referred to a position of, or even a place of, spiritual or ecclesiastical authority. For example, in universities, you know, they have department "chairs", esteemed professors. And the term also referred to the actual seat that was found in the front of a synagogue where the authoritative teacher would go and sit. And Jesus is basically saying that you scribes, and you Pharisees, you seat yourself in a position of authority. I have not put you there. You are self-appointed. Like so many people we have today in pulpits, they're self-appointed. They're not God ordained. They're not God-appointed, God-gifted. They're self-styled teachers. Peter speaks of this in Second Peter two. He describes them as those who "secretly introduce destructive heresies." He says that "many will follow their sensuality," and "in their greed they will exploit you with false words." They will "indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority. Daring, self-willed, they do not tremble when they revile angelic majesties." He goes on to say their eyes are "full of adultery," and they "never cease from sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart trained in greed." He went on to add that they speak "out arrogant words of vanity they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escaped from the ones who live in error, promising them freedom, while they themselves are slaves to corruption." And all of this begins with naive, and often, very desperate people, give them that authority.

So not only are they self-appointed, rather than God ordained, but secondly, they're hypocrites that do not practice what they preach. Verse three, "'Therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things and do not do them.'" Scribes and the Pharisees were notorious for telling everyone how to live, how to honor God, how to obey the law, and they had endless lists of duties--right and wrong, but they were unable to even practice what they preached. And the reason for that is they were unregenerate. The Spirit of God did not dwell within them; nothing to restrain the flesh. I might add, according to Romans seven and verse 22, only a person who has been born again, can quote, "joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man." If you've never been born again, then you're going to hear the Word of God, it's going to be foolishness to you, and you can't understand it and apply it.

Jesus goes on to describe them as not only self-appointed hypocrites, who don't practice what they preach, but thirdly, they lacked genuine compassion. I mean, these guys were overbearing, legalists. Verse four, and "'They tie up heavy loads and lay them on men's shoulders, but they themselves are unwilling to move them with so much as a finger.'" And Judaism, in that day, was absolutely unbearable for the people. They were burdened with countless rules that you couldn't even remember, much less keep. They were saddled with loads that they could not bear. And then the leaders would berate them because of their disobedience. What a way to control people. This is so indicative of false religions today; works righteousness systems. The Jews were taught basically that your good will outweigh your bad, and if it does you will, you know, make it to the kingdom. A lot of people think that way today, don't they? That God basically grades on the curve, and you know, I'm not as bad as some, not as good as others, but I, you know, I think I'll make the cut. The Jewish leaders had no compassion, no sympathy for the people. They were overbearing, abusive legalists. What a contrast to the gentle Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who according to Matthew 9:36, "felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and downcast like sheep without a shepherd." That's why He said in Matthew 11 verse 28, "'Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me. For I am gentle and humble in heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my load is light.'" But inevitably, these false religious leaders would contrive elaborate systems of works righteousness as an effort to maintain control of their followers. In fact, Peter said in Second Peter two and verse three, he warned how that "in their greed they will exploit you with false words." You ask anyone that's been around some of these cults, or some of these legalistic systems, and they will tell you of the onerous rules; never ending rules, bizarre interpretations of Scripture.

Fourthly, they were desperate to be noticed. Verse five, says, "'But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their phylacteries and lengthen the tassels of their garments.'" Now, the Pharisees were notorious for ostentatious garb. If you want to get a little sense of that look at Roman Catholicism, because much of the way they dress and the things they do, came out of how the Pharisees looked and conducted themselves. There was a pretense of spirituality without the reality of it. It says that they would broaden their phylacteries. "Phylactery" is a transliteration of a Greek term, "phylakteria," meaning protection or safeguard. And frankly, there was no record of their use until around 400 BC during the intertestamental period. Sometimes it was called the "tefillin," derived from a Hebrew word translated "frontals." And it was worn on the head, and they had one that's worn on the left arm which is closest to your heart. You'll see this in various aspects of Judaism today. You see what they did is, the Jews took literally the four commands in the Pentateuch, that his law was to be on their hands and foreheads to remind them of his holy standard. And however, it should be understood figuratively, and symbolically that God's law should basically govern all that we think and all that we do. But the description was this--it was a little box made of ceremonially clean animal, and it was dyed black, with leather that was sewn into a box with 12 stitches, the 12 stitches refer to, or symbolized the 12 tribes of Israel. And the phylactery worn on the head, consisted of four compartments, each containing one of the four texts in the Pentateuch book, written on a tiny piece of parchment, and the phylactery that was worn on the hand, on the left hand, contain one piece of parchment with all four texts written upon it. And sadly, the term itself came to be used as a synonym for a magical amulet or charm in pagan cultures. And many Jews gradually adopted that, and they would use it to ward off spirits and evil spirits and so forth. Most Jewish men wore them when they prayed. Today with a bar mitzvah, when a young man turns 13, he's given a set of phylacteries to be worn during morning prayer. But what happened is the Pharisees wore this all the time. It became a symbol of pride, and the Pharisees even broadened these things so that it would be even more obvious; symbolizing the advanced status of their spiritual superiority. They even lengthened their tassels. Now Jesus did not wear phylacteries, but he did wear tassels. Remember the woman with the hemorrhage of blood that touched the tassel? In, what was it Mark, or Matthew. Matthew nine I believe it is. And this originated from Numbers 15, beginning of verse 38, where the Lord commanded Moses to tell his people to "'make for themselves tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, that they shall put on the tassel of each corner, a cord of blue. It shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of the Lord, so as to do them and not follow after your own heart and your own eyes, after which you played the harlot in order that you may remember to do all My commandments and be holy to your God.'" But sadly, what God intended to draw people unto himself, became a pretentious means of drawing attention to themselves. They were desperate to be noticed by men and anytime you see religious garb, religious clothing and paraphernalia, you know that you're dealing with a false teacher.

Fifthly, They were egomaniacs. I like to put it that way. Verse six, and "'they love the place of honor at banquets, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and respectful greetings in the marketplaces, and being called by men Rabbi.'" In other words, they looked for the place where the spotlight would shine on them. You see this with a lot of false teachers today; the most dangerous place on earth is between them and a camera, especially if it's a television camera. False shepherds thrive on being on stage. I've been around them a lot over the years. I used to work with a lot of them, especially in the music industry. Prima donnas, many of them, temperamental; explode into anger if they're inconvenienced, or they're criticized; demanding special privileges, demanding enormous fees from booking agents. Would never come to a small church, only the big churches. They had to have limos in the best hotels and eat in five-star restaurants. They had to have fruit baskets with certain favors, in the baskets in the dressing rooms. I know all about that stuff, folks--that's the stuff of false teachers. This is what the Pharisees were like. Jesus said they love the "'respectful greetings in the marketplaces and being called by men Rabbi'." This was a title that had the connotation of the most knowledgeable one. Right? The supreme one.

Jesus then pronounced a series of woes against them. I'll just read them to you as we wrap this up this morning. He went on to say, "'But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.'" By the way, I want you to know how un seeker-sensitive this is. I want you to notice how in love Jesus spoke the truth directly to them. He went on to say but, "'Woe to you scribes and Pharisees hypocrites, because you devour widow’s houses, and for a pretense you make long prayers; therefore, you will receive greater condemnation. Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel around on sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves. Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the temple that is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple is obligated.'" In other words, they had their own trickery in how they could make oaths and be obligated to some, but not to others, depending upon what they placed the oath upon. "'You fools and blind men! Which is more important, the gold of the temple or the temple that sanctified the gold?"

Verse 23, "Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. You blind guides who strain out a gnat, and swallow a camel! Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites. For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they're full of robbery and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish so that the outside of it may become clean also. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had been living in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them and shedding the blood of the prophets.' So you testify against yourselves, that you were sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up then the measure of the guilt of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence of hell?'" Imagine the look on their faces after enduring that, knowing full well that was absolutely true.

Folks, this is what happens when people deny the Word of God and the will of God. It's a slippery slope, isn't it? And this is what has happened even in our culture. People have a superficial understanding of the word of God. They lack biblical discernment. Little by little the world squeezes them into its mold and conforms people into its image. People begin to compromise. We see apostate churches, for example, embracing the whole LGBTQ perversions. They embrace apostate churches and preachers. I've witnessed over the years, the destruction, the damage of theological liberalism, that has morphed into political liberalism. And as a result, you have people in churches, and now in government, that are immoral, incompetent, and corrupt. I mean just look at our government. Today, it's a DEI government. People deny the inspiration and the inerrancy and the authority of Scripture. They're wise in their own eyes, they call evil good, and good evil. And as a result, you've got churches that just make up stuff. You see this in the charismatic movement. You see it in the Messianic movement, the prosperity gospel, the social gospel, on and on it goes. They despise sound doctrine, so they don't have any discernment. And there's just no end to the insanity.

And I want to close with four areas of sin that I really want us to guard ourselves against. Because it's easy for us to see these things and not apply it to our own lives. And I want to say this with great love and kindness to each of you. But these are the types of things that can cause us to forfeit God's blessing and place us in the pathway of divine chastening. One of the first sins that I see in evangelicalism is a failure to cultivate intimate fellowship with the Lord. Are you developing a deeper and deeper love for Christ? Are you hungry and thirsting for righteousness? Do you have, real practically, have an appetite for the Word, so that you long for those times when you can sit down alone with the Lord, and immerse yourself into his word, and hear His voice, and allow him to speak to your heart and nourish your soul. And give you discernment. Are you a Psalm one, kind of Christian that meditates upon the Word? If not, you're going to be subject to failure, you're going to forfeit blessing in your life.

Secondly, there's a failure in the church today to come out and be separate from the world. The internet has been blowing up over this whole issue of one prominent preacher that told a grandmother that it was okay to go to their grandson or daughter, I forget, wedding, a homosexual wedding, being married to a transsexual person, and that maybe you could even take a gift and that way you wouldn't be perceived a judgmental and maybe then have an opportunity to witness to them. And I know some of you have asked me what I think about that. Would I recommend that you go to a homosexual wedding? With them knowing that you disagree with that? And the answer is, in the most emphatic way I could possibly put it, absolutely not. Absolutely not. To attend a homosexual wedding, is a supreme act of blasphemy against the Most High God. Do you realize that God in his great love made us to be men and women as image bearers and he ordained marriage to be a picture of his love for his bridal church? And Satan has distorted all of that. And to go to something like that would communicate to them that somehow you're okay with this. I mean, when does accommodating the world and compromising with the world and making sure the world likes you become a strategy for evangelism that's better than preaching the gospel. I think of Psalm 12 and verse eight, where we read, "The wicked strut about on every side when vileness is exalted among the sons of men." I mean, to affirm and to celebrate that which God sees as blasphemous is a horrific thing. I think of Second Corinthians six, where we are told that we are not to be partners with unbelievers in any kind of a religious enterprise. I mean, what does light have to do with darkness, right? What is righteousness and lawlessness, how can that work together? What fellowship does Christ have with "Belial." Later in that passage, it talks about how we're to come out and to be separate from them. You see, what I would recommend if you have a situation like this, that you tell those people forthrightly, with love, that in good conscience, I could never do something that would be so reprehensible to me and to God, because what you're doing is blasphemous. It's making a mockery of who God is, and what he has said in his word. But I tell you what I will do on your wedding day, and even in the night, when you begin to enjoy the pleasures of your wickedness--I will fast, and I will pray all day and into the night, that God will be merciful to you. And that he will make you absolutely miserable in your sin, until you come to a place of brokenness; that you will repent, and that you will believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Failure to come out and be separate from the world, folks, don't let the world squeeze you into its mold, but be "transformed by the renewing of your mind."

Thirdly, there's a failure in the church to raise children in the discipline in the instruction of the Lord. Let me ask you parents, how often do you sit down with your child and talk with them about Jesus? How often do you tell them about the glories of his grace, who he is what he's done, what he's doing now, how he's transformed your life? How often do you tell your children the things that I'm telling you now about, for example, the whole LGBTQ thing? These dear people need the gospel, they need our love. They need to hear these truths. And our children therefore need to hear these things. We simply must get serious about protecting our children from the ways of the world and communicating the great truths of the gospel to them. Nancy told me something that blessed my heart the other day. Our little nine-year-old granddaughter, just out of the blue said, "Nana, what's your favorite Bible verse?" You know, Nancy is trying to think, well, which one, you know? And she talked with her second, well, I can't wait, I want to tell you my favorite verse, you know. And I forget where it was, First Peter, something and she knew a verse and spouted it off. And I was, you know, we're just thrilled. I mean, that's what you want for your kids, right?

And then the final thing, folks, that can be a sin, that we tend to overlook, and that is, a failure to evangelize because we don't have a burden for the lost. If you truly love those who are lost, you're going to get to know them, you're going to spend time with them. And you're never ever going to be ashamed of the gospel. You're going to give it to them with clarity, with conviction, and you're going to pray for them. And by God's grace, many of them will come to a place of genuine saving faith. So let's guard our hearts against these things because even as the ancient Jewish people failed, because they did not listen to the Word of God, we too, can do likewise, if we don't guard ourselves. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. I pray that all that you have communicated through it here today will not only be a blessing and an encouragement to our heart but also that you will use it to edify us, to equip us as we do battle against the enemy of our souls. And for those that do not know you as Savior, oh God, how I pray that you will break their heart, that you will give them eyes to see who you really are and what you have provided in Christ Jesus, for it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

This morning we return to part two of a discourse on God's judgment on a failed vineyard. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Isaiah chapter five? We're actually studying Mark 12 but in order to better understand what Jesus is saying in Mark 12, we need to step aside and understand his illustration taken out of Isaiah five. Let me remind you of the context. It's been a while since we were together, and I want to make sure you get the flow here of what's happening. It is the Wednesday before Christ's crucifixion. And he has forcefully taken over and occupied the temple precincts. He has humiliated the Jewish leaders who are scheming to kill him, and he has been preaching the gospel to many people. And that temple area, which could have been several 1000 people, and now with a large crowd gathered around him in Mark 12, verses one one and following, Jesus gives a parable of a vineyard that had been perfectly prepared, had been perfectly cared for and therefore you would expect that vineyard to produce wonderful fruit. But instead, it produced worthless inedible berries. And of course, this symbolized all that God had done for Israel and, unfortunately, the way she had turned out. And in this parable, in Mark 12, Jesus quotes, the same parable in Isaiah five. And the purpose of the parable in Isaiah five is basically twofold-- as well as what he's saying and Mark 12-- basically to expose the outrageous wickedness of the religious leaders; the vine growers who were given the responsibility of caring for this vine of Israel, that he had planted and cared for so carefully. But the second purpose was to steer his audience toward self condemnation, to actually pass judgment on themselves because no rational person listening to the parable would side with the wicked vine growers, but instead, they would denounce them in the strongest terms, and in so doing pass judgment on themselves.

So to better interpret and apply Jesus parable in Mark 12, we must examine the historical background of Jesus combination, along with the specific categories of sin that kindled his wrath against Israel many years prior. And now once again, in the first century. The last time we were together, we examined this whole historical context where God speaks through Isaiah to warn Judah of impending judgment because of her wickedness. There were really three categories that we looked at: number one, the Lord's rigorous preparation of the vineyard. Secondly, the Lord's reasonable expectation of the kind of fruit it should produce, and then finally, the Lord's righteous retribution. And that's where we're at here today to finish this up. And in that context of his righteous retribution, is indictment is made up of six categories of evil that finally kindled his wrath against them. And each one of these categories of sinfulness begins with the word "woe."

By way of review--because we looked at the first three the last time we were together--the first sin was that of covetousness, avarice, greedy materialism, which was a violation of the 10th commandment. As we read in Exodus 20 and verse 17, God said, "You shall not covet." Which means to selfishly desire, or somehow take pleasure in your neighbor's house. "You shall not covet your neighbor's wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor." And so with this background, knowing that they had violated that, and many different ways, he said, as he says, in Isaiah five and verse eight, woe to those who add house to house and join field to field, until there is no more room, so that you have to live alone and the midst of the land!" And you may recall that the problem here was that wealthy land speculators, wealthy people, would devise ways of driving out poor people from their land, and then they would steal their property to create for themselves enormous estates. And as we read here in the text, they would "add house to house," which basically means they would take an existing structure, and they would just keep adding on to it and adding on to it, until they had their own magnificent, massive mansion. This also, by the way, disregarded the law that God had gave them concerning land ownership. The land was sacred to the Lord. It was a sacred trust that he had given to the people. Individual families were allowed to live on their own land, but it was all part of his estate. And the land they possessed as his stewards was an inheritance from the Lord and it was supposed to remain in those families. But obviously, all of this went awry because of the sin of covetousness.

And I might add that this sin of covetousness, wanting that which you do not have; being discontent with what has given God has given you, is a very wicked thing. And it rules the hearts of many people, especially in our culture, especially those who do not find their satisfaction and joy in the Lord. But instead, they have to have other things that they feel will bring them happiness. Well, God went on to promise Judah, a taste of hell on earth because of their covetousness; promising famine conditions in the lands that they had stolen. And I might add, and bear this in mind now, when Jesus accused the Pharisees in Mark 12, he's accusing them of the same thing. Because they too were guilty of robbing the poor to enrich themselves.

The second woe was that of dissipation or drunken debauchery, gluttony, self-indulgence and so forth. Verse 11, "Woe to those who rise early in the morning, that they may pursue strong drink, who stay up late in the evening that wine may inflame them!" And as I brought out the last time we were together, the issue here is not so much in temperance and the wickedness of drunkenness and alcohol addiction that this describes--as wicked as that is, but rather, you go on to look at the next verse. The real issue is a refusal to pay attention to the deeds of the Lord and consider the work of his hands; all that God has done with respect to creation, and redemption. People that live that way give no thought of that which is truly important, and they deal with things that are eternally inconsequential. Few people ever pensively reflect on the realities of what God has done is doing and will do in those who live that way; Paul says in Romans one "are without excuse." Romans one and verse 20, and in verse 21, he goes on to say why, "for even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened." And to be sure, those that are alcoholics, that are kind of constantly inebriated, are constantly using some kind of chemical to add all their emotions; those type of people never give thought to the deeds of the Lord or the works of his hand. They have no desire to know the God of history and redemption. And so they are devoted to self-indulgence, and pursuing the fleeting pleasures of this world, with no regard for the glory of God. And with respect to the ancient people of Judah, they too were unable to discern these things; the things that they heard from the prophets, as well as that which had been given to them and the scriptures, and they therefore ignored the warnings of the prophets. So God pronounced judgment on them in verse 13. "Therefore My people go into exile for their lack of knowledge; and their honorable men are famished, and their multitude is parched with thirst. Therefore, Sheol has enlarged its throat and opened its mouth without measure and Jerusalem splendor, her multitude, her den of revelry and the jubilant within her descend into it. So the common man will be humbled and the man of importance abased, the eyes of the proud also will be abased. But the Lord of hosts will be exalted in judgment, and the holy God will show Himself holy in righteousness. Then the lambs will graze as in their pasture, and strangers will eat in the waste places of the wealthy."

The third sin that they were guilty of is that of mockery. They blasphemed God, they dared God to judge them. Verse 18, "Woe to those," God says, "who drag iniquity with the cores of falsehood, and sin as if with cart ropes." In other words, they exert themselves to sin, like beasts pulling a heavy float of iniquity. We see this for example, the gay pride parades and things like that that are so reprehensible in our culture. Verse 19, he went on to say what they say, "'Let Him make speed, let Him hasten His work that we may see it; and let the purpose of the Holy One of Israel Draw near and come to pass that we may know it!'" Of course, this depicts the utter disregard even contempt for the moral authority of God. This is spiritual arrogance at its worst. This is depraved defiance--strike me down if you're there. That's the attitude. And Jeremiah also described the same kind of ridicule that he endured. We read about this in Jeremiah 17:15. He says, "Look, they keep saying to me, 'Where is the word of the Lord? Let it come now!'" And you see, that was the zeitgeist of that day, as it is in our culture. In other words, the spirit of the age, the general attitude that resulted in behaviors, that dominated their culture. And we again, see this so prevalent here today. And it's fascinating in Isaiah chapter eight the first four verses, we read something more about this particular mockery. There Isaiah says, "Then the Lord said to me, 'Take for yourself a large tablet and write on it in ordinary letters: Swift is the booty, speedy is the prey.'" In other words, I want you to take a large placard and I want you to engrave on that and Hebrew, "Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz," which means "quick to the plunder swift to the spoil." Which depicted the speedy and the imminent defeat of Israel and Aram also known as Syria, under the hands of the Assyrians. And in verse two of Isaiah eight it says, "'And I will take to Myself faithful witnesses for testimony, Uriah the priest and Zechariah, the son of Jeberechiah.' So I approached the prophetess," which by the way, just means the wife of a prophet; she had no miraculous abilities and this is Isaiah's wife, "and she conceived and gave birth to a son. Then the LORD said to me, 'Name him name him Maher-shalal-hash-baz; for before the boy knows how to cry out 'My father' or 'My mother,' the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria will be carried away before the king of Assyria." So he announced his son's name before he was even conceived, which underscored the in editability of his birth. And the certainty, therefore, of the Assyrian invasion, that would occur before Isaiah's child was even able to say daddy or mommy. Walvoord and Zuck state quote, "Isaiah's son, Maher-shalal-hash-baz, was a sign of the coming break in the Aram-Israel alliance against Judah. In about a year and nine months--nine months for the pregnancy and one year of the child's life-- Assyria would plunder both Damascus, which was Aram's capital city and Samaria, Israel's capital. This happened in 732 BC, which confirms the date of 734 for Isaiah's prophecy, and when Damascus and Samaria fell, all Judah should have turned to God, as Isaiah had told them to do. But unfortunately, Uriah, one of the two witnesses, followed Ahaz's orders after 732 BC, and changed the temple worship, to conform with the pagan worship practiced at Damascus." Unbelievable. Folks, I don't want you to lose the big picture of what the Spirit of God is saying here, through the prophet. In this series of woes, which again, have practical applications for each of us individually, as well as all nations as a whole, one must expect mockery of God's promised judgment to follow those first two categories of wickedness. There's a progression of sin that we see here. I mean, think about it, those whose hearts are filled with covetousness are ruled by every imaginable form of loss. They have no fear of God. They fear climate change in our culture, they fear disease, they fear terrorism threats from other nations, but they have no fear of God. They're too busy going after other things that they think will make them happy in life. And even though they know he exists; they will not submit to Him. Paul says in Romans one that they "suppress the truth in unrighteousness." In verse 20, he says, "For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made so that they are without excuse." Now, what's the best way to somehow suppressed the inconvenient truth of inescapable divine judgment because of a holy God that you have offended? Well, the answer is simple. Anesthetize, anesthetize. Silence your conscience with alcohol, with drugs, with parties, with entertainment, with materialism, and then join the mockery mob in blaspheming God; daring him to judge you. Why do you think we have such a drug and alcohol problem in our country? It's such a materialistic problem. And the result of this is people are unable to discern the truth of who God is. They're blind to according to Isaiah 5:12, "the deeds of the Lord and they do not consider the work of His hands." Reminds me of First Corinthians 2:14, that to the natural man, the unsaved man, "the things of the Spirit of God"... "are foolishness." The text says, "and he cannot understand them," because he's spiritually appraised. So what do people do? They mock God. They shake their fist in his face and dare him to judge them. I'm going to live the way I want to live. I don't care what God says in His Word. And when I look at his word, I'm going to twist his word to somehow make it say that which will help me fulfill my agenda. So people laugh at the thought of God's judgment. Isn't an interesting despite the evidence of God's past judgments that we see in Scripture, and in the annals of history, not to mention the undeniable evidence of a worldwide flood, despite all of that, people today laugh at the thought of the Second Coming of Christ and the judgment that he has promised. And isn't it incredible that approximately 1200, or I'm sorry, 2500 prophecies that are in the Bible, about 2000 of them have been fulfilled literally. In fact, the Old Testament contains more than 300 references to the Messiah of Israel, that Christ fulfilled when he came. Despite all of that, people laugh at what God has said.

Well, with all of this, the next category of sin that God promised to judge will be of no surprise. They progress from the woe against covetousness, dissipation and mockery to number four perversity. The sin of perversity; a practice by perverts who redefine morality. And this is one of Satan's most powerful and most deadly deceptions. Those who think they know better than God, and therefore they have a skewed perspective of right and wrong. I was thinking of Proverbs 11:20, as I was studying this, "The perverse in heart are an abomination to the Lord." And that's what we see in this fourth woe. Notice it in verse 20. "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil; who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness."

Now, throughout Scripture, light and darkness symbolizes good and evil. And here we basically have a description of a person who is utterly bereft of reason. I mean, only a madman would look at the daylight and say it's dark, and vice versa. I'm reminded of what God said to Paul, when he sent him to preach the gospel to the lost. It's recorded in Acts 26, verse 18. The Lord sent him to preach the gospel and "to open their eyes," it says, "so that they may turn from darkness to light, and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me."

Notice what else God says through his prophet. In verse 20 of Isaiah five they "substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!" In scripture, bitter often symbolizes evil, which will taste good to the pervert but bitter to those who love God. I think of Psalm 19, beginning in verse 10, there we read that those who fear the Lord, the righteous judgments of God are, quote, "sweeter also than honey." I hope that's how you perceive the Scripture, folks. It's just sweeter than honey, it is so tasty, it's so precious, "sweeter also than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them Your servant is warned; in keeping them there is great reward." You see that is the heart of genuine saving faith, to have an insatiable appetite for the Word of God, and a longing to obey it for the glory of God.

Contrast this to the description of the nature of the wicked that we read about in Deuteronomy 32, beginning in verse 32, "For their vine is from the vine of Sodom, and from the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of poison, their clusters, bitter. Their wine is the venom of serpents, and the deadly poison of cobras." Now, there are numerous examples of this kind of perversity in Israel's history, as well as in every nation's history, but I'll give you just a sample of a few of them where they call what is good evil and vice versa. Jeremiah seven for example, in verse 18, we read that "The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and they pour out drink offerings to other gods in order to spite Me." Now, the "queen of heaven" was another name for the Assyrian deity Ishtar, the Canaanite Astarte they believe to be the wife of a Baal or sometimes called Molech; the goddess of war and love and fertility. And this worship included all manner of sexual immorality. Israel's corruption was so severe that they would sacrifice their newborn children to their god Molech. There's evidence of the statues of Molech; a large metal statue of a man with a bull's head and outstretched arms that would be red hot with the fire. And he would hold out his arms you would toss your infant into his arms. Jeremiah describes the "high places of Topheth" it's called, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is an East/West Valley at the south end of Jerusalem. The term Topheth comes from a Hebrew word "tof" for drum because they would actually play flutes and beat drums to drown out the screams of the children. And so with holy outrage God described this horror in Jeremiah 7:31, "They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnon, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which I did not command, and it did not come into My mind." I mean, this is incomprehensible. This is satanic expression in ways that really boggle the mind, do they not? I mean, how could anybody do that? And here's the thing, they actually believed that such acts of barbarism would bring blessing to their life. What was evil, they saw as good. They believe that the Canaanite God Molech would reward them. You can read about this, for example, in Second Kings 23 and verse 10. As I've written elsewhere, this is where Judah's religious apostasy had led them and they had no fear of God. They scoffed at his law, and thought they were above it. So with a seared conscience, they were comfortable with this depraved practice, one that is no different than when millions of preborn infants are brutally sacrificed every year to the God of self on the altar of personal expediency and corporate profits. Folks, this is moral perversity, a result of satanic blindness. This is the doctrines of demons. And the ungodly deceive themselves, and they're deceived by others. So they end up redefining morality to fit their own agenda. Think of how we see this in in our culture today, things that God calls an abomination. For example, homosexuality is now called an alternative lifestyle, it's considered to be a good thing. Same sex marriage is now the freedom to love who you want. Gender now is fluid, it's not fixed. So if your gender identity doesn't match the sex assigned to you on your original birth certificate, you can change it to become whoever you want it to be. I think they call it nonbinary. I can't keep up with all these terms they come up with. Pedophilia is now destigmatized by calling these people minor attracted persons. Abortion for convenience is called pro-choice, it's part of a woman's reproductive rights. Social justice, which is nothing more than cultural Marxism that has been responsible for the destruction of so many nations and the death of so many people. These people see themselves as liberators that must somehow usher in a new world where rational thought and scientific reason and social justice govern humanity rather than the Word of God. And of course, all of this requires the elimination of biblical Christianity. You've got concerned parents today speaking up in school board meetings appalled over the teaching of the whole LGBTQ perversions. And in many circles in the government, they're called domestic terrorists.

I mean, these are people, dear friends with no moral compass, no moral authority, other than their own lusts. And of course, this is all part of the whole woke agenda that we see where our government is legislating immorality and criminalizing morality. This is the sin of perversity; redefining morality to accommodate your own depravity. The ancient Israelites were guilty of this. In fact, in Matthew 17, verse 17, Jesus described his own kinsmen as quote, "an unbelieving and perverted generation."

Let me add just for a moment--what is our responsibility to this culture that is so wicked? Paul addresses this in Philippians two verse 15. He says "prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life." And isn't it wonderful to see how God is a redeeming God and continues to save people out of the kinds of wicked things that we are describing?

Well, perversity leads to number five, the sin of self-deification. This is the height of arrogance. Notice verse 21, "Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight." I might add this is the exact opposite of what we would read in other passages. For example, in Proverbs three and verse seven, we read, "Do not be wise in your own eyes, fear the Lord and turn away from evil." Well, what they did is they violated God's law in favor of their own opinions. They rejected the word of the Lord from his prophets. They were offended by the truth--"don't tell me those things, it hurts my feelings; tell me what I want to hear; I don't care what God says." And so they replaced the holy wisdom of God with the depraved foolishness of man. You know, Paul warned about this, did he not? Remember First Corinthians three, verse 18, he says, "Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks that he is wise in this age, he must become foolish, so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God. For it is written, 'HE IS THE ONE WHO CATCHES THE WISE IN THEIR CRAFTINESS'; and again, 'THE LORD KNOWS THE REASONINGS of the wise, THAT THEY ARE USELESS.'" Self-deification--I will be the God of my life, I don't care what God has said in his word. I will be the one who speaks with final authority in my life. And Israel’s history is filled with examples of this kind of thing, of how we know better than God. For example, in Numbers 33, verse 55. God says there, "'But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall come about that those whom you let remain of them will become as pricks in your eyes and as thorns in your side, and they will trouble you in the land in which you live. And as I plan to do to them, so I will do to you.'" No, we're going to be wise in our own eyes, clever in our own sight; we're going to reject the word of the Lord and we're going to allow these people to continue to live with us.

Let me give you an individual example of what can happen when this occurs. Remember the story of King Saul? He refused to obey God's command to destroy the Amalekites and kill their king Agag. The Amalekites were among the most vicious of all of the people; they would attack the Israelites and their wilderness wandering especially from the rear. First Samuel 15, three we read, "'Now go and strike Amalek and utterly destroy all that he has, and do not spare him, but put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'" Utter genocide because of their wickedness. In chapter 15, and verse eight, we read what he did. "He captured Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, the oxen, the fatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were not willing to destroy them utterly.'" You see, this is tantamount to tolerating their sin, and their hatred of Yahweh. So God sent the prophet Samuel, as you will recall, to tell Saul of his fate, First Corinthians, I'm sorry First Samuel 15, verse 23, "'Since you rejected the word of the LORD, He has rejected you from being king.'" And you know the rest of the story. And sadly, this kind of disregard has plagued Israel down through the ages.

Again, think about what he said in Numbers 33:55 that I just read, that you are to "drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you." Otherwise, he went on to say, they will "become as pricks in your eyes and thorns in your sides and they will trouble you in the land in which you live." And we see this command reiterated during the age of the judges. In Judges two beginning in verse two we read, "'You shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land; you shall tear down their altars. But you have not obeyed Me, what is this you have done? Therefore, I also said, 'I will not drive them out from before you; but they will become as thorns in your sides and their gods will be a snare to you.'" And look what has happened with Israel ever since. In 1993 they signed the Oslo Accords, which gave their avowed enemies, the Palestinian Authority, much control over Judea and Samaria. Then they abandoned the Gaza Strip, you remember seeing that in 2005? I'll never forget it, seeing it on the news. Destroying 22 Jewish settlements that were flourishing in that region. And in turn, they allowed Hamas terrorists to take control. And the result was the Second Intifada. It broke out and we are continuing to witness the horrific consequences of all of that to this very day, endless strife. 18 years of nonstop rocket attacks, terrorism, inhumane torture and murder and hostage taking. Move ahead a little bit to 2011. Israel freed 1207 murderous Hamas terrorists in exchange for Gilad Shali, an Israeli soldier abducted by Hamas. What kind of trade is that? And one of those released was Yahiya Sinwar, the master be mind behind the October 7 slaughter, who now surrounds himself with hostages to protect him. And you don't think God means what he says?

Now you have the godless and gullible leaders of the United States, Great Britain, of the UN, demanding a two-state solution. Just the opposite of what God has instructed. You can only wonder if Israel will choose to resettle the Gaza Strip; since by the way, it is part of the land that God promised them. The details of all of that described in Joshua 15, which includes according to verse 47, quote, "Gaza, its towns and its villages as far as the brook of Egypt, and the great sea even its coastline." But too often, Israel ignored God and went their own way instead. So God cursed them. In verse 21, "Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and clever in their own sight." The consequences are absolutely devastating. In fact, Amos, the prophet Amos, said this in chapter two, verse four, "Thus says the Lord, 'For three transgressions of Judah, and for four I will not revoke its punishment, because" and here's what they did, "they rejected the law of the Lord, and have not kept His statutes. Their lies also have led them astray; those after which their fathers walked, so I will send fire upon Judah, and it will consume the citadels of Jerusalem.'" Oh dear friends, guard yourself against self-deification. "Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight."

I might add that this is why Paul commanded Timothy, and all of us, to preach the what? Preach the word. Why? Second Timothy four beginning verse three, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths." So the progression of woes begins with covetousness. It moves on to dissipation and mockery, perversity, self-deification, and finally, to just corruption. Corruption--dishonest drunken leaders and judges that can be bribed. Verse 22, "Woe to those who are heroes in drinking wine and valiant men,"--that is powerful men, "in mixing strong drink, who justify the wicked for a bribe, and take away the rights of ones of the ones who are in the right!" You see those guilty of the previous five sins, will have no problem just kind of living in a state of inebriation, and accepting bribes to somehow rule in favor of the guilty and against the innocent. Amos described this as well, in Amos five verse 10. He says, "They hate him, "referring to the plaintiff--"They hate the plaintiff who reproves in the gate." And the gate is where they would typically adjudicate these things; it was kind of like their court room. "They hate the plaintiff who reproves in the gate, and they abhor him who speaks with integrity." In other words, they abhor the witnesses that could provide the necessary information to indict the guilty and promote justice. They hate that. So, God says "Therefore because you impose a heavy rent on the poor and exact a tribute of grain from them, though you have built houses of well-hewn stone, you will not live in them; you have planted pleasant vineyards, yet you will not drink their wine. For I know your transgressions are many and your sins are great, you who distress the righteous and accept bribes and turn aside the poor and the gate. Therefore, at such a time the prudent person keep silent, for it is an evil time."

And my again, the illustrations of this in our culture today are many. I mean, we see this in our own government, and we see how the DOJ and the FBI and other government agencies have been weaponized to silence political opponents and promote leftist agendas. It's just so commonplace anymore. I was reading in The Daily Mail the other day about the quote "Treasury Department officials suggested that banks review transactions at sporting and recreational supply stores like Cabela's, Dick's Sporting Goods and Bass Pro Shops, in order” to quote, "to detect customers whose transactions may reflect potential active shooters." I mean, I got a Cabela's card that I've had for probably 20 years. So, I guess I'm on that list. And I shop at Bass Pro all the time. They went on to say in addition, "Officials warned banks of" quote "extremism indicators, like the purchase of a bus or plane ticket" quote, "for traveled to areas with no apparent purpose, or the purchase of a religious text like a Bible." And I was reading according to a September 19, 2023 study, conducted by the Pew Research Center that said quote, "Currently fewer than two in 10 Americans say they trust government in Washington to do what is" quote, "right just about always or most of the time. This is among the lowest trust measures in nearly seven decades of polling."

Six sins that ignited God's wrath against his stubborn people, Israel and Judah. The same types of sins that Jesus alludes to in Mark 12: covetousness, dissipation, mockery, perversity, self-deification and corruption. Back to Isaiah five as we close this morning, we read God's judgment begin in verse 24, "Therefore, as a tongue of fire consumes stubble and dry grass collapses into the flame, so their root will become like rot, and their blossom blow away as dust; for they have rejected the law of the LORD of hosts and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. On this account, the anger of the Lord has burned against His people, nd He has stretched out His hand against them and struck them down. And the mountains quaked." That's always evidence of the divine presence. "And the mountains quaked, and their corpses lay like refuse in the middle of the streets. For all His anger is not spent, but His hand is still stretched out." Verse 26, "He will also lift up a standard to the distant nation and will whistle for it from the ends of the earth; and behold, it will come with speeds swiftly." (whistles) Assyria that's what he's talking about. Verse 27, "No one in it is weary or stumbles, none slumbers or sleeps; nor is the belt of its waist undone, nor its sandal strap broken. Its arrows are sharp, and all its bows are bent; the hoofs of its horses seem like flint and it's chariot wheels like whirlwind. It's roaring is like a lioness and it roars like young lions; it growls as it seizes the prey and carries it off with no one to deliver it." I mean, this is describing an irresistible predator. "And it will growl over it in the day like the roaring of the sea. If one looks to the land, behold, there is darkness and distress; even the light is darkened by its clouds." And if you read the ancient history of what the Assyrians did, and some of it you can see, for example, in the Lachish relief, that is now housed in the British Museum, you will see that these people were barbaric, and did things that you cannot even begin to conceive. Dear friends, this is speaking of divine rage. And this is what happens when we live inconsistent with the word and the will of a holy God. And aren't you thankful for his grace, because apart from it, we would all be doomed. But as believers, we must do everything we can to guard ourselves against these very same sins that can creep up in our flesh and wreak havoc in our marriage, in our family and our workplace, and in our church. So let's all guard our hearts and celebrate the goodness of the Lord and saving us and giving us the hope of eternal life in Christ, amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. I pray that you will help us to grasp them with all of our heart and live consistently with them. And Lord, for those that are deceived, those that are blind, we know that only you can give them sight. Only you can raise them from spiritual death to spiritual life. And so we pray for the miracle of regeneration. And I pray that you will use us as instruments of righteousness, to present the gospel, preach the gospel, and to live out the Gospel to accomplish your eternal purposes. We thank you; we give you praise in Jesus name. Amen.

We will begin this morning in Mark's gospel, if you will turn there to Mark chapter 12. In a moment, I'm going to read verses one through 12. And we will use that as a launching pad into Isaiah five. And I hope you will understand why when we do so. This is a very sobering, convicting, relevant passage; relevant to our godless pagan culture in which we live. And I've entitled my discourse to you this morning "Judgment Upon the Failed Vineyard." And we will probably be here for three, maybe four weeks.

Let me give you the background so you are thinking in the proper context. Jesus has come into Jerusalem, now he's making his way inexorably towards the cross. He has purged the temple grounds from the very lucrative mini mall created by the high priest and us. In fact, it was called the Bazaar of Annas in that day. And this further infuriated the religious establishment for several reasons, not the least of which it cut off their money supply. They were getting wealthy from all of this, but it also threatened their power, and their prestige in the eyes of the people. And of course, money, power and prestige always motivate false teachers, religious phonies. And then the next day, Wednesday before his crucifixion, he goes back and he preaches the gospel, which refuted the works righteousness system of the Jewish apostate Judaism, I should say. And as a result, the chief priests and scribes and the elders attacked him. And in chapter 11, verse 28, we read what they said, "'By what authority are You doing these things or who gave You this authority to do these things?'" And then his response utterly humiliated them in front of all of the people that were standing around. And as a result, they all stood self-condemned before the judge of heaven and earth. And because of their deliberate, conscious rejection, Jesus then deliberately sealed them in their unbelief, extinguishing forever the light of truth, so that they could remain in the darkness that they loved.

And this brings us now to chapter 12, where Jesus speaks to the crowd, that's surrounding him, along with these humiliated religious leaders that are trying to trap him, so that he could be arrested and ultimately be put to death. So follow along as I read, Mark 12, beginning in verse one. HAnd he began to speak to them in parables: 'A man PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT, AND DUG A VAT UNDER THE WINE PRESS AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey. At the harvest time, he sent a slave to the vine-growers in order to receive some of the produce of the vineyard from the vine-growers. They took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Again, he sent him another slave and they wounded him in the head and treated him shamefully. And he sent another, and that one they killed; and so with many others, beating some and killing others. He had one more to send, a beloved son; he sent him last of all to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.' But those vine-growers said to one another, 'This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours!' They took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the vine-growers and will give the vineyard to others. Have you not even read the Scripture: 'THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THEIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND ITIS MARVEOUS IN OUR EYES'? And they were seeking to seize Him, and yet they feared the people, for they understood that He spoke the parable against them. And so they left him and went away.'"

This is a very graphic parallel to many other passages of Scripture that depict the wickedness of the Jewish people. And in this parable, you can see very clearly the outrageous wickedness of the Jewish leaders--the vine growers--given the responsibility for caring for God's vineyard, Israel. Now, obviously, no rational person would hear this parable and side with the wicked vine growers. But instead, they would denounce them in the strongest of terms. And in so doing, they would pass judgment upon themselves. And that was Jesus' intention. And while it is important to interpret the parable, which as you will discover is really rather straightforward, I wish to spend more time helping you understand the historical background of Jesus' condemnation, and the specific categories of sin that kindled his wrath against his covenant people and their leaders. And this will also help us examine our lives, frankly, to hopefully bring us even to, perhaps some place of repentance. Because friends, what we will see here is that there's nothing new under the sun. The same evils that resulted in God's judgment against Israel and Judah, in the Old Testament, by the hands of the Assyrians and the Babylonians, and later on, even the Greeks and the Romans, and all of the pogroms; in other words, the organized massacres that have occurred since then--all of those same type of sins that brought all that about, exists today. Evils not only in Israel, but evils that we see in every sinful nation. And frankly, we see in every sinful person, including ostensibly evangelical churches. The damning iniquities that infuriated God in the past, still exists today. And his judgment is as certain today as it was in days gone by. Now, to accomplish all of this, we have to go to Isaiah five, the passage that Jesus quoted in this very indicting Parable of the Vineyard .

Notice again in Mark one, or Mark 12, verse one, "And He began to speak to them in parables. A man PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT AND DUG A VAT UNDER THE WINE PRESS AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to the vine-growers and went on a journey." Now you cannot fully understand why Jesus used this illustration and the implications of all of it, unless you have a grasp of Isaiah five, which I can assure you, those people understood very clearly. So we go to Isaiah five.

Let me give you the context of Isaiah five. Isaiah prophesied during the period of the divided kingdom, with his primary audience being the southern kingdom of Judah, which had developed into a very prosperous commercial entity. They were militarily invincible, or so they thought; they perceived themselves to be this way. And under the reign of Uzziah, their military preparedness and their economic prosperity were comparable to those that were experienced many years before in the reign of David and Solomon. I spent some time in studying some of the ancient Israelite Judean military service articles, things that most of you probably wouldn't want to spend much time reading, but it was quite fascinating. Especially one article by Haggai Olshanetsky, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Basel in Switzerland. And here's what he said so that you get a grasp of what they had there, okay, in terms of military power. Quote, "Massive chariot forces were recorded as being deployed by the Israelites as can be seen in the Kurkh monolith where the battle of Qarqar from 853 BCE is depicted. According to this monolith, King Ahab's Israelite force included 2000 chariots." He went on to say, another inscription from the period, which mentioned their military might, is the Tel Dan stele. A stele is a stone slab and a number of us we've been to Tel Dan, you may recall that. That stele also has; a stele is like a piece of stone that has engravings on it. It's also called the "House of David" inscription. It's displayed now at the Israel Museum. But it was found at Tel Dan--Dan was, is one of the oldest sites in Israel, it dates back to 5000 years, and you can actually see the gates that they've uncovered in the city when it was an ancient Canaanite city, and those would have been the gates that Abram would have gone through, when he was chasing the captors of Lot. So anyway, in that place, they found the stone slab and he says, "And on that slab, the armies of the kingdom of Israel under King Jehoram, and of the kingdom of Judea, under Ahaziah, of the house of David had 2000 chariots at their disposal." So you can imagine that type of military might. And sad, yet very typical, they feared their enemies, all around them and prepared to protect themselves. But they did not fear the Lord, the greatest enemy of all; they had no fear of God. I'm reminded of our own country, right? We fear China and Russia and all of these other places, but we have no fear of God. Proverbs says in chapter one, verse seven, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and instruction." And the Psalmist tells us in Psalm 20, and verse seven, "Some boast in chariots and some in horses, but we will boast in the name of the Lord our God.'

Now, ancient Judah, like all affluent countries, gradually ignored God, and began to embrace the wickedness of the culture around them. They intermarried with the pagans; began to adopt some of their thinking, some of their religious practices, and their Judaism became nothing more than empty ritualism combined with pagan idolatry, and all of the wicked practices that went with it. For example, and we'll study this more later, they sacrificed babies to the fires of Molech. And when we were in Israel, we saw some of the high places where they did that. And they also worship the Queen of Heaven, which was a goddess that was considered to be the wife of Baal or Molech, he was called either one, she was called Ishtar, or Ashtoreth, or sometimes Astarte. So all of this wickedness was going on. And as a result, it absolutely exhausted God's grace, given all that he had done for them. And he then brought the Assyrian invasion to the coastal regions of Israel, in about 701 BC. And as they were heading toward Egypt, they began to spill over into Judah. And in that process, Sennacherib conquered many of the cities there in the southern kingdom as well, all the way up to Lachish, which is not far from Jerusalem. And you can see what they did there. And the Lachish Relief that is now housed in the British Museum, unimaginable torture. The same types of things that you would see in many of their ancestors today, in that region. And you may recall that when they moved towards Jerusalem, Hezekiah-- because Isaiah had talked with them--refused to bow to him, and in Second Kings 19 we read how the angel of the Lord came and killed 185,000 Assyrians. And Sennacherib then returned to Nineveh. But then consistent with Isaiah's prophecy, where we're at here today, about 100 years later, the Babylonians laid siege to Jerusalem in about 597 BC. And it finally fell in 586 BC. And in Second Kings 25, verse nine, we read this "Nebuchadnezzar burned the house of the Lord, the king's house and all the houses of Jerusalem; even every great house he burned with fire. So all of the army of the Chaldeans who were with the captain of the guard broke down the walls around Jerusalem. Then the rest of the people who were left in the city and the deserters, who had deserted to the king of Babylon and the rest of the people, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away into exile."

Now, that was just a historical summary of what happened, and where we're at now is the prediction of all of those things. So beginning in Isaiah one, you basically have a courtroom scene, where the Lord is the plaintiff, and Israel is the defendant. And the charge against them is literally failure to obey the Holy One of Israel. In fact, you read that title, many times, I think it's about 25 times in Isaiah, the "Holy One of Israel”; the one who had lavished his undeserved love upon them and protected them and provided for them. And their rebellion against the "LORD of hosts," which is used 60 times by Isaiah, that rebellion was so irrational, because he was the one that could destroy all of their enemies in a word. Yet they did not fear him. And in chapter one, verse 10, God likens their wickedness, to the godless homosexual perverts in Sodom and Gomorrah, that he destroyed. So the first four chapters really sets forth his case, as well as a promised day of reckoning, a time of judgment. And chapter five, where we're at this morning, is basically a summary of his lament over the rebellion of his people, and the specific categories of sin that animated his wrath against them. The same type of sins, mind you, that Jesus accused his people, and the religious leaders, of committing in his parable of the failed vineyard in Mark 12. So all of this was very familiar to them.

I want to look at this passage of Scripture over the next few Sundays, under three headings. We're going to see number one, the Lord's rigorous preparation, secondly, his reasonable expectation and finally, his righteous retribution. So let's look first of all, at his rigorous his meticulous, careful, painstaking preparation, verse one of Isaiah five. "Let me sing now for my well-beloved"-- Isaiah is speaking here, speaking of the Lord his God as his well-beloved--"Let me sing now for my well-beloved. A song of my beloved concerning His vineyard." In verse seven tells us that the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is "the house of Israel and the men of Judah His delightful plant." I want to sing a song of my beloved concerning his vineyard. "My well-beloved, had a vineyard on a fertile hill." By the way, you can imagine the Prophet here, visualize him in your mind, the prophet comes to speak, the people know he's a prophet, they begin to gather around, you could hear a pin drop as he began to speak. So they're very interested here, and they understand the imagery, because this was a part of their life. He says in verse two, "He dug it all around, removed its stones, and planted it with the choicest vine. And He built a tower in the middle of it and also hewed out of wine vat in it." So in other words, he went to great lengths to prepare the land. And certainly, we know that this is what God did with his people; he prepared that land for them. He removed the stones of the Canaanites, he placed them--the choicest vine--in it. And indeed, God's covenant people are among the most noble and brilliant strain of genetics on the planet. So there's enormous effort here. He built a tower in the middle of it, which they would do, to protect the vineyard, as well as to process some of the vines and so forth. And even hewed a wine vat in it, which would be a large stone type of structure. We've seen them over there, they still exist today. A stone that would have another stone on it, that would crush the grapes, and it would go into a large vat.

And then it says, "Then He expected it to produce good grapes, but it produced only worthless ones." In Hebrew, it produced only "beushim", which was a sour, inedible, worthless grape, a fruit of some sort. It also denoted offensive putrefaction and the Arabs called the fruit of the nightshade "wolf grapes." We see the same imagery used in Deuteronomy 32, verse 32, where God describes the wickedness of Israel's enemies. It says, "For their vine is from the vine of Sodom, and from the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of poison, their clusters, bitter. Their wine is the venom of serpents, and the deadly poisons of cobras." So this is the type of thing that he sees now. What a tragedy. The Lord has done all of this, for his covenant people. He delivered them from the slavery of Egypt, he parted the Red Sea, he led them with his very presence. He cared for them in the wilderness. He gave them his law to govern them, morally, and socially and religiously. And he brought them into a promised land that was flowing with milk and honey. A land in the middle of two great civilizations, in that day of Egypt and Mesopotamia. Because of the Arabian Desert, all of Asia, Africa and Europe had to go through what was called "The Land Between", which was another designation--and even to this day is a designation of Israel. Israel connects three continents. He gave them victory over their enemies in miraculous ways. God took a family, the family of Abram, and eventually made them a nation. And as we look at Scripture, we see that their role was to proclaim the true God that was manifested in their midst through his miraculous deeds; to reveal the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Savior of the world would come through them. They were to be God's priest nation. As God told Moses on Sinai in Exodus 19, six, "You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation." A priest, being a mediator between God and man; all Israel was to serve as a mediator for God to the rest of the world. We see in Scripture that they were charged with the preservation and transmission of divine revelation. They were to show the world the faithfulness of God, the blessedness of serving God, to show God's grace in dealing with sin. Indeed, He lavished his love upon them in ways that are unimaginable. He blessed them with supernatural endowments, and resources; nothing was left to chance. Nothing more was to be desired. So naturally, he expected his vineyard to produce good grapes of God glorifying righteousness, but instead, they produced "beushim." What a graphic picture of the viral nature of Judah's corruption. I hope you can hear the pathos of the heart of God in all of this. What a heartbreaking thing--I have done all of this for you. And this is how you turn out?

One of the great difficulties in shepherding is pastoring and caring for parents who did all they know to do for their children. And they ended up being "beushim." What a heartbreaking thing. I think of all that God has done for me, all that he has done for you, and I hope he looks at us and sees good grapes and not "beushim."

So this is the Lord's rigorous preparation, which moves us to the second point in our little outline, the Lord's reasonable expectation. Verse three, "And now all inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge between Me and My vineyard." And again, you can hear this is just a plaintive lament, a song of mourning. God has greatly grieved. Verse four, "What more was there to do for My vineyard that I have not done in it?" Then the answer is, Well, that's obvious. There's nothing more that you could have done. He says, "Why, when I expected it to produce good grapes, did it produce worthless ones?" Despite his infinitely holy, righteous, rigorous preparation, they spurned his love, they squandered his provisions. They ignored his divine power, they mocked his wisdom, they disregarded his promises. And what's happening here is God is steering his audience towards self-condemnation. This is what's happening here, as well as what Jesus did in Mark 12.

And this brings us thirdly, now, and here, we will count for some time, the Lord's righteous retribution, verse five. "So now let Me tell you what I am going to do, to My vineyard,"--to my covenant people, distinct from all other people groups, the apple of my eye, the primary object of my supernatural care, the ones that I separated from all of the other nations to manifest my glory, here's what I'm going to do. "I will remove its hedge and it will be consumed." They put hedges around vineyards in many places around the world, they still do that. Hedges would be made up of large mounds of thistles and thorns that you couldn't possibly get through. I'm going to remove your hedge. "I will break down its wall and it will become trampled ground. I will lay it waste." And certainly this would happen later on when the foreign powers would come and invade and conquer. "It will not be pruned or hoed, but briars and thorns will come up. I will also charge the clouds to rain, no rain on it." In other words, I am going to deprive you of any and all means of life. I'm going to make your land a complete wasteland. And you people the object of scorn and derision, which we see an anti semitism even to this day.

Verse seven, "For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel and the men of Judah His delightful plant. Thus He looked for justice but behold, bloodshed; In other words, he looked for the righteousness of God being manifested in his people, people that would be just in how they conducted themselves. Instead, he sees bloodshed. In other words, he sees violent murderers. Then he says he looked, "for righteousness, but behold a cry of distress." In other words, he would expect to see righteousness in the land and instead, he hears desperate expressions of anguish from people. And in the Hebrew, it's a play on words in this song. It basically says he looked for justice which is "mishpat," and instead behold, bloodshed which is "mispah." He looked for "mishpat" and he got "mispah." For "sedaqa" and he got "seaqa."

He then goes on to indict them with six categories of wickedness that kindled his wrath. Six woes--that is six judgment, six curses--against his people. "Woes" are the opposite of blessings. And we will look at three of them here this morning. The first one is the sin of covetousness. Or it could be avarice, greed, materialism, which by the way is a violation of the 10th commandment. In Exodus 20, verse 17, God said, "You shall not covet." Covet means to selfishly desire or to take pleasure in that which is not yours. "You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor." You're not to do that; you are to be content and be thankful for what I have given you. So with this, we read the first woe of covetousness, in verse eight of Isaiah five. "Woe to those who add house to house and join field to field until there is no more room so that you have to live alone in the midst of the land!" You see, this was a curse against greedy property and land acquisition by the rich people of Judah, a serious problem in that day. In fact, Micah speaks of this in Micah chapter two verse two. He said, "They covet fields and then seize them, and houses and take them away. They rob a man and his house, a man and his inheritance." You see, this is what godless people will do. They live only for themselves, not for God and his glory. And they will go to great lengths to accumulate things that don't belong to them. Because this life is all they live for. Land speculators in that day, would devise clever schemes to drive away land holders and then steal their property to create for themselves enormous estates. And we've seen this down through history, haven't we? And then they would, as Isaiah says, "Add house to house." This means they would add on to existing structures to erect massive mansions to exalt themselves. And they would join field to field until there is no more room. In other words, there is no more room for anybody in all of my estate except me and my family. But we must understand that the land was also a sacred trust belonging to the Lord. It all belonged to him, and he allowed his people to live on it. And he gave each of them a portion of the lot as part of their inheritance. Individual families were allowed to live on, shall we say, the Lord's estate, the land they possessed as his stewards was an inheritance from the Lord. And they were required to remain--that the land was required--to remain in the family. And it's for this reason that the law says in Leviticus 25 verse 23, "The land, moreover, shall not be sold permanently, for the land is Mine; for you are but aliens and sojourners with Me. Thus, for every piece of property, you are to provide for the redemption of the land. If a fellow countryman of yours becomes so poor, he has to sell part of his property, then his nearest kinsmen, is to come and buy back what his relative has sold." I might add that God instituted the jubilee restoration of possessions in order to protect inherited belongings, and holdings of each family. We read about this, for example, in Leviticus 25:13, “On this year of jubilee, each of you shall return to his own property."

So what God describes here, in this first woe, is a very clear violation of his law, and exposes their avarice, their greed, their covetousness. And all through Scripture, we see how wicked that is. In fact, in First Kings 21, Ahab is a great illustration of this, you will recall, Ahab coveted Naboth's vineyard, you remember that story? They both had a vineyard, and Ahab wanted it for himself because it was close to his property. He wanted to grow vegetables on it, and he told Naboth, hey, I want your vineyard. I'll either buy it from you, or I'll trade you for a better piece of land. But in First Kings 21 verse three, "Naboth said to Ahab, 'The Lord forbid me that I should give you the inheritance of my father.'" And then you'll recall the rest of the story. The demon-possessed Jezebel schemed and had Naboth killed and on and on it goes, all through Scripture.

And certainly it's been my experience, we see that the sin of covetousness, when it is allowed to rule in a person's heart will ultimately destroy them and everyone around them. And it's a graphic illustration of the fact that they do not find their greatest source of joy in the Lord. The Lord is not their satisfaction. They have to have what other people have. And their commitment will not be to him, it will always be to themselves. I find it interesting to see how Americans today are absolutely drowning in debt. And much of this is fueled by the sin of covetousness. US credit card debt is 1.79 trillion, as of the third quarter of 2023. According to the latest consumer debt data from the Federal Reserve Bank, I was reading that 56 million credit card holders have been in debt for at least one year and nearly 30% are behind on debt payments in the nation's 100 largest metros. By the way, while I'm on it, debt is a cruel wicked taskmaster dear friends. Proverbs 22, seven, "The rich rules over the poor and the borrower becomes the lender's slave." You show me a greedy man who is always scheming to somehow have more material wealth and I'll show you a man that will never be satisfied. And I'll show you a man whose satisfaction and joy is not in the Lord, but in material things. In Matthew six, Jesus said in verse 21, "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." In verse 24, "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth." And likewise, Paul told Timothy in First Timothy six, beginning in verse 10, "For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs." And then he went on to say, "But flee from these things, you man of God, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance and gentleness." Dear Christian, if God is not the source of your greatest satisfaction, and joy, you will be tempted to greed, and your heart will go in secret search of other lovers and you will act wickedly to gain what you think you must have. But on the basis of the Word of God, I can tell you that what you're pursuing will never satisfy and God will judge you for your idolatry. Because greed is idolatry. In fact, Paul says this in Colossians, three, beginning of verse five, "Therefore consider the members of the earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and," here it is, "greed, which amounts to idolatry. For it is because of these that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience." So dear friends, guard yourself from this wickedness. Left unchecked, covetousness will depose God from the throne of your life, and you will be ruled by your own depravity and the father of lies. Like all idols, greed, will promise what it can never deliver. And because of this, this was one of the first sins that God condemned Israel, Judah about and this is what we see in Isaiah five, a woe to those who add house to house and join, field to field. In other words, woe to you covetous thieves, that have annexed the dwellings of other people's lands, poor neighbors, forcing them to live someplace else, so that you can have it all for yourself.

In fact, King Uzziah seemed to be one of the worst offenders. In Second Chronicles 26:10, we read that he built towers in the wilderness and hewed out many systems, for he had much livestock, both in the lowland and in the plane. He also had Plowman and vinedressers in the hill country, and the fertile fields for he loved the soil. Now, I want you to remember this because when we get back to Mark 12 you will see that Jesus accusations against the Pharisees included the sin because they were guilty of the same thing, robbing of the poor, to enrich themselves. So notice the consequences. In verse nine we read, "In my ears the Lord of hosts has sworn," in the Hebrew is very clearly it's fascinating here. It is essentially saying that Yahweh has directly, verbally revealed his outrage by exclaiming it in my ears. I've heard him say this, surely many houses shall become desolate, literally a desolation. The term the Hebrew, carries the idea of waste an appalling horror, that your houses shall become a waste, either through decay or by being destroyed. He goes on to say even great and fine ones, without occupants. In other words, all that you have accumulated unfairly will be a desolation. And then he described famine conditions, the curse of barrenness on their land, verse 10. "For 10 acres of vineyard will yield only one bath of wine." "10 acres" here could be translated ten yolks, which is a reference to the area 10 oxen could plow in a day, and 10 acres would normally yield an average of 500 baths. One bath is equal to about six gallons. So 10 acres would typically yield about 3000 gallons of wine, instead of one bath, which would be six gallons. And he says, "A homer of seed will yield but an ephah." An ephah is a 10th part of a homer, which is about one bushel of grain. So it would yield only a 10th of the seed sown. In other words, 90% failure.

Oh, dear friends, please hear this. If you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind. And that's what is happening here in this judgment. So we go from the first woe against covetousness. Secondly, to the woe of dissipation, which could also be described as drunken debauchery, gluttony, self-indulgence, and so forth. "Woe" verse 11, "to those who rise early in the morning, that they may pursue strong drink." This is indicative, is it not, of alcohol dependency and addiction, people that have to start with alcohol, kind of keep drinking it through the day. Then he says, "who stay up late in the evening that wine may inflame them!" Now I want you to understand that this is not merely an attack against the spring break crowd as we would understand it; not merely those who live in bars and honky tonks and nightclubs, and who love the drunken debauchery of music concerts, and all of that type of thing. Certainly, this is describing more of a person that just lives in a state of mild intoxication all day, and then kind of throws a binder at night. And certainly, it speaks to that, but as you're going to see, it's more than that. People do that in order to deaden their senses. They need to silence their conscience and squelch the horrifying reality of death and judgment, and they need chemicals to somehow alter their state of consciousness so they can kind of get through life, and they become dependent upon this. And of course, those chemicals give a temporary state of euphoria. And gradually that euphoria is less and less. So you have to have more and more chemical. And there you have the whole cycle of addiction. But the issue here is not so much in temperance in the wickedness of drunkenness and alcohol addiction, as wicked as that is, but rather, it is primarily a refusal to pay attention to the deeds of the Lord and consider the work of his hands. In other words, you people are just--you're like a bunch of drunks, and in many cases they were and therefore you're not paying any attention to the deeds of the Lord. You're not considering the work of his hands as it relates to creation as it relates to redemption. I mean, to be sure you talk to a party animal about these essential truths and they don't pay any attention to any of this; they never think about this. You talk to an alcoholic or a drug addict and ask him, do you ever give any thought to the deeds of the Lord or the works of his hand? They just kind of laugh at you. Like, huh,? What are you talking about. But this applies to anyone who uses alcohol or any other means to somehow escape the realities of life, as it pertains to God and his glory, and who he is in history; what he's up to in history and in your life, and the judgment that is to come. But these people couldn't care less about what the Lord is up to. They have no appetite for his word, they have no desire to know Him to worship Him, to serve Him; they just live for themselves in a state of stupor. So they have no sense of what God is doing. And obviously, these people were unable to therefore discern the word of the Lord that was given to them through the prophets. They disregarded the judgment, the warnings given to them. In fact, as we will see, they will eventually kill Isaiah. People don't want to hear the truth. You try having a spiritual conversation with folks like this. People that are just drunks, and you all know that. Maybe they're not drunk all the time, but they just kind of always have to have a glass of wine in their hand. You know, it's just how they live. You try to ask them something about theology, ask them about their love for Christ, they're longing to know more of him. And you'll see real quickly there's no one home. Unbelievers depend upon the anesthetizers of life, to help them suppress the truth in unrighteousness, that gnaws at their conscience, as Paul said, in Romans one, eight, "because the wrath of God has revealed from heaven against all men who suppressed the truth in unrighteousness." And they will do this, even though, as Paul went on to say, "that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them." And this is certainly indicative of what was going on with the people of Judah. I mean, they knew who God was, they had his law. They could see him in nature and the prophets. But they love darkness rather than light. They knew they were violating God's law, but after a while, they don't really care because after all, there's doesn't seem to be any consequences. So let's just keep living for ourselves. And so they defied him to judge them. But deep down, they're trying to silence their conscience. So they are devoted to self-indulgence. They're devoted to the fleeting pleasures of this world.

Verse 12, "Their banquets are accompanied by lyre and heart by tambourine and flute, and by wine; but they do not pay attention to the deeds of the Lord, nor do they consider the work of His hands." Certainly, we have to guard ourselves against this temptation. Peter addressed this in Second Peter three verse three, where he warns believers about falling back into that kind of wicked mindset. He said, he describes it as "the desire of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality, lusts, drunkenness, carousing, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries. In all this, they are surprised that you do not run with them into the same excesses of dissipation, and they malign you; but they will give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead."

You're all familiar with Ephesians five in verse 18, where the apostle tells us under the inspiration of the scripture of the spirit, "do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit." God then speaks through his prophet and he pronounces judgment on those who further blind themselves to the word and will of God, verse 13, "Therefore, My people go into exile for their lack of knowledge." Lack of knowledge concerning the judgment of God that was upon them, especially since the false prophets were preaching to them peace and safety, everything's gonna be okay. Haven’t we heard that before? "And their honorable men are famished, and their multitude is parched with thirst. Therefore, Sheol," which is the place of the departed dead, or the grave, "has enlarged its throat and opened its mouth without measure." What a striking passage. Here, the grave is personified as, as some hideous monster with an insatiable appetite, ready to devour the wicked. And they will go to their grave in the same stupefied, befuddled state, that spiritually dull condition in which they lived.

And then he goes on to say, "And Jerusalem's splendor, her multitude, her din of revelry and the jubilant within her, descend into it. So the common man will be humbled and the man of importance abased, the eyes of the crowd also will be abased. But the Lord of hosts will be exalted in judgment and the holy God will show Himself holy in righteousness. Then the lambs will graze in their pasture, and strangers will eat in the waste places of the wealthy." This is a picture that J.A Motyer describes as, quote, "The empty achievement of human vanity, the net profit of pride." How sad to see people flaunt their ungodliness living in a fool's paradise.

And we'll close this morning with one last woe; one last sin, and that is the sin, number three, of mockery. This is to blaspheme and dare God. Verse 18, "Woe to those who drag iniquity with the cords of falsehood, and sin as if with cart ropes." In other words, they exert themselves, like beasts of burden, pulling a cart of their iniquities. It reminds me of how Sodomites flaunt their gross immorality on large floats, and gay pride parades, daring anyone, including God, to challenge them. What a heartbreaking scene it is.

Verse 19, "Who say, 'Let Him make speed, let Him hasten His work, that we may see it. Let the purpose of the Holy One of Israel draw near and come to pass that we may know it!'" Obviously, this is what Isaiah is hearing from the people. This depicts the utter disregard of the people, their utter contempt for the moral authority of God. Dear friends, this is spiritual arrogance at its worst. This is depraved defiance, like we see in our lives. How many times have we heard people arrogantly get up in front of others and say, "oh if there's a God, I dare him strike me down right now." And nothing happens. And so that's proof that there is no God. You would expect this, because these people were unable to discern the truth of God. They were, according to verse 12, "blind to the deeds of the Lord and they did not consider the work of His hands." So they shook their fist in God's face, and they dared him to judge them.

Peter reminds us of this very thing, and certainly we all are aware of this, Second Peter three beginning of verse three know this. First of all, he says, that, "in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, and saying, 'Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation. For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world and that time was destroyed, being flooded with water." Obviously, speaking of the worldwide flood in Noah's days. But he went on to say, "But by His word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like 1000 years and 1000 years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance."

Well, the next time we get together we will examine the other three woes, but I pray that you will examine your own heart in light of these great truths, because indeed, God is a righteous judge and he will not allow sin to go unpunished. But aren't you thankful that there is grace in the gospel that God is a redeeming, long suffering, forgiving, gracious God? Were that not so we would have no hope. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the glorious truths of your word. May we grasp them, not merely in an intellectual way, in an academic way, but may we embrace them with our whole heart that they might motivate us with a longing to know more of Christ, to experience more of the joy of serving, of worshiping Him, and we thank you that there is grace in Christ. And we thank you that you are coming again one day to take us home. And for all of this, we give you praise. In Jesus name. Amen.

Once again, we have a wonderful opportunity to open up the Word of God. So will you take your bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter five. We're going to be in verses one through eight this morning as we continue to make our way through this amazing epistle. Although it was written back in the first century, it has such relevance to each of us today. I'm sure that most all of you will agree with me when I say I am homesick for heaven. I am homesick for heaven. I know what it's like to be overseas, especially in lands where you can't understand anything they're saying. And you have to depend upon somebody else to interpret. And I know what it's like to really be homesick, and I'm sure a lot of you have felt that as well. But my, I have to say that given everything that's going on in the world, right now, I really am feeling more than perhaps ever in my life, what it is to be an alien, in a foreign land. I mean, we are citizens of another kingdom. And people that have never been born again, people that know nothing of what it is to be a new creature in Christ; and suddenly your citizenship is in heaven, and everything's changed. People don't understand that. But those of us that have been transformed by the power of the Spirit, know that feeling. And so it's always wonderful to come together and open up the Word of God and hear truth. I'm so tired of hearing deception. I mean, you don't know who to believe, right? With so much of the stuff that's going on today. But certainly a lot of things we know are absolute deceptions, because we compare them to the Word of God. So what we have before us are some very encouraging words, truths that will speak to each of our hearts; those of us who know and love Christ. We're looking here at the words of the Apostle Paul, who has suffered in ways that, frankly, we couldn't even imagine, as we have examined what happened to his body, you could just see in your mind's eye, a body that was just absolutely disfigured, especially from 195 lashes that he had experienced over the course of his life. And so here we're learning how the Apostle Paul was able to not lose hope, okay? And so this will be an encouragement to all of us as we reflect upon these great truths and apply them to our life. This is a way of understanding how he was able to endure the things that he endured, and therefore helpful for us to be able to endure what we're experiencing now. And as you've heard me say many times, persecution against the true church is mounting rapidly. This will also help us understand how we can have joy, how we can have confidence even in the face of death.

So let's pick it up at verse 16, Second Corinthians five...I'm sorry, Second Corinthians four beginning of verse 16. We're going to look at verse five and following but I want to start in chapter four. Verse 16, he says, "Therefore, we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." And now the text that we will examine here this morning..."For we know that if the earthly tent, which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For indeed in this house, we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked. For indeed, while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life. Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the spirit as a pledge. Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord--for we walk by faith, not by sight--we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body, and to be at home with the Lord."

I've entitled my discourse to you this morning "Groaning for Glory." And I think you can understand why. It's interesting as I age, I find myself making more noises when I get up out of a chair. Maybe some of you can identify with that kind of strange groanings that I catch myself doing. And of course, we all groan with physical aches and pains, and we groan because of heartaches; the great difficulties that we experience in life. In fact, life in general includes a lot of groaning. The more we experience life in this fallen world, the more we long for heaven. Now, when we were young, we didn't think about those things that much, we were all excited about life. And we had all of these dreams. And in fact, a lot of young people, when I asked them about heaven, they really don't want to talk about that, that much because, after all, they want to get married, and have their career and do all of these things. But as we begin to age, we begin to see that things aren't the way we wished they would be all the time. And we begin to long and, in fact, God has set eternity in our hearts. We're told in Ecclesiastes three and verse 11. In fact, as we look at Scripture, we see that God has created within us a void, that only he can fill. He created us to bring glory to him. And we can never find any satisfaction in life, any real fulfillment in life, unless we are living our life for his glory. The problem is, we are limited in our ability to do that, because of our body, because we still remain incarcerated in unredeemed flesh, unredeemed humaneness. So we groan for glory. And by faith, we wait patiently for him to take us home and to clothe us in our glorified bodies.

Now, as we prepare to look at this text, let me ask you, do you find yourself longing for heaven? Do you find yourself groaning for that day when you will be in the presence of Christ? Do you "exult in the hope of the glory of God," as Paul said, in Romans five, verse two? Do you yearn for a resurrected body? If not, you're probably grasping onto this world far too tightly. You know little of your sin and the Savior, and you're living for yourself rather than living in light of eternity. Well, as we look at this text, we see that Paul lived his life in light of eternity. And as we look at this text, we can see that there are basically two lenses, if you will, that he looked through, as he looked at his life, and all that was happening to him. And these will be two very simple points in a little outline that I've given you this morning. He lived in light of eternity, because he was confident of two promises. Number one, a glorified body awaited him. And secondly, he knew that a sovereign God was preparing him. Very simple, very profound. And I pray that these truths will encourage you so that you don't lose hope in the days to come, especially when it's your time to face death, as we all will.

You will recall when Job was suffering, he was abandoned by his brothers, he was abandoned by his friends, his relatives, his wife, his household. In fact, his wife told him to curse God and die. Where did he turn? He set his mind on things above. In fact, we read that he set his hope on fellowship with God that would come one day and on a new earth and a resurrected body. He said this in Job 19, verse 25, "For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh, I shall see God; whom I shall see for myself and my I shall behold, and not another, my heart faints within me." He was consumed with a longing, or desire, to be with the Lord his God. Someone has well said that diamonds are best displayed on black velvet. And that's what we see here. Beloved, do you believe in the physical resurrection of the body? I hope you do. This is fundamental to the Christian faith. In fact, the prophet Isaiah tells us in Isaiah 26, verse 19, "Your dead will live; their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, for your dew is as the dew of the dawn, and the earth will give birth to the departed spirits." Folks, there is nothing more encouraging, there is nothing more exhilarating, there is nothing more exciting in the Christian life, than to know that we are in the process of being conformed into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ, and one day we will be glorified with Him. I hope that hope is yours. One day we will be given a glorified body. In fact, the old theologians used to call it "the beatific vision"--that moment, when we will finally feast our eyes upon the visible presence of Christ and enjoy his infinite beauty and love forever. And that's the goal of the Christian life. Ultimately, that day when we will see God, when we will, as Jude tells us in verse 24, when we will "stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy." That instant, when, for the first time, for the first time, we will experience unhindered perfected, fullness of Triune love. I mean, can there be anything more exhilarating than that? And that's what motivated the Apostle Paul.

Now in light of this, Paul, who, by the way, was a tentmaker on the side, which is very important. He says, this beginning of verse one of chapter five, four, "we know that if the earthly tent, which is our house, is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." Now the phrase "for we know," emphasizes that they had already been taught these things, and they were confident of these doctrinal truths. And then he goes on to say that "if the earthly tent"--which is a metaphor, describing the temporary dwelling of the mortal body that houses the soul-- "we know that if this earthly tent, which is our house is torn down"-- referring to death--"we have a building from God," and that denotes a permanent dwelling house, "not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

And this brings us to the first lens through which the Apostle Paul viewed life and that is he knew number one, that a glorified body awaited him. Now, why did he say "if the earthly tent, which is our house, is torn down?" Why didn't he say "since?" Well, I believe it, because he understood along with the people that he was speaking to, that the imminent return of Christ would also include perhaps being snatched away in the rapture of the church. This would mean that there would be a possibility that they wouldn't die, that they would be taken up into glory. Instead of dying, they would according to First Corinthians 15, "be changed, in a moment in the twinkling of an eye." In fact, if we go to that text at First Corinthians 15, verse 51, as we read earlier, "Behold, I tell you will mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed." Speaking to believers here, "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed." This refers to the same eschatological event that is described in First Thessalonians four, verses 16 through 17. There we read, "For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord." "Caught up," a term in Greek--"harpazo"--it translates "harpazo" and it means to be suddenly snatched up, suddenly caught up, suddenly removed. So whether raptured or resurrected from the dead, this transformation is going to be instantaneous; an amazing thought in and of itself. It's going to happen in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. I don't know who measured this, but I looked it up the twinkling of an eye is 1/10 of a second. So that's pretty fast. And it will happen at the last trumpet. That is, it's symbolic of the sound that was used historically in Israel to summon the people. And this will be the final sound of the church age when the bridal church will be prepared for her groom, who comes to snatch her away unto himself.

John spoke about this in his Gospel; Jesus speaking here in chapter 14, beginning of verse two, "'...I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.'" He will then according to Scripture, take his raptured bride to celebrate the marriage supper. There we will receive our rewards and then we will return back with Christ when he comes again to establish his earthly kingdom. This is according to Colossians three, four, "When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory." In fact, in Romans 8:19, we read, "For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God." And back to First Corinthians 15 and verse 52, At the last trumpet..."the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality." And as we all know this, this body is subject to death, it is subject to decay, and we must be clothed with something, a body that that is going to be indestructible, something that is going to be eternal. And dear friends, Paul knew this and he waited for this, he longed for this. What about you?

Back to Second Corinthians now, chapter five, verse one. He speaks of, "a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." No wonder would he say in First Corinthians 15:54, :But when those perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, 'DEATH IS SWALLOWED UP in victory. O DEATH, WHERE IS YOUR VICTORY? O DEATH, WHERE IS YOUR STING?'"

Now, people will rightly ask, what is the nature, what will be the nature of the glorified body? Well, the word of God gives us a little bit of instruction here to help us understand what it's going to be like, at least a little bit. First of all, we know that it will be a renovated version of our current body. Romans chapter eight and verse 11, we read that God will also "give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who dwells in you." As we look at Scripture, we see that our bodies are going to be changed. They're not going to be exchanged; as we read, for example, in First Corinthians 15:51. Remember, he says in verse 53, of First Corinthians 15, "This perishable body," in other words, the one that we have right now, "must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality." So there will be continuity, you might say, with our present body, yet, it's going to be radically different in ways that that we can't even begin to comprehend. Remember, Christ is the first fruits of the resurrection, as we read in First Corinthians 15:23. And that figure, the first fruits, is really a powerful figure, a powerful image. And by the way, it harkens back to Leviticus chapter 23, where the Lord spoke to Moses, concerning the first fruits of their barley harvest, which would happen in March and April. Barley similar to what we would call wheat. And that was the initial feast of "first fruits" that symbolized the consecration of the whole harvest to God. And it was a pledge of the whole harvest that was to come. An amazing thought. It pointed to, as we see in other passages, a future resurrection fulfilled in Christ.

Now, in that first fruits, harvest and all that went with that in that sacrifice, in that feast, what we see is that the first sheaf of barley was a representative sample of a harvest that already existed. And this is very important to keep in mind. This is very exciting to me, it already existed. It was the first installment of a fully ripened crop that was waiting in the field to be harvested. That was the point of all of this symbolism. And Paul's point, in that whole passage, was to basically say, How could Christ be the first fruit? If he were the only fruit? You see that would be totally absurd. I mean, do you really think he is the only sheaf of the barley? Well, of course not. That's ridiculous. And his point in all of this, is that the resurrection is certain. The resurrection is certain. The first sheaf cannot be harvested and offered unless the rest of the harvest is also ripe; unless the rest of the harvest is also ready to be harvested. So since Christ has been raised, and since you belong to him, you also are ready to be raised from the dead. Christ is the first fruit of a resurrection harvest that includes each and every person that belongs to Christ through saving faith.

Now back to the nature of our glorified body. Since Christ Himself is the first fruits of the resurrection, and since he himself will "transform the bodies of believers into conformity with the body of his glory"-- Philippians 3:21, it is safe to assume that our, the believers glorified body, is going to somehow be like Christ's body. And we know that he was raised with a renovated version of the body in which he died. Remember, Thomas the doubter, actually saw the scars and nail prints and so forth; placed his hands in his wounds. And he was, Jesus was recognized by those who knew him well. And as I'll talk about, in a moment, we are going to know each other and others in heaven, we will recognize them. But like Christ's resurrection body, our body will be radically different than the way we have now. Hallelujah? First Corinthians 15:42 and 44, again, that we read earlier, provides for contrasts, and I want to dwell on just for a moment, where Paul underscores the vast difference between our current body and our resurrected body. The first one is in verse 42. He says, "it is sown a perishable body, but it is raised an imperishable body." And certainly again, we know that decomposition and decay is the natural, it is the inevitable process of this body, but he says, it is raised an imperishable body. It means a body that is impervious to decay. It is incorruptible, in other words, is not going to break down. No arthritis, no disease, no sickness. And we will probably be forever youthful, perfect specimens of maleness and femaleness. By the way, there's no hint of multiple genders in heaven. There's no hint of gender confusion, none of those LGBTQ whatever perversions.

The second contrast in verse 43, "it is sown in dishonor, but it is raised in glory." Now dishonor speaks of a state of shame, a state of disgrace. We were created in perfection, with the ability to bring glory to God and all that we do. But sin ruined all of that. And more often than not, we dishonor God in our bodies, we fail to present our bodies as a living and holy sacrifice that's acceptable under God, but not so in our resurrected body. Moreover, there's nothing honorable about a decaying body. I've been around decaying bodies, you probably have to, and the horrible stench of putrefaction alone speaks of that disgrace. It was considered unclean in the Mosaic law, to be around the body, certainly to touch a corpse. Numbers 19:11, "The one who touches the corpse of any person shall be unclean for seven days." But the resurrected body will not stay as it was in internment. It's going to be raised in glory. And it's safe to assume that our resurrected bodies will have all the marks of youthfulness and marks of strength; a perfect manifestation of the intended beauty of God's creation in maleness and femaleness that will help us be able to render praise to our Creator forever and ever.

A third contrast is in verse 43, "it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power." And we would all agree that our bodies are very limited in physical strength and stamina, we lack vigor. Some are stronger than others, but we're all weak people. Again, I am amazed at how such a microscopic thing called a Coronavirus can absolutely put us down. And for some put us away. We are fragile, we're vulnerable to disease, we're vulnerable to injury. And when the body dies, that lifeless corpse is really a symbol of its weakness. But as we read here, it's going to be raised in power. We're going to be able to function in ways that we cannot imagine. We're going to be able to worship God in the realm of the supernatural. Now, how so? Well, we're not real sure, Scripture doesn't tell us. But we know that we will be like Christ. First John three two says "We know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him." And I find it interesting, if you examine the post-resurrection manifestations of Christ's glorified body, you begin to pick up a little bit of what our body is going to be like. It's going to be very similar in appearance. In other words, we will be able to recognize each other, but it's going to be radically different. Again, in ways that we cannot comprehend. When you think about Christ, what could he do? Well, he could suddenly appear, and then he could suddenly disappear. Boy, you want to get away? Remember that commercial? I wish I had that ability, there's times where I wish I could suddenly disappear and appear and then reappear in a distant place. Amazing. He could pass through walls and closed doors, and yet he could eat food, he could drink liquids, he could speak he could interact to others with whom he chose to reveal to himself, he was able to ascend into heaven, and he has promised to return physically. And in the same way, folks, God only knows how he is going to use the power that he is going to give us. I mean, perhaps we are going to rule other galaxies. I don't know, you don't know. Scripture doesn't say. I know he's not going to give me all that power to play a harp because I don't like harps. But I like other things, you get the idea. I mean, we may be ruling in galaxies that are not yet created. We don't know. But it's going to be something beyond our ability to comprehend. It's what he talked about in chapter four and verse 17, "the eternal weight of glory" beyond all, I forget exactly the term there--beyond our ability to comprehend is basically how it can be translated. beyond all comparison, I think is what he says.

Well, a fourth contrast in verse 44, "it is sown a natural body"-- that's what we have now, but "it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body." Now, the natural body is one suited for life on this earth. It is not suited for the supernatural realm; it's suited for the natural world. But we're greatly limited in our ability. There's no way that we could live in the new creation that's going to require a spiritual body. Now you must understand spiritual does not mean ethereal. It does not mean immaterial. It does not mean that we're some disembodied spirit that's going to float around throughout eternity like a ghost, that's not what he's referring to here. In fact, saints in heaven right now, have not yet received their glorified body, which is a fascinating thought. Heaven is the dwelling place, according to Hebrews 12:23 of the spirits of righteous men made perfect, but they are able to recognize each other, and God recognizes them, obviously. We could look at passages for example, in the Old Testament where saints that die are described as those "gathered to his people," Genesis 25:8, 35:29, and many other passages. In Second Samuel 12, you remember how David spoke with confidence that one day he would go to his infant son that had died and that he would see him. And he expected to actually recognize him. In Matthew chapter eight and verse 11, Jesus promised, "many shall come from the east and the west and shall sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven," which implies that we're going to recognize them. Matthew 17--you will recall on the Mount of Transfiguration--Peter, James and John, were given the ability to recognize Moses and Elijah that appeared with Jesus, although they existed in the form of a spirit with a spiritual body; obviously, they retained their individual identity. So even prior to the resurrection, the resurrected body, all the redeemed, will retain their identity forever. In First Thessalonians four, let me give you another example, Paul comforted the Thessalonian believers who thought their dying loved ones would miss the return of Christ. And he said in verse 17, "we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and so shall we ever be with the Lord." Well, what comfort would that have been to them if they were going to be caught up, but they couldn't recognize anybody? Obviously, that's foolish. Paul's promise that we will be together, forever, implies that we are going to enjoy sweet fellowship with all whom we have known in this life and other saints down through redemptive history. Won't it be fun to be able to recognize Noah and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and got a Enoch--got of questions for these guys. But the good thing is, they will know us as well.

Now back to our resurrected body, First Corinthians 15:44, "It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. Again, doesn't mean ethereal, doesn't mean immaterial. But by "spiritual," Paul means that it will be perfectly submitted to the Holy Spirit that now dwells within us. Folks, this will be that time when our sanctification will finally be perfected. When we will be like Christ, when we will be conformed into His image. Our resurrected body will not be subject to temptation, not be subject to sin; no more limitations of the mind or the body. It will be able to instantly respond to every impulse of the new creation without the slightest weakness, or aspiration or ability, that would somehow be hindered by anything at all.

Back to Second Corinthians five now, verse two, Paul says, "For indeed in this house, we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven." Verse three, "Inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked." Now, it's important that you understand this phrase, "that we not be found naked." This was given to the folks in order to counteract the Greek and Roman influence upon the culture with respect to what was called "philosophical dualism." You will recall that they, the pagan Greeks, believed that the spirit was good, but material is bad. And so they believe their souls needed to be freed from the prison of the body. So this idea of we're going to get another body, oh, no, who wants that? And so he's explaining this, by the way, Seneca, who was a Roman stoic philosopher, and even an advisor to Nero said this, quote, "I am a higher being and born for higher things than to be the slave of my body, which I look upon as only a shackle, put upon my freedom." He went on to say, "and so detestable a habitation dwells the free soul." End quote. Well, obviously, this idea of the soul being freed from the body at death, and existing as some kind of disembodied spirit for eternity, was in conflict with what God is teaching through His Apostle. And he says we longed to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven and as much as we haven't put it on, will not be found naked again. We're not going to be some disembodied spirit suspended in space. I love what William Barclay writes, quote, "Paul is not looking for nirvana, with the peace of extinction. He is not looking for absorption in the divine. He is not looking for the freedom of a disembodied spirit. He is waiting for the day when God will give him a new body, a spiritual body, in which he will still be able, even in the heavenly places, to serve and adore God."

And then Paul goes on to say, "For indeed, while we are in this tent, we groan." Boy, again, can't we all identify with this, we groan over relationships that don't work. We groan over bodies that are subject to injury and disease. We groan over kids that break our heart. We groan over apostate Christianity, corrupt politicians, domestic terrorism, terrorists, and corrupt politicians to support them. We groan over rampant sexual immorality, and the vilest forms of sexual deviancy that's just constantly being crammed down our throats. So often, I have to deal with these things in counseling with people. We groan because of mounting persecution, and the list goes on and on. And think of all that Paul dealt with, all that he suffered. And we've gone over this at length on other Sundays, but folks, one of the things I find interesting in studying the life of the apostle Paul--although there were so many things that that tormented him, both physically as well as in terms of the sins of others--his greatest misery was his own sin. Think about that. For example, he said in Romans 7:24, "Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?" Referring to the mortal body in which sin operates, in which sin ultimately brings about decay, and death. And it's interesting, this could possibly be a reference to a horrific practice that was implemented near where the apostle Paul had lived. If you kill someone, they would strip you and take the corpse of the one that you had killed, and strap it to your back, and then banish you into the wilderness. And within days, the corruption of that corpse would eat away until it killed you. That's how he saw it. That's how he saw sin in his own body. You know, folks, it's easy for us to look at the speck in your brother's eye and not see the log in our own. But Paul mourned over his sin. And you know, as you mature in Christ, his holiness becomes even more vivid, all the more clear to us. And in the light of his purity, and in the perfections of his person, we begin to see the corruptions of our own soul in ways that we hadn't seen before. That's what causes us to sing "Amazing Grace" from the very core of our hearts, right? His word is like turning on a light down in the cellar. And when that happens, all of a sudden, all of the little critters begin to run away into the corners. Don't you feel that at times when you read the Word of God?

By the way, this is why sinners hate the Bible. This is why people apart from Christ, hate the laws of God. Some men love darkness rather than light. Why? Because their deeds are evil. We just don't want to see that. But when we look at even the sin in our own lives, we begin to see things that wish we weren't there and by the way, we only see the tip of the iceberg. Aren't you glad the Holy Spirit doesn't convict us of everything all at once? It'd be overwhelming. Jesus said, Matthew five, five, "blessed are those who mourn," referring to mourning over their sin, "for they shall be comforted." And certainly the comfort comes in the forgiveness that is ours when we place our faith in Christ. Not only the forgiveness, but the imputed righteousness of Christ, that is then put into our account; he takes our sin, gives us his righteousness. But our mourning over sin, dear friends, is in direct proportion to our ability to see the holiness of God, the purity of God, the law of God. And as I say, when we see that, we are amazed at his grace. In fact, we can never be truly amazed at his grace until we're amazed at our sin. 17th century English Puritan Thomas Manton said this, “Paul was whipped, imprisoned, stoned, in perils by land and sea, persecuted by enemies, undermined by false brethren. But afflictions did not set so close to them as sins. The body of death was his sorest burden. Therefore did he longed for deliverance. A beast will leave the place where he findeth neither food nor rest. It is not the troubles of the world only which set the saints a groaning, but indwelling corruption, this grieveth them. They are not yet rid of sin, that they serve God with such apparent weakness and manifold defects, that they are so often distracted and oppressed with sensual and worldly affections. They cannot get rid of this cursed inmate, and therefore desire a change of states. By the grace of God they have got rid of the guilt of sin and reigning power of sin, but the being of it is a trouble to them, which will still remain till this tabernacle be dissolved, then sin shall gasp its last and the saints are groaning, and long for the parting day, when by putting off flesh, they shall put off sin and come and dwell with God."

Oh Child of God, I pray that this is the burden of your heart. David's lament you will recall in Psalm 38 goes like this beginning in verse four, "There is no health in my bones because of my sin. For my iniquities are gone over my head; as a heavy burden they weigh too much for me. My wounds grow foul and fester because of my folly. I am bent over and greatly bowed down; I go mourning all day long. For my loins are filled with burning and there is no soundness in my flesh. I am benumbed and badly crushed; I groan because of the agitation of my heart." Paul said this in Romans eight beginning in verse 23, "And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit,"--in other words, believers--"even we ourselves groan within ourselves," literally, we groan inwardly; "waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body." Then I love what he says, "For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance, we wait eagerly for it." Beloved, this is the glorious, life-dominating, soul exhilarating expectation of the redeemed.

I remember on several occasions in Siberia going to visit some of the elderly people, mostly elderly widows, they don't have nursing homes there. In fact, there's no place to take care of the elderly. Usually what happens is the little churches build on little shanties to wherever they meet, and house these people. I remember going into the room of several of these elderly ladies with Natasha, my interpreter, and sitting down with them, and for them, it was the first time they'd ever seen an American, much less another believer. And I remember sitting with them, and they love to hold my hands, you know, and they would hold my hands and they would look at me and rattle off things that I had no idea what they were saying and Natasha would interpret them. And one lady kept doing this, she would get my face and she kept doing this. And finally she calmed down and Natasha told me, she said, she can't wait to go home. She said, "I'm ready to go home." And then she talked about a glorified body. And they all started talking about the glorified body, talking about the resurrection. Folks, these were happy people, and they had nothing. How sad, we have everything. So many people today are unhappy. And the reason why is because they don't have the Lord. They have no hope. They have no help.

We see this as well, this hope, in Second Corinthians five four, Paul says, "For indeed, while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal, will be swallowed up by life." I mean Paul knows that his suffering is not in vain. He knows that he's going to be rewarded. He knows that his sinful, dilapidated, mortal flesh is wasting away. But someday it's going to be totally renovated. Indeed, "what is mortal," he says, "will be swallowed up by life." Again, folks, this is what he was referring to, in chapter four, verse 17, "the eternal weight of glory, far beyond comparison." And may I remind you that Christ is the ultimate glory of heaven. Too often, I come across Christians who would be fine if they went to heaven, and Christ wasn't there. Now, they don't really want to admit that, but that's how they think. They can't wait to see aunt so and so, and mom and dad, and kids and all these things, and that's wonderful. But folks, Christ is the jewel of heaven. You see, the offer of the gospel, if I can put it real practically, the offer of the gospel is not social justice. The offer of the gospel is not health and wealth. The offer of the gospel is Christ. And he is the glory of heaven. You must understand that Christ is not a means to an end, but rather he is the all sufficient and all glorious end himself. Ephesians one three, we read that "God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ." Now, there's so much more that could be said about our union with Christ. But folks, I hope you're groaning for Christ. Because if you truly know Him, you will.

Paul spoke of this, as well in First Corinthians 15:54, "But when this perishable will put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, DEATH IS SWALLED UP IN VICTORY." By the way, he was probably alluding to Isaiah 25, beginning in verse eight, where we read, "He will swallow up death for all time." The idea of consuming something, to bring it to a complete end, "He will swallow up death for all time and the Lord God will wipe tears away from all faces, and He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth; for the LORD has spoken. And it will be said in that day, 'Behold, this is our God for whom we have waited, that He might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.'"

Well, Paul knew that he had a glorified body that awaited him. And finally, in closing, he also knew a sovereign God was preparing him. Look at verse five. He says, "Now He who prepared us for this purpose." "Katergazotai" in Greek, it means "to equip, to prepare." He's prepared us for this purpose. Literally "this purpose" is referring to "for this very thing." Who is it? Well, it's God, "who gave to us the spirit as a pledge." A pledge is a down payment, it is a first installment, it is a guarantee. In other words, the "clothing" of verse four awaits us, this complete transformation from the perishable to the imperishable. And it's interesting that Paul uses the same verb "katergazotai" in verse 17 of chapter four. He says, "For momentary, light affliction is producing for us,"--same verb, "an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison." You see, folks, what he's saying here, is that he knew that a "swallowing up" power was already at work within him. And nothing could stop it. It was the sanctifying work of the indwelling Spirit of God, the Christians pledge of the future inheritance.

Ephesians one and verse 13, "You were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God's own possession to the praise of His glory." And Philippians one in verse six, you're familiar with it, "I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus." John MacArthur said this, "The indwelling Holy Spirit is God's guarantee that believers are His possession, and that He will redeem them to the praise of his glory. For that reason, it is ludicrous to believe that Christians can lose their salvation. Nothing can interrupt the plan God set in motion in eternity past--referring to election--and has pledged himself to carry through until eternity future--referring to glorification. To argue otherwise, is to assume that God is incapable of achieving His purposes, and thus to diminish His glory." How true.

Beloved, dwell on these things, the next time you're tempted to lose heart, the next time you're filled with fear. And in verse six, he says, "Therefore being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord--for we walk by faith, not by sight--"meaning our lives right now are lived in the sphere of faith, we trust in Him. Verse eight, he says, "We are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body, and to be home with the Lord." So as we walk in the realm of faith, dealing with these decaying bodies, dealing with all of the sin around us, as well as our own sin, we can be deeply encouraged. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is preparing us, he's doing this. And it's certain, it's guaranteed. And I might even add, it's because of him, we are all groaning for glory; because we want to be at home with the Lord, "to be absent from the body, is to be at home with the Lord." Dear Christian, I pray that this is the passion of your heart. And if so, won't you live in light of his glory. And the more you learn of him, the more you worship him, the more you serve him, the more you commune with him, the more you will see the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, your Lord; everything else becomes rubbish, as the Apostle Paul tells us. And as this happens, the more we experience the power of his presence deep within our soul. The more he blesses us, the more he reveals himself to us, until that day, when he takes us home. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. They certainly speak to our hearts, they encourage us, especially in these dark days of such deception, the freefall of immorality that we're witnessing in our country, Lord, the apostasy in the Church. But Lord, even our own sin, my goodness, we just long for you to come to take us away. And we're thankful that we know that you will indeed do that either in death, or you will come and snatch us away. We know that that's going to happen. But we thank you that you are preparing us for this time. And in this we rejoice greatly. So encourage us with these truths. And for those who know nothing of what it is to be in Christ, those who have never placed their faith in Christ because they've never seen the horror of their sin, they've never seen the glory of the cross, Oh, Father, I pray that by the power of your Spirit, you will overwhelm them with such conviction that they will run to the cross and be saved. Thank you for this time we could share together. Minister to us as only you can do, I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Once again, we have a wonderful privilege to be able to open up the Word of God here this morning. And I would invite you to do that. Take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians four. We're going to be looking at verses 16, actually, through verse 18, this morning, under the heading, 'The Triumph of Saving Grace." If you haven't been with us, we go through each book, the Bible verse by verse, in an effort to glean all that we can from what the Spirit of God has revealed to us. And what a joy it is to be able to come together and worship, amen? To be able to sing together and fellowship and open up the word that's a lamp unto our feet and a light into our path. And my we need a lamp and a light today, don't we, with everything that's going on? I mean, every time you turn on my pillow, I mean, Fox News. Every time you turn it on, your jaw just drops, it's like what else is gonna happen, you know. And people are afraid, not just because of this pandemic; that's been grossly exaggerated for political purposes; but people are afraid of some of the other groups that are out there, this Antifa and Black Lives Matter and certainly the wicked politicians that support these things. I find it fascinating you really cannot buy ammunition. Ammunition manufacturers are as much as three years behind. It's sad, it's hard to buy a gun. I mean, people are preparing for war. Militias are forming; secret militias are forming within the military and within law enforcement. It's really frightening times. And of course, you know, these, the Antifa and Black Lives Matter protests are nothing but political theater filled with phony propaganda, dedicated to promoting mayhem and lawlessness to somehow promulgate their phony narratives, exercise power, and all of that. And, you know, if they gain power, I mean, we are in for, for some severe threats in our country.

And certainly, as you've heard me say before, as we've studied some of these groups, Biblical Christianity simply cannot coexist with what these groups demand. And that's frightening. I was noticing that there were Black Lives Matter protests in Portland, where they were burning Bibles along with American flags in the bonfires. I mean folks that's where it's headed, because ultimately, Satan is behind all of this. God's judgment is upon this nation, a nation that has mocked him; persecution is mounting. And certainly, we know according to Second Timothy three, beginning of verse 12, Paul said, "All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived." And that's what we see today. But may I remind you, that persecution purifies as well as grows the church? We've seen this historically. And that's the exciting thing with all that we see happening, the Lord has promised to build his church, right? And I mean, you look at China today, there's an estimated 300 million people that worship the Lord like us today, they have to do it underground. In North Korea, the church is growing, but they have to meet in groups of two or three, sometimes four, hidden in places, and they sing hymns by whispering them, but the church is growing. The same thing in Russia. So you can go on and on. And you can see that the Lord is behind, ultimately, behind all of this, in that he has allowed these things to happen for his purposes.

And, and I know people will say, "But Pastor, I mean, our precious children are going to be exposed to these things and we're just watching our way of life just being destroyed right in front of our eyes. What are we to do?" Well, Bible is very clear, and we're gonna look at some of that this morning. But we're to set our mind on things above not all the things of this earth, right? We're to present the gospel. I was so impressed, maybe you saw this, if you haven't, you ought to see the interview with Orlando Magic forward. Jonathan Isaac, did any of you see the interview with him? It just happened. He became the first NBA player not to kneel during the national anthem, since the league resumed on Thursday. And you can see all of his other brothers, kneeling with Black Lives Matter t shirts; they're all locking arms and he's standing up with his uniform on and his head bowed. It's really moving. And later on, he was asked, you know, don't you believe Black Lives Matter? And he said, Yes. And I wrote down some of what he said. He said, "kneeling or wearing a Black Lives Matter t shirt doesn't go hand in hand in supporting black lives." He said, "My life has been supported through the gospel of Jesus Christ. And everyone is made in the image of God, and we should live for God's glory." He went on to say how "sometimes we point fingers at whose evil is worse. And sometimes it comes down to who's evil is most visible." I thought that was rather profound. He went on to say, "you know, I feel like we all make mistakes, but the gospel of Jesus Christ gives grace." He went on to add, "Jesus came and died for our sins. And if we all come to an understanding of that, and that God wants to have a relationship with us, we can get past all the things in our world that are messed up, that are jacked up." He added "racism isn't the only thing that plagues our society." And boy, isn't that the truth that plagues our nation that plagues our world? "I feel like coming together on that message, we can get past not only the racism, but everything that plagues our society. I feel like the answer is the gospel." It just brought tears to my eyes. I mean, that's what you do in these days.

And as the true church comes under attack, we're all going to experience mounting persecution, but we know that ultimately, God is in control and his plans and his purposes will not be thwarted. But none of us have ever come close to experiencing anything close to what the Apostle Paul experienced in his persecutions and suffering. When Second Corinthians one five, he said, "the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance." In fact, he went on in verse eight to describe the affliction; it was so great that he says, "we were burdened excessively beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life." And if you study his life, you see that his life and his ministry was just perpetual conflict. The Jews are trying to kill him, the Gentiles are trying to kill him. In Lystra, the Jews did stone him. In Acts 14, we read the Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having won over the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing him to be dead. And in Philippi, we read that he was beaten with rods, and after receiving many blows, he, along with Silas, were thrown into prison, Acts 16. Second Corinthians 11, beginning of verse 23, Paul says, "I was beaten times without number often in danger of death. Five times I," catch this, "five times, I received the Jews 39 lashes." Five times, that's 195 lashes by the way. The reason they would say 39 lashes is because normally the 40th lash would kill a man. And so without giving a death sentence, they would say, well, let's just give him 39 lashes. I mean, folks, his back and his ribcage would not have looked human, it would have been so scarred. That's why in Galatians 6:17 he says, "I bear on my body the brand-marks of Jesus." Second Corinthians 11, he went on to say, "Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep. I've been on frequent journeys and dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; I have been in labor and hardship through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches." Worse yet, beloved, he was abandoned by all of his friends, in his last imprisonment. I mean, think about this, in Second Timothy 1:15. He says, "You are aware of the fact that all who are in Asia turned away from me, among whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes. And then in chapter four and verse 16, he says that "my first defense no one supported me, but all deserted me." Then he says, "May it not be counted against them." You imagine that?

Now, here in Second Corinthians remember that he is under enormous stress through the slander the scurrilous markings of these false teachers that had slithered into the church and had seduced many of the naive and immature saints into believing their lives and turning against their spiritual father. That's why in chapter four here in verse eight, he says that he was "afflicted in every way"-- perplexed, persecuted, struck down, "always carrying about in the body, the dying of Jesus; constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus sake. I mean, none of us can say that we've been anywhere close to that. Nevertheless, according to verse 15, are verse 14, he was at peace, "knowing," he says "that He who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you."

Now, that's the background of where we are here this morning, Second Corinthians four beginning in verse 16. "Therefore, we do not lose heart. But though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." Dear friends, I ask you this morning, are you tempted to lose heart? Do you find yourself struggling under the weight of all of the difficulties of life, whatever they might be? How do you endure persecution? How do you endure loneliness, and suffering, sorrow? And even beyond that, what is your attitude toward death? Because we're all headed there aren't we? Every single person in this room. Now the unbeliever refuses to think much about death in particular and Satan provides a myriad of ways to distract him from those realities, all of the pleasures of life, drugs, alcohol, whatever they might be, and then false teaching, that would say, Oh you're a pretty good person, so you will make the cut; those types of things. But a mature Christian looks at it, head on, face on and realizes that it's coming. But beyond that, knows that it can face that last enemy of death, actually, with joy, you know, as I often think, to myself, I'm not afraid of death. It's the dying part that I'm not looking forward to, right? I mean, we all we all know what that means. I mean, you never know how you're going to go, but boy, the death part--we're in glory. So this is what we see here. This is why I've entitled this discourse to you "The Triumph of Saving Grace" and here in this passage, we're going to discover three principles that are key to experiencing joy and power. And frankly triumph in the face of severe adversity and suffering, and even death. Three spiritual realities; realities that should really capture our attention; be dominant within our heart. And here they are, we can rejoice knowing number one: our inner man grows stronger as our outer man grows weaker. Or as our outer man weakens, I should say. Number two: our eternal reward grows greater as our suffering for Christ intensifies. And number three: our earthly joy grows fuller, as our mind is set on eternity.

First of all, let's familiarize ourselves with the terminology that Paul uses. First of all, he speaks of the outer man, this is referring to the physical body. In fact, in verse seven, he calls it "the earthen vessel," verse 11, "mortal flesh." In other words, this is all that is visible. Unlike the soul, that is the inner man that is invisible. And at death, we know that the soul vacates the body and goes to heaven or to hell. The souls of believers will receive a glorified body suited for heaven in one of three stages of resurrection. Let me give them to you very briefly. The first stage is for those that are saved from Pentecost to the rapture of the church, when they will be joined by living saints to meet the Lord in the air. And then those second stages those saved during the tribulation and all of the Old Testament saints will be raised up when Jesus returns to Earth to reign with Him during the Millennial Kingdom. And then finally, those who died during the Millennial Kingdom, we believe that they will probably receive their eternal glorified bodies instantly, immediately at death. Now, you might say, Well, what about unbelievers? Do they get a resurrection? Well, they do. Revelation 20 in verse five, "The rest of the dead did not come to life, until the 1000 years were completed." This is a reference to the unbelievers. Then the text says this is the "first resurrection," which is actually referring to the resurrection of believers in the previous verse. But Paul speaks of this as well, in Acts 24, verse 15, "there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just, and the unjust." And Jesus spoke of this in John 5:29, there is a "resurrection of life." And he went on to say, on the "resurrection of judgment," or it can be translated "of condemnation." And this resurrection of condemnation for unbelievers will occur at the end of Christ's millennial reign upon the earth at the Great White Throne Judgment. And that is described in Revelation 20, verse 11, and following. And at that time, all of the places that have held the bodies or the DNA, you might say, of the unrighteous dead will yield up a hideous body suited for eternal torment in hell. We don't know what that body will look like. We may have a preview of that, in some of the things that we see, like the horrifying repulsive bodies of the of the Living Dead that so many people feed on, I don't...I can't understand that. But people like to watch that demonic stuff. But they will be raised to eternal death, which is called the second death biblically, Revelation 21 in verse eight, we read, "But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death."

So folks, this is the dreadful state of all those who reject Christ. You know, whenever I reflect upon the justice that I deserve, and the mercy that I have received, I just become speechless. I mean, that's when the great old hymn Amazing Grace really captures it. And that's frankly, why I resent so many people singing that song as if it's just some, you know, pop tune. So the outer man is the visible, the physical body that houses the soul or the spirit, the inner man. By the way, soul and spirit are not two separate entities, they are one in the same the terms; are used interchangeably throughout Scripture. In fact, Mary said in Luke 1:46, and 47, "my soul" which is in Greek "psuche", "My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit,"--"pneuma"--"rejoices in God my Savior"' many other passages say the same thing. So as we look at who we are as human beings that God has created, we exist as both material and immaterial beings, we have a body and we have a soul. You will recall in Genesis two seven at creation, God formed man out of the ground, there's the material part. And then what did he do? He breathed life into him, there's the immaterial part and so forth. And I might add, that Jesus makes this distinction between body and soul in Matthew 10 and verse 28. Jesus said, "'Do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul, but rather fear him who was able to destroy both soul and body in hell.'"

So here Paul is facing the reality that he's having to face all the time in his life and ministry, the reality of death and decay of the body. He says, the outer man is decaying, literally, it is in the process of deteriorating. Now, when you're young, you don't notice this. But as you start getting older, it's real obvious. In fact, I always laugh at my kids, when I hear, and grandkids, when I hear them howling in the other room in laughter. I know they've gotten into some of the old pictures, you know, and those of you that are my age will understand that. So there's a natural progression in life, a progression of deterioration, an aging process that we all experience. And hair color, makeup, plastic surgery, exercise all of those things may conceal it at some level for a while, but it cannot do away with it completely, it cannot prevent it. Death by the way, is the consequence of sin. And we are all born sinners. We're sinners by nature. Romans 5:12, "Through one man sin entered into the world and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned."

Now I want to take you for a moment to Ecclesiastes chapter 12. Want to look at just seven verses in here. King Solomon, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit describes the the inevitable decay of the outer man, and frankly, the importance of reflecting upon the reality of death, and the judgment that is going to follow. Ecclesiastes 12 one, let me give you just a real brief exposition of it; it's quite powerful. "Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come." In other words, before the times of misery and trouble that we're all going to experience at the end of life. "And the years," he says, "Draw near, when you will say, 'I have no delight in them.'" And then he goes on to describe the inevitable decline in life that can be seen very easily in all of us.

Verse two, "Before the sun and the light, the moon and the stars are darkened, and clouds return after the rain." And here now he's illustrating the evil days. And what he's referring to here is in old age the eyes begin to fail. The vision begins to get cloudy, like the process of glaucoma.

Verse three, and "in the day that the watchman of the house tremble"-- you see that in old age, both physically the hands, for example, begin to tremble, and emotionally we get weak and feeble. In old age, we become increasingly paranoid, increasingly vulnerable. And then he says, "And mighty men stoop"--referring to the major muscle groups that begin to weaken and the back begins to bend. "The grinding ones stand idle, because they are few"--referring to teeth. "And those who look through windows grow dim"-- a reference again to the eyes.

Verse four, "and the doors of the street are shut as the sound of the grinding mill is low, and one will arise at the sound of the birds and all the daughters of song will sing softly." We know that the shutting of doors refers to the ears as people shut doors. Why do they do that? Well, they want to exclude outside noise. But this is a reference to deafness that begins to take over, as indicated by the sounds of grinding and singing that fade out. But he says, rising up at the sound of birds, and this alludes to a very cruel paradox and old age, doesn't it? It's really funny when you think about it, you can't hear hardly anything but you sleep so lightly, that the slightest little sound of a bird wakes you up. That's what he's speaking of here.

Verse five, "Furthermore, men are afraid of high places." And with aging, you have an increased fear of heights-- "and of terrors on the road." Again, an aging man is unable to protect himself; that begins to wane. And then he says, "the almond tree blossoms." This is a reference to the hair that begins to turn white. By the way, the white color of the blossoms of an almond tree come toward the end of winter before the leaves even begin to sprout. Then he says, "the grasshopper drags himself along." Probably, we believe a reference to bad joints, swollen ankles, certainly a halting walk, the elderly shuffle, and they drag themselves along with an awkward gait. And then he says that, "the caperberry is ineffective"--a paraphrase in the Hebrew would be "and desire is no longer stirred." And apparently this speaks of the loss of sexual desire in old age. In fact, the Targum, which was an Aramaic interpretation and paraphrase of the Hebrew Bible, the Targum paraphrases this more directly it says, quote, "you will cease from sexual intercourse." Now the ancient peoples in the Near East, prized the caperberry for stimulating sexual desire, and in the advanced years, however, the caperberry no longer works as an active stimulant. And then a man continues to decline; eventually he dies. We see here, goes on in verse five, "For man goes to his eternal home while mourners go about in the street." So aging is a harbinger of death. The aging tells us that we're on our final journey, he says to our eternal home. By the way, Jewish community still to this day refer to their cemeteries as "beit olam," which means eternal home; the same phrase that is used here. We see a similar description in Second Corinthians five one, "For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house"--referring to the body--"is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." And so aging is that ultimate harbinger of death.

But death is seen as returning to God in verses six and seven, he says, "Remember Him before the silver cord is broken, and the golden bowl is crushed." The silver cord or the silver chain depicts the value of life, perhaps even the spinal cord, we're not real sure, but finally it breaks with age, and the head--the golden lamp--crashes to the stone floor. And likewise, the pitcher that holds the life-giving water drawn from a well or a cistern cannot serve his task if it breaks. He says, "the pitcher by the well is shattered and the wheel of the system and is crushed." The wheel, of course is the pulley that would lower the pitcher into a well, it can no longer be drawn. So the end has come. So remember him, remember your Creator before this happens.

Verse seven, "then the dust will return to the earth as it was, and the spirit will return to God who gave it." Now, back to Second Corinthians 4:16. Indeed, the "outer man is decaying." I think I have made that point very clear. I don't think there's anyone that would differ with me on that; differ with the word I should say, "yet our inner man is being renewed day by day." Now, folks, this is where it gets really exciting. This is so exciting. The inner man speaks of the heart or the soul, the spirit; terms used again interchangeably; that immaterial, invisible, immortal, spiritual part of man that is reborn at salvation. This is what Paul called in Ephesians 4:24 The "new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth." Colossians 3:10 He says that we are to put on the "new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him." What an exciting truth that is. First Corinthians 15:42, where he's speaking concerning the resurrection of the dead where the body is likened to a seed planted in the ground, he said, "It is sown a perishable body, but it is raised an imperishable body." And in verse 44, he said, "It is sown a natural body, it is raised the spiritual body. If there is a natural body, then there also is a spiritual body.: There's the inner man.

Now that we understand the terms, let's look closely at the beleaguered, disfigured, persecuted apostle, and try to understand now why he didn't lose heart in the face of all of the adversity that he experienced. Verse 16, "Therefore we do not lose heart. But though,"-- there's a hint of hope there right, a hint of triumph of victory--"but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day." Oh, dear Christian, this is the secret to joy in the midst of sorrow, especially when we face death. And it brings us to our very first little point here, our inner man grows stronger when our outer man weakens.

I mean, have you ever considered this? What a magnificent truth this is? It's astounding. In Ephesians 3:16, Paul says, we are "strengthened with power through His Spirit in the"--here it is--"inner man." Why? "So that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith." So that we will experience the soul satisfying soul exhilarating joy of the living Christ deep within our soul. That's what's going on within us. Now the unbeliever cannot say this. As his body weakens his soul stays the same; it's dead, it's alienated from God. It is lifeless, it is at enmity with God. And it will blaspheme God and the solitary confinement of hell forever. But not so the redeem. Our inner man is forever hidden in Christ. An amazing thought, we're forever united to Christ. We have died, Paul says in Colossians, three, three, and our "life is hidden with Christ in God." Verse four says he "is our life." You see folks in the inner man, we enjoy communion with God, we enjoy intimate fellowship with him. In the inner man he speaks to us through his word by the power of his Spirit. And he grows us into the likeness of Christ. Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me." Obviously, it's not my physical body, it's my inner man. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself up for me. Dear friends, it is the inner man, not the outer man that deserves our full attention. That should be the priority that should captivate our thoughts. It is our soul, not our body that is most important. And of course, we live in a culture that is obsessed with the body; absolutely obsessed with the body. We've got to show it off, we got to paint graffiti all over it. We've got to do all of this exercise, we've got to take steroids to make us look more muscular, for the guys. And I guess for some of the girls, we've got to go to the beauty salon, which never does that for me for some reason. We've got to do all of these things. But God looks at our heart, not our body. Proverbs 4:23, "Watch over your heart, with all diligence for from it flow the springs of life." So we've got to guard our hearts, our inner man, we've got to cultivate godliness within our soul, we've got to pursue holiness in the inner man.

Again, the body is decaying, that's just gonna happen. And yeah, I know you want to paint it up, you don't want to look as bad as you can I understand that, you know. You've got to do certain things, I get that. But it's the inner man that deserves our full attention. Because it is there by the power of the Holy Spirit, that Christ is revealed to us. And we become likened unto him. That's the process of sanctification. Paul spoke of this, in Second Corinthians three, verse 18, "But we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord..." by the way, you will recall, it's a reference to seeing Christ in Scripture, we behold "the glory of the Lord." Well, what happens? We're being "transformed in that same image, from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit."

Now we know when we first come to Christ, we are babes in Christ, spiritually speaking, but we gradually grow into maturity. In first, John 1:29 and following, John gives us a description of three stages of spiritual growth he speaks of little children, and then young men and fathers; we're not going to look at that closely, but he speaks of, first of all, there's the little children. That's how we all start. We're immature men of God, we possess just the most rudimentary fundamentals of God and his gospel. And then we begin to mature into young men, where we are now, shall we say, moderately mature, in the Lord; we have a grasp of sound doctrine, he tells us and, and we're able to stand against Satan, and walk by the Spirit, not by the flesh. But then the final stage is the father, the mature man or woman of God, that person who has a profound experience of the living God within their soul and has such a grasp of the knowledge and the fullness of God, that they live for the glory of God. It's not a duty, it is a desire, it is the passion of their soul. This is the one who walks in intimate fellowship and communion with God. But whatever the stage of maturity, we know that it's always the spirit that is at work in the inner man, to make this happen. This is why Paul never lost heart. That's the point. He keeps growing us in the grace and the knowledge of Christ and at death, at death, the renewing process is complete. Suddenly, the soul of a believer vacates the body, leaving all of the sin and all of the sorrow behind and it is instantly transported into the presence of God. Dear Christian, is this your testimony? Is this a testimony of your soul? Or are you hearing this and saying I have no idea what that man is talking about? Well, if that's the case, unless you do business with God and trust in Christ, you will perish in your sins. So we want to ask ourselves does this thrill our heart, does this animate our worship? And if it does, you're not going to lose heart when you face these things. When all of life seems lost, we know that all is about to be gained. We know that the fires of suffering are purifying the silver, if you will, of our life. We know that the Lord is purifying the inner man, we know that he tempers the steel of our faith. And then on the anvil of adversity, he shapes us into men and women that will live for His glory. And in the context of all of that, we enjoy amazing benefits of what it means to be in Christ. And then at death, we can say with Paul, "oh death, where is your victory? O, death, where is your sting?" I've been in the presence of both believers and unbelievers, in the final days, sometimes hours, sometimes minutes or even seconds of their death. I know some of you who are nurses, medical people, you've been there as well. What a difference, what a difference, the difference between terror and triumph, the difference between panic and peace. I've heard people howl in horror as they are about to slip through the veil, and to hell. I've heard them growl at me as I present the gospel to them in the final moments of their life. I've seen and I've heard people at the close of their life suddenly start grasping for things, knocking furniture lamps grasping to hang on to life, as they perish in their sins. And then I've been around believers, who are perfect peace, who typically are ministering to me more than I'm ministering to them and who want to sing praises to the Lord, in whose presence they are about to appear?

Well, how will you face death? How will you face eternity? We never know when God will summon us to pass through the veil. But in the face of death, a true Christian is going to experience that peace that surpasses all understanding. Why? Because that man or that woman knows that his soul is going to be released from his body and he is going to enter into the glorious presence of God, where there is fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore. Why? Because he knows his inner man has been "renewed, day by day," over the course of his life. And as we weaken in our body, we gain strength in our spirit. What an amazing paradox. That's why Paul said in Second Corinthians 12:10, "Therefore, I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties for Christ's sake;" and here's why, "for when I am weak, then I am..." There it is, there's the inner man. So our inner man grows stronger when our outer man weakened.

Secondly, our eternal reward grows greater when our suffering for Christ intensifies. Notice what he says in verse 17, "For momentary, light affliction is producing..." In the Greek it can be translated "preparing" or "cultivating"--"for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison." My goodness, what an amazing perspective. It almost seems like a non sequitur here. It's like, Whoa, I thought this was Paul, the guy that's being beat up. And yet he's saying this "momentary, light affliction?" Are you kidding me? All the suffering that he's enduring, and he says, "momentary, light affliction?" You see, it's all relative, isn't it? It's relative to what he's going to receive in heaven. Romans 8:17, "if indeed we suffer with Him, so that we may also be glorified with Him." He speaks about, "For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God." Peter said the same thing in First Peter one beginning in verse six, "In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ."

Now, I want you to notice something technical here in the original language. It's really fascinating. It helps us understand what the Spirit is telling us through his inspired apostle with respect to our eternal reward. He says, "For momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison." In Greek “kata hyperbole eis hyperbole," we get our English word "hyperbole" from this term. It's a double expression here in Greek and it indicates extra ordinary overabundance. I just have to start stacking superlatives up here to give you an idea here. In other words, this is a beyond all measure weight of glory. That's the point. That's what he's saying. This momentary and light affliction of ours is producing for us an eternal load of glory, that is incomparable. It is inconceivable, it is immeasurable in degree. It's beyond all proportion. It's beyond all comparison, or exaggeration. It exceeds the limits of the imagination. O dear Christian think of this the next time you cower in fear? Think of what awaits you because of what the Spirit of God is doing in the inner man. Too often we could be likened to, I don't know this is probably a corny illustrations--most of mine are-- but sometimes we're like the guy who's in a prisoner of war camp, okay. All of a sudden he finds out he's going to be released. Not only that, he's won $300 million in the lottery. But he can't enjoy it. He just can't enjoy it. Why? He's got a hangnail on his thumb. Got a hangnail, I'm really hurt. The journalist says, are you excited about getting out? Well, not really. I got a boo boo here. All they can focus on is his boo boo, got this hangnail here. Boy, I just don't know, you get the point. I mean, folks what we're going to receive is way beyond a get out of prison ticket and $300 million.

I've been around a lot of believers in countries where they're persecuted, I think of African believers, Russian believers, people that struggle in profound ways. Christians in Israel who are being persecuted by the Hasidic Jews, the Gur Hasidim. But they're filled with joy. They're overflowing with joy. I think of the last time I was in Uganda and every time I would speak, there were, I don't know, 300 pastors or so from all over Africa that were there. And when I would finish speaking, they would come around, and they would start asking questions. And before you know it, I would just have a group of them around me. And you know what, what they wanted to know about? Without fail, what they wanted to know about is tell us about Christ returning to the earth, and the establishment of His kingdom. Tell us about the second coming of Christ. We want to know about the end. That's what they were excited about. And as I would start to open up the scriptures to them, they would clap, and they would weep. And they would laugh, and they would sing and even at times, they would start dancing. I mean, it's real different than the way we do things here, you know, and I know I'm rather stoic myself inside, I'm really dancing and clapping, but I don't do much of that on the outside. I don't want you to think I'm some of those people. You know how that works. John MacArthur put it this way, "Whether suffering comes from believer's, faithful, loyal, committed testimony about Jesus Christ, or the patient enduring of life's normal trials, such as disease, divorce, poverty and loneliness, if endured with a humble, grateful God-honoring attitude, it will add to the eternal weight of glory." Folks, this was this was the apostle's heart. And this is why he was giving this message to the saints at Corinth.

Again, "Therefore we do not lose heart, though the outer man is decaying, yet her inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison." And so why, in light of this, he's not looking at his boo boo. He's looking at the eternal glory that awaits him. That's why he says in verse 18, "While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen, are eternal." You see, he wasn't concerned about what he could see, what he could experience in his body; all of that transient. All of that, the Lord is in control of that. What he's concerned about is what is presently unseen, that will soon be revealed.

And this is why, thirdly, we see that our earthly joy grows fuller when our mind is set on eternity. Let's stop and think about this. For the unbeliever, the only joy that they can have is experienced in this body, and in what they can see, because their inner man is spiritually dead. They can only experience sensory perceptions of the body. So they can enjoy many things, they can enjoy the pleasures of this world; they can enjoy it, you know, a good football game, a good meal, great literature, great music, all of those things. But when they don't have that. Life is not very happy. Had a doctor friend of mine saying, Dave, if we don't have college football, this fall, I'm gonna go postal. And there's a lot of people, probably some in here, that say the same thing. When the Nazis bombed London in World War Two, Parliament demanded that they have blackouts at night, so that the Nazis couldn't see as well. So they shut down all of the bars and all of the theaters and all of the sports arenas. And as a result, massive protests broke out. Because the people said, we are going to go mad if we have no way of escaping the miseries of life. Not so for the believer. Oh, yes, we enjoy those things. But my life has not lived in what I can see. My life is not lived with my body. My life is lived in the inner man in relationship with the Living God. That's where my inner man, and her inner man--my wife--connect in the oneness of marriage. That's where you enjoy what God has given us. And that's what Paul is saying here.

In Romans five and verse three, Paul says, "we also exult in our tribulations"--interesting, "we exult in our tribulations." By the way, the Greek helps us understand that. He's not saying we exult in spite of them, but rather we exult because of them. Why? "Knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance, and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our heart through the Holy Spirit who was given to us." So again, because of what God is doing in our inner man, we know that we are citizens of another kingdom. I mean, we're just passing through here. So therefore we count it all joy when things begin to fall apart. We set our mind on things above. And then we experience that soul satisfying joy of God's presence, the peace of God that that surpasses all understanding, guards our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus. Peter put it this way again, First Peter 5:10, "After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you." When we come to the end of life, with this perspective, we can say with Paul, Second Timothy four, verse seven, "I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course. I have kept the faith; in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all who have loved His appearing." Beloved, let these great truths be the center of gravity around which your life orbits especially those of you who are perhaps today tempted to lose heart. To know that the spirit is renewing your inner man constantly.

And perhaps I can close with the words of Isaiah the prophet, to encourage those going into the Babylonian captivity, to remind them, as I will remind you now, of this work of God's grace in the inner man. He said in Isaiah 40, "Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth never grows weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary and to those lacking might, He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous, young men stumble badly, yet those who wait upon the Lord will gain new strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run not get tired. They will walk and not become weary." Beloved, these are the promises that are ours; our hope, and our help is in Christ, because he is preparing us for the triumph of saving grace and eternal glory. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths that minister so deeply to our hearts as your people. But may they be more than just some intellectual understanding of great theology, But Lord, may this be the very food that we eat, the very air that we breathe, the theme of every song that we might enjoy--the fullness of your glory and grace, even this side of heaven. And for those that do not know, you know, Father, I plead with you. Bring conviction to their heart, that they might believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved and experience even this day, the miracle of the new birth. For it's in Christ's name that I pray. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter four, we are going to be looking at verses seven through 15. As we continue to make our way through this epistle, I've been titled by discourse to you a "Priceless Treasure in Earthen Vessels." Before we look at the text may I say that in a world drowning in a cesspool of wickedness, it is always a wonderful thing to see the saints come together who long to see the glory and the greatness of God, who long to hear his word, who are willing to humble themselves before the word. May I remind you that God is always looking for hearts in which to dwell, that have a passion for his word. And certainly I've seen that here at Calvary Bible Church. In fact, in Isaiah 66 and verse two, we see how God promises to focus intently and bless those who are humble and contrite of spirit, and who tremble at his word. So I'm deeply humbled to be able to minister the word of God to such a group of believers as that. Those of us who were all debtors to his grace.

Now, before I read this text, and we look at it closely, may I say that this is a very personal passage of scripture for the apostle Paul. It’s one that reveals just some of the very core longings of his soul and some of the things that he's excited about. And I might say that this is a passage that is that is deeply moving, as we look at it--to each of us. It’s also one that is very encouraging. Now remember, Paul is defending himself against the scurrilous slander of the false teachers. He's not doing this out of personal ambition or pride to somehow just defend himself; he's concerned about the gospel. Because if these people are able to discredit his apostolic authority, and therefore discredit his message, then they will be allowed the freedom to proclaim their deceptions and propagate their lies. So in humility of heart, what's really fascinating here, in humility of heart, rather than refuting their claims about the apostle--that he's ugly, that he's unimpressive, he's imperfect, and all of those things--rather than refute those things, he agrees with them. It's really an amazing thing. He gives God all of the glory for whatever virtues are there, and whatever success in ministry. And what is really remarkable is that his humble acknowledgment of personal weaknesses, not only become his greatest asset, but also the most convincing proof of his apostolic authority. And that's what we're going to see play out here. And as we will discover his testimony of God's grace in his life and God's power in his life, even though he is feeble, and he's flawed, becomes just a profound encouragement to all of us who are likewise predisposed.

So let me begin in verse seven, Second Corinthians four verse seven. "But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves; we were afflicted in every way but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body, the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death works in us, but life in you. But having the same spirit of faith according to what is written, 'I believed, therefore I spoke,' we also believe, therefore we also speak, knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you. For all things are for your sakes, so that the grace which is spreading to more and more people may cause the giving of thanks to abound to the glory of God."

As we read ancient history, we discover that included in a Roman general's triumph--included within that procession of a conquering general--would be a number of things, but especially several large carts of clay pots filled with all of the spoils of war, all of the beautiful diamonds and emeralds and rubies and golden bracelets and silver and all of those things; fabulous treasures of a conquered empire. All of them concealed in fragile, ugly, worthless, disposable clay pots. Well, I think you know where we're going here, right. Paul uses this as the perfect illustration of the treasure, of a transformed soul, the soul of the redeemed, concealed in human flesh. The soul of those of us who by God's grace have been transformed, we're transformed image bearers, and we're housed in the earthen vessels of these bodies; the priceless treasure of those whom He has revealed, according to verse six, "the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." That's what's inside these earthen vessels. Those of us who have been united to God by the gospel, whose inner man now reflects the glory of the Triune Godhead, whose soul now is the habitation, the temple of God. And o, dear Christian never lose the wonder of this. Christ in you, the what? "The hope of glory;" in you and your soul, the soul that never dies, that lives eternally because it is united to Christ.

Later in verse 16, Paul speaks of the profound importance, yea, the mystery of the believer's soul, he calls it our "inner man." Notice what he says in verse 16. "Therefore, we do not lose heart, but though our inner man our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day." In verse 18, he says, "we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen, are eternal." Folks, take a moment, just look at your hands. Look at your hands, look at your arms, look at your body. Look at those around you. Look at all that you see here in this worship center. You realize all of these things are going to disappear one day, none of these are going to last. It's only the things that we cannot see that are eternal. And who knows what we can't see, I'm sure there are angelic beings all around us, we can't see them. Another thing that you cannot see is my soul or your own soul. But the priceless treasure of a redeemed soul, a soul that has been made partakers of the divine nature, the soul that has been given, as Paul says, the "Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ" that is eternal. Oh how we should cherish the new nature that has been wrought within our soul by the power of the Holy Spirit. What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but loses his soul? Think of it dear Christian, your soul, biblically is forever hidden in Christ Jesus. I mean, these things make your head explode, right? I mean, we believe them by faith, and we can experience some of the reality of this, but it's amazing to think that that our soul is housed in a body that is getting weaker and weaker. Now, if you're young, it's going to get stronger and stronger for a while, but trust me, you know, you're going to reach a point where all of a sudden it's going to start doing this and then seems like it gets steeper and steeper, you know as it goes right. But though we're growing weak and frail, and someday we will return, you know, to the soil--ashes to ashes, dust to dust. I mean, though we were fashioned from the dust of the ground, and we were cursed by God, because of sin, because of that, we're going to experience death, we're going to experience decay and, and one day we'll return to the dust. Nevertheless, the soul belongs to God. It's an amazing thing. It has been renewed into the likeness of God and it's gradually being more conformed to express the glory of Christ. It's the very temple in which the Triune God lives forever. And it is the glory, dear friends, of this magnificent arrangement that Paul addresses here in this passage, and thus the title of my exposition, "Priceless Treasure in Earthen Vessels."

And here we learn why God has done this, let me give you four reasons, four little categories, that will kind of help us frame our thoughts as we go through this passage. He has done this, number one, to demonstrate the power of God. Secondly, to manifest the life of Jesus, number three to embolden gospel witness, and finally, to multiply God glorifying worshipers. And I trust God will impress these great truths upon your heart today. Now let's look closely at the text in verse seven. "But we have this treasure in earthen vessels." Now, some would say that this treasure is the gospel. And at some level that is true, but I believe it's much more than that. The "treasure" is the human soul that God has renewed by the power of the gospel; that soul that has been given as he says in verse six, "the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." That soul that now reflects that same glory through a human body. That is, according to Romans 12 one, "a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God." That inner nature that is being renewed every day, that inner man that causes the outer man to redound to the glory of God.

But notice, this priceless treasure is concealed. He says, in "earthen vessels;" literally, clay pots; perishable earthenware, that's what he's referring to. And the analogy here is obvious. The human body is relatively worthless in comparison to the soul, in comparison to the priceless treasure that it contains. Like a clay pot, we are fragile, we are unattractive, some of us more so than others. And we are disposable, right? O the glory that resides within. Now, remember the context here. Paul is agreeing with the accusations of the false apostles. Yes, I am weak, I am ugly, I am unimpressive. I am expendable. I'm of little value whatsoever. But know this, I am the trustee of a glorified soul; a priceless treasure. For within me resides the Triune Godhead. Within me, resides "the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." Therefore I will preach it, come what may. And why? Why is it in there, in this is clay pot? The end of verse seven, "so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves." Now he doesn't say this, but I'm sure in the back of his mind, and consistent with the with the context, he's saying, unlike you pompous, self-righteous emissaries of Satan who receives your power from the father of lies and your own flesh. So the priceless treasure is concealed within the earthen vessel of this body number one to demonstrate the power of God.

Beloved, we have no power in and of ourselves. None whatsoever, even physically, I mean, we grow strong for a season then we begin to wither and we begin to die. I mean, think about it. There's this microscopic, little demon floating around called a Coronavirus. And we can get that and it can cause all kinds of problems, for some people it could be fatal. There's accidents, right? We're frail, it doesn't take much to destroy this body. And, frankly, we're homely, you know? I mean, I don't want to be crude here. But if we look at ourselves without our clothing, without our makeup, without our hair coloring, without all that we realize, ew, you know, we're not exactly the most beautiful creatures on the planet. So a clay pot is a pretty good analogy. But folks, we are equally weak spiritually. I mean even though the Spirit dwells within us, there's this constant battle, right-- Galatians, five. I mean, the flesh and the spirit, it's always in enmity with one another. Jesus said, apart from me, you can't do very much. No, no, he said, You can't do anything. Right?

I recall what was going on with Timothy, you may remember, his spiritual knees were buckling under the weight of persecution, he was afraid all the things going on at the church at Ephesus. And Paul said to him, and Second Timothy two, one, "be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus." That's where we get our strength. Also, in First Corinthians two, beginning of verse three, Paul said, "I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God." Where does he get that power? It's from within the soul. It's what resides within that clay pot. And remember the extreme weakness that Paul experienced as a result of that thorn in the flesh, that that emissary of Satan, that messenger of Satan, that false teacher that was trying to destroy him; remember, he asked the Lord three times to remove that thorn. And what did the Lord say? No, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness."

You know, I love to reflect upon the ways God is. God proves himself powerful on our behalf. I think that over the course of my life, he has always used just ordinary, flawed people just like me to do extraordinary things. And you think about it, he chose 12 ordinary men to be his apostles. Four of them were Galilean fisherman. One of them was a tax collector. The other guys were just ordinary guys. And later, he had chosen the apostle Paul. Even though he was a brilliant rabbi, he was also a persecutor of the church. Prior to his conversion, in fact, in First Corinthians 15, nine, he said, "I am the least of the apostles, and not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church." First Timothy 1:13. He says, "I was formerly a blasphemer, and a persecutor and a violent aggressor." But God saw him said, I'm going to turn that man around and use him for my glory. Second Corinthians 10:10. His critics said his "personal appearance is unimpressive and his speech contemptible." And he admitted that he was unskilled in speech, Second Corinthians 11 six. And apparently he had some kind of a repulsive eye condition that caused people to kind of want to back away from it. We read about that in Galatians four. Nevertheless, he said in First Timothy 1:12, God "considered me faithful, putting me into service." You know, when I think about that, I rejoice and I can say, Boy, there's hope for all of us, right? There's hope for all of us. His life and ministry was so God honoring that he was even able to exhort others to say, "Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ," First Corinthians 11:1. And in Second Corinthians 11 six, that :even if I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge." Again, over the course of my life, and I'm sure you will agree with this, as I look back over the years and see the type of people that had a gospel impact on my life, they've always been simple, ordinary people, unimpressive in the eyes of the world. In fact, I can safely say is that some of the most godly, humble, yet spiritually powerful people, that exist on the planet are a part of Calvary Bible Church, and other churches like ours. That's the way God likes to do it, right? It's an amazing thing. And yet, the world will never know those people. If they did know them, they would scoff at them. And yet one day, these are the very saints that are going to rule with Christ in His kingdom. And yet today they are nobodies. In fact, they're considered fools for Christ's sake. I think about this often--people driving by this church right now, lots of times on the way to church, I'll see, you know, people, you know, they've got their boats and their jet skis and all these things, and they're getting ready to go out and have a great day. And I think my, they're living for the now rather than for eternity, and they could come right down the road. And there's a little church here in rural Tennessee, that could give them the keys to the kingdom of God through the gospel, that they might be saved. And yet they want nothing to do with it. They want nothing to do with these obscure kind of odd people who actually believe that Jesus saves and he's coming again, do you realize how utterly ridiculous that is to the world? And yet how true it is.

First Corinthians one, verse 26, and following, Paul said, "For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world ashamed, the things which are strong, and the base things of the world, and the despised, God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. But by his doing, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. So that just as it is written, 'Let him who boasts," what? "boast in the Lord." Boast in the Lord.

You know, some of you, I'm sure are struggling in some significant ways in your life, it's just part of being in a fallen world, right? Things are difficult for you. But I would encourage you this morning to remember that you have this treasure in this earthen vessel. The treasure of a transformed redeemed soul that will one day be glorified. A priceless treasure. One, a soul that has been renewed by God, an invisible temple of the Triune God, that the world cannot see. An eternal soul that is forever hidden in Christ. A soul that is alive to God, but dead to sin; the opposite of the world. If you were to look into the soul of the unredeemed, you would see a corpse. You would see a person that is dead in their trespasses and sins; alienated from God. But "we have this treasure in earthen vessel, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves." When people see Christ, they don't say, "Wow, isn't that because of this great man or great woman?" No, it has nothing to do with that. It has everything to do with the one who dwells within me, and who dwells within you.

Now Paul gives some examples of some of his own struggles. And he does this through a series of paradoxes. In verses eight through nine, actually, you might say that there are four balanced antitheses that summarize his life and ministry. Notice what he says in verse eight. "We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed." "Afflicted", carries the idea of being distressed by severe difficulties. But he's not crushed. In other words, he's not hopelessly distressed. Now, why is that? How can that be? How can a person be afflicted and yet not crushed? Well, the answer is clear. It's because of the "surpassing greatness" of the power of God within the soul. I mean God's grace is always sufficient, right? He goes on to say, he says, we're "perplexed, but not despairing." "Perplexed" literally means "filled with confusion." Sometimes you just don't know which way to turn, but you're not despairing. You're not losing your emotional and mental composure. How can that be? Well, it's because of the "surpassing greatness" of the power of God within the inner man. I think of Isaiah 26 three, "The steadfast of mind You will keep in perfect peace, because he trusts in You." Folks, serenity and hope is always anchored in our faith in God.

He goes on to verse nine and he said, we're "persecuted, but not forsaken." "Persecuted," it's an interesting term. In the original language it is one that refers to just a systematic attack on a person because of their belief. But we're not forsaken. In other words, even though that's happening, we're not abandoned. We don't feel neglected here. Well, how can that be? Because of the "surpassing greatness" of the power of God within the inner man. He has promised to never leave us nor forsake us. He goes on to say in verse nine, we're "struck down" a term that literally carries the idea of being knocked to the ground by a severe blow. Sometimes we feel that way, right? We've just feel like somebody just taken a baseball bat and hit us and we're just on the ground looking up. He said we're struck down at times, but we're not destroyed. In other words, we're not irreparably damaged. Well, how can that be? Because of the "surpassing greatness" of the power of God within the soul. I mean, he has promised to never tempt us beyond what we are able, right? First Corinthians 10:13, "but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, that we may that we may be able to endure it." Folks, remember, all of the sufferings that we experience in life, are merely ways that the Lord uses to conform us into the likeness of Christ. With every wound, he chisels away at the relics of corruption that continue to cleave to our unredeemed humaneness. He's fitting us to be placed in the temple of God in the New Jerusalem.

I was thinking about this, you may recall in the Old Testament record, it is revealed that that King David was given the plans for the temple. And he gave it to Solomon. And part of those plans included the importance of precutting and prefitting every stone that would go into the temple. To do that in the quarry, and then take it in to the temple so that there would be no sound of chisel when the temple was erected. And this of course, was done to basically underscore the solemnity of their task and the perfections of holiness that that would symbolize. Can you imagine? I've seen these temple stones? I mean, they are just mammoth. Can you imagine cutting them that precisely and when you look at them, the way they're fitted together, it is astounding. First King six, seven, "The house," referring to the temple, "while it was being built, was built of stone prepared at the quarry, and there was neither hammer nor axe, nor any iron tool heard in the house while it was being built." Great Puritan Thomas Manton wrote this, "The present life is an incurable disease, and sometimes attended with that sharp sense that death is desired as a remedy and accepted as a benefit." He went on to say "Here, the living stones are cut and wounded and made fit by sufferings for a temple unto God in the New Jerusalem. But as in the building of Solomon's temple, the noise of a hammer was not heard. For all the parts were framed before with that exact design and correspondence that firmly combined together. They were hewn in another place, and nothing remained but the putting them one upon another in the temple. And then, as sacred, they were inviolable. So God, the architect, having prepared the saints here, by many cutting afflictions, places them in the eternal building, where no voice of sorrow is heard. Beloved, what a joy to know that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus and he's working on us right now.

But not only is this priceless treasure in earthen vessel there to demonstrate the power of God but secondly, to manifest the life of Jesus. Notice verse 10, he says "always," not occasionally, but, "always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body." I mean, this is why he experienced the hardships described in the previous verses. He is saying to them, Look, despite what these phonies are telling you, I'm not experiencing hardship, because there's some secret sin in my life, that God is somehow punishing me. I'm merely submitting to the will of God who has ordained my afflictions, who has ordained by sufferings, so that the power of Christ would be manifested in my life, so that my life and my ministry would be a purposeful sacrifice. This is why he said in First Corinthians 15:31, "I die daily."

Now, as we look at verse 10, there's a key here that's interesting, the word "dying." Normally in Greek, in the New Testament, the term "thanatos" would be used; the word used to describe the actual event of a death, but here, it's "nekrosis." The prolonged process of dying, that includes the events that lead up to death. In English we have the word "necrosis" from that; it describes the death of cells in an organ or tissues or whatever. So Paul's life for Christ here, I'm sorry, Paul's love for Christ in his life manifested by obedience to Christ, was part of what was gradually destroying his outer body, because of all of the persecution. And because the world hates Christ. it hated him and hates all of us. So Paul denied himself, he was willing to take up his cross daily and follow the Lord. And of course, when you do this, Satan and his minions are going to attack you.

Verse 11, "For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh." But why? Why is this happening? So God can prove himself powerful on our behalf. And so others can see the power of God put on display in our life. Think of those that you have known over the years who have taken a stand for Christ in a hostile environment. People watch the response of that. Sinners had been converted because of the response of godly people who have suffered. I think of Stephen. Remember in Acts six. We read how he was full of grace and truth. And in verse 10, we read that "they were unable to cope with his wisdom and the Sirit with which he was speaking. So they secretly induced men to say, 'We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses, and against God.'" Well, that was just pure baloney. That was just slander. So what did they do? They took him out they and they stoned him. They were going to kill him. And then they did. In fact, we read that the witnesses laid aside their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul. Isn't that interesting? We read the Stephen called upon the Lord and said, "'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit! And falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, 'Lord, do not hold a sin against them!' And having said this, he fell asleep." Folks, take a stand for Christ and watch what happens. You are going to experience the hostility of the world. Put biblical truth on facebook, watch the reactions you'll get. You will experience just the venomous, malicious attacks of the ungodly, but also you will see how it will soften the hearts of the redeemed. And when you do this, you will be "carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in your body."

You know, satanic persecution is always certain proof that you're penetrating the kingdom of darkness, right? And one of the best ways to determine a godly man or a godly woman is by identifying their friends as well as their enemies. Jesus said, "Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way." So again, in verse 12, "So death works in us, but life in you." Folks, evangelism comes with a cost. Have you ever thought about the sacrifice that others have made in your life over the years so that you could hear the truth of the gospel? The great English theologian and seminary professor at the University of Oxford, John Wycliffe, stood against the heresies of Roman Catholicism in the 14th century. And among many things that he stood against one of the things that he stood for was the translation of the Bible, from the Latin Vulgate into the common vernacular so that people could actually read the Word of God. Of course, the Roman Catholics didn't want that at all. So he was hated, and he was hunted. He, by the way, was one of the forerunners of the Protestant Reformation. He had to flee for his life and eventually, he worked himself to exhaustion, he died of a heart attack. And then it's interesting, 41 years after his death, the Roman Catholic Council of Constance declared Wycliffe, a heretic on May 4, 1415. They hated him so much that they banned his writings and excommunicated him retro actively. The council decreed that Wycliffe's work should be burned, and his bodily remains removed from consecrated ground. and the order was confirmed by Pope Martin the fifth. it was carried out 1428. And so what did they do? They went to Wycliffe' grave, and they exhumed his body, they burned what was left, and they took the ashes and cast it into the River Swift. That's how much Satan hates those that follow Christ. And we could recount 1000s of similar stories of people who were willing to die for Christ so that others could experience life in Christ. But folks, the priceless treasure of Wycliffe's soul was in glory, right? It was beyond the reach of their venomous malice. You want to ask yourself, "To what extent am I willing to sacrifice?" I'm thankful for parents that I had when I was a little boy that would read Bible stories to me. You know, I still remember a lot of those. I remember they brought me a set of books called the Book of Life. And it was kind of age appropriate, up through, you know, maybe high school and I remember looking at those pictures and reading those stories. I'm thankful that my parents took me to the churches where the truth was taught, I'm thankful for especially godly older women that taught me as a young little boy. We used to have flannel graphs. I know that's ageing me, but some of you shake your head, you know what flannel graphs are, I still remember those stories. I'm thankful for godly pastors that taught me. I'm thankful for godly youth leaders that gave themselves, that I might know and live the truth; that took me on campouts and canoe trips up to the Boundary Waters in Minnesota and on and on and on it goes. They sacrificed. Romans eight verse 36, that we read earlier, Paul says, "Just as it is written, 'For your sake, we are being put to death all day long; we were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.' But," and I love the word "but" there, "but in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us,." Folks, the trials may be great, but the victory is infinitely greater. You must remember that.

And while languishing in a Roman prison cell, Paul wrote to the saints at Colossae, in Colossians 1:24. He says, "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh, I do my share on behalf of His body, which is the church, in filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions." You see, he understood that suffering is a grace-granted privilege; in that in our dying, the church may receive life. As we give of ourselves, the Gospel goes forth, and men and women and boys and girls come to saving faith in Christ. And by enduring persecution intended for Christ, he was, as he says, "filling up what is lacking in Christ's affliction." You see, you might put it this way, He was the lightning rod for the world's unending hatred of Christ, a hatred that was not fully meted out at the cross but will continue throughout eternity with the blasphemies of the damned, as we read in Revelation 16. And like Christ, Paul was happy to endure an extra measure of suffering, as a willing substitute on behalf of the church, and perhaps even sparing the church some of the heartaches of that suffering, while at the same time putting the glory of Christ on display, so that they could look at him and say, wow, look what look what God can do in the life of his redeemed. And in Paul, they could see Christ. But again, how could such a frail and humbly man have such an impact on so many? How could a man press on in the midst of all of this persecution with such vitality and such joy? Well, the answer is in the text, it's because a priceless treasure was concealed within an earthen vessel, that treasure of that renewed soul.

So dear ones, God placed this priceless treasure of the gospel redeemed soul in these earthen vessels, to demonstrate the power of God to manifest the life of Christ. And thirdly, to embolden gospel witness. Think about this, despite the inevitable hostility that the gospel produces, Paul would never compromise. Verse 13, "But having the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, 'I believed, therefore I spoke,' we also believe, therefore we also speak." He is quoting by the way, Psalm 116, verse 10, "I believed, when I said, 'I am greatly afflicted.'" The idea here is, despite the magnitude of his troubles, even as the Psalmist said, he was confident that God would deliver him. You see, folks, faith not only survives, but it transcends suffering. It transcends persecution, sorrows, fear of death, and all of those things. That's why Paul was not ashamed of the gospel. He knew that it was the power of God unto salvation. And that's why he said in First Corinthians 9:16, "Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel." Because he knew that's the only message that will save. And that is why dear friends, we must remain steadfast in our commitment to preaching the gospel, and not get off in all of these other tangents--oh, the gospel is all about giving you a purpose driven life, or oh, the gospel is all about making you happy, and healthy and wealthy, or the gospel is all about promoting social justice and racial equality. Folks, none of that is true. None of that is in Scripture. That is not what the gospel about. The gospel is all about reconciling sinful man to a holy God. And once you move away from that, you have nothing more than the foolish rantings of man. Useless in preventing the decay in this world. The salt loses its saltiness in the church. And that's what we've seen today.

By the way, we see this most markedly in the new evangelical obsession with improving the social and economic problems in the world. But folks, if you will excuse just a very brief digression. When the gospel focus becomes humanitarian, rather than redemptive, you have no gospel at all. It's just another form of human wisdom that God calls foolishness. Paul knew the saving, transforming truth of the gospel, so he preached it without compromise, regardless of the costs. You might say, "well, yes, but Pastor, I struggle with fear." Join the club, don't we all? Paul did. Remember Ephesians 6:19. He said, "Pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness, the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in proclaiming it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak." But concealed in that frail, fearful earthen vessel was the infinite power of the Triune Godhead.

Back to verse 14, "knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you." Oh Child of God, will do well to remember this passage of Scripture, when you find yourself trembling in fear, standing before maybe even just a few people in your family, as you present them the gospel, realize that the very power that raised Jesus from the dead dwells within your earthen vessel, in your soul. We must always remember the implications of the resurrection, and glorification of Jesus Christ exceed, indeed, that exceeded the importance and power of all other events in history. I would say only the act of creation rival to this, because within the resurrection body of Jesus Christ, in whom we have been forever united, existed the supernatural power source of eternal life in God's everlasting kingdom. For this reason, Paul prayed for the Ephesians in Ephesians 1:19 that they would know what is the "immeasurable greatness of His power in us who believe, according to the working of his might, which he accomplished in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead and made him sit at his right hand in the heavenly places." Folks, this is a prayer that we should pray often for each other, for our family.

So indeed, God placed this priceless treasure of a renewed soul in an earthen vessel, to demonstrate the power of God manifest the life of Jesus, and embolden gospel witness. And finally, as we close this morning to multiply, God glorifying worshipers, Well, isn't that what we all want? Don't you wish the whole world would worship Christ? You know, one day we're going to see that happen at the beginning of the millennial kingdom. The glory of the Lord will fill the earth as the waters fill the sea; amazing thought. Notice what Paul says here in verse 15, "For all things are for your sakes, so that the grace which is spreading to more and more people may cause the giving of thanks to abound to the glory of God." Oh, dear friends, what a testimony we have here of selfless, selfless love. His passion was to see men and women and boys and girls come to saving faith in Christ; not only for their eternal good, but for God's eternal glory. He wanted to see more and more clay pots, if you will, filled up with the glory of God and the souls of his redeemed. Saints that will one day join in the heavenly choir and sing "Worthy is the Lamb." Earthen vessels that will one day burst forth with the effulgence of the glory of God even as we saw in the Transfiguration of Christ on the mountain. In fact, the prophet Daniel says in Daniel 12, in verse three, "those who have insight will shine brightly, like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever." Oh, how I long to see all of you in the company of the redeemed when these earthly vessels will be exchanged for a glorified body; one that is suited to exist in the presence of the glory of God, one that is suited for eternal worship, in the presence of our thrice Holy God. When according to First Corinthians 15, verse 54, "this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written 'Death is swallowed up in victory. Oh Death, where is your victory? Oh, Death, where is your sting?' The sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore," Paul says, "My beloved brethren, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord." Well may these truths animate your heart to further praise and motivate your will to obedience and service to the one who deserves our utmost. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. We are so humbled by them. They are beyond our ability to even fathom, but by the power of Your Spirit that dwells within us, we are we are able to comprehend at least a portion of that which you would have us understand. And in so doing, we find our souls being lifted up into the heavens, as we are able to, perhaps a new way, even this morning to set our mind on things above and not on the things of this earth. Encourage each of us as we reflect upon what you have done in us what you're doing through us, and what one day you will do for us in the presence of your glory. For it's in Christ's name that I pray. Amen.

So here we are, once again, with the wonderful privilege of looking into the Word of God. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter three. This will be the third and final exposition of this section of scripture under the heading "Beholding the Glory of the Lord." We're in Second Corinthians chapter three, beginning in verse 17. And actually, I'm going to be mainly in chapter four, but all of it fits together, as you will see. Now before I read that, let me remind you that here we have the opportunity to understand what the Apostle Paul was communicating with respect to beholding the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ as he is revealed in Scripture; of beholding his majesty and his meekness, of being able to see the glory of his grace to see his power and his authority. For indeed, he is the Savior of sinners, and he is the Lord of the church. And unlike the old covenant believers, the new covenant believers like us are able to see Christ very clearly, as he is revealed in Scripture. We see him with, as Paul says, an unveiled face as Moses did on Mount Sinai. And the more we gaze upon him in Scripture, the more we contemplate the glories of his person and work, the more we become like him. And this was Paul's great concern for the saints in Corinth. Because you will remember the context here, there were false apostles that had come into the church, and they were trying to deceive people into believing that you needed to arbitrarily take some aspects of the old covenant and mix it with the new covenant in order for salvation and sanctification to occur. And as we will see, Satan continues to use that strategy of legalism, along with many other strategies, to deceive people, and he does so with devastating power. And as we've seen thus far, in the little outline that I have given you, seeing Christ in Scripture accomplishes five amazing realities in the life of a believer. Number one, it reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly, it transforms believers into the likeness of Christ. Number three, it emboldens believers to stand firm in their faith in Christ. Number four, it motivates believers to renounce sin, pursue holiness and proclaim the truth of Christ. And then the final one that we will deal with this morning is, it dispels the darkness of sin, and ignorance concerning the person and work of Christ.

So let me read this section to you and then we will begin to look at it closely and apply it to our lives. Second Corinthians three I want to begin with verse 17. "Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, justice from the Lord, the Spirit. Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus sake. For God who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness is the one who is shown in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.'"

So indeed, as our fifth point tells us, beholding the glory of the Lord in Scripture, dispels the darkness of sin and ignorance concerning the person and the work of Christ. Now again, a bit of context, in his absence, and behind his back, the false apostles and their sycophants in the church at Corinth were saying all manner of things to somehow discredit the Apostle Paul. And although they were according to verse two of Chapter Four "walking in craftiness and adulterating the Word of God," they accused Paul of that very thing. They even ridiculed his personal presence. They ridiculed his preaching style and his content. Boy, do I know what that feels like? I get that all the time. In Second Corinthians 10 and verse 10. Then he tells us how that they ridiculed his personal presence, saying it it was" unimpressive, his speech is contemptible." In other words, he's just a weak, ineffective person, you don't need to listen to him. They were saying that his preaching was offensive, and that it alienated people. First Corinthians 1:23, "to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness." Now remember, in ancient Corinth, and that whole area of the Greco Roman Empire, they preferred lofty, skillful rhetoric, eloquent oratory, steeped in philosophy, so that these speakers would woo and wow the audience; sway the crowds. They were the original seeker sensitive people, okay. They were culturally relevant ear tickling philosophers. That's what they were used to. But Paul's method and his message, were counterintuitive. He didn't do any of that. In fact, he said in First Corinthians two two, "I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." My goodness. That's it. From verse four, he went on to say, "my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but, “here it is, "in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." You see, he understood that it's not the messenger, but the message that God uses to save sinners. It's not cleverness, but it's clarity. He understood that it's not trickery, it is truth. It's not a message of relevance, but a call to repentance based upon the pure gospel of Jesus Christ.

And so again, in verse two, he says, "We have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God." In other words, like the false apostles, "but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God." And then he says this, and this is where we're going to focus in a few minutes, "And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." You see, folks, the reason why people do not respond to a clear, bold proclamation of the gospel is not because it is not packaged properly or presented properly. It's because people are spiritually dead in their trespasses and sins, Ephesians two, one. It's because, according to John 3:19, they "love the darkness more than the Light for their deeds are evil." It's because according to First Corinthians 2:14, The natural man is "spiritually discerned." In other words, he is incapable of discerning the activities of the Spirit of God. He cannot understand the things of the Spirit of God. They're utter foolishness to him, and we've all encountered such people. When you try to give them the gospel, they look at you like you've got two heads. Men and women reject the gospel, dear friends because they are spiritually blind. Jesus says in Matthew six, and verse 22, the lamp of the body is the eye. "If therefore your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light." But here he's making a spiritual comparison, "If your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!" You see, unbelievers cannot see the light of truth because the internal corruption of their very nature emanates darkness within them causing them to walk in darkness, which they perceive to be light. Worse yet, as we will see, they are double blinded. Not only are they blinded because of their depraved nature, but Satan does everything he possibly can to deceive them with all manner of strategies of darkness to keep them in unbelief. So what is it that gives man spiritual sight? It is the gospel by the power of the Holy Spirit. It's the miracle of regeneration. That instantaneous, supernatural impartation of spiritual life to the spiritually dead, like we would see pictured, even in Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. You see, the miracle of spiritual sight is what we must understand if we're going to have boldness in our evangelism. Because sometimes we think it's up to us to be really clever and come up with really cool ways to somehow help people be soft to the Gospel. And I'm not saying we shouldn't be kind, and we shouldn't present it in a loving manner. But folks, it's not going to be up to you to do that. It's going to be the truth that the Spirit of God uses to open their eyes. You will recall the miracle of spiritual sight that was pictured in John nine. In that narrative, Jesus takes the initiative to show mercy to a man born blind from birth, the text says, you know, those born blind from birth, give no value to sight, because they don't know what they're missing. They don't even know what it is. What a picture of spiritual death, right? And likewise, the spiritually blind have no capacity to see the wretchedness of their very nature of their condition, nor are they able to see the imminent danger that they are in. So they have no capacity to see their desperate need for the Savior. And they have no ability to see the glory of the person and the work of Christ. So God must do something. And folks, none of us would have ever seen the glory of Christ; we would have never seen our sin had the spirit of God not taken the initiative and stooped down to give us sight. Because there is none who seeks after God, Romans 3:11. So God must seek after us, as we read in Luke 19. And he must seek after us and he must save us. In fact, Jesus said, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God, as in the case of the blind beggar, we too were utterly destitute, utterly helpless. And were it not for a merciful God to come and to seek us out, we would have never been saved. So, folks, the point is, it is God, it is not man, that opens the eyes of the spiritually blind.

Now back to Second Corinthians four. Later in verse six, Paul is going to describe this very thing when he speaks of the sovereignty of God, granting spiritual eyesight to sinners. Remember there he says, "God who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness,' is the One who has shown in our hearts, to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." So it is not human persuasion, but the divine Spirit through his word that causes us to be born again. This is why evangelism must begin with the word, with the gospel, not apologetics. In fact, Peter states in First Peter 1:23, "For you have been born again, not of seed which is perishable, but imperishable, that is through the living and enduring word of God." He went on to say in verse 25, "And this is the word which was preached to you." Similarly, in James 1:18, James says, "In the exercise of His will, He brought us forth by the word of truth." The apostle John said, in John 1:13, "We were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God." Let me give you another passage, Paul told Timothy in Second Timothy two, beginning of verse 24, "The Lord's bondservant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wrong, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition. If perhaps," now catch this, "if perhaps God may grant them repentance, leading to the knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil having been held captive by him to do his will." And this is why Paul would say that he's not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God unto salvation to all who believed, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. So again verse three, he says, "And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing." In other words, unlike what these false apostles are saying about me, that the reason people aren't believing, the reason the church isn't filling up, so to speak, is because this guy's not saying the right things. That's not at all what the issue is. It is veiled to those, notice, who are perishing, which means those who are spiritually discerned, those who are spiritually blind; they're dead, they are doomed. Only God can open their eyes. It is not veiled because the preacher isn't clever enough. It is not veiled, because they're not hearing a non-offensive, culturally relevant, entertaining, conversational style sermon that'll kind of soften them up in order to somehow help spiritual cadavers be more comfortable, so that they will accept the gospel, so that they will be open minded towards the person and the work of Christ. Folks, that is just foolishness. That's just unbiblical. Nor is it dependent upon a preacher who can manipulate people emotionally, to get them to make a decision for Christ. Very dangerous.

He says again, in verse three, "If our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing." "Tois apollymenois" in the original language, it's a phrase used in chapter two and verse 15, where Paul described his ministry as a fragrance of death to those who rejected Christ. By the way, it's also used in Second Thessalonians two in verse 10. It says, he describes those who perish again, same phrase, "tois apollymenois,” those who perish, they do so because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. Now, this brings up a very important theological distinction that I want you to be aware of. Because I fear that this kind of, or misunderstanding, what Paul is saying here, and in many other passages of Scripture, has led to a great deal of false conversions so to speak. You know, we see this especially in what I call altar call evangelism. You've probably seen this before, at the conclusion of many church services, or evangelistic crusades. People are given an invitation to respond to the gospel message, which in many cases is is grossly distorted. And they are asked to raise a hand or walk an aisle, repeat a prayer and some of these types of things. Where upon they will immediately be welcomed into the kingdom of God, without giving any evidence whatsoever that they'd been made a new creature in Christ and the old things have passed away, the new things have come and so forth. And here's why this is dangerous. Friends, when an immediate external act in response to an evangelistic appeal is considered evidence of new birth, instead of a changed life, many people are going to be deceived into believing that they are born again when in fact, they are not. It's almost like, Oh, this is all I need to do to get my ticket punched. Okay, I'll do that. You probably have seen this with Franklin Graham here recently on television, where he gives kind of a gospel invitation and says, repeat this prayer and if you've repeated this prayer, there's people on the other end, and they'll talk to you and they're basically going to say, welcome to the kingdom. Don't let anybody ever tell you that you weren't just now born again. Well, you may have been, but there's a real danger with all of that. And furthermore, when a non-offensive kind of watered down gospel that appeals to carnal minds is the gospel that is preached. And then when masses of people embrace that kind of gospel, the perceived success of that kind of evangelism and the perceived success of that kind of, shall we say, gospel seed guaranteed to grow in any soil--when people see that, they say, Well, you know what? We need to adopt that style because that's bringing in the masses. Unfortunately, this is the tragic legacy of the errant Arminian and I would even say Pallagian theology of the flamboyant revivalist preacher, Charles Finney. He lived from 1792 to 1875. And this has been adopted by many evangelicals over the years, very common even to this day. Finney believed, quote, "human depravity is a voluntary condition." Didn't believe in, you know, the depraved nature of man. It's a voluntary condition. That is to say, it's continuance depends upon the choice of the human will. He went on to say, "Let a man once decide for Christ and he will become a new man." So the evangelist is not simply to preach Christ and tell men of their duty to believe he has to help make that believing reality by appointing some outward action to assist a change of will. Ian Murray, writes this concerning Finney; Finney believed, quote, "That evangelism has to involve telling gospel hearers that they are able to become Christians at once. They have to be presented with an immediate choice, and to show the sincerity and reality of their choosing Christ, let them do something to prove it. Hence, what became known as the altar call. That is the practice of calling those who would be converted to take some visible action, which would clinch the matter. The fact that such novel public actions were calculated to create natural excitement was the opposite in Finney's mind to being a drawback." He said, "God has found it necessary to take advantage of the excitability there is in mankind to produce powerful excitements among them before he can lead them to obey."

Now perhaps you've been in revivals, so called revivals, or crusades or whatever, you know, at the end of the sermon, there is a gospel invitation and all of a sudden the organ comes on, begins to set the mood. Typically, "Just as I am," you know. And then you begin to see people get up from all over. And they've been preprogrammed to do this in order to prime the pump, to get other people to kind of join in because we tend to be sheep. And, obviously, this method of evangelism, and based upon this kind of a gospel, really rules out dependence upon the sovereign grace of God to save people. That's the danger. And then the danger is that many of these people become false converts. And we know that to be true. It's not to say that some aren't saved, but many are not. In 1838, Joseph Ives Foot, a Presbyterian minister who lived in that era, and witnessed Finney's ministry wrote this quote, "During 10 years, hundreds and perhaps 1000s were annually reported to be converted on all hands, but now it is admitted that Finney's real converts are comparatively few. It is declared even by himself," even by Finney that, quote, "the great body of them are a disgrace to religion." Writing in 1835 in the Princeton essays, Albert D. Dodd, made a similar observation, quote, "Appearances were somewhat in favor of the new measures, at least wherever they were carried, converts were multiplied. But it is now generally understood that the numerous converts of the new measures have been in most cases, like the morning cloud and the early dew; in some places, not a half, a fifth, or even a 10th part of them remain." You know, someone has well stated that the one thing we learn from history is that we never learned from history. And this is certainly true in this regard. Countless people have responded to these kinds of emotional invitations without ever really even understanding the true gospel, without really understanding their own heart, their own nature, their own sinfulness and their own need for Christ. Nevertheless, as Michael Horton has aptly stated, quote, "The New York revivalist was the oft quoted," and by the way, he's referring to Charles Finney, "The New York revivalist was the oft quoted and celebrated champion of the Christian singer Keith Green and the Youth with A Mission organization. He is a particularly esteemed or he is particularly esteemed among the leaders of the Christian right. And the Christian left by both Jerry Falwell and Jim Wallace, Sojourners magazine. And his imprint can be seen in movements that appear to be diverse, but in reality are merely heirs to Finney's legacy-- from the Vineyard Movement and the Church Growth Movement to the political and social crusades, televangelism, the Promise Keepers movement, and even as a former Wheaton College President glowingly cheered, 'Finney lives on.' That is because," as Horton goes on to say, "Finney's moralistic impulse envisioned a church that was in large measure an agency of personal and social reform, rather than the institution in which the means of grace, Word and Sacrament are made available to believers who then take the gospel to the world," end quote. See, folks although Finney's theology was errant on many levels, which is beyond the purpose of our discussion here, his denial of the doctrine of original sin, and man's utter inability to somehow contribute to his salvation, because of the bondage of his will, and his nature. All of those things just are really contrary to the true gospel, contrary to the doctrine of regeneration, and justification. After all, who needs the Spirit, if a clever preacher can get someone to make a decision for Christ? Who needs the Spirit, if you can get a man to lift his own veil off of his eyes so that he can see the truth? Who needs the Spirit if you can cause yourself to be born again. And by what standard of measure, can anyone be called a Christian? If all that is necessary for man to do is just to decide on himself, make a decision for Christ, with the help of a compelling evangelist, of course, and then validate that conversion solely on the basis of some external act and a profession of faith. That is the great danger. And over the years, I've seen many people come to faith in Christ. I've seen them break down and weep. And in the middle of a service, I've seen them, go into a back room and just come to Christ, often with great emotion, sometimes not. I know of many others who have gone home, I can just think of story after story, where they've gotten down on their knees and come to Christ. But folks, the other dangers, whenever you have a sanitized, watered down version of the gospel; some seeker sensitive form of the gospel, what you have is just a hybrid of the same kind of system. You know, let's soften up the crowd with some entertainment. Let's get the lights right, get the music right. Make sure everybody's kind of getting into it, and then offer them a feel-good sermon. And invite them to ask Jesus into their hearts so that they can be happy. Because after all, God wants you to be happy; doesn't mean he wants you to be successful and all of those types of things. He even wants you to be prosperous. Boy, watch what happens. And what happens is you fling open the wide gate, and you make it wide as possible so that people enter the wide gate rather than the narrow and they traverse down the broad path that leads to destruction.

You know, it's funny, I bring this up because Satan had been at all this stuff and we could see it all the way back in the first century with the apostle Paul in Corinth. The false apostles were into this type of thing, their own version. And they were criticizing Paul because he wasn't. You know, all Paul did, I mean, he was just dumb enough to just unleash the truth on people. We see this, for example in First Thessalonians two beginning of verse two, Paul says, "after we had already suffered and been mistreated in Philippi as you know, we had the boldness in our God to catch this, to speak to you the gospel of God amid much opposition. For our exhortation does not come from error or impurity, or a by way of deceit; but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts." I've had a number of evangelical preachers that I've interacted with over the years that have told me, "So Dave, we could never get away preaching some of the things you preach in your church." And one guy telling me, you know, brother, that stuff just turns people off. You know, I remember one preacher called me and he said, he said, If I were to preach, and he was talking about a certain message that I preached, kind of a series, he said, If I would have preached that they would have hauled me off of the stage in the middle of the sermon.

And I reminded him of what Jesus said in Luke 6:26, "Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way." Folks, as people that know and love Christ, and had been saved by His grace, we're not trying to win some popularity contest. We're trying to give people the truth of the gospel, the truth of what the Word of God has to say. And then let the Spirit do what only He will do. And whenever the truth is preached, it will do one of two things, it will either harden hearts or soften hearts, and that's up to the Spirit. "So even if our gospel is veiled," Paul says, "It is veiled to those who are perishing in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving." The word "world"-- "aion," in the original language, it could be translated "age." Paul described it by the way, in Galatians, one four as this "present evil age." It's a description of this whole world system that God has allowed Satan to oversee, to influence, to control a system that is in opposition to God, that's designed to hinder the work of God, and to hinder his people. We all experience this. And that's what he says, in whose case the god of this world, referring to Satan, is the one doing this. By the way, "god" small g, obviously, Satan is a created being. Nevertheless, he has dominion, albeit temporary and limited; nevertheless, he has subjects--they are called unbelievers. I like the way John MacArthur put it, quote, "Satan is the archetype of all the false gods in all the false religions he has spawned."

So he's the one that has blinded the minds. "Minds" are a term in the original language that speaks about a person's ability to apprehend, to reason, to understand logically. "He has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel," and so forth. Now, how does he do this? He doesn't necessarily do this by indwelling people, even though that has happened, and that can happen. But rather, he does this through temptations, and through deceptions that appeal to a man's innate, depraved nature. Think of it this way. He's the pimp that provides the prostitute to the man who is already enslaved by his immoral loss. He's the cartel that provides the drugs for the people who are already living in a state of unimaginable depravity. He is the record label that promotes the artists who sing the lyrics that appeal to those who are in love with the world. He is the Hollywood that produces the filth that appeals to depraved minds. Here's the educational system that trains the teachers who teach the students who are already alienated from God and walk in darkness. He is the political party that deceives the masses, makes laws to oppose God's law and therefore panders, the wickedness that is already there in the human heart. We see this today with the satanic groups like Antifa and Black Lives Matter; Marxist revolutionaries that grossly exaggerate racial inequalities in order to push their agenda of social injustice and create division amongst the people so they can quote, "disrupt the Western prescribed nuclear family structure." Can you imagine that? Yeah, that's what Satan does. Also the Black Lives Matter people say they want to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift black trans folk, especially black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans antagonistic violence. Basically, they want to promote sexual deviancy, things that are an abomination to God. They don't want to promote radical feminism; they want to abolish the police. Basically, they want to abolish capitalism, they want to abolish the Constitution. And folks, please hear this. They want to abolish biblical Christianity. That is at the very core of what Satan is doing here. And if you don't understand that, you've been deceived. Think of the unbelievers that, you know, not only are they dead, spiritually, and blind because of their depravity, because they love darkness rather than light, but virtually everything that they experience in life is Satan’s way of somehow deceiving them and blinding them even further. I mean, think we send kids to, not everybody, but a lot of people will send kids to school. And by the way, I understand some people have to do this, but we have ungodly teachers, you know, they're going to tell the kids that there's no creator, for example. College professors, phony churches, false teachers, media, music, politics, social media. I mean, these are things that are designed by people whose father is the devil, and they want to do the desires of their father as Jesus said in John 8:44. These are people who want to kill unborn babies right up to the point of birth, and some of them to let them die even beyond that. I dare you, go to a high school principal and say, Look, I want to make sure that my child is not put in a class where they teach the LGBTQ agenda and watch the reaction you get. Can you imagine asking permission from the mayor in New York City to go there in front of the Trump Towers next to the Black Lives Matter thing that they've painted on the thing? May we also paint something right next to that, we just want to paint John 3:16. Oh, my we couldn't do that. That would be racist. And you know, on and on and on it goes. Folks, this is how Satan blames the minds of unbelievers. They're already hostile to God. They're already ruled by the lust of their flesh, and he just comes along and provides more opportunities to tempt them and to deceive them. Why do you think millions of people clamor to these prosperity cult charlatans? I mean, they just fill up these massive, ordered auditoriums. Why do you think that's so? It's because Ephesians, according to Ephesians, two beginning of verse two, "they walk according to the course of this world." That's why. "According to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience." Paul went on to say that they're "living in the lust of the flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and are by nature, children of wrath." You see, these people simply cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

I love to read a lot of the old dead guys all right, can't wait to meet them someday. I glean so much from them. And under the heading Satan and the Gospel, an 18th century Scottish churchman Horatius Bonar, he lived from 1808 to 1889. He offers some very compelling, powerful insights regarding Satan's diabolical opposition to the purposes of God. And it's as if he could have written this, I know the language is a little bit old English, but he could have written this as if he had written it today, okay? I want you to listen to what he writes, quote, "Let us mark how in these days of ours, Satan works and tempts and rages. He comes as an angel of light to mislead yet pretending to lead to blind yet professing to open the eyes, to obscure and bewilder, yet professing to illuminate and guide. He approaches us with fair words upon his lips, liberality, progress, culture, freedom, expansion, elevation, science, literature, benevolence, nay and religion too. He seeks to make his own out of all these, to give the world as much of these suits his purpose, as much as will make them content without God, and without Christ and without the Holy Ghost." He went on to say, "He sets himself against God and of the things of God in every way. He can deny the gospel, or he can dilute the gospel, or he can obscure the gospel, or he can neutralize the gospel just as suits his purpose, or the persons with whom he has to do. His object in regard to the gospel is to take out of all of it that makes it glad tidings to the sinner. And oftentimes this modified or mutilated gospel, which looks so like the real, serves his end best. For it throws men off their guard, making them suppose that they have received Christ's gospel, even though they have not found in it the good news, which it contains." He goes on to say the "Satan rages against the true God, sometimes openly and coarsely and other times, calmly and politely. Making men believe that he is the friend of the truth, but an enemy to its perversion. Progress, progress, progress is his watchword now, by means of which he hopes to allure men away from the old anchorages, under the pretext of giving them wider, fuller, more genial teachings. He bids them soar above creeds, catechisms, dogmas, as the dregs of an inferior age and a lower mental status. He distinguishes too, between theology and religion, warmly advocating the latter in order to induce men to abandon the former. He rages against the divine accuracy of the Bible, and cunningly subverts its inspiration by elevating every true poet and philosopher to the same inspired position. So successfully has he wrought in disintegrating and undermining the truth, that there is hardly a portion of it left firm. The ground underneath us is hollow, and the crust on which we tread ready to give way and precipitate us into the abyss of unbelief." Folks, that was back in the 19th century. Look where we are now. You say, Well, is there any hope for sinners? Yes, it's the gospel. It's the power of the Spirit unleash it upon people. You don't need clever sermons. You don't need emotional altar calls with 37 verses of "Just as I am," you don't need all of those things. No smooth-talking crowd pleasers, not a non-offensive, self-esteem promoting conversational gospel, you don't need all of that. The only thing that dispels the darkness is, as Paul said, the manifestation of the truth.

So in verse five, we begin to wrap this up. He says, "For we do not preach ourselves." In other words, we're not trying to promote ourselves like the false teachers do. We're not peddling the word, we're not in this to make a buck. So many pulpits today are filled with entrepreneurs, not men that God has called and gifted to shepherd his people. By the way, later on, Paul will expose the false apostles in chapter 10 and verse 12 and following. He talks about how they would compare themselves with each other, which was common in their culture, using vicious smear tactics against their rivals. Can we say politics in America today? Guilty of character assassination, being boastful, territorial. In fact, self-boasting was an act of honor in their culture. Of course, you see Satan using the same types of things today.

Well, Paul denied being this way. He attributed whatever success there was, to one thing it was the ministry of the Lord through His Word. First Corinthians two and verse three. He said that he came to them again in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. He went on to say "on my own behalf, I will not boast except in regard to my weaknesses." Second Corinthians 12 five, and then verse nine, "I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me." You see, folks Paul didn't want a personal following. He wasn't trying to get a man to make a ministry empire. He simply preached Christ Jesus as Lord. He wanted Christ alone to be worshipped and praised and served and obeyed. And he didn't want people to serve him. He didn't have his own personal entourage carrying all of his bags and treating him like some prima donna. Instead he was there he says bondservant. "Doulos" in the original language; it could literally be translated "slave." He was their slave, for Jesus sake. By the way, the understanding of that term the slave was a person who was legally owned by someone else, and whose entire livelihood and purpose was determined by their master. That's who Paul was. That's who we need to be.

Well, then he closes the section by underscoring the sovereignty of God in salvation, by comparing it to the sovereign work of God in creation. And this passage always moves me to tears. I think I'll be okay here this morning. But it is so powerful when you think about it, folks, because this is the story of my life and yours. In verse six, he said, "For God who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness is the one who has shown in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." By the way, this is a reference to the Spirit's role in creation. When he spoke the world into existence out of nothing, we read about it in Genesis one, three. There, it says, God said, "Let there be light and there was light." One of my professors in seminary, Dr. Dick Mayhue, who writes this, "In regeneration, God unites the external call of gospel preaching with his sovereign, effectual call unto new life, into darkened and dead hearts, He speaks the command, 'Let there be light.' And he instantaneously births in us the light of eternal spiritual life where it had not existed."

Dear friends, I pray this as your testimony. You see, because regeneration is that great bridge of grace that that spans the infinite chasm between man's depravity and all that is needed, the righteous demands of the law, necessary to enter God's kingdom. Because of this, Paul was thrilled, he rejoiced, knowing that God had made him a minister, as he said in Second Corinthians three, six, "of a New Covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." So I would challenge you in closing here this morning to spend more time in the Word and less in the world, okay. As you go into the Word, and as you behold the glory of the Lord in Scripture, you are going to see the five little points that I've given you here in the outline, the Spirit of God will reveal the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, transform you into the likeness of Christ embolden you to stand firm in your faith in Christ, motivate you to renounce sin, pursue holiness, and proclaim the truth of Christ. And then finally, it is going to dispel the darkness of sin and ignorance concerning the person and work of Christ so that you will have discernment. And you can teach your children to have discernment. My great fear for each of you is, it's so easy, especially in these days, to be deceived by the enemy. And then, with all of the things that are bombarding us, not only are we deceived, but we end up being distracted. You know, one of the things that drives me nuts is when I click on something on the internet, I want to read an article all sudden, pop up, pop up, I can't even what is this? And now I'm fighting to get rid of all these things. You know, that's what Satan does. You know, you try to focus on something that is pure and lovely, and holy and godly in your life. And what happened? Boop, boop, there's just stuff everywhere. And we get distracted. We get distracted. I know so many people today, and there's, by the way, there's a place for some of this, but they're more concerned about stockpiling guns and ammunition and an ammo than they are having a secret devotion to God and prayer and worship and evangelism. And again, I know there's a place for all that, we need to be concerned with some of those things. Christians joining militias all over the place. People obsessed with the news and politics, horrified to see what's happening in the country and all of these types of things, getting all depressed and discouraged. Folks, please let me remind you again, our hope is in the in the Lord. It's not in anything else. It's not in politicians. It's not in anything in this world. We're citizens of another kingdom. You know, expect these things to happen and glorify Christ in the midst of them. Use it as an opportunity to present the gospel. Let your light shine before men so that they will see who Christ really is. But as Paul said in Second Corinthians 11 three, "I am afraid lest as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, that your minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." Therefore, I would encourage you, as Paul said, in Colossians, three one, since "you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of the Father. Set your mind on things above, not on the things that are on the earth. For you have died and your life is what it is hidden with Christ in God." Then I love that next phrase, he says, "When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory."

Folks, let me close by encouraging you. King Jesus is coming again. Don't forget that. King Jesus is coming again as he has promised, believe the next thing on the prophetic stage is the church is going to be snatched away. Then Daniel's 70th, week of judgment upon Israel and upon the nation's will begin, sometimes known as the tribulation. He's going to judge the nations, he is going to restore a remnant of Israel and then he is going to return in power and great glory as King of kings and Lord of lords; we are going to return with him and he is going to establish his earthly kingdom. He is going to reign upon this earth for 1000 years in fulfillment of the Abrahamic and the Davidic covenants. As well as hundreds of Old Testament and New Testament prophecies, that will be a time when as Habakkuk says, "The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." O how I long for that day, don't you. But folks, it's coming, mark it, it's coming. And we pray that his kingdom will come and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Then that magnificent millennial kingdom will be the consummating bridge between human history and the eternal state. And we will dwell with him forever. All because of the glory of his grace. Amen? Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your gospel that has not only saved us, but that is in the process of sanctifying us. May we embrace these things with all of our heart and live them out in such a way that others will see the glory of Christ emanating from us. May our lives redound your glory. And once again, use us as salt and light in this very decaying, corrupt and dark world, that many will come to faith in Christ and finally, Lord, come quickly. I ask, come quickly. We long to see you face to face. For it's in Jesus name that I pray. Amen.

I'm always deeply honored to be able to minister the word of God to you. And we do that once again by looking at Second Corinthians chapter three. We're looking at verses 17 through verse six, actually of chapter four. I don't think I'll get all the way through this. But this is the second part of a little series on beholding the glory of the Lord. So follow along, as I read the text, and if you've not been with us, we go through the Bible verse by verse in whatever book we're in so that we don't miss anything, and we can apply all that the Lord has for us. So, second Corinthians chapter three, beginning in verse six, or 17. "Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit. Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness, or adulterating the Word of God, but by the manifestation of truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond servants for Jesus sake. For God who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness,' is the One who has shone in our hearts, to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ."

Here we see the power of gazing upon the Lord Jesus Christ as he is revealed in Scripture. And certainly, this was the passion of the apostle Paul as he endeavored to defend himself against the attacks of the false teachers, and some of the sycophants that he had developed within the church of Corinth. Remember, these were false teachers that were trying to mix elements of the Mosaic Law, the old covenant, with the new covenant, trying to say that you've got to do certain rituals and you've got to be circumcised, and all of these types of things, in order to be saved. And we've talked much about that. But what he is wanting them to do is to look clearly at the glory of Christ in the new covenant. And to be sure, we need to do this often in these dark days of deception that we find ourselves in; days of violence and lawlessness, and mounting persecution against the church. I've had the joy, this last week of speaking with several pastor friends of mine. Some of them are black pastors, and in black communities, others are white pastors in inner cities, that where they're dealing with all of the Antifa and Black Lives Matter and all of this, and it's wonderful to hear their biblical understanding of what's going on that really echoes what I have been telling you, but certainly, the domestic terrorism that we're watching unfold before our very eyes; I agree with all of my brothers this is, this is just one of many evidences of God's judgment upon just a godless nation, a pagan idolatrous nation. We are witnessing frankly, the wrath of divine abandonment. You've heard me talk about this before. Romans one. God has given so many people over to a depraved mind to do things that are just not only irrational but immoral and bizarre. And beloved, mark my word, your faith is going to be tested in ways like you have never had it before. We've had it really good here in the United States for many years. That's drawing to a close. Marxism and Biblical Christianity cannot coexist. Paul told Timothy in Second Timothy 3:12, "Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted."

Now we know biblically that most of the persecution is going to come from, (cough) excuse me, the unbelieving world; people that hate Christ. But it's also going to come from the unbelieving church that says it's Christian. By the way, this has been how it has worked down through history. I mean, the greatest opponents of God's people, even in ancient Israel, were the religious leaders. The greatest opponents of Christianity at the birth of the church, were once again, religious leaders, the Pharisees and so forth. And we're going to see the same thing continue in the era in which we live. Don't be naive, the greatest threat to the true church is going to be from other professing Christians. Now, I know many of you are afraid of what you're seeing happening with the kind of the leftist movement, the Marxist movement, we've talked about that before. It's, not just Antifa. It's behind the Black Lives Matter movement. And of course, most of the people that are a part of that don't even realize that they're pawns in a much larger game that's going on here. But we want to remember that there are people, for example, in the Black Lives movement that are just trying to expose what they perceive to be is ethnic. So social inequality, they want unity. And they're clueless about how Satan can use maybe some legitimate things to accomplish his nefarious diabolical purposes and ultimately, prepare the world for the Antichrist. Lot of people were ignorant of that. Some of my brothers that I talked with said that, that most of the people in there, as one brother said, most of the people in my community couldn't spell Marxist, much less know that anything was a part of what they're doing or that that's part of what's fueling much of this. But there are many people in these movements that embrace agendas that are absolutely an abomination to God. Especially the whole LGBT Q. What is it? AI plus movement. These are things that we must not partner with as believers. Second Corinthians six clearly states that; that Christians cannot partner with these kinds of ungodly movements. So righteousness has no fellowship with lawlessness, Paul says and so forth. But whether it's Black Lives Matter, Antifa, LGBTQ IA plus adoption agencies, the leftist political party, or even the godless conservatives, the godless, a lot of the people that are pro life absolutely hate Christ. Regardless of whatever the movement might be, you must understand that these people serve their father, the devil, and most of them don't know it. They serve the father of lies who was a murderer from the beginning. They love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil, and they need the gospel. And I'm convinced that at their core, the agenda of the whole social justice, Black Lives movement is to ultimately silence Christians, to silence those who preach the gospel and who pursue holiness. They have no fear of God. They bow to no authority other than their own. They hate all authority. They love darkness rather than light. They love the world, and they hate Christ and all who belong to him.

I know, I have been accused, and I'm sure you have as well, of being a conspiracy theorist. Well, you know what, I am a conspiracy theorist because I know the Word of God. And there is a conspiracy going on. We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but powers and principalities. And we know according to Second Thessalonians two that the mystery of lawlessness is already at work that started even back in the in the first century when that was written. We know that the lawless one is going to be revealed and his coming is in accord with Satan, referring to the Antichrist, and all of these things. So folks, indeed, there is a conspiracy, it's been going on since the fall. And we're a part of it in terms of those that Satan and his people hate. I love what we read in John 16:33. "'In the world, you have tribulation, but take courage I have overcome the world.'" isn't that wonderful promise. Because there's no way we're going to elect enough politicians to overcome the world. Somebody told me the other day Pastor, you need to get woke. And, you know, the idea that you need to feel guilty because you're a racist, that you're, you know, the very fact that your white means you're a racist, and you need to feel guilty for your white privilege and he kind of went through this type of thing. You need to embrace critical race theory--that is utterly unbiblical. You need to embrace social justice and Black Lives Matter and all these types of things. And I tried to be kin-- I think I was--but my mind went to Ephesians five and I reiterated this a bit to this brother. In verse 11, the apostle Paul says, "Do not participate." Let me say it again, "Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them; for it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light, for everything that becomes visible is light. For this reason, it says 'Awake sleeper.'" This is how I want to be woke, right? "'Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead. and Christ will shine on you. Therefore, be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil." And sadly, much of the church today has no clue as to what's going on in our world. The church has really become like the world. In fact, we live in an evangelical era where people really don't know how to define a Christian. I mean, think about this, if you were to take, let's just take 1000 public school teachers, okay, let's just pick them at random. Let me ask you this question, school teachers. Do you believe that all men and women are born in sin that we have a sin nature? That all we do, and all we are is fundamentally offensive to a holy God. And therefore, the wrath of God abides upon all men. And the only hope of our salvation is placing our faith in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And obeying His Word, which tells us that such things as the LGBTQ and so many of these other movements are an abomination to Him. How many of you believe that teachers? I don't know, we might get one hand, maybe two or three. Now, let me ask the next question. How many of you are Christians? Do I make my point clear; many hands would rise up or would raise up? Well, since the inception of the church at Pentecost, dear friends, Satan has been sowing tears amongst the wheat. And this will continue we know, until the Lord returns.

Dave Harrell

And this causes evangelism to take on a whole new image. I mean, you think about how so many evangelicals evangelize today. They have an obsession with church growth at the expense of Bible doctrine. And so rather than the church being the proclaimer, and the protector of divine truth, it has become an amorphous amalgam of social services and pseudo-Christian entertainment and prosperity hustling and political activism and on and on it goes. The church for the most part has become a cross between, I don't know, a circus and a country club. The church has gone out of its way to coddle unbelievers to make sure that they are culturally relevant. So they don't offend anybody. And therefore, no one who hears a pseudo phony gospel is truly going to be born again. But they're going to fill up churches. And therefore you have churches filled with unbelievers.

Now many evangelicals are trying to find some common ground with all of these lawless haters of God that we see in our world; trying to find some nuanced position between what we believe as Christians and what you believe out here with, for example, critical race theory and gender identity, and same sex marriage and all of that. Because after all, we don't want to be called a racist, or a bigot or a homophobe, or transphobic, or whatever else you hear. But pastor, we've got to build bridges. No dear friends, we don't, we have got to preach the gospel. There is no bridge between the sinfulness of man and the holiness of God. There is no bridge between heaven and hell. And there is but one mediator between God and man. And that is the man Christ Jesus. I hear people say why I'm just so confused. I just, I just don't know what to do. I don't, I don't know what to say. Then let me end that today, the Scripture is very clear about this. What we need to do is preach the word, we need to proclaim the gospel.

Folks, you really have to ask yourself, and by the way, I am going to get to the text in a moment because it does fit in. But you really have to ask yourself, do you really trust God? You know, when it's all on the line, do you really trust him? Come what may? Well, yes, but Pastor, I mean, I don't want to lose my job. I don't want to get beat up, right? I mean, these people just get in your face. They just intimidate you and they could burn my house down and all these types of things. Well, yeah, and I certainly hope that none of that happens, but it might. Jesus said, If you're going to come after Me, you gotta be willing to deny yourself, take up a cross. You know, are you willing to do that? Or maybe just up to a point. As long as it doesn't cost me anything, I'll follow Jesus. But when it comes time to stand up, and look the enemy in the face, and love them enough to say, Thus saith the Lord? Are you willing to do that? I've given you tracks to handout. I'm ashamed to say that most of them are still here. Are you linking these things on your internet? We're trying to do everything we can to give people the gospel. Are you serious about that? First Thessalonians, two, beginning of verse two, the apostle Paul says, "After we had already suffered and been mistreated in Philippi, as you know, we had the boldness in our God to speak to you, the gospel of God, amid much opposition. For our exhortation does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit; but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak a," catch this, "not as pleasing men, but God who examines our heart." Beloved, your faith is about to be tested in the days to come, the years to come, like never before. The question is, are you going to cower in fear? Or are you going to stand in the strength of the Lord our God? Did you not give your life to Christ? You said you did. Well, now it's time to, as we say, put your money where your mouth is right? Oh for boldness.

Jesus warned about the days that are coming upon us, Luke 21, beginning in verse 12, "'They will lay their hands on you, and will persecute you, delivering you to the synagogues and prisons'"-- in other words the religious authorities, and the-- "'prisons, bringing you before kings and governors, for My name's sake. It will lead to an opportunity for your testimony. So make up your minds, not to prepare beforehand to defend yourselves, for I will give you utterance and wisdom which none of your opponents will be able to resist or refute.'" Isn't that a wonderful promise? When they get in your face, and I've had this before, it's amazing to see how the Spirit of God gives you just the right words to say. "'But you will be betrayed even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. And you will be hated by all because of my name.'" Folks, churches like ours are targets of the enemy. The voices like mine are going to be drowned out; voices like yours are going to be drowned out by the mob. It's inevitable. That's part of what's going to happen on this earth before our Lord returns. And as persecution mounts, those who resent the truth and love the world are going to leave Calvary Bible Church. It's inevitable. Of course, we've had this for years, every church has this. But others who love the truth and resent the world are going to come from other churches. We're seeing some of this mount even on the internet. Because the saints are starving for truth. And what's going to happen as persecution mounts is you are going to long for the glory of Christ and for his return like you never have before. Your hunger for the Word of God will become absolutely insatiable. Prayer will become the very air that you breathe. Payer meetings, which we want to enact once again here in the fall when things get back, hopefully to a little bit of more like normal, prayer meetings or will be attended like Sunday morning services. Fellowship will take on a whole new meaning. You're going to sing hymns with a renewed passion. I've been around people in other parts of the world. Like my Russian brethren, who know all about Marxism. And when you hear them pray, and you hear them sing, it's like you're in a parallel universe. We're all going to find ourselves invigorated with a zeal for evangelism like never before, and people are going to be saved. That's the amazing thing about persecution. God uses it to bring people to Himself. God's saving purposes are always concealed in calamity. But whatever God sends our way we can know that God is in it and that he is going to accomplish his good purposes in us and through us.

Well, all of that, by way of introduction here, Paul knew exactly what it was like to be persecuted in ways, frankly, that we can't imagine. And in this section of his letter to the Corinthians, he underscores the key to survival during suffering, and that key is the holding the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, as he is revealed in Scripture. In this section, as you will recall, in our previous times together, seeing Christ in Scripture accomplishes at least five amazing realities in our life. I've delineated them as following; seeing Christ in Scripture number one, reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly, it transforms believers into the likeness of Christ. Thirdly, it emboldens believers to stand firm in their faith in Christ. Number four, it motivates believers to renounce sin. pursue holiness and proclaim the truth of Christ. And number five, it dispels the darkness of sin and ignorance concerning the person and the work of Christ. Just remember the five verbs seeing Christ in Scripture: reveals, transforms, emboldened, motivates and dispels.

Now remember Paul's line of argument here, he is reminding the folks who are being tempted to go back and arbitrarily mix some aspects of the Old Covenant Mosaic Law with the new. He's reminding them that unlike Old Covenant believers, New Covenant believers are able to see the face of Christ with an unveiled face as Moses did on Mount Sinai. Moreover, he's reminding them that the radiance of the glory of God that emanated from Moses’ face gradually faded, but the glory of the Lord that resides in the believer, through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit, is reflected in the life of a believer, and it remains that way forever. In fact, it gradually increases and the more we gaze upon him in Scripture, the more we contemplate his perfections the more we reflect upon His person and work, the more we become like Jesus. That's Paul's whole argument here. The more his glory will emanate from us, the more our lives will redound to his glory. And as you will recall, our sanctification is a process, an ongoing transformation. But that transformation as we studied the last time we were together, that transformation is affected by-- in other words, it is brought about by--our quote, "beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord," referring to the gazing upon Christ as he's revealed in Scripture. And one day that process of sanctification is going to be completed. I cannot wait until that day. I was waiting for my wife to say amen. Won't that be something when one day we will be glorified? My my, my.

First John three, in the verse two, "We know that when He appears, we will be." what? "We will be like Him. Because we will see Him just as He is." By the way, do you remember when God was calling you and when he drew you unto himself, and suddenly you really saw who Christ was? Who He is? You could see it in Scripture. For most of us, that was a gradual process. It certainly was for me. But it was finally a time when the veil just came off. And I just, I just saw it. It was Elementary. I mean, I was only nine years old. But I knew enough that I was a sinner. I knew enough that God's wrath abided upon me, and that I knew that I needed to repent and ask Jesus to save me because I couldn't save myself. And I know that God saved me. You know, the natural man is incapable of seeing any of this, in order to be reconciled. In fact, he wants nothing to do with any of this. First Corinthians 2:14. But with the miracle of the new birth, suddenly, the sinner has given eyes to see his rebellion against the Most High God and he's given the ears to hear the truth of the gospel. You read about this in Matthew 13:16, and 17. By the way, this is often called the "effective" or the "efficacious call of God." An operation of the Holy Spirit through the word of God whereby individuals respond in faith, and they accept the gift of salvation that God has given us. I was thinking about this the other day, we read about this in so many places. I love the passage in Romans eight verse 28, and following, "And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew,--referring to being for loved,--He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined," here it is, "He also called and these whom He called he also justified'--and certainly that happens at regeneration, when were born again--"and these whom He justified, He also glorified." It's interesting in Scripture, the effective call of God in regeneration seems to happen simultaneously. For example, Peter states in First Peter one, verse 23, "for you have been born again," he goes on to say, "through the living and enduring word of God." And in verse 25, "and this is the word which was preached to you." Similarly, in James one in verse 18, James says, "In the exercise of His will," not our will, but "in the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth." You know, I always marvel at the power of regeneration; God's power to instantaneously and supernaturally impart spiritual life to the spiritually dead. And I remember once reading a poem called The Hound of Heaven, maybe you've read it. It's 182 line poem, very long poem, written by an English poet, Francis Thompson. It was first published way back in 1893. And it describes God's loving pursuit of a sinner, with his grace pursuing them, chasing after us, as we run from him until finally, he captures us with his love and saves us. Every believer knows what that's like. And I wanted to share with you a story as told by Andrea Wolf, she was on staff with CoMission in Raleigh, North Carolina, it was published by R. Kent Hughes under the title, "The Hound of Heaven and a Young Agnostic." And it reminds me of many of my conversations in my times in Siberia, with the pastors in the churches there. Let me read this to you. It's powerful. "In the 1930s, Stalin ordered a purge of all Bibles and all believers." By the way, folks, if things continue on and escalate, this is where we're headed. Okay? Don't be deceived. This is where we're headed. And Stavropol, Russia, this order was carried out with vengeance. 1000s of Bibles were confiscated, and multitudes of believers were sent to the gulags--prison camps--where most died, unjustly condemned as quote 'enemies of the state.' The CoMission was sent a team to Stavropol. The city's history wasn't known at the time. But when the team was having difficulty getting Bibles shipped from Moscow, someone mentioned the existence of a warehouse outside of town, where those confiscated Bibles had been stored since Stalin's day. After the team had prayed extensively, one member finally mustered up the courage to go to the warehouse and asked the officials if the Bibles were still there. Sure enough, they were. Then the CoMissioners--part of the mission organization--asked if the Bibles could be removed and distributed again to the people of Stavropol. The answer was, 'Yes!' The next day the CoMission team returned with a truck and several Russian people to help load the Bibles. One helper was a young man--a skeptical, hostile agnostic collegian who had come only for the day's wages. As they were loading Bibles, one team member noticed that the young man had disappeared. Eventually they found him in a corner of the warehouse, weeping. He had slipped away, hoping to take a Bible for himself. What he did not know was that he was being pursued by the 'Hound of Heaven.' What he found shook him to the core. The inside page of the Bible he picked up had the handwritten signature of his grandmother. It had been her personal Bible. Out of the 1000s of Bibles still left in that warehouse, he stole the very one belonging to his grandmother--a woman, who throughout her entire life, was persecuted for her faith." My what a coincidence. He goes on to write, "No wonder he was weeping--God had powerfully and yet tenderly made himself known to this young man. Such was his divinely appointed meeting with the sovereign Lord of the universe, the 'Hound of Heaven,' who had tracked him down to that very warehouse! Remember, Jeremiah's words, Jeremiah 23:24. 'Can anyone hide in secret places so that I cannot see him?' declares the Lord. 'Do not I fill both heaven and earth?'" declares the Lord. Then he closes saying "Jesus is truly the ever-present, all-seeing 'Hound of Heaven.' He can track us down wherever we're hiding! And once on the trail, he sets his heart with relentless zeal and undivided focus to the pursuit."

Well, what happened here is by the power of the Spirit of God. The Word of God was revealed to him. And in that word, he saw the glory of Christ. There, God miraculously saved him, and set his sanctification into motion. So indeed, seeing Christ in Scripture, not only reveals the glory of Christ, not only transforms us into the likeness of Christ, but now number three, and we finally come to our outline, it emboldens believers to stand firm in their faith in Christ.

Notice chapter four verse one. "Therefore, since we have this ministry," Paul says, "as we received mercy, we do not lose heart." A term in the original language means we do not become disheartened and act like a coward, very clear. Now, the false apostles and some of their sycophants were absolutely hammering the apostle Paul, as we have studied, and it would have been easy for him to give in, to cower. But no, he knew the truth of the gospel. He knew the truth of who Christ is, that he is the Creator, the Sustainer, the Redeemer and ultimately the consummator of all things. And so he did not cower, nor should we. O child of God, don't miss this. And this is Paul's point because of the New Covenant ministry of the Holy Spirit. He has now caused us to be new creatures in Christ, the old things pass away, the new things have come, He dwells within us. So now we can see Christ for who he is. And on that basis, we are able to speak candidly and forthrightly and boldly about Christ, and the glory of his saving grace.

We have no need to be ashamed of the gospel. For it is the power of God unto salvation to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Paul told Timothy in Second Timothy one and verse seven, "For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline. Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord or of me His prisoner, but join with me and suffering for the gospel according to the power of God." Oh dear friends, I grow weary of cowardly Christians, especially pusillanimous pastors that refuse to stand before men and women and open up the Word of God with clarity and conviction. Jesus said in Matthew 10, and verse 32, "everyone who confesses Me before men, I will also confess Him before My Father who is in heaven." But catch this now, "Whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before my Father who is in heaven. Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother and a daughter in law against her mother-in-law, and a man's enemies will be the members of his household. He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me, is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it. And he who has lost his life, for My sake, will find it." Oh, dear Christian, I plead with you to look to Christ often, see His mercy for what it is and how he has extended it to you. And on the basis of that mercy, be bold in your gospel witness. So indeed, as we see Christ revealed in his Word, the Holy Spirit emboldens believers to stand firm in their faith in Christ; but number four, it motivates believers to renounce sin, pursue holiness, and proclaim the truth of Christ.

Notice in verse two, "but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame." "But" can be translated, "on the contrary," in other words, as opposed to losing heart, on the contrary of losing heart. That's the exegesis here. On the contrary of that, "we have renounced the things hidden because of shame." You see Paul completely and totally rejected all of the treachery and unscrupulous, underhanded ways that false teachers were dealing with other people. Unlike the false apostles, who were shrewd and treacherous and cunning in their manipulation of the truth; always trying to massage the truth to fit their agenda, to make sure everybody liked them. Paul just spoke the truth. And, of course, the hypocritical, even immoral lifestyles of the false teachers were just shameful practices that were devised and lived out in secret. And of course, all of this is, is energized by Satan and his minions. These things are designed to deceive people and promote the teacher, or the politician or whoever it might be. So he says, "but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame." And then he says, "not walking in craftiness." The term could be translated "cunning"; not walking in deceitfulness that's practiced by wicked people. We're not doing that. nor are we adulterating the Word of God. "Adulterate"-- an interesting term, it can be translated, "to falsify, to distort or manipulate or add something." I mean, this is what we see all the time, for example, with fake news. I mean, they'll take something that happened, and by the time they get through describing the event, it's not even anywhere near what the truth is. By the way, if you want to see what CNN really is, go to Japan, because in Japan, and I learned this the hard way, that's the only English-speaking station that you can get. And as I listened to CNN, I realized they're not even talking about the same country here. It is so deceitful. While many false teachers do this. I mean, for example, I've heard false teachers preach about loving your neighbor. And they use that as the basis for a social justice gospel that Jesus came to liberate the poor and the oppressed, something Jesus never taught, nor did he ever pursue. Social gospel, again, and part of that social gospel is the whole same sex, marriage, homosexual, all of that stuff; the unbiblical, presuppositions of critical race theory and on and on and on. And let me give you another example. Think of those who walk in darkness and adulterate the Word of God who are part of the whole word of faith movement, just an absolute total cult. Preachers who claim God that speaks to them directly, telling people that they need to go out and claim things, material things, in the name of Jesus. Fake healings, bizarre, frenzied, emotionalism nonsensical, babbling, uncontrollable laughter, falling on the floor and claiming that somehow, you've been slain by the Spirit. I mean, folks, only Satan and his minions can cause someone to prostrate themselves upon the grave of a deceased preacher to soak up the quote, "anointing." Something called grave sucking, absolutely wicked. Only a person bereft of the indwelling Spirit of God could possibly believe that the seizures and hypnosis and and hysteria and being slain in the spirit or works of the Holy Spirit. These are false teachers guilty of, as Paul said, peddling the Word of God, entrepreneurs trying to make a buck off of the gospel. Salesmen who seduce Christians, and mostly pseudo-Christians, into believing these lies. People who, as Paul said, in Second Timothy four, "will not endure sound doctrine." No, they don't want to hear that. We will not endure that. The wanting to have their ears tickled, they accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desire. Text goes on to say they "turn away their ears from the truth they turned aside unto myths." But what Paul is saying is here is this, look, New Covenant believers see the glory of Christ. They've been made new creatures, the Holy Spirit dwells within them. And we know biblically that when the Spirit of God dwells within a believer, he becomes, shall we say, their illuminating guardian. The one who guides all believers into all truth, as we read in John 16:13. He is the one that empowers us to know all things pertaining to the revealed word of God, as Jesus said in John 14, as well as in John 16. He is the believers, shall we say, resident lie detector. I mean, if you truly know Christ, and you're a part of those chaotic, wicked things, eventually, the Spirit of God is going to expose it to you and you're going to come out of it. First Corinthians two verse 12. "Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom. but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words."

You see, friends, the unregenerate know nothing of this. They are what the Word of God describes as fools. First John two and verse 19, the apostle Paul explains how that those who promote these types of false theologies and all the false teaching and those who embrace them are not believers. But then in first John two and verse 20, he says, "But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know." He went on to say, in verse 27, "As for you, the anointing which you receive from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him."

And in First John four verse 13, we read, "By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit." Well, folks, this is what Paul goes on to say here, as we begin to wrap this up here this morning in Second Corinthians four and verse two, he says, "but by the manifestation of truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God." John MacArthur said this, "All people, even those who have not heard the gospel, have an innate, though limited, knowledge of God's law. The preaching of the Gospel activates the conscience, which bears witness to the truth of the message, even in those who reject it. That is true because," and then he quotes Hebrews 4:12. "'The word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul, and spirit of both joints and marrow, able to judge the thoughts and the intentions of the heart.'"

Now, what those false teachers were doing in Corinth is similar to what they do today. They tell you things that you never thought you could see before. Throw in a little bit of mysticism, a little secret knowledge--I bet you all didn't know that--yeah, well, God told me that. Yeah, let me tell you some of the things that he's revealed to me. Oh, and people say, Oh, my, whoa, I better listen to that guy. I better listen to that woman; God speaks to them. Man, can you believe that? Yeah. And then what they do is they cherry pick passages that support their position and advance their agenda that have nothing to do with the authorial intent of the passage, and people get sucked into their deceptions. This happens all the time. All you have to do is turn on the television or look at the hundreds of videos of of preachers, both men and women, who are constantly telling you about their private conversations with God. Folks, as soon as you hear that, don't walk. run to get away from it. That person is a heretic.

Paul didn't do any of these things. First Corinthians two four, he said "I determined to know nothing among you except here it is. Jesus Christ and Him crucified." Though it was, to Jews a stumbling block, and to Gentiles foolishness, First Corinthians 1:23, he knew that his uncompromising proclamation was the only truth that could save. And so it caused him to say in First Corinthians two, four, again, "my message and my preaching, were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit, and of power.

I was thinking about the sanitized gospel that is preached so often today, this non offensive gospel that, frankly cannot save, you know, don't tell anybody about their sin, oh, no, you don't want to talk about that. Don't tell them that the wrath of God abides upon them. I mean, the people don't want to hear that type of thing. I mean, how do you expect people to come to your church if you preach that way? Of course, the point is, I care nothing about people coming to church, I want them to come to Christ. There's a huge difference. No, tell them how much God loves them. And how desperate he is to make them happy and successful in their life. Boy, there's the wide gate that leads to the broad way of destruction.

Let me tell you how their consumers typically respond to this kind of gospel message. And I wrote this based on numerous conversations that I've had with people who've come out of these types of churches. "Yeah, if God is real, I suppose I am guilty of ignoring him. I don't think about God very much, and I love lots of things more than God, so to that extent, I suppose I am living in prideful rebellion. And yeah, I have fallen just like the whole Satan analogy. I mean, just look at all the junk in my life. Relationships are messed up, my marriage is boring. My finances are a wreck. I hate my job. I basically feel as though my life is going nowhere fast. For sure, I need to be saved from all this stuff. Maybe God is the answer to my unhappiness, my lack of success, my negative emotions, my lack of purpose and direction in life. I'm just glad God loves me just the way I am. Because I'm not sure I could ever change. I mean, I am what I am. And I'm not sure why Jesus had to come and die for me, assuming all that's true. But I'm glad he did, I guess. I sure don't get all that stuff about the Father killing his son. And there's so much for a loving God. But I'm told I have to accept it that stuff by faith. So I guess I will. I mean, nothing else seems to be working. I suppose Jesus died on the cross. So he could demonstrate what selfless love is all about. Not sure. But anyway, I want to take advantage of anything God may have to offer to make my life better. So I think I'll accept Jesus as my personal Savior and see what happens." And then somebody says, repeat this prayer, they repeat the prayer, and then they say, welcome to the kingdom brother.

And some day, the Lord's gonna say to them, "depart from me you worker of iniquity, I never knew you." Ah, dear friends, this is what happens when you walk in craftiness, and you adulterate the Word of God. Well, we're going to have to close let me do it by first of all, we're going to look at the last point the next time we were together. Okay, we're together, I want to challenge you to do a few things. My list is very short here. But I want to leave you with something very practical. Based upon this passage, and all that we've examined here today. First thing I would love for you to do dear friends is get serious about your own personal pursuit of holiness. Turn off Fox News. Get rid of your MAGA hats. All of your Trump stickers. You get where I'm going here. If you're on the other side, get rid of your BLM shirts and quit putting hashtag Black Lives Matter. I mean, all of this political stuff, folks, put all of that aside and immerse yourselves in the Word of the living God. And get on your knees and begin to pray for yourself and your family and your church and the leaders of your country as we're going to see. Because when you immerse yourself in the Word of God, what's going to happen, You're going to see Christ in Scripture. And seeing Christ in Scripture reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ; transforms that believer into the likeness of Christ, emboldens believers to stand firm in their faith in Christ, motivates believers to renounce sin, pursue holiness, and proclaim the truth of Christ and it dispels the darkness of sin and ignorance concerning the person and work of Christ. Folks get serious about your own personal pursuit of holiness.

And number two, get serious about evangelism. Beloved, God did not call us to protest he called us to preach. Get serious about that. Don't be ashamed of the gospel. Pass out the tracks, or whatever else you want to use. By the way, they're available up here on the piano with some of my books, and they're out there as well. I mean get serious about evangelism.

Number three, get serious about teaching your children especially if they're in public schools, which is basically a brainwashing machine, run by ungodly people that know nothing of Christ. And along with that, limit their screen time, social media, YouTube, all of that stuff. I mean, all of those things are Satan's way of just providing a conduit of deception. Ephesians six four, "Fathers," could be translated parents, "do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord."

And then finally, pray for the leaders that God has placed over us. Don't hate them, love them enough for the sake of the gospel. Pray for them that God would save them and certainly that God would protect us from them. You say But Pastor, I mean, these some of these people, I mean, they're just, they're just satanic. Yeah. Aren't you glad that we have a saving God? Do you know? Paul told Timothy to pray for Nero and couldn't have been a guy on the planet that's ever worse than that guy. Here's what he said in First Timothy two beginning in one, "First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgiving be made on behalf of all men." Then he adds this, "for kings and all who are in authority,"--and here's why--"so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity." Well, we've enjoyed that down through the years, haven't we? A tranquil and a quiet life in all godliness and dignity. I fear that that's coming to an end, but we pray that by God's grace, He will protect us. As we make these things a priority in our life, regardless of the level of persecution, we can know that the Lord will reveal Himself to us. And we will experience the soul satisfying joy of his presence deep within our souls. May God have mercy on all of us. And for those who do not know our precious Savior, let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths that you have given us in your word. Thank you that indeed they are a lamp unto our feet and a light into our paths. I pray that you will take what we've examined here today and by the power of your spirit, cause the seeds of truth to germinate in our hearts and bear much fruit for our good and for your glory. For it's in Jesus name that I pray. Amen.

Well, what a joy it is to be able to minister the word of God to you again this morning. So if you will take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter three, if you have not been with us, we are making our way verse by verse through this epistle. And this morning, we will be looking at Second Corinthians three, beginning in verse 17. Ultimately, we're going to go through verse six of chapter four, but it's going to take a few times to do that. So I am starting, probably it will be a two, maybe a three part, series on beholding the glory of the Lord.

Now before I read the text, and we begin to look at it closely, I know that that many of you are frustrated, you're frightened as we continue to watch what's happening in our country. It's as though America is in a freefall of anarchy and immorality. The diabolical and clearly stated Marxist agenda of the Black Lives Matter movement is even being embraced by many so-called evangelicals. That movement, by the way, is really rooted in a Hegelian Dialectic, a material worldview. It's a philosophical worldview. Hegel was a, a German philosopher, Marx picked up on that. And ultimately, they believe...that philosophical view believes that there's no such thing as absolute truth. That truth is always evolving; that new truths come up and has to replace the old truths. You see that, by the way, in the fight over the Constitution. It's kind of like, well, that's outdated. We've got no truth now. So let's, let's do things differently now. And ultimately, that's at the root of what's going on with the Black Lives Matter movement. Marx took that to an extreme. He believed that you had to have a revolution to get the new truth to come forward. And obviously, these people reject the Bible, the Word of God, as being the authoritative source of truth. And for them, you worship the state, you don't worship God. And of course, Biblical Christianity cannot coexist with that kind of a system. It's frightening communist regimes that have embraced this type of thing historically; have killed over 100 million people. So I don't want you to be naive as to what's really going on here. The Black Lives movement is committed to something way beyond racial justice, social justice, social equality; they’re committed to Marxism. They believe that they must, for example, disrupt the nuclear family.

I was reading some of their website and their positions. They say, "we disrupt the Western prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families,” end quote, "villages that collectively care for one another, especially our children." That translates into government control of your children and their education. They want to end private education, have the community control the curriculum, you know, abolish the police, reparations for black people, redistribution of wealth, and certainly one of their big things as the advancements of their sexual agenda--the LGBTQIA plus movement, they've added IA plus, that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and asexual.

I read an article last night in the Wall Street Journal. It's entitled "The Abolition of Man and Woman." It's written by Crawford and Hanby. I would encourage you to read it. They are condemning the Supreme Court ruling in Bostock versus Clayton County. The ruling holds that sexual orientation and identity are included in the definition of sex under the title seven of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Just very briefly, the underlying assumption in the ruling is that a man who identifies as a woman might really be a woman. That to be a woman is a mental state, not a biological state. Gender has nothing to do with our embodiment at birth as a male or female. It's arbitrarily determined by a subjective sense of quote, "identity." That's at the core of what they're saying here. The author's arguing against that say, quote, "If each of us is defined by a," quote, "gender identity related only arbitrarily to sex, we are all transgender now." Folks, this is Romans 1:28--"And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper." Well, certainly the movement that we see out there, especially with the Black Lives movement, and the Antifa movement, this is at the core of all of this. And so now, we have angry mobs of Marxists seeking to take control. They say they want justice; they say they want equality. But what they really want is privilege and power, they want reward without responsibility. You know, if you see yourself as oppressed, then that gives you the right to go take things from other people, and so forth. And what they want is way beyond big government, what they want is a totalitarian regime. If you'll notice, by the way, most of the quote "protesters" are white, educated, millennial women, who are grief stricken over their white guilt and their white privilege. Folks, these people need our love, they need our prayers, they need the gospel, and we need to give it to them. We need to be bold and give it to them. And where's the church and all of this? I've had several people ask me, can you be a Christian and support the Black Lives Matter movement, for example? And I think the answer is well, yes, you probably could, but you would have to be seriously misinformed; seriously lacking in biblical discernment. You would have to be the worldly Christian, that Paul spoke about in First Corinthians three, controlled kind of by your flesh, immature babes in Christ. But folks, most of the church today is not Christian. You must understand that most of the church today consists of pseudo-Christians that are Christian in name only. Jesus warned about this, for example, in Matthew seven, they have no spiritual discernment. They've not been born of the Spirit, they're still spiritually dead.

I remember a number of years ago, when the Purpose Driven Life book first came out, I read that and I thought to myself, and I know I shared it with many of you, I thought, this is one of the most clever satanic deceptions that I have ever read. Because it says so many wonderful things, about how we can be happy, we can have purpose in our life, but it never tells you how because it never gave the gospel. It never explained how we have violated God's holy law, his wrath abides upon us, we are utterly unable to save ourselves. It never explained what sin really is. It never explained repentance. It never explained God's wrath. It never explained hell or any of those things. And so what happens is many people rush through in hordes, they rush through the wide gate, start traveling down the broad way that leads to destruction. People fill up churches that are not born again. And like so many of the seeker sensitive new movement, they see people that come to church as consumers. And the gospel is the product. And the pastor has to be the salesman. And so you have to make the product appealing to the people. And so you've got to do things to it, kind of massage it, so everybody's gonna like it. Of course, that is just blatantly unbiblical. And you see what has happened now. So ultimately, Jesus died on the cross to save us from our unhappiness. So it's no surprise that so many professing evangelicals believe and buy into and support some of the things that we're seeing today.

Again, before we look at the text, I just want to remind you of something. In first Corinthians 2:14, we read a "natural man." In other words, an unregenerate man, a person that has never been truly born again, "does not accept the things of the Spirit of God." Does not accept them, "for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot,"-- not that he will not--"he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised." That term "spiritually appraised"--"anakrino," it was a judicial term, it was used to describe a judicial investigation. It meant to examine, to scrutinize, to discern, to evaluate. People apart from Christ cannot do that. They have no capacity to render a decision because they cannot discern the facts. Why? Because they're bereft of the Holy Spirit. When the Holy Spirit is not dwelling within you, you're not going to be led into truth and holiness. And so they are bereft of illuminating grace, if you will, and are therefore utterly incapable of spiritual discernment; and that's much of the church today. Finley says, quote, "The unspiritual are out of court as religious critics. They are deaf men judging music." Powerful. So you wonder why so many ostensibly evangelicals embrace so many of these crazy things that are out there, things that God forbids? Because they're not saved. They're of the world and the world loves its own. "If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him," First John 2:15. They belong to their father, the devil. They're "Christian" in name only, Matthew seven. Jesus said in John 8:47, "'He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason, you do not hear them, because you are not of God.'" Of course, Jesus said in John 10:27, "'My sheep hear my voice,'" and what do they do? "'They follow Me.''"

So whenever I listened to the incoherent and irrational and emotional rants of the progressive leftists and the unbiblical babble of liberal evangelicals that support them, I'm reminded of so many things, but especially this last week, I was just reminded of Proverbs one and verse seven. "The fear of the Lord," is what? It's "the beginning of wisdom." That's where it has to start. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. Proverbs 18:7, "A fool's mouth is his destruction, and his lips are the snare of his soul." So I thought about this, I looked up biblically, the concept of a fool and here's what you will find. I won't give you all of the references. But fools biblically, are without the knowledge of God, they deny God, blaspheme God, mock sin, hate knowledge and wisdom, die for a lack of wisdom. They feed on foolishness, display their folly, produce folly, make sport of mischief, walk in darkness, hate to depart from evil, their worship is evil to God. They're described as corrupt and abominable. They're self-sufficient, self-confident, self-deceived, mere professors of religion, full of words given to quarreling, slanderers, liars, slothful, angry, contemptuous, proud, they come to shame, they destroy themselves by their speech, companions of fools, will be destroyed. The lips of a fool is a snare to his soul, they will cling to their folly, worship idols, trust in their own hearts. When they hear the gospel, they will not obey it, their mouths pour out folly, and to honor them is unbecoming. God has no pleasure in them, they shall not stand in the presence of God, and believers should avoid them. The other thing I always think about when I contemplate these things is, were it not for God's grace, I would be in a fool's paradise, just like all the rest of them, and so would you. And therein we celebrate the gospel. And folks, this is why people need the gospel. And I hope you are burdened for these people. I hope you're praying for them. Titus three and verse three, the apostle Paul says, "For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace, we would be made heirs according to the hope, of eternal life." And its to this gospel that we now turn, all right? It's to this glorious gospel that we turn, as we examine the words of the Apostle Paul here in Second Corinthians three.

Now, let me remind you that here we are learning from the beleaguered apostle that has been slandered so severely by false apostles that have been come into the church at Corinth, preaching a false gospel, trying to mix old covenant with new. And some of the dear people that he loved had bought some of their lies, and he's trying to defend himself. These are vicious wolves devouring the sheep. And here in this particular section of Scripture, we learn how the apostle Paul, and I might say millions of others, were able to endure seasons of great sorrow, and great danger. And frankly, we're in that today, and I fear it's gonna get much worse. Let me ask you, if somebody came to you and say, Alright, you know, I'm a Christian, you're a Christian, I'm curious. What do I need to do to find joy and sorrow? How can I find strength in weakness? How can I find peace in peril? How can I somehow triumph over trouble? What would you tell them? Well, obviously, it's the gospel. Well, yes, I believe the gospel but what else should I do? Well, the apostle Paul is going to answer that. And ultimately, the answer is in the title of my discourse to you. The answer is, we do this by beholding the glory of the Lord, by looking at the face of Christ as he is revealed in his word in the Bible. This is what Paul did, and this is what we must do. We don't look to our political leaders; we need to look to Christ. And we see him in the Word of God.

So with that background, let me read the text to you, Second Corinthians three beginning in verse 17. "Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit. Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the hidden things because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond servants for Jesus sake. For God, who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness,' is the One who has shone in our hearts, to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ."

This is such a precious, it's such a practical passage of scripture that speaks to our hearts. And here we see the power of seeing Christ, learning of Christ, knowing Christ as we look at him in the word of God. And certainly this was Paul's great concern for the believers there in Corinth because they were being led astray by these false teachers that were having them look to the law, rather than looking to the new covenant that reveals Christ. So it's a very, very important passage of Scripture. He wanted them to look to the Lord. In the old covenant, people could only see a tiny portion of God's glory, but the veil is lifted in the new covenant. That's Paul's argument here. And when the blinding light of God's shekinah glory encompassed Saul on the road to Damascus, later became Paul, he suddenly saw the light of the glory of God revealed in the Lord Jesus Christ. What a magnificent scene that would have been. And suddenly he realized that all of his law keeping was for naught. All that mattered was the glory and the grace of Jesus.

The new covenant lifted the veil of God's glory from his eyes, we read about this for example, in Hebrews one beginning in verse one. The writer says, "God after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the world. And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." Now none of us have had a Damascus Road experience, at least not to my knowledge. I haven't been blinded by the shekinah glory of the living God. But you know, we're all still able to see the glory of Christ, as he is revealed in his word. That's the power of the word. That's where Paul was going in this argument.

And what we see here in Second Corinthians is the importance of seeing Christ in Scripture. And I've broken it down so that there are basically five amazing realities in the life of a believer that occurs when you see Christ in scripture. We're gonna see five things. Number one, seeing Christ in scripture reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly, it transforms believers into the likeness of Christ. And those are the two that we're going to deal with today, okay? But let me give you the other three. Seeing Christ in scripture emboldens believers to stand firm in their faith in Christ. It motivates believers to renounce sin, pursue holiness, and proclaim the truth of Christ, and it dispels the darkness of sin and ignorance concerning the person and work of Christ. If you just look at the verbs there, seeing Christ in scripture reveals, transforms, emboldened, motivates and dispels. What a magnificent set of truths these are.

So let's be reminded again of the context here. If we go back to verse 16, Paul was saying that whenever a man turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away, suddenly a person will be able to see that the Old Covenant law is over, the New Covenant of the Spirit, it has begun. Then in verse 17, he summarizes this, "Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." And indeed, it is the Spirit's work of regeneration that causes us to be born again, as he said, in verse six of chapter three. He is the one that takes away the veil that obscured the glory of God in the face of Christ. We're going to see this in verse 16. And when this happens, truly, there is liberty; we suddenly see the liberty of saving grace, we see the liberty from the bondage of sin, the liberty from the condemning tyranny of the law that we could never ever keep. We see the liberty from Satan's dominion, liberty from the fear of death, and so forth. And then in verse 18, he says this, "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord," I want to stop there. This brings us to the first little point in my outline, number one, seeing Christ in Scripture reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, let me explain the background here. Remember, after Moses had been in the presence of God, he had to wear a veil over his face, in order to prevent himself from just terrifying the Israelites when they saw the glory of God emanating from his face, it was a terrifying glow. But whenever he would return, to talk with the Lord, he would take the veil off. He would remove the veil. And what Paul was saying here is that because of the new covenant, all believers can do the same. We can all take off the veil now, we can all see the glory of God; we can all enter into the presence of God with an unveiled face, so to speak, not only to see the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, but also to experience some measure of that same transformation. One that will ultimately result in our glorification. What does John say on First John three, verse two? "Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be." And he adds this, "We know that when He appears, we will be," here it is, "like Him,"--"like Him, because we will see Him just as He is." Moreover, beholding the Lord Jesus Christ in Scripture is like looking in a mirror, where we have a visible representation, or a reflection of our own image. And when we look in a mirror, we can take our time, we can see all the specific aspects of our reflection and some of those things aren't all that great. Every year I have to go to the skin doctor to have certain things frozen, precancerous things from being in the sun so much over the course of my life. And I'll always ask her "What about this brown spot?," "What about that?" No those are okay, that's just part of it. So in other words, he's just gonna have to live with it right? Or wear makeup. And no, I will not wear makeup. So anyway, the point here is, now we can see Christ in Scripture, but we're not going to be disappointed because we're not going to see any blemishes. But there's an intimate view here. Now think about it. How did you come to know Christ? Well, somebody gave you the gospel. Somebody gave you the Word of God, John 5:39. Jesus said, The scriptures "testify of Me", we would never know really who Christ is apart from his word. Acts 18:28. Paul, it says, vigorously "refuted the Jews publicly showing from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ." And Paul reminded Timothy, that it was, quote, "The sacred writings that are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus," Second Timothy 3:15. And in First Corinthians 15, three, Paul says, "For I delivered to you as a first importance"-- In other words, here's the priority--"what I also received, that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures." So we see Christ in Scripture, it revealed his glory.

But will you notice another astounding truth here at the end of verse 18. Let me just read the whole verse. "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." What an amazing statement. All believers are being changed into the likeness of Christ. It's absolutely astounding. The likeness of Christ as we see him mirrored in Scripture. This means that seeing Christ in Scripture, not only reveals the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, but secondly, it transforms believers, into the likeness of Christ. The word "transformed," in the Greek its "metamorphoo." We get our word "metamorphosis" from that. It means to be changed in an outward appearance. And in this context here, unlike the fading glory of Moses, believers have an ever-increasing glory, because of the Holy Spirit that dwells within us; who is progressively transforming us into the image of Christ. And grammatically, this transformation is in the present tense, meaning it is an ongoing, it is a continuous, it is a a progressive, transformation.

But now, here's where it gets really, really exciting, what is it that facilitates this gradual metamorphosis? What produces this ongoing change? And the answer is "beholding as in a mirror." Really fascinating, "beholding"-- "katoptrizo" in the original language. And here, grammatically, is what we call a present participle, making it the means by which we are continuously, progressively, being transformed into the image of Christ. This is what some define as, quote, "transformation by vision." In other words, the more we behold the image of Christ, as he is revealed in Scripture, the more we become like him. Absolutely astounding. And one day, this transformation will be fully and finally accomplished. Boy, I'm looking forward to that day, I know you are as well. It will no longer be a gradual, progressive change. It will be instantaneous, and it will be complete. First Corinthians 13, verse 12, "For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then,"-- in other words, when we see Christ, --"I will know fully just as I also have been fully known." And in chapter 15, verse 49, "Just as we have borne the image of the earthly, we will also bear the image of the heavenly." Oh dear friends, the glory of the gospel, the glory of it all. I mean, think about this, at regeneration the process begins when he makes us new creatures in Christ. He changes our desires, the process of sanctification begins, Gradually, sin loses its power over us. Gradually, we begin to manifest the fruits of the Spirit fruits of obedience. But we've got to understand this in light of Paul's argument, he's making a contrast here, he's making a contrast between Jews who only saw a tiny portion of the glory of God, emanating from the face of Moses. Remember, Moses could only see a tiny portion. And then he comes down off the mountain, and he's glowing so much that he has to cover his face. But yet, still, they're only seeing a tiny portion of what Moses saw. And so the contrast here is that Moses had to cover his face, but the glory of God, bear this in mind, now remained outside of them. The glory of God did not take up residence within them. The Spirit of God did not come to live with him permanently. There was no change of nature, they were not made new creatures in Christ, so to speak. But because of the Spirit's internal work of regeneration under the New Covenant, he causes us to be born again. He raises us to walk in newness of life. And now we can behold the glory of God in the face of Christ, by seeing his radiance in Scripture.

Moreover, the radiance of God's glory, on the face of Moses gradually faded, right? Gradually faded. But the glory of God that now resides in the believer, by the power of the indwelling Spirit is reflected in the life of the believer, and it gradually increases in brilliance over time. This is Paul's argument. What a brilliant, Holy Spirit inspired argument it is. It's just overwhelming. And the more you gaze upon Christ in Scripture, the more you become like him. The more you contemplate his glory, his person, his work; the more you become like him, and the more his glory will emanate from you, the more your life will redound to His glory. Folks, that's why it's so important to study the Word of God, to meditate upon the word of God, to know it, to live it, to pray it, to preach it. In regeneration we’re instantly justified forever. Our sanctification is a progressive process. An ongoing transformation that is affected by, quote "beholding, as in a mirror the glory of the Lord." The Greek grammar helps us understand that. This happens until our final and complete glorification at the consummation of all things. I don't get too excited about a lot of things, at least externally, but let me tell you, in my heart, I am really excited. Okay? I hope you can see that. And I hope you share that. Again, I go back to the end of First John three, "We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, that's just overwhelming to me, we will be like Him because we will see Him just as He is." And then in verse three, he says, "And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." Beloved, don't miss this. At salvation we're raised from spiritual death to spiritual life. And this transformation of the inner man occurs immediately. All right? Just like that. However, over time, we're gradually going to become more like Christ, but only in proportion to our willingness to behold the glory of Christ as he is revealed in his Word, the Bible. The reason so many Christians today don't look much like Christ is because they don't know very much about him. Well, they might have a head knowledge. But even at that it's weak. Colossians 3:10, Paul says "Put on the new self, who was being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him." And this is why Paul even likened his passion for ministry to a woman who was about to give birth to a child. He said in Galatians 4:19 "I am again in labor until Christ is formed in you." And folks, this is why our number one priority in life should be to run "toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus," Philippians three. And what is that prize? What's the ultimate? It's Christ likeness. May I ask you? Is this the goal of your life? Is this the priority of your life to become more like Christ? If not, why not? Can you not see that by beholding Christ in Scripture, not only will you begin to see the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ in ways that you never have before, but also by doing that you're going to be transformed more and more into his likeness.

I want to camp on this a bit more by taking you to Romans chapter 12. And we'll stay here for the next few minutes until I'm finished. In Romans chapter 12. I'm just going to kind of hit the highlights here. In verse one, Paul urges believers, "to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship." And then he tells us how to do this. Very, very important. If you wonder, well, how can I do that? How can I present my body living in a holy sacrifice, which is my spiritual service of worship? Well, here's at least one of the major themes to help you understand that. Verse two, and "do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." In other words, this is how we give our mind to him; our way of thinking, our disposition, our manner of thought, our attitudes. He says, "Do not be conformed,"-- "syschematizo" in the original language. It was a term that came to mean a masquerade or a mask, playing a role, putting on an act according to a script, a schema. And "syschematizo" is a term that refers to assuming an outward expression, or a form that does not accurately reflect what is on the inside, that does not come from within. It does not reflect an inward reality. It's the idea of being something on the outside that you're not on the inside. And as we look at the term exegetically, the prefixed preposition "sun," S U N, dds to the meaning of the verb that is the idea of assuming an expression, or assuming a form that is pattern after something, namely the world. And so what he's saying here is, do not allow something on the outside to shape you in such a way that it does not accurately reflect who you are on the inside, your inner nature. In other words, don't be something on the outside, that you're not on the inside.

By the way, who are we on the inside? We're a new creature in Christ, we've been clothed in the righteousness of Christ, we saw a little glimpse of the glory of Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration, a glimpse of the glory that we will one day share. Now, what's fascinating in this text, is that the verb is passive, it's not active. So in other words, the shaping, this conforming, this molding, if you will, is not something you will choose to do. But it will be something that you will allow to happen to you, really without even knowing it is going on. And what's that? The world is going to shape you into its image. This is what Satan does all the time. He provides a world system that shapes us into his image. And what is the world this term "age"? Well, it's this world system dominated by Satan, all of the things that he does to thwart the purposes of God. So he's saying here, if you're going to present yourself as a living and a holy sacrifice that's acceptable to God, do not let the world shape you into its image, stop allowing yourself to be shaped by Satan, stop masquerading, therefore, in the garments of this world; adopting its styles, its habits, its attitudes, its mannerisms, its speech and so forth. I like the JB Phillips, famous translation, "Don't let the world squeeze you into its mold." Boy, it's so easy to do, isn't it? Linhart says, quote, "What madness it is to join in this puppet show, which is displayed on a tottering stage. Christians have been introduced into the life of the world to come. What a tragedy then, if they conform to the perishing world they have left." And remember, Satan orchestrates this world system in an effort to destroy you, to destroy your family, to destroy your marriage, to destroy your kids; make monsters out of your children, to destroy your testimony, to destroy your power, to destroy the church. And this has been going on for millennia. Think of the ingenious ways he has of doing that. He provides just a myriad of ways to deceive us. And in fact, our minds, especially through media, through those little cell phones, these little screens, television, music, pornography, false teachers, worldly philosophies on and on, and on it goes. All you have to do is listen to the news today and you will see one satanic deception after another, they just pile up on top of each other.

So Paul is saying in order to present your bodies a living and a holy sacrifice acceptable to God, do not be conformed to this world. Don't allow the world to shape you into its image without you realizing this. Beloved, we must guard our children against this type of stuff. We must guard ourselves, what fellowship has light with darkness, as we read earlier today. But here's the contrast in verse two. "Be transformed." There's that word again. "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Again, transformed from the word "metamorphoo." We get our word "metamorphosis" from that. It connotes, as I said earlier, a change, an outward appearance that reflects an inner nature. I mean, that's what happens when a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, that kind of concept.

Matthew used the same word to describe Jesus' transfiguration. He said in Matthew 17, two, "He was transfigured before them; and His face shone like the sun and His garment became white as light." And you will recall how the effulgence of Christ's glorified inner nature suddenly blazed forth from his person in ways that we cannot understand. A manifestation of the glory of his inner nature. You might say, a preview of coming attractions for us, right? But the key here is understanding that this transformation is also in the passive voice. It carries the idea of allowing ourselves to undergo a radical, thorough change, where we become on the outside who we are on the inside. When it says "Don't be conformed," that's referring to, don't be on the outside who you're not on the inside. To be transformed, is saying, become on the outside who you really are on the inside. Where our outward conduct reflects our inner. Our transformed, redeemed nature that will one day shine forth with the same ineffable glory that we could see in our mind's eye that occurred when Christ transfigured himself on the mount.

Folks, how does this happen? Again, it's in the passive voice, not the active, you're not the one that is going to make this happen. It happens by the renewing of your mind. It's the renewing of your mind. Renewing means to cause something to become new and different with the implication of becoming superior. And this is what Paul is saying here, Second Corinthians 3:18, "Beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord." It's the word of God once again, that causes this transformation to occur. He is the sanctifying one who works within us. He is the agent of regeneration and transformation. By his word he animates the outward transformation that has already occurred because of an inward transformation of our mind, by our thinking and that continues to develop as we look into the Word of God.

So indeed, back to Second Corinthians three, verse 18, "We all, with unveiled face, beholding us in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." Beloved, please hear me. You will never be able to present yourselves as a living and holy sacrifice to the Lord our God and be a person that is acceptable to him, not in a saving way, but in a sanctifying way, apart from the renewing of your mind. If you allow yourself to be conformed by this world, you're going to rob yourself of blessing. And you're going to diminish your ability to glorify God. It's only when your mind is saturated with the Word of God, will you automatically do the will of God? Paul spoke of this often in the New Testament Colossians 1:28. "We proclaim Him admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, that we may present every man complete in Christ. Chapter three, verse 16, he tells us to, "let the word of Christ richly dwell within us, with all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in our heart." And we've got to understand that there is both a moral and an intellectual component to this transformation; this continuous process of renewal that occurs through the word. Jesus prayed to the Father, in John 17:17. "Father, sanctify them in the truth, Thy word is truth." So again, is this a priority for you? I pray that it is. You see, we don't just automatically drift towards holiness, do we? We automatically drift in the other direction. There's always this conflict between the Spirit of God and the flesh. That's why we have to treasure the word of God, as David said in Psalm 119:11, "Thy word I have treasured in my heart, that I may not sin against you."

And then finally, here. Notice the result, the end of verse two, Romans 12, "that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect." To "prove," it means to put to the test, to approve. The renewed mind can know and live the will of God and thus prove it. It can demonstrate it, and thus, give glory to God. And his will is, isn't it interesting, it is good, it is acceptable, and it is perfect. And folks, when his will becomes our will, at that point, our lives will be a living and a holy sacrifice to him.

Back to Second Corinthians 3:18, "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." And Paul is essentially saying to the people there that are being deceived--folks, the days of all of the rituals, and all of the ceremonies and of all the law keeping are over. Christ has satisfied the demands of the law, he paid the penalty that you never could, that we never could. He has paid that penalty. We have been justified by his blood. And the indwelling Spirit is now sanctifying us he is transforming us. And ultimately by that same power, he will glorify us. And we see all of this in the new covenant.

Well, when I was contemplating these things in my study, even this week, as is so often the case, my heart went to a hymn. Don't you find that happening a lot when you're studying the Word of God, all of a sudden you just break out in a hymn. I couldn't remember all of the words; my wife Nancy knows all the words to all to hymns. So I said, "Honey, do you remember it?" She immediately started singing it. It always amazes me. And we're going to sing it just a moment. But in light of all of this, here's what came to my mind, a hymn called "One Day." I used to say it was a little boy. "One day when heaven was filled with His praises. One day when sin was as black as could be. Jesus came forth to be born of a virgin, dwelt among men. My example is he.” and the refrain goes, "living he loved me, dying he saved me, buried he carried my sins far away." "Rising he justified, freely forever. One day he's coming. Oh, glorious day." How many of you know that hymn? (Audio cut off, end of transcription not available)

Before we look at the text, I would like to remind you of why we do what we do right now; why do I stand before you and open up the Word of God and preach it to you? Well, certainly there are many reasons. But first of all, we must remember that sinners cannot be saved, apart from the hearing of the Word. They need to understand it so that they can believe in it. Secondly, saints cannot be sanctified, unless they understand the word and apply it to their lives. And then thirdly, because Satan is so deceptive, it's important for us to understand the truth so that we can spot the counterfeits. Weak preaching will produce weak Christians. And so it's very important that every pastor, fulfill the role of a pastor teacher, as delineated. For example, in Ephesians, four, beginning of verse 12. My role, my responsibility, my calling, my gifting, is to equip the "saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God." The text goes on to speak of how that is to bring you to a place of maturity, so that you will, "no longer be children tossed here and there by waves carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming." And certainly, that is one of Satan's greatest tools to fill pulpits, and Bible colleges and universities, with those who are going to teach things that are false. And shallow preaching that does not deal with the word of God systematically, and exegetically, will ultimately banish believers to an island of spiritual infancy. Most Christians today have very little understanding of Bible theology, and so they have very little spiritual discernment. And they get sucked into all kinds of crazy things that are out there. Perhaps one of the most graphic manifestations of this can be seen in the typical American, quote, "Christian" teenager. I was reading an article on this, Christian Smith and his fellow researchers with the National Study of Youth and Religion at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, conducted interviews with 3000 American adolescents to learn about their religious beliefs. And they discovered what they identified as moralistic therapeutic deism; a concept by the way, which is summarized in his book, Soul Searching the Religious and Spiritual Eyes of American Teenagers by Christian Smith, along with Melinda Lundqvist Denton. But according to the researchers, moralistic therapeutic, deism consists of beliefs like what follows. They discovered that they believe number one, that a god exists who created and ordered the world and watches over human life on Earth. But secondly, God wants people to be good; nice and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions. Thirdly, the central goal of life is to be happy, and to feel good about oneself. Fourthly, God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life, except when God is needed to resolve a problem. And then finally, good people go to heaven when they die. And frankly, that's how most people think today. This is consistent with deists. "Deist" comes from "Deus" in Latin which is word for God. And deists believed basically those things, they believe in the existence of a supreme being, but even though he's the creator, he's not really involved that much with his created world. And we know a lot of diests today. President Trump is a deist; he is not a Christian. He is a deist. Our founding fathers were deist; they weren't born again Christians, most of them. The researchers went on to say quote, "That in some," referring to those five concepts, "when it came to the most crucial questions of faith and beliefs, that in some, is the Creed to which much adolescent faith can be reduced. When it came to the most crucial questions of faith and beliefs. Many adolescents responded with a shrug and quote, 'whatever'." As a matter of fact, the researchers found that American teenagers are incredibly inarticulate about their religious beliefs, and most are virtually unable to offer any serious theological understanding. As Smith reports, quote, "To the extent that the teens we interviewed did manage to articulate what they understood and believed religiously, it became clear that most religious teenagers either do not really comprehend what their own religious traditions say they are supposed to believe, or they do not understand it, and simply do not care to believe it. Either way, it is apparent that most religiously affiliated US teens are not particularly interested in espousing and upholding the beliefs of their faith traditions, or that their communities of faith are failing in attempts to educate their youth, or both." End quote. And as the researchers explained, quote, 'For most teens, nobody has to do anything in life, including anything to do with religion, 'whatever' is just fine. If that's what a person wants." End quote. Well, beloved, we must do better with all of our people, certainly with our young people, but with everyone, we are not a social club. We are not a social activist organization, preaching a social gospel, trying to promote social justice, we're not a word of faith, prosperity cult, learning how to manipulate God so that we can pry goodies out of his stingy fingers. But rather we are the church of the living God, the pillar and the support of the truth, as Paul said, In First Timothy three, verse 15. And as elders we are, "to preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction; Second, Timothy four, two. So that's why we're here right now. That's what I'm doing. That's why I'm doing what I do every Sunday morning. So just a reminder, I know I'm preaching to the choir, but I just want you to really grab a hold of that, because it is so important.

Now as we come back to the word, and this text in Second Corinthians three, may I remind you of the context here; Paul, has been defending himself against the scurrilous and the satanic attacks of the false apostles that had invaded the church at Corinth. They were for the most part Judaizers that insisted obedience to the Mosaic Law was necessary for salvation. And so they mixed elements of the old covenant with the new and so forth, trying to blend it together. And in this section of his defense, Paul provides a short summary of the new covenant that underscores some of the amazing blessings that are inherent in it. And we have looked at the first two of five that I have described in weeks gone by. We looked at number one: the new covenant is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. In other words, as we studied, it is the Spirit who causes us to be born again, he delivers us from the slavery of sin; the power of Satan. He causes us to be more and more conformed to the likeness of Christ and so forth. But secondly, we celebrate the blessings of the New Covenant because it is the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ. The old covenant could not do that. But you have to have the righteousness of Christ or you cannot be saved. And now, thirdly--that we're going to look at today--is that it is also the source of eternal glory. Number four, it is the source of courageous hope. And number five, it is the source of unveiled gospel clarity. So let me read the text beginning in Second Corinthians three in verse 12.

"Therefore having such a hope, we use great boldness in our speech, and are not like Moses, who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away. But their minds were hardened; for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remains unlifted, because it is removed in Christ. But to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their heart; but whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." And I pray that the Spirit of God will give us real understanding, as we look at this text. As I was thinking about the blessings that we can celebrate from the New Covenant my mind, for some reason, went to the Publishers Clearing House commercials. You've seen those where all of a sudden, this van pulls up, these people get out with this great big check, and somebody gets $5,000 a week for life. I assume that's true. I'm not even really sure. But that's beside the point. But you see these people, they're just overwhelmed with joy. It's like the greatest thing that's ever happened to them. Well, folks, the greatest thing that could ever happen to anybody is not winning $5,000 a week for life. It's coming to saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's the blessings of the new covenant. My point is simply this, we need to have the same kind of exhilaration at least that the people have when they win Publishers Clearing House.

So we've examined in days gone by, that the new covenant is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. It's also the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ. And now we're going to look at the final three in the series of five, beginning with--it is the source of eternal glory. Now, you will recall that when Moses received the law on Mount Sinai, he came into the presence of our infinite, holy, transcendent God, and the Shekinah glory of God encompassed Moses. And of course, that glory of God--that dazzling light--in the Old Testament, and even in the new, is always a picture of the visible manifestation of the power and the perfections in the presence of God. And according to Exodus 34, beginning in verse 29, we read how that blazing light of God's glory stayed with Moses. And it emanated from his face when he came down off of the mountain. And that light was so blinding, it was so terrifying, that he had to put a veil over his face. Imagine what that would have looked like. And what is even more fascinating is to note that the effulgence of God's glory that encompassed Moses was only a tiny fraction of the total glory of God. He saw only a partial glory, not the full glory. Of course, that would have destroyed him had he seen that. Let me remind you of this. It's written in Exodus 33, beginning in verse 18. "Then Moses said, 'I pray You, show me Your glory!' And God said, 'I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and I will show compassion on whom I will show compassion.' But he said, 'You cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live!' Then the Lord said, 'Behold, there is a place by Me and you shall stand there on the rock; and it will come about, while my glory is passing by that I will put you in the cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by. Then I will take My hand away, and you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen.'" It's amazing, isn't it? Despite Moses veiled exposure to that tiny, little portion of God's glory, his face shone with such devastating brilliance that it terrified the Israelites and he had to wear a veil. By the way, what will it be like when one day we see the Lord face to face. Because you'll have to be in a glorified state before that can happen or we’d just be disintegrated. But the veil, you must understand, served another purpose, not only to prevent them from just kind of passing out in fear, as they were horrified, it's such a sight. But what we're going to see a little bit later in verse 13, it says Moses "put a veil over his face, so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away." A reference to the Mosaic Covenant, the old covenant. You see the concealment prevented them from seeing the fading splendor that accompanied the old covenant. Let me take you back to verse seven of this chapter. There we read, "But if the ministry of death in letters engraved on stones,"--which by the way is reference to the old covenant law, that which God Himself etched on the stone tablets we read about in Exodus 32--"If the ministry of death in letters engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses, because of the glory of his face, fading as it was, how will the ministry of the Spirit fail to be even more with glory?" A reference to the new covenant. "For if the ministry of condemnation has glory,"-- a reference to the law--"much more it is the ministry of righteousness abound in glory"--a reference to the new covenant.

Now friends remember the old covenant could only damn, it could never justify. It was the basis of condemnation, not the basis of salvation. It could only expose our unrighteousness; it could never impute the righteousness of Christ. And without the righteousness of Christ, no one can be reconciled to a holy God; nobody could be saved; nobody could be redeemed; nobody could enter into the glory of heaven and so forth. And Paul went on to say in verses 10 and 11 of Second Corinthians three, "For indeed what had glory, in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it. For if that which fades away was with glory, much more that which remains is in glory." You see, dear friends, the old covenant law faded after it served its purpose. And its purpose was to expose man's sin and his utter inability to save himself; his utter lack of righteousness and need for the righteousness of God that only he could give. And so its purpose was to bring conviction and to bring repentance, not salvation. But the new covenant, the Gospel, superseded the old covenant and so therefore, as the text says, it "remains," its permanent; it will never fade away. And that's Paul's argument here. He's saying, essentially, to the saints there in Corinth, who are being deceived by these people who are wanting to take elements of the old covenant and add it to the new he's saying, Folks, why do you want to return to that which was obscure; that which was veiled? Yet it was glorious, yes, the Mosaic Covenant, but all of its symbols and types and mystery-- all of that pointed to the new covenant. In fact, its glory was intended to diminish. Its glory would ultimately be superseded by an infinitely greater glory in the glory of the new covenant, a permanent glory. So why resort again to all of the external rituals and ceremonies and sacrifices and diet restrictions and Sabbath restrictions. The old covenant was intended to curse, not to bless. Hebrews 9:12, we read that we are saved, "not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, He entered the Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption." And when we come to saving faith in Christ, that's what we believe. We are saying, Father, I have no merit of my own. I have nothing to contribute to my salvation. I am wholly dependent upon your mercy and your grace and so I cry out to you in faith, asking you to save me. And on the basis of such a profession of faith, we obtain, as we've seen here in the text, eternal redemption, access into the glorious presence of God.

Now remember Old Testament saints were saved the same way New Testament saints were. They were saved by grace, through faith alone--grace alone, faith alone, but on the basis of the new covenant that was promised in Jeremiah 31, for example. You see, the new covenant was ratified at the cross, but its benefits were appropriated by faith that believed that God would fulfill his new covenant promises, that were given in the Old Testament. So you might say that the Old Testament saints were saved on credit. Hebrews nine, verse 15, says, "For this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance." So dear friends, because of the new covenant, we are glory bound; it is the source of eternal glory. I was thinking of that great hymn, "Blessed Assurance, Jesus is mine, oh, what a foretaste," of what? "Glory divine. Heir of salvation, purchase of God, born of his Spirit, washed in his blood." So we celebrate the new covenant because it is also the source of eternal glory.

But number four, it is the source of courageous hope. Notice verse 12; "Therefore, having such hope, we use great boldness in our speech." You know, all you have to do folks is look around and you see a world that has no hope. It's really sad, isn't it? People hope in their political ideologies, they hope in their politicians, they worship the god and goddesses of government. I think of all of this chaos that we see around the country today. The people that basically say, Look, folks, we can have Utopia on Earth, if everyone will just agree with our presuppositions with our agenda. And if you don't, we are going to silence you. We're going to force you to agree with us. What kind of hope is that? Other people hope in their religion; their personal efforts to impress God with their good works, with their rituals and ceremonies. And of course, that's what was going on in Paul's day with Judaizers. We see this in many branches of Protestant evangelicalism, even today. Jesus came to make salvation possible, but only if you do your part. And folks, that's not the gospel. You have nothing to contribute. All false religions have their list, don't they? Do this, do that; earn your salvation. And of course, all of those are counterfeits. These are people that really have no hope. You've heard me say before that when I encounter Jehovah's Witnesses, or Mormons or Muslims, I will always ask them somewhere in the conversation, “So I'm curious, do you think you're going to make the cut?" And it's always fascinating to watch the reaction. Because down deep, they just don't know for sure. And sometimes they will tell you that. And I always love to be able to say to them, "boy, I know I couldn't. But I trusted Jesus who made the cut for me. He paid a penalty I could never pay. So my confidence, my hope, is in Him; in what he has accomplished." I always like to tell people; the law says here's what you must do. But the Gospel says here's what Christ has done. And therefore, we can sing "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest frame but wholly lean on Jesus’ name. On Christ, the solid rock I stand all other ground," is what? "Is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand."

Back to verse 12. "Therefore, having such hope, we use great boldness in our speech." The term "boldness" here is a reference to the fearless proclamation of the gospel even in the face of great adversity. You know, I've given you a tract here that you can hand out. Or you can link it online to somehow plant the seeds of the gospel. And it's easy for us to be filled with fear--oh I'm not sure what somebody might say. And then suddenly we become more afraid of man, have fear of man more than we do of God. We very subtly become ashamed of the gospel. But folks, when your heart is absolutely consumed with the Gospel; the triad of the gospel, which is faith, hope, and love, then you will have boldness. I mean, think about it, you have to have faith, otherwise, you have no hope. And if you have no hope, you will have no real love for other people to share the good news of the gospel with them; you're too concerned about protecting yourself. So if you're afraid of opposition, you need to think about this. You need to be obedient. First, Thessalonians, five, eight, where Paul says, put on "as a helmet, the hope of salvation." I see a lot of the police out there, they've got these helmets and the masks, they keep the bricks and all the other opposition coming at them. Well, we've got a helmet too. And it is the hope, the helmet of the hope of salvation. So again, the new covenant is the source of courageous hope. Romans 15:13, Paul says, "Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." Folks, this is the hope according to Colossians, one five that is "laid up for you in heaven, of which you previously heard in the word of truth, the gospel." According to Hebrews 6:19, this is the, "hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope which is both sure and steadfast, and one which enters within the veil."

You see, this was the new covenant hope that Paul preached that absolutely infuriated the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. But also, it was the new covenant gospel that saved many of them, as it has us. Aren't you thankful that people were bold enough to share the truth with us? Paul prayed for the Ephesians in Ephesians 1:18, "that the eyes of their hearts may be enlightened, so that they would know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints." This is, according to Hebrews seven and verse 19, "the better hope through which we draw near to God." This is, as Peter said, In First Peter, one, three, "the living hope, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." And for this reason, he went on to say in verse 13, and verse 21, he said, "fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ....Your faith and hope are in God." You know, as I was meditating on that passage, I just thought to myself, Lord, when you come to take me home, I want to be found as a bold, indefatigable, wounded, perhaps, soldier who just never gave ground; battle scarred, but refused to give up the post. And folks, I want you to be with me. And I know so many of you are. But what drives that kind of boldness? It's the hope that we have in Christ. It's the new covenant. It's the gospel. We serve the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the victory is ours. I know a lot of times it looks like we're losing the war. You know, it's kind of like playing in a football game, and they just keep moving the goalposts. It's like, you're just never going to win. But ultimately, because of Christ, we win. So we fix our hope completely on the grace to be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ, our faith and our hope are in God.

So, the new covenant is the source of eternal glory. It's the source of courageous hope. And number five, it is the source of unveiled gospel clarity. Again, verse 12. Notice, "Therefore having such a hope, we use great boldness in our speech." Verse 13, "and are not like Moses, who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away." What's going on there? Why do the veil? Why would God have him do that? Well, verse 14 says, "But their minds were hardened." In other words, what he's saying here is, in contrast with Moses--who wanted them to understand the impermanence of the law; who wanted them to understand that its purpose was to reveal sin and our inability to keep it; to expose our need for a Savior, to expose the fact that it was a covenant that was going to fade away and be superseded by the new covenant--Unlike them, you know these truths. Of course, the Jews had lowered the moral standards of the law. They came up with creative, superficial ways of keeping the requirements externally. When I think about that, boy, that's me, my heart just naturally goes to that. I can always come up with some way that I think God is going to be impressed with me. Kind of the shortcut, you know? We've all got a little bit of hypocrisy in us, right? And that's what they were doing. And like all legalists, they invented ways to be righteous in their own eyes. And it's for this reason that God hardened their minds and their hearts. I mean, after all, think about it, who needs a savior if you can save yourself? That's what he's saying to them. So in verse 14, we read that God judicially hardened their minds. "Mind" in Greek, it comes from the word, "noema." Which refers to our faculty of thought; our ability to apprehend or understand things. And because they were playing this ridiculous game, trying to come up with ways of being obedient to the law, and thinking that they were righteous in God's eyes, because of this, God rendered them unable to recognize the significance of the fading glory symbolized in Moses' veil. They just couldn't see it, they didn't get it. So their ability to apprehend, their ability to perceive the truth of the new covenant was dead. And as I say, two plus two is five. We run across that all the time. You give people the gospel, you explain it to them--two plus two is five. Unless the Spirit of God does something in their heart, it's always going to be five or six, or seven, or whatever, but it will never be four. Unless the Spirit of God changes their heart. It says, verse 14, that their "minds were hardened." "Poroo", in the original language. It comes from a Greek word "poros." It was used to describe a stone, for example. A stone that would be used in, in construction. But it was also used to describe the formation of that kind of bony callus that forms around a fractured bone. That's the idea. And in that sense, and especially because it's a passive verb, there's the indication here that their unbelief caused their minds to become calloused over, or to become hard. Metaphorically, they became insensitive, blind to the truth. We see this concept of hardening in numerous passages in the Old Testament. Let me give you one, Deuteronomy 29. If we go there, we would see that the context describes how the despite all that God had done for the Israelites, and rescuing them, delivering them from the bondage of Egypt, they still did not fear the Lord. They still disregarded His glory and the awesomeness of his character. They still disobeyed him; tried to pursue righteousness on their own. And so in Deuteronomy 29 four, we read, "Yet to this day, the Lord has not given you a heart to know, nor eyes to see, nor ears to hear." And of course, we saw this in the first century and it continues to this day.

The same spiritual blindness continues among most--not all--Jewish people. Paul spoke of this in Romans 11 and verse eight. He said, "Just as it is written, 'God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes to see not and ears to hear not, down to this very day.'" Jesus described this as well, you may recall, John five, Jesus excoriated the Jews for their fastidious rule keeping, where they thought that they could somehow impress God and obey the law even though they were mucking around with it to get it where they could; obey it superficially. And, of course, this prevented them from seeing the truth of the new covenant. And so in John 5:39, Jesus says, "'You search the Scriptures because you think that in them, you have eternal life.’” Then he says this, "'it's these that bear witness of Me.'" The point is, you can't see it.

And by the way, Christ is the main theme of Scripture. In verse 46, of that same chapter--in John five--Jesus said "'For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me.'" So in other words, you just wouldn't see it in the Old Testament. And ultimately, we see that God blinded them--judicially hardened their heart because of their unbelief. If you go to Deuteronomy 18, verse 15, we see the Lord clearly there. "'The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your countrymen, you shall listen to him.'" It's as if Jesus was saying to the Jews, I mean, what do you think when you read that? You couldn't see me in that? You couldn't see me and the new covenant promises in Jeremiah 31? You couldn't see me in the royal messianic psalms and the Psalter? You couldn't see me in Isaiah 52, verse 13, through Isaiah 53? Paul tells us that Israel's blindness is going to continue until the Messiah returns and saves a remnant of his people. Romans 11, verse 25, and following, here's what Paul says, "For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery--so that you will not be wise in your own estimation." In other words, you Gentiles, I don't want you to get cocky here. I want you to understand what God has done with the Jewish people. And he says this, "that a partial hardening has happened to Israel, until great word of hope there until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS."

So indeed, back to our text in verse 14, "their minds were hardened." I see this as well in Luke 24. Remember, when Jesus met with a couple of his disciples on the road to Emmaus? You know, I mean, they were they were frustrated. They were talking about, well, you know, Jesus, we thought he was the Messiah, we thought the kingdom was going to be brought in, and then all of a sudden, I mean, He's crucified. And now there's rumors that he's been risen from the dead? What's going on here? They were astonished at all of this. They had no idea they were talking with Jesus, until later. And Jesus said to them in Luke 24, beginning in verse 25, "'O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!'" He went on to say, "'Was it not necessary for the Christ,'" the Messiah, "'to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?' Then beginning with Moses, and with all the prophets, Jesus explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures."

See again, if only the Jews had embraced the purpose of the law, and the passing glory of the Old Covenant, that would be superseded by the new--had they done, so that veil would have been removed. And fortunately, someday, for many it will be. And some are having it removed now. But Paul's point with all of this, with the Corinthians, is to say, look folks, unlike the hard-hearted Israelites in the days of Moses, your hearts have been softened by the Holy Spirit who now dwells within you. Verses two and three speak of that in this chapter.

Back to his Jewish kinsmen, in verse 14, at the end, he says, "for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant," which by the way, they would do in the synagogues, "the same veil remains unlifted, because it is removed in Christ. But to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lives over their heart." I've got Jewish friends that have come to faith in Christ and I love to hear them describe how the Spirit of God lifted the veil over their eyes. But how sad, think about it, even in Paul's day. People knew who Christ was, he had healed everybody in Palestine, basically. They knew of his crucifixion, his resurrection from the dead, or at least claims of it. They had all this new covenant clarity from his preaching, and the preaching of the Apostles and others, that explain the purpose, and impermanence of the old covenant. And yet, despite all of that, they still would not believe it. And in their arrogance, they believe that they could somehow accomplish their own righteousness by keeping their version of the law. And of course, this is totally contrary to anything you would read in the Old Testament. I think of Isaiah 66. You may recall the context there is how God is not looking for a temple of stone to dwell in, he's looking for tender humbled broken hearts. And in verse one of Isaiah 66, he says, "Thus says the Lord, 'Heaven is my throne and the earth is My footstool. Where then is a house you could build for Me? And where is a place that I may rest? For My hand made all these things, thus all these things came into being.' declares the Lord. 'But to this one I will look.'" In other words, this is what gets God's attention. "'To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word.'" That's what the Lord's looking for. He dwells in that kind of a heart. And ironically, Israel's unbelief actually fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies that he would have to suffer. Really an interesting thought. Paul described this to his Jewish audience in Antioch. He was speaking in a synagogue; they're telling them all of these things they certainly didn't want to hear. We read about it in Acts 13, verse 27, he says, "For those who live in Jerusalem, and their rulers, recognizing neither Christ nor the utterances of the prophets, which are read every Sabbath, fulfilled these by condemning Him." In other words, fulfilled the fact that Messiah would have to suffer. And I must confess, I fear that some of that same hard-hearted unbelief may exist even among some of the people here at Calvary Bible Church. I mean, you want to ask yourself, am I humble and contrite of heart? Is my heart tender to the reality that I have nothing to offer God to earn salvation? And I'm wholly dependent upon his grace. Do I tremble at his word? Or am I indifferent towards it, like the typical American, quote, unquote, "Christian teenager," and just say, "whatever, no big deal." You hear the gospel, but it really doesn't impact you. You kind of wish the preacher would just hurry up and get through it all. You don't embrace it wholeheartedly. Folks, if that is you, you're spiritually dead, and you will perish in your sin.

Dear friend, examine yourself. Don't be deceived. Hebrews 10, beginning in verse 28, says, "Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses." But then he adds this, "How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled underfoot the Son of God." In other words, rejected the Gospel. "And has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?" Then he says, "For we know Him who said, 'VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY.' And again, 'THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE." It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Folks, we must remember that God only saves those who are absolutely convinced that they have nothing to offer. Those who are desperate for mercy and grace. His grace is only available to those who know they cannot earn it. He only saves the broken and the humble and the contrite and the desperate; those who mourn over their sin; those who hunger and thirst for righteousness beyond their own.

In verse 16, he says, "But whenever a person turns to the Lord," here it is, "the veil is taken away." I love that. You remember when the light came on in your life? I do, when I was a young boy. Gospel clarity. When suddenly you could see the horror of your sin, the glory of the cross and all of a sudden it made sense. By the way, when that happens, that's called regeneration. Reminds me of an old bluegrass song we used to sing--"I saw the light, no more darkness, no more night. Now I'm so happy, no sorrow inside, praise the Lord. I saw the light." That's what verse 16 is. Whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Paul spoke of this in Second Corinthians four six, he said, "For God, who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness.'" A reference to creation. That same God is, "the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." Folks, that's what the new covenant does. That's the power of the gospel.

I'll deal with verse 16, or 17, and the end of 18 the next time we're together, but jump down to verse 18. He says, "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord." The analogy here is this-- When Moses was in the presence of God on the mountain, his face was unveiled, even though he was only allowed to see a tiny portion of the glory of God. But now, new covenant believers--those who have placed their faith in Christ--can behold the glory of the Lord with an unveiled face. That's the idea. O child of God don't miss this. We celebrate the blessings of the new covenant because it is the source of unveiled gospel clarity. Think of it this way, regeneration produces illumination. It causes us to be born again, as we see the light of the amazing truth of the gospel. So what was once concealed in all of the types and the mysteries of those symbols, and the pictures; all of that's now clear. The New Covenant explains what was once a shadow of what was to come-- the glory of the gospel. So Paul is saying, you people are being duped by these false apostles. Why go back to the shadow when you have the reality? That's the point.

Well, may I challenge all of you to celebrate the blessings of the new covenant in your family and in your life. Fathers, especially you. Real men, godly men, shepherd their families. Men that don't are wimps. That's all there is to it. So many wives, so many children are frustrated because their husbands and fathers don't shepherd their people. Godly men are going to take these truths and understand them, make them such a part of themselves, that they're gonna share them and teach them to their children.

First Corinthians 16:13, "Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong." And that's my encouragement to all of the men here on Father's Day, but to all of us. Let's see, let's examine, reexamine and celebrate the blessings that emerge from the new covenant, because it is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. It is the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ. It is the source of eternal glory, the source of courageous hope, and the source of unveiled gospel, clarity. And all God's people can say, Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these truths. May they bear much fruit in each of our hearts as we celebrate them in our lives, as we live them out, so that others can see the hope that is in us. And because of our faith and our hope, and our love, may we be bold in our proclamation of the gospel. We commit all of this to you in the name of Jesus and for his sake. Amen.

Good morning, everyone and welcome to Calvary Bible Church via the internet. Unfortunately, I'm speaking to an empty sanctuary. But I know that you are there via the computers and all of the technology that we have. So I'm glad to be able to minister the word of God to you this way, unfortunately, the pandemic has come into our church with at least one individual that we know of. So as you're probably aware, we are going to shut down for a couple of weeks to quarantine ourselves. And Lord willing, this will pass and just pray for the individual that has this and pray that God will be merciful to the rest of us to keep us healthy.

Well, this morning, we come again to our study of First Corinthians or Second Corinthians, I'm sorry, Second Corinthians chapter three, if you will take your Bibles and turn there, we're going to be looking at the second part of this concept of celebrating the New Covenant. We're gonna be looking at verses six through 11 this morning. And as we begin, may I prepare your hearts and minds by reminding you of a little gland that we have on our body. It's called a pituitary gland. And the pituitary gland is about the size of a pea, it's right behind your nose, it's at the base of your brain, it's right in the very center of your brain. And until the invention of super powerful microscopes and technology that could measure infinitesimal amounts of hormones, scientists didn't really know what that little gland did. But once they discovered what it was really doing, they understood that it was, what they now call, the master gland. It was a gland that secretes hormones that regulate many of the organs in our body, many of the glands in our body. Well, I give you that as a little analogy of this passage of Scripture. We can come to this passage of Scripture, and we can think to ourselves, well, this really isn't all that important of a passage of scripture. And so we tend to just kind of read over these things and, and not really look into them. But as we take our time, and really look at what the Apostle Paul is saying here, we find ourselves just overwhelmed with a myriad of great truths that are both exhilarating to those of us who know and love Christ and very instructive as well. So I invite you to, to look at this portion of Scripture with me once again. Remember, Paul is defending himself against the slanderous attacks of the false apostles that had invaded the church at Corinth, Judaizers that were trying to mix Old Testament law with the new covenant and so forth. And, as I mentioned to you the first time we were together, there are five reasons that emerged from this text. Five Reasons to help us celebrate the New Covenant. We're going to see, as we looked at the first-time last week, that it is number one, the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. Secondly, the new covenant is the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ. Number three, it's the source of eternal glory. Number four, it's the source of courageous hope. And finally, it is the source of unveiled gospel, clarity. So we're going to look at least a couple of these this morning as we continue to make our way through this passage very carefully.

So let me read it to you. Second Corinthians chapter three, beginning in verse six. God, "also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. But if the ministry of death, in letters engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face, fading as it was, how will the ministry of the Spirit failed to be even more with glory? For if the ministry of condemnation has glory, much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory. For indeed what had glory, in this case has no glory, because of the glory that surpasses it. For if that which fades away was with glory, much more than that which remains is in glory."

Now the last time we were together, we looked at the first source of celebration of the new covenant. Number one, it's the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. I want to elaborate on that a little bit more, before we move to the second reason that we can rejoice. Now remember, if we come back to verse six, unlike the false apostles that were trying to mix Old Testament law with the new covenant, he against says, "God also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." Remember the letter of the law, in other words, it's legalistic, external requirements that the Jews were trying to keep in order to merit salvation, all of that kills; just what Paul says it kills your joy, it kills your peace, it kills your hope. And to know that if you violate one aspect of God's holy standard, then you have violated it all. And it's punishable by death. And so the old covenant saints were living under that bondage, plus all of the rules of the rabbis. I was reminded by a friend that sent me a video this week of Manhattan, where a lot of Orthodox Jews live, there is what's called an "eruv;" e, r, u, v--a Hebrew word that stands for a boundary. And in this case, in Manhattan, the whole urban area is enclosed by a single wire boundary. And you if you go to Israel, you will see this in many places, you'll see eruv in various parts of the land. But anyway, this wire boundary symbolically extends the private domain of Jewish households into public areas. And this in their mind permits them to have activities in a much larger area that would normally be forbidden in public on the Sabbath. And so it gets crazy, the types of things that people will come up with, to impress God. That particular wire, by the way, that circles around Manhattan, I believe, is 18 miles long. They say it costs $100,000 a year, just to keep it up, to make sure that it's not broken. And there's a rabbi that travels around every day, to make sure that it's not broken. So you see these types of things that rabbis impose on top of what God's law was.

They also have for example, "mezuzahs", as they're called. It's a little decorative box. And inside is a piece of parchment that has some of the Torah some of the law rolled up inside of it. They will have, for example, Deuteronomy six, four and following, "Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with, with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your might." And they take literally Deuteronomy 11:20, where God said, "You shall write them," referring to the law, "on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." So if you go to Israel, for example, you go to a hotel, you go into your room, right there on the doorpost is a little mezuzah; got some of the law in there. You'll see in a restaurant; they are right on the doorposts. In fact, I've been in restaurants in Israel, where the waiters and waitresses will go in and out of the kitchen, there's a mezuzah right there on the doorpost, every time they go by, they will touch it and kiss it. And you just see this routine going on and on and on.

Well, unfortunately, these are the types of things that people believe when they misunderstand the old covenant, and they do not appreciate the new covenant that it pointed to, that now surpasses it in all of its glory. And remember, the law never had the power to redeem people. That was not its intention. All it could do is condemn us. And obedience to the law was never meant to be a means to salvation Romans 3:20, "by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin." So we come back to verse six here at the end And Paul says, "but the Spirit gives life." And as we discussed the last time we were together, it is the Spirit that produces regeneration; he causes us to be born again. Otherwise we would remain under the power of the evil one; First John 5:19. John three, remember, in verse five, Jesus told Nicodemus, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water, and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." The Greek when it says, "he cannot," "ou dynamai," it means you have no power, you have no ability, in and of yourself to enter into the kingdom of God, by any other means whatsoever. I mean, it's very strong language. And he says, "you must be born of water and the Spirit."

By the way, that has nothing to do with water baptism. Water and spirit were frequently used in the Old Testament; they were used together to symbolize renewal and cleansing. And of course, this would have resonated with Nicodemus. He would have understood this very clearly because he was a great teacher of Israel. And he would have known that what Jesus is referring back to is Ezekiel 36, beginning of verse 24. And by the way these rabbis memorize, essentially the entire Old Testament, so he would have known about this, Ezekiel 36:24, God says, "'For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your land.'" By the way, that's part of the promise of the Abrahamic covenant that will ultimately be fulfilled, but that regathering and that restoration of Israel in the Land promises, cannot occur until there is salvation, until there's a new heart and so forth; and we see the beginnings of that now. But then he goes on to say, "'Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.'" My what a day that will be for those people, as it is today for many of us who have been saved by God's grace. And Paul uses the same metaphorical imagery when he describes regeneration as being sprinkled with clean water and being given a new heart. He uses this in Titus three, verse five, where he says, "He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit." So regeneration is therefore, shall we say, a cleansing from sin. It's a purifying renovation of our very nature, a creation of a spiritual life. It's something that the old covenant law was never intended to do. And this change is referred to in the New Testament as "a new creation" Galatians 6:15. We're called "a new creature" in Second Corinthians 5:17; "the new self," Ephesians 424. It's called "being born again," First Peter 1:23, and so forth. Oh dear friends, what a miraculous transformation. And we must celebrate this. This is part of the new covenant. There is a a supernatural breaking from what Paul said, "our former manner of life," Ephesians 4:22 and our quote, "former lusts," First Peter 1:14. As new creatures Paul says that, "the old things passed away, behold, the new things have come," and we can all who know Christ, we can see that in our in our lives, in our hearts, in our minds. Colossians 3:10, "We have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge, according to the image of the One who created him." In Romans 12 and verse two, "We are no longer conformed to this world, but we're transformed by the renewing of our mind." John 3:19, Jesus went on to tell Nicodemus that we, "no longer love darkness rather than light." Indeed, dear friends, we come to the light by the power of the Spirit, because he has made us to love the light; we have new affections, we have new desires because of the Spirit; new desires that the natural man cannot understand because the natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God. They "are foolishness to him," Paul says, and they "cannot understand them," First Corinthians 2:14.

Now think about this, have you ever noticed how different our desires are from the unregenerate from those that don't know Christ, all you have to do is look at the hideous display of depravity in the police brutality that we witnessed last week, and also the rioting and the looting of these depraved anarchists, and arsonists that are destroying parts of various cities around the country. And then to look at the the utterly astounding absurdity in the lack of response from these progressive leftist mayors and governors. It's astounding. I shake my head when I listen to some of these politicians and some of the pundits, they're utterly clueless about what's really going on; how to diagnose and therefore treat the problems in our country. And of course, the answers are always political--Oh, it's systemic racism. It's white privilege. It's white supremacy, it's income inequality. If we would just provide better jobs and educational opportunities and on and on and on it goes, then all of our problems will go away, folks, that's foolish. That is utterly foolishness. The problem is human depravity. And the answer is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, whereby the Spirit of God changes people's nature; changes their desires; changes their hearts. True Christians do not care about the fads of the world. They don't embrace its values or its wisdom, which God calls foolishness. They don't take up its causes. God has saved us to take us out of the world, not to make us conform to the world. "But whatever is born of God overcomes the world," First, John five and verse four. We know according to Romans 12, two that the believer is constantly seeking that which "is good and acceptable and perfect." And folks, we do this, because of the power of the Spirit of God at work within us. And this is why Paul told the Corinthians in First Corinthians two verse four, "my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit, and of power, that your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God."

Now, the folks in Corinth understood this; most of them were true believers. Some of them were undoubtedly Christian in name only; you always have that in churches. But the important point to remember is this-- what validates genuine saving faith, what validates the fact that a person is regenerated or has been born again, is not some profession of faith. It is not church attendance, or denominational affiliation. It's not even outward morality; not even the conviction of sin. The real evidence is a changed life. And it is the indwelling Spirit of God that energizes that obedience.

If you drop down a little bit lower in our text in verse 17, Paul says, "Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." Indeed, there is. There is liberty from the unsuccessful attempts of trying to impress God by keeping the law. It's the spirit that brings liberty from the bondage that people had to the law; Romans seven, one through six. It's liberty from the power of Satan, who terrorizes people with the fear of death and coming judgment. In fact, Paul says in Romans eight two, "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death." And certainly, it's also liberating in that it liberates us from the enslaving power of sin, so that we might walk in newness of life, as we read in Romans six. And if you also look at verse 18, at the end, he says, We "are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." That's the work of the Spirit. This is why we celebrate the new covenant, just even in this aspect of it. Colossians three, beginning in verse eight, Paul says, "But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander and abusive speech from your mouth. Do not lie to one another since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, and have put on the new self, who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him." Folks, this is what the Spirit of God enables new covenant believers to do. And, of course, this is a great concern of mine; for the church today, even here at Calvary Bible Church. A person can make all kinds of affirmations about the gospel, all manner of professions of faith and yet be a total stranger to the saving and sanctifying power of the gospel. I remember the testimony of a good friend of mine who was saved out of a very liberal denomination that he attended faithfully for many years. But a denomination and a church where they never taught the gospel. He had no clue what the true gospel was. He eventually came to Christ. He's been a pastor for a number of years. But let me let me read to you part of his testimony. Here's what he said, "Having lived most of my life in the so called "Bible Belt," I have met and known scores of people who profess to be Christians. Yet in their daily lives have been indistinguishable from those who have never made such a profession. In fact, I myself used to be such a person. I have lived both sides and seen the fallacy of one and the truth of the other. Such people as I, once rarely read their Bibles, much less know them. They take no delight in talking about the things of the Lord, their lifestyles, are as worldly and self-indulgent as their incomes will allow. And oftentimes more than they will allow. Their minds are set on and preoccupied with earthly things. In their dress, they take their cues from the culture, or are driven by personal preference rather than biblical principles, and are just as immodest, provocative, ostentatious and sensual as the world. They allow the culture to dictate the standard of modesty and morality, and what is appropriate and inappropriate. They watch the same ungodly movies, listen to the same music, are influenced by and follow the same fads and trends and reflect the same values, priorities, thinking and reasoning of the culture. Their speech is often course and profane. Their social media platforms are shallow, vain, self-promotional, compliment-seeking and narcissistic. They have no devotion or love for spiritual truths and biblical principles; especially if they contradict some preference or presupposition, or require an alteration in their thinking, values, beliefs and lifestyles, and to forsake some cherished lust and sin." He goes on to say, "They're giving to the work of the Lord is sporadic, self-serving, and minimal at best, with virtually no inconvenience to their overall lifestyle. They are not only utterly incapable of discerning truth from error, the clean from the unclean, the holy from the profane, and the fruit that is from the spirit of the world, from the fruit that is of the Spirit of God, but they are completely indifferent toward them. They can listen to what is good and true and what is bad and heretical without any discrimination. But for all of this, they are quite certain they will go to heaven when they die. If you ask them. 'What is the basis for this confidence?' They will tell you that many years ago, they accepted Jesus as their Savior, and invited him into their heart,” end quote. ''Once saved, always saved,' is their comfort and assurance." But he says, "the sign and evidence that someone is truly regenerate, is not some empty prattling about how secure they are once they made a profession of faith. But," quote, "'that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed'--Romans 6:17," end quote.

And, folks, this is the great danger of cultural Christianity; a Christianity that is in name only; a Christless Christianity and may I humbly encourage all of you to examine your life. Later on in this epistle, Paul encouraged the folks of Corinthians, to do that very thing. He said in Second Corinthians 13, five, "Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you--unless, indeed you fail the test?

Now, I want to make a very important digression; a very brief one, but an important one. I want to offer you three very basic tests that you can use to examine your heart, examine your life, and there's many others. There's a number of them in First John, for example. But these are evidences of regeneration. Number one, ask yourself, do others see Christ in me? You know, many professing Christians live respectable Christian lives on the outside, but they know nothing of the reality of the new birth on the inside. Physically speaking, we know that a child will manifest a likeness to his or her parents. When you see a baby, we always can very quickly say, "Oh, my goodness, that child has his father's nose and maybe his mother's eyes" or whatever. They will share many of the same qualities because they share that DNA. Well, the same is true spiritually. Those born of the Spirit will manifest qualities that are consistent with their divine nature. In fact, Second Peter one four we read that we have, quote, "become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust." But when we come a child of God, we began to manifest characteristics consistent with holiness. We're able to escape the power which the rottenness of the world can overcome us with. And we see this in this new life. And think about it all life manifests characteristics consistent with its nature. Jesus said that, "A good tree cannot bear bad fruit nor can a bad tree produce good fruit," Matthew 7:18. And Jesus went on, by the way, to tell Nicodemus remember, in John three and verse six, he said, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Now, obviously, no believer can attain to perfect holiness; that is not going to happen until glory, but if you're truly born again, you're going to see decreasing patterns of sin, and an increasing hatred of it.

I can thankfully say, I am not what I want to be, but by God's grace, I am not what I was. And that is all the work of the Spirit in my life. And so many of you can say the same thing. First, John three, beginning in verse nine, the apostle says this, "No one who is born of God practices sin," why? "Because His seed abides in him, and he cannot sin." In other words, that will not be the pattern of his life, "because he is born of God. By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God." So you want to ask yourself the question, "Do others see Christ in me?"

A second question that gives evidence to regeneration is this, "Do I have a hunger for spiritual food?" First Peter two beginning in verse two, "Like newborn babies, we are to long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow and respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord." Now we know that a little child cannot survive, and he certainly cannot grow, apart from proper nourishment. Well, the same is true of a person born of the Spirit. We cannot survive. We cannot grow apart from the word. And so like a newborn baby, a true believer is going to crave the pure milk of the word. He's going to crave that like a little baby craves mommy's milk. It's like a matter of life and death. The true believer is going to love the Word of God. They are going to love to read their Bibles. They're going to love to hear good solid preaching and teaching and read books that help them understand how to know and how to serve the Lord their God. The excellency and the majesty of the Lord Jesus Christ will be their food and drink. And they will constantly gaze upon the cross and all that Christ has done for them. They will have what Jonathan Edwards called, "holy affections." That is the work of the Spirit. They will therefore have a hunger for spiritual food. Those who have no appetite for the pure milk of the word, have no basis to believe that they have been born of the Spirit. It's very simple. I mean, think about it. By nature, carnivores love meat, and herbivores love plants. And by nature, vultures love roadkill. Human beings can't stand to even get near it. Only a change of nature can change those desires. And we know for example, according to Ephesians, two three that the unregenerate quote, "indulge the desires of the flesh and of the mind." Why? Well, by nature they are, quote, "enslaved to various lusts and pleasures." Titus three, three--from same sex attraction to pornography, from alcoholism to materialism, from self-exultation to self-fulfillment, that's where their mind is. They're enslaved by the lusts and pleasures that God abhors. But not so those who have been radically transformed by the Spirit of God, we have no desire for those things; the things of the world--the philosophies, the psychological theories, the values, the false religions, the false doctrines that are out there. Most forms of worldly pleasure and entertainment are like roadkill to the truly regenerate. We've got to change nature, but not so for those who had never been born again. According to Romans eight, five, "For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh." So you want to ask yourself, "Do I really have an appetite for the Word of God?"

So number one, do others see Christ in me? Number two, do I have a hunger for spiritual food? And finally, "Am I growing into the likeness of Christ?" Dear friends, this is a basic principle of lif; all living things grow. If they're not growing, they're dying. Those born of the Spirit will according to Second Peter 3:18, "grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." And biblically we know that growth is proportional to one's commitment to know and obey the Word of God. Growing into spiritual maturity requires a deepening knowledge of Scripture. This is why for example, God has given pastor teachers to the church, we read about this in Ephesians, four, beginning in verse 12. God has given pastors and teachers "for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the Body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ." He goes on to say as a result, "we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth and love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ." And as we grow up, we began to manifest the fruits of the Spirit, as we see in Galatians five, "love joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control." This is what will grow on the vine of our life. Those who walk by the Spirit, in other words, those who yield to the Spirit of God as He has revealed Himself in Scripture--on a moment-by-moment basis--they are going to look, and they are going to act, they're going to talk differently than those who don't. They are not going to be ruled by the flesh. The unregenerate are ruled by the flesh. Galatians five goes on to say that in verse 19, there Paul speaks of the deeds of the flesh he gives a little list they are: "immorality, impurity," which is another term for fornication. "Sensuality idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing and things like these." So you need to ask yourself, can I see and can others see measurable growth into Christ's likeness in my life? Or do I just kind of play an external game? Am I just part of the churchianity crowd? Am I just a more religious version of the same self- willed, self-serving hypocrite that I've always been?

Well, the new covenant makes all of this possible, because it is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. Now, some have asked, and I want to address this very briefly, an important footnote here; some have asked, did Old Testament saints receive the same type of spiritual blessings as the New Testament saints? In other words, were they born again as well? Were they regenerate? Well, the answer is ultimately, yes. The Holy Spirit regenerated Old Testament believers, and this is evidenced, by the way; there's a number of reasons we could go into, but certainly, Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus gives evidence to this because that occurred before the ratification of the new covenant with Jesus' death; as we read about in Luke 22:20. So regeneration essentially involved a quote, "circumcised heart," as you read in the Old Testament. But the Holy Spirit did not permanently indwell Old Testament saints. He did, however, abide in them, as we see, for example, in Haggai two and verse five. You might say that the spirit dwelt with the Old Testament saints through the community, but he did not permanently dwell in them individually and intimately, as Jesus indicated in John 14:17, where he said to the disciples, quote, "'You know Him, because He abides with you, and will be in you.'" And of course, that happened at Pentecost. This is what Jesus referred to in John seven, beginning of verse 37. There he says, "Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, 'If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, 'From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.''" But he goes on to say, this, "He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified." So there John helps us see by quoting Jesus. So it's fair to say that that New Covenant believers enjoy a more permanent and more intimate experience of the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit than old covenant saints. But his essential work and salvation was the same.

So back to our examination here of this amazing passage, we can celebrate the new covenant number one, because it is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit, but secondly, it is the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ. Notice verse seven. "But if," or could be translated, "since"..."the ministry of death, in letters engraved on stones"-- referring to the old covenant law, which God himself etched on tablets of stone, as we read about in Exodus 32--"but since the ministry of death and letters engraved on stones came with glory, so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses, because of the glory of his face, fading as it was, how will the ministry of the Spirit fail to be even more with glory? For if the ministry of condemnation has glory, much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory. Now, this is fascinating. Remember, his opponents were telling everyone that Paul just doesn't see the glory in the old covenant; he is opposed to God's law. And we read about these charges, for example, in Acts 21. But of course, none of that was true. For example, in Romans seven beginning of verse 12, Paul says this, "So then the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Therefore, did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be Rather it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by effecting my death, through that which is good, so that through the commandment sin would become utterly sinful." You see, again, the purpose of God's law was to expose man's depravity in light of God's purity and drive him to the Savior. Romans seven in verse seven at the end, "I would not have come to know sin," Paul says, "except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, 'You shall not covet.'" An interesting example that he uses "covet," "epithumeo" in the original language; it means to lust or to strongly desire; to have what belongs to someone else; to crave that which is forbidden. It carries the idea of an evil desire. We're not to have evil desires. By the way, this refutes the unbiblical and very misguided position that some evangelicals promote regarding same sex attraction. They say, Well, hey, that's just normal for some people, and therefore it's acceptable. But if they act on it, then it's sin. No, no, no, no, no. That is not true. The desire itself is sin. And the power of regeneration changes those desires. What a glorious truth that is. Regeneration just doesn't just merely change behaviors, it changes our very desires to act in ways that are reprehensible to God.

By the way, you shall not covet is taken from the Old Testament law and the 10 commandments that God gave to Moses in Exodus 20. And this is the 10th commandment actually, in Exodus 20, verse 17, we read, "You shall not covet." In other words, you shall not lust for or strongly desire for the following, "You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant or his female servant, or his ox or his donkey or anything that belongs to your neighbor." Now, it's also fascinating that Paul uses other concepts to describe how he wasn't opposed to the law. We see that the Holy Spirit inspired him to tell us something else that the law would do. And that is that the law would actually incite him to do more sin. And he wants people to understand this as well. We read about it in Romans seven in verse eight, "Sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, produced in me coveting of every kind, for apart from the Law sin is dead." So on the one hand, he's praising the law because what it exposes, but also, he showing how sin took advantage of him.

By the way, the key to interpreting that text is understanding the little phrase, "taking opportunity through the commandment." "Taking" in the original language means "to seize or to grasp"-- what he's saying here is that it seized me and it's the idea of a cause to give occasion for something that is going to take a hold of you. In fact, the term was used to describe a staging area or a base of military operation to begin an expedition. So we could literally translate what Paul was saying, like this-- sin, making use of the commandment as a base of operations--produced in me coveting of every kind. It's a fascinating concept. And here, sin is personified as an evil power that is antagonistic towards the law, intent on making a mockery of it by producing more sin that will violate it. So what is he saying? He's saying this, when I understand the laws, once I understood the laws, strict prohibition against lust, against coveting, my rebellious flesh was incited to further covetousness, to further rebellion. It used the commandment as a staging area to launch an attack of every kind, on coveting. Its why he says "it produced in me," an interesting term. It was a powerful term in the original language to mean, "to accomplish something with absolute success and thoroughness." And what is it that that the law accomplished in him? Well, it incited further rebellion. Notice the last phrase, in verse eight, "For apart from the Law, sin is dead." So what he's saying is, yes, the law is holy, it's glorious; it exposes sin. But it also causes our sin nature to be provoked, to actually come alive as it were. It's as though we have these malignant cells that lie dormant within our bodies, as if they are dead until something activates them to more corruption.

You see, friends it is characteristic of our sinful nature to rebel against all manner of authority, especially God's authority. Man is by nature a rebel. Man is by nature one who despises rules and regulations. He is a fool that has no fear of God. Now we see this in our little children, right? I mean, do you tell them? No, or Yes, more than the other? Obviously, we tell them no far more than we tell them, yes. Because they're demanding their own way. Moreover, you can tell them, look, children, you can play anywhere in the house, anywhere on the property, but do not go into that red shed back there. Well immediately what's going to happen in the heart of a child? I'm going to get into that red shed one way or the other. I've got to go in there. Well, this began in the garden, didn't it? Remember with Eve? I mean, God told Adam and Eve that you can freely eat of every tree in the garden, except the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Of course, that was a test. They already knew good. But if they disobeyed, suddenly they would know evil. And what happened? Well, Eve basically said, as she responded to Satan's temptation, I don't care what God says, I'm going to eat that forbidden fruit.

So back to Paul's defense here in Second Corinthians three and verse seven. Paul was basically saying to them, Look, you know, if you try to rely upon the law for salvation, you're in for an eternity of suffering, because the law is, as he says, "a ministry of death." Now, mind you, this was in stark contrast to the Jewish idea that the law is life-giving, but rather it is life-taking. And then he uses the illustration of the Shekinah glory of God. Remember that dazzling light that was the visible manifestation of the perfections, and the power in the presence of God that encompassed Moses when he went up onto Mount Sinai and he stood in the Lord's presence, and the Lord gave him his law. This is recorded in Exodus 34, verse 29, let me just read this to you. "It came about when Moses was coming down from Mount Sinai (and the two tablets of the testimony were in Moses hand as he was coming down from the mountain), that Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because of his speaking with Him. So when Aaron and all the sons of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him." As we study that passage, we see that it was so bright it was like they couldn't really look at him. It was just a terrifying thing. And later on, and in that same section of Scripture, we read how that all the children of Israel came near, and he gave them the commandments; all that the Lord had spoken with him on Mount Sinai, and then what happened? He put a veil on his face. And this concealment prevented the people from seeing the fading splendor that accompanied the old covenant. But Paul's use of this illustration refutes any accusation that Paul did not see the glory of the law; that somehow, he opposed the Law. No, no, not at all. The old covenant manifested the ineffable glory of God, of his perfections and his power, his presence, but also his holy nature, his justice, his wrath. It shows his glory even in his judgment. But it only pointed to that which was far greater, namely the new covenant. The new covenant that reveals the ineffable grandeur of his compassion, of his mercy, of his grace, of his forgiveness.

So in verse nine, back to our text, Paul says, "For if the ministry of condemnation has glory," which obviously he's saying it did, "much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory." You see, the point here is the old covenant had no power to impute the righteousness of Christ to believers. And without his righteousness, there's no salvation; we can never enter into the presence of a holy God. And for this reason Paul declared in Romans three beginning of verse 21, “But now apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been manifested." Oh, what a wonderful truth. "Apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, for all those who believe."

So Paul goes on in his defense here in Second Corinthians three, in verse 10. He says, "For indeed what had glory, in this case has no glory, because of the glory that surpasses it." Yes, the moon is beautiful. It has glory, until you see the sun. Then he says, verse 11, "For if that which fades away was with glory, much more that which remains is in glory." Folks, this helps us better understand Paul's amazing testimony. Remember, in Philippians three, there, he listed all of his impressive credentials. He gave his resume, you might say that would be reason that anyone would think that of all people, this man can have confidence in his religiosity. I mean, he was a super Jew, if you can put it that way. I mean, Superman wore Rabbi Saul pajamas in those days if we can imagine this. Chuck Norris, of that day, had Rabbi Saul's poster in his bedroom. I mean, Saul was just, he was just super Pharisee. And yet, look what he says in Philippians, three, beginning in verse four, all because of the new covenant. He says this, "If anyone else has a mind put confidence in the flesh, I far more: circumcised the eighth day of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless. But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I might know him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained it, or have already become perfect, but I press on, so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus." My what a profound source of encouragement for every believer who can read that and say, my, I can attest to the same thing. I can look back at my life and realize that there, there's nothing in it that's worthy of showing a holy God and saying, aren't you impressed with what I've done. But rather, we see the horror of our sin and we see the righteousness of Christ that was imputed to us, that changed everything. All because of the new covenant; the power of the Spirit to transform our heart. Dear friends, we have so much to celebrate in the new covenant. Indeed, it is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit, and it is the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ.

Dave Harrell

I want to close this morning with a true story of a man who was born of the Spirit in Scotland in 1839. I love testimonies, because it puts the glory of Christ on display, not the glory of man. And this is a testimony that's going to thrill all of us who, by God's grace, have experienced what it means to really be born by the Spirit. But I might also add that this testimony will sober those who have not. This is actually an extract from a letter written by George Moody, Esquire; the son in law of Pastor W. H. Burns, who was the faithful pastor of the church in the little village of Kilsyth Scotland. He served there, by the way from 1821 till 1859 when the Lord took him home, and this letter was one that was written to give evidence of the Great Awakening that occurred there for a small period of time in that region in Scotland. And here's what the testimony reads, quote, "The case of D.S." He doesn't give the name to protect the man's name, "collier," which is another word for coal miner, he was a coal miner. The case of this coal miner "may be mentioned as interesting." He says, "he had for some time been thoughtful and had been given up entirely, taking any intoxicating liquor, and might be characterized as one of the more hopeful description. Since the present awakening, he was deeply convinced of his sin and misery. And for a month was deeply exercised in spending much time in secret prayer and reading the scriptures." By the way, folks, there's evidence of regeneration--being born by the Spirit. "On the evening of the 21st of August, he had a meeting with several of his praying companions, and spent the night in prayer, praise and converse. He appears to have obtained peace during that night and came home to his house in a very happy state of mind. After taking just two hours rest, he worshiped with his family, and proceeded to his work. Being the foreman, it was his lot to descend first into the pit, which he did with unusual alacrity and with prayer," alacrity is another word for enthusiasm. "On the reaching of the bottom, the air instantly exploded, and in a moment, he was ushered into eternity. How soothing and cheering, the thought that he has escaped the everlasting burnings and has passed literally, through the fire, to the regions of glory." O, dear friends, what hope we have in Christ. And if you're within the sound of my voice, and you know nothing of the miracle of the new birth, because you have never come to Christ in repentant faith and pled with him to save you, by his grace, which he will do instantly, then you are living in a very dangerous season of your life because you never know when something might explode, so to speak, and take you into eternity. And so I pray. I pray, especially for our children, for our youth, for anyone that has some phony religion or whatever. If you do not know Christ, you need to do business with God today. You need to cry out to him for his saving grace. And he will save you, even as he saved this dear saint that I just read about. And for those of us who know and love Christ, I just closed by asking you to just rehearse some of these great truths in your mind in your heart. We've got all of this terrible news out there, you turn on the television, and after a while, it just almost makes you sick. You're seeing all of this depravity. You're seeing all of the insanity. Folks come back to the glorious truths of the word of God. And it will bring refreshment to your soul. Celebrate what Christ has done for you, what he is doing, and what he will ultimately do. And because of this, we will worship him with great adoration, and others will see Christ in us. And by his grace and by his power, we can be salt and light in a world that desperately needs cleansing; it desperately needs truth. And hopefully, they can see that in our lives and in our testimony. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths that always emerge from your Word, and penetrate our hearts with such clarity and such conviction. And for those that don't know Christ, I pray that you will bring conviction and bring them to saving faith. Lord please don't let any of our people be self-deceived with a cultural Christianity. And Lord, for those of us who know and love you, even though we fail in so many ways, we celebrate the power of your grace. We celebrate what it means to be born again. And we thank you for the sanctifying power of your spirit. Use us mightily for your sake, in our families, in our workplaces and in our communities. I ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus, and for his sake. Amen.

This morning, I would like to begin a series that will take us through the next several Sundays. I'm not sure how long, we'll just see how the spirit moves within me through his word. But I want to talk with you about celebrating the new covenant. So take your Bibles, turn to Second Corinthians chapter three--we're continuing to make our way through this epistle. This morning, we will begin to look at verses six through 11. Before I read the text, may I remind you of the context, Paul continues his defenCorinth andhe scurrilous attacks of the false apostles that have infiltrated the church at Corinth, and made all kinds of ridiculous accusations against him. They were for the most part Judaizers, those that were trying to mix elements of the old covenant with the new, trying to impose mosaic aspects of the Mosaic Law upon believers. And in this section of Paul's defense, we find a beautiful summary of certain aspects of the new covenant, which really underscores the amazing blessings that are ours in the Gospel. And in this text alone, we have sufficient revelation to fuel our hearts with celebratory praise for eternity. So let me read it to you. Second Corinthians three beginning of verse six. God also "made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. But if the ministry of death, in letters engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face, fading as it was, how will the ministry of the Spirit failed to be even more with glory? For if the ministry of condemnation has glory, much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory. For indeed what had glory, in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it. For if that which fades away was with glory, much more that which remains is in glory."

We live in a culture that has no fear of God. And of course, that is indicative of the heart of fallen man. But sadly, we're also witnessing that same dynamic in the evangelical church. Most professing Christians are biblically and doctrinally illiterate. In many ways, they're too ignorant to know they're ignorant, which is sad. They have no concept of the holiness of God, they have no concept, therefore, of the sinfulness of man; they have no concept of the eternal wrath of God that abides upon sinners and his gracious deliverance that is available to all who repent and come to faith in Christ. So for many people, in churches today, the good news of the gospel just isn't really all that good of news. In fact, because the gospel is so offensive, many have opted for a less offensive version of the gospel, to make it more appealing to the masses. And so the emphasis is on how much God loves you, and how God accepts you just as you are, how he died to make you healthy, and happy and successful in life. And so the gospel is all about self-esteem. In many churches, it's all about eliminating guilt. It's all about promoting tolerance, and social justice. And in an effort to validate the subjective feelings of unbelievers and believers alike, the church has largely abandoned bold, exegetical, preaching and teaching, that exposes very clearly the righteous wrath of God against sinful man and exalts the mercy and grace of God that can deliver them from it. And as a result, the church is constantly being filled up with more and more unbelievers. People who are Christian in name only. Satan continues to sow tears amongst the wheat. So even in churches today, wrong has replaced right, worldliness has replaced godliness, hypocrisy has replaced genuine saving faith and deception has replaced truth. Because to the natural man the things of the spirit of foolishness. And like the proverbial frog in the kettle, religious people sit in their churches with a self-righteous grin as Satan gradually and imperceptibly turns up the heat of deception on them until they are utterly destroyed eternally.

You know, many people today in churches are concerned about how COVID 19 is affecting churches and rightfully so. But dear friends, I would submit to you that the horror that is happening, in evangelical Christianity, makes any fear of COVID-19 pale into utter insignificance. We have women preachers; we have homosexual clergy. We have churches blessing animals. We have drag queens reading Bible stories to children, in so-called worship services. We have people lying on the graves of deceased preachers to soak up the, quote, "anointing from the corpse," a practice known as grave sucking. In many churches, there is nothing more than unfettered emotionalism and ecstatic gibberish that they call worship; that frankly, mirrors the type of satanic pagan worship that existed in ancient Corinth, known as Extasia. A friend of mine sent me a YouTube video of a woman preacher, Paula White, who I understand is a spiritual adviser to President Trump, which is frightening to me. And in this video, she says this, "The queen bee is known for her dance, and she starts dancing, fluttering her arms going up and down and twirling around," and by the way, as she says these things in between everything she says, is a rhythmic gasp, to work people like that. And so that's kind of the dynamic here. "The queen bee is known for her dance. She goes into a frenzy to get all the bees activated. And she leads the way by stirring something up. I dare you, Deborah, come on"-- a reference to Deborah I think is possibly the prophetess Deborah in Judges. "I dare you, Deborah, come on, stir it up right now in the name of Jesus, stir up faith in others, stir it up. Do you think I was ashamed to stand on the lawn of the White House in front of the President, the Vice President, the FLOTUS, the nation, and the press and declare in the name of Jesus? I declare right now an end to this COVID-19. What good if I pray some cute little prayer? What good am I if I have some fancy little poem or just talk about the problem? Everybody knows the problem. But who's going to come forth with the solution? Stir them up, stir them up. Come on, Deborah. Stir them up right now. Stir them up. There's a whole lot of food, there is revelation. Come on. Where's my Deborah, where's my Deborah?" Folks, I ask you, how does that in any way point to the glory of Christ? And how can ostensibly evangelical people tolerate that kind of insanity? That kind of blasphemy. And we're worried about COVID-19's effect on the church. Jesus prayed "Father sanctify them in the truth, Thy word is truth." How is that going to sanctify people? Like so many others, she's making Christianity a laughingstock to the entire world. 1000s of so called Christians follow this woman and many others like her, which is not only a demonstration of a lack of discernment, to say the least, But also, I would submit to you, a lack of genuine saving faith. I know of women, even in this town, in the Nashville area, and in other parts around the country who are into the prosperity gospel cult, who will go to the most expensive clothing stores down in Nashville, knowing full well they can't afford anything in there. But they will go there and lay hands on the clothes that they want and claim them in Jesus name. Now what kind of insanity would promote that? No true believer will be deceived for long with such imbecility because the Spirit of Truth dwells within true believers. Jesus said, "They shall be taught by God," John 6:36. And we're all worried about COVID-19 and what it's doing to the church? Yet we're witnessing an unprecedented freefall of apostasy in the church today.

Recently, I noticed a teaching pastor position on an online church staffing website. They were looking for a teaching pastor, nondenominational church, about 1000 people, let me read you part of the job description, "They will be open minded and non-religious." With the next sentence here, "they will have a solid grasp of the principles and values that Jesus taught. They will have the ability to complete a message in a timely fashion, and the ability to deliver it in the 30 minutes or less time allowance." Rules me out, right? They give the name of the church and say, "we're in agreement with Rob Bell, John Shelby Spong and other more liberal leaders, we are an all-inclusive community that welcomes and affirms all, regardless of history or sexual orientation or preference. Our goal as a community church is not to get people," quote, "saved, as they do not need saving." "We believe in the transformative power of love and grace that Jesus offers, but do not believe in traditional punitive models of hell, requiring salvation."

Dear friends, what I just read, finds its source in the father of lies. What I just read is satanic. By increasing numbers, instead of the church being, as Paul said in First Timothy 3:15, "the household of God," literally the dwelling place of God, the church of the living God, the pillar and the support of the truth, the church has become, in many sectors, the dwelling place of Satan, the pillar and support of deception. While many churches do not embrace some of the charismatic error that's out there, or some of the blatantly apostate forms of liberalism, they do embrace just a dumbed down, watered down superficial gospel. Cotton candy, sermonettes for Christianettes. Shallow as water on a plate. Therefore people don't grow.

Now the consequences of a superficial man-centered church is multifaceted, but certainly at the top of the list is a gross misrepresentation and mitigation of the holiness of God. And when God isn't all that righteous, man isn't all that sinful, right? Who needs a savior if God's just kind of our buddy, and he just kind of winks at sin? Well, God knew that this would be part of the depraved part of mankind. He knew that we would be foolish, and that we wouldn't really understand his holiness and the depths of our sin, and our need for a Savior. So what did he do? He gave us his law which is crucial for our understanding of the difference between the old covenant and the new covenant and understanding the text before us.

So let me take you back and help you understand a little bit about the law of God. This is crucial. The Law of God, sometimes referred to as the "Mosaic Code," was the codification of God's holiness. It was the divine standard for righteousness. And as we look at the law, we can see various elements of it. First of all, there was a twofold summarization of the law. Very simple. We are to love the Lord God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength and love our neighbor as ourselves. But then there was a 10 fold summarization of the two fold summarization, which was called the Decalogue, or the Ten Commandments. It was also called the Tablets of Stone; the Mosaic law given to Moses on Mount Sinai in Exodus 19 and 20. It was also called the Old Covenant. Now, under the old covenant, God said, if you will obey what I tell you, I will bless you. If you disobey, if you violate it, I will curse you. As we look at the Decalogue, we see that the first three were basically on how to love God perfectly, then you have the Sabbath, and the rest of them are how to love your neighbor. But then there was also a manifold summarization of the 10-fold summarization that summarized the two-fold summarization, you with me? And the manifold summarization was called the Words of the Covenant Exodus 24:7. In fact, the entire Book of Leviticus is a detailed expansion of the law. And all of this was written down and it was placed in a receptacle next to the Ark of the Covenant. And the Ark of the Covenant, of course, had the tablets of stone inside of them. Deuteronomy 31, verse 26, God said, "Take this book of the law, and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may remain there as a witness against you." You see, the purpose of the law was to expose sin; a witness against you. Any breach of the law, any violation of the law, means that you broke the whole law, and the consequence was always death. So it was very oppressive. It exposed man's need for mercy and for grace, for savior, for a righteousness beyond our own.

Now, the law, which could also be understood as the Old Testament scriptures, had three divisions. First of all, there was the moral law that regulated Israel's...the way they were to love the Lord their God with all their heart and love their neighbor as their self, which was based upon the 10 commandments; that was the moral law. And then secondly, there was the judicial law that regulated Israel as a theocracy. And then there was the ceremonial law, which regulated how Israel was to worship. And ultimately, we know biblically, that Jesus fulfilled each division of the law as we read in Matthew 5:17. His sinless life fulfilled the moral law, and his condemnation and temporary judgment upon Israel, whereby they were temporarily set aside as a nation, fulfilled the judicial law. And then finally his atoning work on the cross fulfilled the ceremonial law.

But I want to add, we don't want to forget that while the judicial and the ceremonial laws were fulfilled in Christ and are now obsolete, the moral law is still being fulfilled through the church, through us, because we are united to Christ through faith. For example, the apostle Paul spoke of this in Romans chapter eight, beginning in verse three. Sobering words here, he says, God sent, "His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the requirement of the Law,” catch this, "might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." And if we look, for example, at the first four verses of Romans seven, Paul reveals to us that because of the fact that we have died in Christ, we've been freed from the penalty of the law. We are now hidden in him, the one who has fulfilled the law, the one who is perfectly satisfied. The justice that God demands in the law, we are no longer in a position of somehow trying to keep the law. However, the law was never intended to save us. Because the law never had the power to redeem anyone from their sin. All it could do, was condemn. Constantly. Obedience to the law was never a means of salvation, Romans 3:20, "By the works of the Law no flesh will be," what?.."justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin."

Now, as we go to Corinth with Paul, these false apostles come in, requiring people to obey certain aspects of the old covenant, which would naturally be a direct attack upon the finished work of Christ, an affront to grace. You see works and grace are mutually exclusive. When it comes to salvation, works will always be the fruit of grace. But it will never be the route of grace. And this is Paul's point here in Second Corinthians three, seven through 11. And here in his defense. We discover five reasons to celebrate the blessings of the new covenant. I'm gonna give you all five, but we're just going to do part of number one today, okay? There's just so much here.

We celebrate the new covenant, because number one, it is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. Number two, it is the source of the imputed righteousness of Christ. Number three, it is the source of eternal glory. Number four, it is the source of courageous hope. And finally, it is the source of unveiled gospel clarity. And I pray that the Holy Spirit will use this to illuminate your minds with these astounding realities that Christ may have an even greater preeminence in your heart.

So first of all, under this first heading that we'll begin to examine today, we see that the new covenant is the source of eternal life by the Holy Spirit. Again, notice verse six, God, "made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." The phrase, "the letter of the law," is a reference to the external requirements of the law that the Jews would try to live by; they would try to obey. And Paul was saying, that kills. It does. It insults your self-righteousness; it exposes your sin. Let me take you to Romans chapter seven to better understand this, beginning in verse nine. Here's what Paul, who remember now was a Pharisee; was a rabbi; He was a fastidious keeper of the law. Here's what he said, Romans seven, verse nine, "I was once alive apart from the Law;" in other words, I thought I was really spiritual, before I really understood the law; I thought I was quite alive, I was doing well and my ignorance, as the old saying goes, ignorance is bliss, right? "But," he says, "when the commandment came, sin became alive, and I died." My what a striking reversal. Think about it. First sin is dead, and I am alive. And then sin is alive, and I am dead. In other words, what he's saying is when I was alive apart from the law, sin was dead and I was alive, sin had not yet provoked within me a true grasp of God's holiness, of his righteousness. I felt like I was doing pretty good. I mean, I was a Pharisee, I was an expert in the law, I was fulfilling all those externals, but not from the heart. I was a self-righteous hypocrite, thinking that somehow, I could justify myself and sanctify myself. But when I truly understood the law, suddenly sin became alive, and I died. You see, when you understand the holiness of God, suddenly sin goes on a rampage within your heart. I remember this, when I first came to Christ, I began to see sin like I had never seen it before. How it was animated within me, within my...even my imagination, I see it like never before. Suddenly, I can see the horror of my guilt. It's running rampant in my imagination; I can't get away from it. Sin is alive, because corruption is lurking within the caverns of my imagination, within the very depths of my soul, and worse, yet, I am utterly helpless to do anything about it. That's what the Lord does. It's almost as if Paul was saying, I was once like the Pharisee in Jesus' parable, remember Luke 18. He went to the temple to pray and verse 11, he says, "'God, I thank Thee that I'm not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax gatherer. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.'" And on and on it goes. But it was the tax gatherer that truly understand the law. He understood it because It exposed the depths of his sin. If we go back to Romans seven, verse 10, Paul said, "and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me." You see, the law can't do anything to bless an unbeliever by keeping it, because we can't keep it. So he says in verse 11, "for sin, taking an opportunity, through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me." The idea here is that the sin tricked me into believing I was good enough on my own to be acceptable to God, therefore, I didn't need a savior. So this Jesus comes along, he's like, What are you talking about? So obviously, folks, it was not the law that was sinful. I want you to understand that. Nor does it inspire sin; the law is perfectly holy, but the commandment became the occasion for sin, the opportunity for sin, and death becomes the tragic consequence of it. So for this reason, Paul goes on to say in verse 12, "So then, the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good." Yes, because it's illuminating us to see our sin and cry out to Christ, and put our trust in him, and therefore glorify God. So he says in verse 13, "Therefore, did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be! Rather it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by effecting my death, through that which is good, so that through the commandment, sin would become utterly sinful."

Now back to second Corinthians three, verse six, God also, "made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter," not of all those external requirements, "but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." Let me show you how the letter kills. I want to take you back into the Old Testament. Let's be the dear Jewish people that are trying to obey the law, let me give you a sample of what that would have been like. And again, remember that God gave the law to reveal his holy standard, so that people would cry out for a savior. And you're going to see this, as I go through some of this Galatians 3:24, "The law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith." Not by works by faith. "But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor."

So let me give you a sample of what it was like to live under the old covenant. And I want to do this by examining the dominant feature of the old covenant of the Mosaic law and that is the Sabbath, the Hebrew Shabbat, which means rest, which means cessation. So let me begin by taking you to Exodus 31, beginning in verse 13. God says to Moses, "'But as for you, speak to the sons of Israel, saying, 'You shall surely observe My Sabbaths,''" plural, with "''this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you. Therefore, you are to observe the Sabbath, for it is holy to you. Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death; for whoever does any work on it, that person shall be cut off from among the people. For six days work may be done, but on the seventh day there is a sabbath of complete rest, holy to the Lord; whoever does any work on the sabbath day shall surely be put to death.''" You get the idea, friends, that God is serious about his holiness? By the way, the command for the Sabbath is the fourth of the ten commandments, but it is not repeated anywhere in the New Testament, because it belonged to Israel under the mosaic economy. It does not apply to the new covenant economy of the church age. In fact, it is nullified completely in the New Testament. For example, read Colossians 2:16 and 17.

Let me tell you what it was like. Every single sabbath day the Jewish people were reminded of their obligation to keep the two-fold commandments, summarized by the ten-fold commandments, expanded in great detail by the manifold commandments, right? That's what you were to do every sabbath day. The sabbath was again a constant reminder of your need to obey God's righteous law. It was never to be violated or you would be put to death. For example, you could not work on the Sabbath. You might recall in Number 15, the Jews found a guy, well he was gathering wood on the sabbath, and they hauled him before Moses and said, "Moses what should we do?" And Moses said, "The man shall surely be put to death all the congregation shall stone him with stones outside the camp." That's what they did. You see on the sabbath day, all activities were completely suspended. And you will say, well, what did the people do? Very simple. They basically sat and contemplated the depths of their depravity, and their wretchedness and their need for righteousness that was not their own; so that they would cry out for mercy. You also had to stay at home; you could do absolutely nothing at home, you couldn't even cook. Meals had to be prepared the day before. You couldn't even start a fire. This is why if you go to Israel today, they have what's called Shabbat elevators. On the Sabbath day, when you go into an elevator, every button is pushed, you know, like the kids do that make you mad when they get on and just punch all of them, and it takes you forever because it stops at every floor. That's what happens in the elevators in Israel. And the reason for that is because you can't light a fire. If you touch it, there's a spark; violate the law. See how crazy it gets. In fact, Orthodox Jews have timers on their lights in their home so that they won't turn on a light on the sabbath and kindle a spark. You couldn't carry a load. You couldn't buy or sell anything. So it's not like, well, hey, let's order a pizza; no, can't do that. Couldn't post something, what is it, you post stuff on to sell, you couldn't do that. You couldn't order anything on Amazon. I mean, all that's out. Isaiah 58:13 talks about the sabbath, "you turn your foot from doing your own pleasure on My holy day, and call the sabbath a delight, the holy day of the Lord honorable, and honor it, from your own way." In other words, you couldn't enjoy anything according to your own preference, or he says, "from speaking your own pleasure." So no personal indulgences. Or he says "speaking your own word." So in other words, there was no mindless chit chat. Basically, you did nothing but contemplate the holiness of God and your own sinfulness.

It was a day to be as holy as possible, a day of complete rest, but also a day to celebrate the perpetual covenant that God has made with Israel, Exodus 36:16, which will cause you to "delight in the Lord your God," Isaiah 58:14. So again, folks, what I'm trying to impress upon you is God is serious about his holiness, real serious about his holiness. And God has not changed. Fortunately, he's given us a new covenant, where Christ has satisfied the demands of the law on our behalf, otherwise we would be toast. Right? Now, they're obeying all of these things, in addition to all of the sacrifices and ritual cleansings and celebrations. I want you to understand that the Sabbath, and all of the other feasts and sacrifices and so forth, were the very center of gravity around which the entirety of their lives would orbit. It controlled everything they did. And then you have all of the holy convocations and feasts. Let me give you a little sample of them. These are other forms of sabbath. In Leviticus 23, there's the Passover. That was followed immediately by the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Verse eight says, "For seven days you shall present an offering by fire to the Lord. On the seventh day is a holy convocation; you should not do any laborious work." Then there's the Feast of First Fruits with all of its restrictions, then the Feast of Pentecost; 50 days more of restrictions. Then the holy convocation of the Feast of Trumpets, verse 23, we read in the seventh month on the first of the month, you shall have a sabbath. There's another sabbath, a reminder by blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation, you shall not do any laborious work. And remember, now, during all of this, you're still having to keep the sabbath every single day. Then you have Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, Leviticus 23:27. "On exactly the 10th day of the seventh month is the day of atonement; it shall be a holy convocation for you, and you shall humble your souls and present an offering by fire to the Lord." So we all line up now and we bring our offerings. "You shall not do any work on this same day, for it is a day of atonement, to make atonement on your behalf before the Lord your God. If there is any person who will not humble himself on this same day, he will be cut off from his people. Then verse 33, you have another sabbath, the Feast of Booths, it says in verse 34, "On the 15th day of the seventh month, the Feast of Booths for seven days to the Lord. On the first day is a holy convocation, do no laborious work." By the way, during the Feast of Booths, when you're in Israel, and even in certain parts of the United States with Orthodox Jews, you'll see the people making little huts out in their yard and they will stay there. Verse 36, "For seven days you shall present an offering by fire to the Lord. On the eighth day you shall have a holy convocation and present an offering to by fire to the Lord; it is an assembly. You shall do no laborious work. These are the appointed times of the Lord which you shall proclaim as holy convocations, to present offerings by fire to the Lord--burnt offerings and grain offerings, sacrifices and drink offerings, each day's matter on its own day--besides those of the sabbath's of the Lord, and besides your gifts, and besides all your votive and freewill offerings, which you give to the Lord. On exactly the 15th day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the crops of the land, you shall celebrate the feast of the Lord for seven days, with the rest on the first day and the rest on the eighth day. Now on the first day you shall take for yourselves the foliage of beautiful trees, palm branches and bows of leaves, leafy trees and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. You shall thus celebrate it as a feast to the Lord for seven days in the year. It shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations; you shall celebrate it and the seventh month. You shall live in booths for seven days; all the native-born in Israel shall live in booths, so that your generations may know that I had the sons of Israel live in booths when I brought them out from the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.''" It's a good way to sign off. Right? "So Moses declared to the sons of Israel, the appointed times of Lord." Boy, talk about a complicated onerous system.

Let me give you a little bit more, in case it hasn't sunk in sufficiently. In Numbers 28, verse 11, we have what's called the New Moon convocation, "at the beginning of each of your months you shall present a burnt offering to the Lord: two bulls and one ram, seven male lambs one year old without defect." Peter would have had a fit in those days right? Then in Leviticus 25, he describes the restrictions for Sabbath years, each seventh year they had to leave the ground alone. Then in verse eight, there's another Sabbath called the Jubilee. You, "count off seven sabbaths of years," seven times seven every 49th year, it's the year of Jubilee. And if you violate any of God's covenant law it's punishable by death. It's interesting they punished a lot of things; God had capital punishment on many things. If you look it up, you'll see that if you were a child or a teenager and you cursed and dishonored and disobeyed your parent, you could be put to death. Be put to death for adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, idolatry, incest, and the list goes on. By the way, there were no prisons in ancient Israel; that didn't come along until the monarchy. You were either executed or enslaved, to make restitution for what you did.

Now you add to all of this, the ridiculous rules that the Pharisees came up with; rules that God didn't ask, but stuff they came up with, I won't even go into it. They are they are ludicrous. And you can see why Jesus said to the people, "Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden." Don't you know they were? I get weary and heavy laden, just talking about it. Just thinking about it. "Come to Me and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle, and humble of spirit and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." This is why the apostle John would say in First John five, three, "His commandments are not burdensome." No, they're not because of the new covenant. The Psalmist said "Oh, how I love your law." Psalm 119:97. Psalm 40 verse eight, I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your Law within my heart." Lord, I know I try the best I can, but I know that ultimately, I'm just dependent upon your grace. By the way Old Testament saints were saved just like New Testament saints, they were saved by grace, through faith; and Christ that had not yet come.

By the way, I hope you understand how absurd it is for some people, like, for example, the Seventh Day Adventists to arbitrarily transport certain aspects of the law and grace, the Old Covenant, into the new. You know, I've talked with some of them before, and they say, Yeah, you know, we keep the Sabbath. Oh really? First of all, which one? And secondly, all of it? You know, which parts do you leave out? Really, you keep the Sabbath? Oh, my, you know, the diet restrictions alone would leave me out. Boy, I love a good pork BBQ sandwich, you know?

Now back to Paul's defense that God made us "adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter"-- not of all those external things that you have to do--but of the spirit, "for the letter kills." Yeah, it kills your hope. It kills your joy; it kills your peace. You're always wondering if you're gonna make the cut. And this is the horror of legalism. Always coming up with another hoop you got to jump through; some external religious hoop to impress God, and somehow make you feel better about your own spirituality. Because after all, you're doing all these things that other people aren't. Talk about hypocrisy; the futile works of sacramental ism and ceremonialism. Romans 10, verse three, "not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God." So here in Second Corinthians three, Paul is saying, Look, God did not make me a servant of the old covenant, of all that stuff. I mean, the letter kills, he made me adequate to be a servant of the new covenant, because the Spirit gives life.

And, folks, here's why I would say that number one, we see that the new covenant is the source of eternal life in the Spirit. You must understand that it is the Spirit of God that is the agent of regeneration. Do you realize that by His power, you and I were born again?

Remember, when Nicodemus the Pharisee, this great leader of all of Israel, he was on the governing body of the Sanhedrin; this teacher of Israel at the very pinnacle and prominence of Israel. He comes to Jesus, confessing that he's this great teacher and miracle worker. And, and in essence, what he's saying is, what do I need to do to get into the kingdom? I'm doing all these things, but I need to know what must I do to be saved? And basically, what did Jesus say? Well basically what he said, You must be born again. Got to be born again. Notice what Jesus didn't say, Well, you need to, you need to keep this rule here. And you need to start doing this. And then this and this, quit doing this and start doing this. No. You see, folks under the new covenant, it's all of grace. It's not of works. Jesus said, John three, three, "'Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.'" In other words, what Jesus is saying, and this is why the true gospel is so offensive; and I'm going to give you elements of it right now--what Jesus is saying is that sin has so corrupted and polluted the soul of man, that there is absolutely nothing that he can do to save himself. He is utterly dependent upon God to do a total renovation of his nature. He is saying that all that man is, and all that man does, is fundamentally offensive to a holy God. It is only the Spirit that gives life. That's what he's saying. You can't do certain things and somehow cooperate with God's grace and then save yourself. It's the Spirit that gives life. Jesus repeated this in John 6:63, "It is the Spirit who gives life."

You see in regeneration, we are born according to John 1:13, "not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." In regeneration, man is entirely passive, wholly dependent upon the miraculous work of the Spirit to give spiritual life to a spiritual corpse, because we're dead in sin. James 1:18, "In the exercise of His will," not ours, but his will, "He brought us forth by the word of truth." And of course, Jesus uses this amazing imagery of birth. I mean, think about it, even as a child makes no contribution to his own conception or birth in the physical realm. He’s totally dependent upon the activity of the parent. So too, a sinner who is dead, spiritually dead, totally depraved, and totally dependent upon the sovereign grace of God, can't do anything to contribute to his spiritual birth. It is the Spirit who causes man to suddenly see the horror of his sin. And it is the Spirit that causes us to acknowledge that sin, to cry out for mercy, to repent and to believe in Christ. Even though that is our responsibility, it is the Spirit that causes us to act consistently with what God has called us to do. Jesus said in John three verse eight, back to Nicodemus, "'The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from, and where it is going.'" Then he says, "'so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.'" I like the way John Murray put it, quote, "The wind is not at our beck and call, neither is the regenerative operation of the Spirit," end quote. By the way, this is the danger of altar calls. This is the danger of revivalism. This is the danger of us trying to say "Spirit of God, I'll take over here, I'll do some things to manipulate people. Let's get the music just right, get the stories just right, get everybody kind of worked up. And let's get them to make a decision for Christ." Folks, we give them the gospel and it is the Spirit of God who gives them life. That is the glory of the new covenant. The effectual call of regeneration is pictured in the future regeneration of Israel. Remember, in Ezekiel 37:1 through 11, there the Spirit of God breathes life into a valley of dry bones, my what a picture of man and his depravity, utterly lifeless, unable to respond. Then in Ezekiel 37:12, we read, "'Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves.'" In verse 14, "'and I will put my Spirit within you and you shall live.'" O, child of God, salvation is a gift of grace from beginning to end.

The effectual call of regeneration is also pictured in the story of Lazarus, remember that in John 11? What an amazing story. Jesus stands before the tomb of his friend that's been dead for four days and Jesus cries out, "Lazarus, come forth!" And the text says, and the man who had died came out. Jesus did that with me when I was nine years old. He called me from death unto life. He's done that with you, I hope all of you.

We also see the Spirit giving life in Paul's comparison of regeneration to God's creation of the world. In Second Corinthians four six we read, "For God, who said, 'Light shall come out of darkness,' is the One who has shown in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.'" There he's referring to the Spirit's role in creation, where he spoke things into existence out of nothing, "ex Nihilo," where he said, "Let there be light and there was light." That's what he does in our soul. So indeed, Paul was made a minister of the new covenant, where the Spirit is the source of eternal life, not your own works.

One of my former professors, Dr. Dick Mae who said quote, "In regeneration, God unites the external call of the gospel preaching with his sovereign and effectual call to unto new life, into darkened and dead hearts, he speaks the command, 'Let there be light,' and instantaneously births in us the light of eternal spiritual life, where it had not existed." Oh, dear friends, the blessings of the New Covenant are beyond our imagination. They exceed the bounds of language. You see, in regeneration we have that great bridge of grace that spans man's depravity and the righteous demands of God's law. That is the requirement to enter into the kingdom. But you ask, well, what must I do to be saved? If it's all a work of the Spirit? How can I be held responsible? Well, it's true, that you are responsible; we are responsible to believe in God's sovereignty and man's responsibility is a matter that's perfectly compatible in the mind of God. He doesn't even try to explain it knows we couldn't understand it. And for us, it's an inscrutable mystery. But let me say this. If you truly see the horror of your sin, and you see the righteousness of Christ and the glory of the cross, and you know that unless God does something, you are going to perish in your sins; if you see that, know full well that is the Spirit of God that has quickened your heart and given you that light. He is speaking light into your life. If a person experiences that and they suddenly are crying out to God in mercy, know that it is the Spirit of God that has caused them to do so. Know that it was the Spirit of God that had written their names in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world. Know full well that if that is in your heart, if that is your desire, it's because God elected you to his grace before the foundation of the world; that he chose you in Christ before time began. Never will there be a person who can stand before a holy God and say, Oh, it was just all up to you and you just didn't do what you were supposed to do. And so how can I be held responsible? You say I just don't believe in it that okay? Then you will perish in your sins. But if you want to be saved, Paul says in Romans 10 Nine, "If you confess with your mouth, Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead," what's gonna happen? He says, "you will be saved." "For with a heart a person believes resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation."

You see, dear friends, man's responsibility is to respond to the gospel. And when man responds to the gospel, it is the Spirit of God that has caused him to do so. It is the Spirit of God that is quickening his heart, speaking light into that corpse and life into that corpse. And it is the Spirit of God who then will cause a person to be born again, because we can't "born again" ourselves.

Well, the next time we're together, we'll look at more works of the Holy Spirit. There's just so many great things that we need to understand, especially as it relates to the new covenant. And I pray that today you have a renewed appreciation of the holiness of God, because it is sorely missing in evangelicalism today. And when you don't understand the holiness of God, you'll never be able to sing, sincerely, "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me." Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths that speak so clearly to our hearts. Thank you for the new covenant. Thank you that we are united to Christ, who has fulfilled the law perfectly. And therefore, on our behalf, he has satisfied your demands. This is the glory of the gospel. And we celebrated here today. And Father, if there be one that knows nothing about what it means to truly be reconciled to a holy God through faith in Christ; they know nothing of what it means to have that intimate relationship, that joy, that peace, that comfort, that hope, that faith, I pray that by the power of your Spirit, you will breathe life into that spiritual cadaver, cause them to come alive, cause them to see the horror of their sin and come running to the cross, pleading for a mercy they do not deserve and a righteousness they cannot have on their own, that they might be saved. Lord, I pray this for members in my family, for friends, for people in this church, for our young children, Lord, be merciful and save them. We thank you We give you praise in Jesus name. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter three. We continue to make our way through this epistle; we're going to be looking at the first six verses, under the heading "Five Marks of a True Shepherd." That's where we are in our study of Second Corinthians and I might add that this is going to be encouraging to all of you and instructive to all of you, not just to pastors or to elders. Before I read the text, let me remind you of the context. It's so important.

The Corinthians, as you will recall, we're in love with the wisdom of man, philosophy. They loved that and that was their form of entertainment. And rather than having their favorite football team or their favorite basketball team, or whatever, they attach themselves to their favorite philosopher, kinda like political parties or whatever. And so a skilled orator would move an audience with their soaring rhetoric. And of course, they were doing it to make money. And people naturally we're attracted to their favorite orator or their favorite preacher in Corinth. Remember that as well, I've of Paul, I'm of Apollos, and so forth. Well, naturally, with the growth of Christianity, comes the growth of people that are interested in it and want to know how they can make a buck off of it. And so that's what happened. This caught the attention of these characters who had superficially attached themselves to the church. We believe that the ones that came to Corinth were probably from Jerusalem; I'll maybe hint about that a little bit more later. But certainly everybody was aware of the miracles that Jesus had done. It was well known. So people were fascinated with this. And I might add that every church is a magnet to every weirdo and nut job and con artists and false teacher in the world.

So Satan dispatches these greedy, unscrupulous men, mostly Judaizers, to hound the apostles, and to infiltrate the churches. Now, remember, the Judaizers were ones that they accepted some of the new covenant, but they wanted to mix the Old Covenant in with it. And so, in order to be saved, you had to also be circumcised, you had to do the Jewish rituals and, and all of those types of things. So they would impose all of this Judaism on to these new Gentile converts. And so these false teachers had drifted into the church with their phony letters of commendation that they had received from some other church and they come into the church and they begin to con the people there in Corinth and that's what they would typically do with other churches as well. They would get a letter of commendation whether it was phony, or maybe it was real that some of the people in the church had given them a letter, they would go to the next church and they'd begin to ply their trade in that church. And Paul said that they were guilty of quote "peddling the Word of God" in chapter two verse 17. They were con artists; they were shuck stirs they were they were charlatans. And Jesus warned about them, as well as the apostles, for example in Second, Peter and Jude in particular, you read much about the character of these people. In Second Peter two beginning of verse one, here's how Peter described them, "But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them, the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed, they will exploit you with false words." And of course, there's 1000s of these kinds of people today, men and women. They are entrepreneurs. They are not divinely called and gifted shepherds serving Christ. In fact, all women preachers are self-appointed. God has not called them; they are forbidden to be in that position. The New Testament is so clear about that. But these people were all over the place then, they're all over the place today. I've got one guy that follows me on the internet and he's trying to make noise about how that the cross is the mark of the beast, and all kinds of bizarre things. I mean, you just get these crazy people, especially on the internet. Well, this was what was happening in Corinth.

Now mind you, Paul had been there for 18 months, these people knew who he was. And he had led many of them to Christ. But after he departed, the wolves started to come in. The shepherd leaves, now you've got wolves coming in to devour the sheep, and they viciously attack Paul's character in his absence. And of course, there was a main guy, who we believe is Paul's thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan. So they challenged his apostolic authority; they challenged his competency as a pastor. And unfortunately, some of the people bought the lies. And this was heartbreaking to Paul, to know that there were people that he loved, that he had led to Christ and that he had disciples that were suddenly believing these demonic lies. And so in this passage before us, he continues to offer a defense not so much for himself personally, as for the sake of the Gospel, for the glory of God, he doesn't want them to be led astray.

So anticipating that his adversaries would spin everything that he would say, in their favor, in their advantage, and accuse him of being arrogant and self-promoting, here's what he says, and this is our text, Second Corinthians three, verse one, "Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some, letters of commendation to you or from you? You are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all men; being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts. Such confidence we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of the new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life."

Now, we all know that defending your integrity from scurrilous, slanderous attacks is very difficult. You know how it works, even with a business, you can have 1000 satisfied customers, and have four or five dissatisfied customers, and guess who makes the most noise, right? And in fact, now, there's a whole industry of reputation restoration out there where they can somehow help you retrieve your good name. And I know what it's like, I've been called just about everything, it tends to go in one ear and out the other. But when the people of Calvary Bible Church began to believe a lie, now that's different. That's when I must defend not just my integrity, or the integrity of the elders, or of the church, but actually, for the sake of the gospel, we must defend from the lies. You know, "The first to plead his case seems right," Proverbs 18:17, "until another comes in examines him." And although truth and time walk hand in hand, sometimes you have to accelerate that process. And that's what's going on here with Paul and he does this so brilliantly, obviously, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. But from this portion of his defense, we are able to glean some fascinating insights into the marks of a true shepherd.

By the way, this is the type of information that every pastoral search committee and every person looking for a church should know very well. So I've broken it down into five categories for you that I hope will be helpful. The life and ministry of a true shepherd will be marked by five things, number one, a virtuous reputation. Secondly, a fruitful ministry. Number three, a confident calling. Number four, a godly presence. And number five, a new covenant message.

So let's look closely at what the Holy Spirit is revealed to us through his inspired apostle. I want you to notice first in verse one that Paul asks them two questions. And both of them require a negative answer. He wants them to rebuff the allegations of the false apostles on their own. Especially the allegation that somehow, he's arrogant, that he's self-promoting, that he's tooting his own horn. And I'm sure they're capitalizing on some of the things that he said earlier. For example, in First Corinthians, he has to assert his apostolic authority, because they were believing lies, and this this was important, it was necessary for correcting error. But notice what he says in verse one, "Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? The word "command" means "to introduce" or "to recommend, " to recommend a person as worthy of high regard of acceptance. I've written many letters of recommendation, he says, do we have to do this again? Really? Is this what's going on? He goes on to say, "Or do we need, as some, letters of commendation to you or from you?" Now, you might wonder, why is he using the word we when he's talking about himself? Well, that was a customary literary device. It's called the "editorial we" rather than saying "I," it was a way of kind of being humble and self-effacing in the communication. But he's asking them to make an honest evaluation of his character based upon the 18 months that he had been with them. In fact, he's saying really? After all, that you saw when I was with you, you think my character is in question? You're believing what these people are saying about me? Now, they were used to receiving letters of commendation. We know for example, in Acts 18, verse 27, there's a description there of a letter of recommendation that the church received at Corinth, from Ephesus, regarding Apollos to come to them. Verse two, he says, "Are we beginning to commend ourselves again?" The answer, of course, is no. "Or do we need a some letters of commendation to you or from you?"

Now, evidently, the false apostles told them that he lacked the proper official letters of commendation, which were customary in that day. And it's customary in these days when you don't know something about other people, and they need to be properly introduced. So these wolves probably came from Jerusalem originally, we get a hint about this, and Acts 15:24. But they present some kind of phony letters of commendation. And here in the second part of verse two, we see that they wanted the Corinthians to give them letters of commendation so that they could use them to go on to the next church to do the same type of thing. By the way, Paul addresses this in Second Corinthians five, verse 12. He says, "We are not again commending ourselves to you but are giving you an occasion to be proud of us, so that you will have an answer for those who take pride in appearance and not in heart." And in chapter 10 and verse 12, he adds, "For we're not bold to class or compare ourselves with some of those who commend themselves; but when they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are without understanding." And in verse 18, he went on to say, "For it is not he who commends himself that is approved, but he whom the Lord commends." Beloved, from this, we can clearly see that the life and ministry of a true shepherd will first be marked by a virtuous reputation. Everybody that knows that man will know who he really is based upon the pattern of his life. And Paul's life was not marked by self-promotion, not marked by arrogance, or by greed or anything else as he had been scurrilously charged by his opponents. A man's life and a man's ministry must and will speak for itself, as he will go on to say, in fact, he says in First Timothy three two that, "An overseer, then, must be above reproach"--referring to elders, pastors, elders, got to be above reproach--"the husband of one wife," meaning them must be devoted to their wife and not a womanizer, must be "temperate, prudent, respectable...free from the love of money." It goes on to say, verse seven, "He must have a good reputation with those outside the church."

Well, certainly Paul's conscience was clear on all of this, as he stated in chapter one and verse 12. He says, "For our proud confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, but in the grace of God, we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you." You see, Paul's life and his ministry, were beyond reproach. He had a virtuous reputation. He had no desire for wealth, he had no desire for fame. He wasn't trying to build a ministry empire; he wasn't trying to build a mega church. Boy, he could have done that with all of his giftedness, and with his apostolic powers, but that wasn't what he was about. He was gladly willing to suffer for Christ and serve him faithfully and sacrificially in obscurity.

You know, there are many examples of men and women, especially missionaries, who have done the same pastors as well. I'm currently reading a powerful biography, that I would encourage you all to read. It's a biography of a 19th century Scottish Minister, the name of the book is "The Pastor of Kilsyth: The Life and Times of W. H. Burns: Kilsyth, by the way is k i l s y t h and it was written by Islay Burns, who was his son, and his son lived between 1817 and 1872. You say, well, my goodness, I've never heard of W. H. Burns. Well, that's exactly the point. He won't show up on a Google search, except with reference to this book. He served Christ faithfully in obscurity in rural Scotland, from 1800 until the Lord took him home in 1859. Talk about a virtuous reputation. On the jacket of that book, it says this "In a celebrity driven age, (from which the evangelical church is far from exempt), this is exactly the kind of life that ministers, especially young ministers would do well to study. For it is good to be reminded of the beauty, dignity and ultimately, the glory of humble, obscure Christian service (Matthew 10:42). While there is needed times for towering leaders such as John Calvin, and John Knox, it is nevertheless true that the great work of the church is ultimately carried forward by those who receive little earthly reward and recognition (but whose reward in heaven is great). William H. Burns, the pastor of Kilsyth was one of these, and we need many more like him in our day." Folks, this was the heart of the apostle Paul and his life. And his ministry validated the integrity of his heart, and he needed no further commendation apart from a just as virtuous life. You want to ask yourself, can I be characterized in that way?

Well, the life and ministry of a true shepherd will be marked not only by a virtuous reputation, but secondly, a fruitful ministry. Notice again, verse two, "You are our letter, written in our hearts." That's a phrase denoting his great love for them. "Known and read by all men; being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the Living God, and not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts."

Now, this, of course, is consistent with God's covenant promises given to the Prophets, especially Jeremiah, for example, a new covenant promise, remember, and Jeremiah 31, verse 33, "'But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,' declares the Lord," here it is, "'I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God and they shall be My people.'" And certainly Paul is harkening back to that great truth; that great promise the Lord spoke to Ezekiel as well. Ezekiel 11, beginning of verse 19, "And I will give them one heart, and put a new spirit within them. And I will take the heart of stone out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in My statutes, and keep My ordinances and do them. Then they will be My people, and I shall be their God."

So Paul is saying to the saints in Corinth, the Spirit of God has written his letter of commendation for me, he has written it on your hearts--the ones that he has saved, that he is transformed by the word of Christ that I preached to you. By the way, this was a letter the false teachers did not have right. They did not have a fruitful ministry. In first Corinthians two chapter four, or chapter two, verse four, Paul said this, "my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God." O, dear Christian, there is no greater evidence of the power of the gospel than men and women whose lives have been transformed by it. Nor is there any greater authentication of a man's ministry than seeing those that he has shepherded; to see lives that have been changed by the power of Christ--saints who are born again; that's the great power of regeneration--when the spirit breathes life into our spiritual corpses and he raises us from spiritual death to spiritual life. It makes us new creatures in Christ. All of the old things that once appealed to our flesh, no longer do; these new things have come. And now we begin to walk by the Spirit. That's so different than the Christless Christianity that we typically see today. This cultural Christianity, this phony churchianity, where people are Christian in name only. They say they're born again but there's nothing in their life that would validate that. You know, it's like being pregnant. You either are or you're not, right? And if you're pregnant, it's going to show there's going to be evidence of that. And if you're not pregnant, there's going to be evidence that you're; it's the same thing with Christianity. You know, you say you belong to Christ, then let's see the fruit of Christ's likeness in your life. The fruits of the Spirit--love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. That's the only letter that Paul needed--the fruit of his ministry, and that's what was going on with many of those dear saints, even though some of them had been snookered by these false teachers. The only letter Paul needed was a fruitful ministry of transformed lives that loved Christ. Remember, First Thessalonians chapter one, verse five, Paul said this, "For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in," catch this, "power and in the Holy Spirit." You see, he's the one that causes us to be born again. Verse eight, he goes on to say, "For the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone forth, so that we have no need to say anything. For they themselves, report about us what kind of reception we had with you, and how you turn to God from idols to serve a living and true God." Folks, this is the power of a fruitful ministry that results when a man of God preaches the transforming truths of the gospel; the Spirit of God changes people. First Thessalonians two verse 13, he says, "For this reason, we also constantly thank God that when you received the Word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe." Folks, if you want to measure a minister, look at the fruits of his ministry. It's real simple. Don't look at his popularity, don't look at the size of his church. Don't look at all the numbers of special ministries that are offered. My goodness, if that was the criteria, Jesus and the apostles fell woefully short of all of that; they would have been considered miserable failures in our culture. Look at the people that that man shepherds; men and women who have the mind of Christ, who love Christ and serve Christ. And when you look at their lives, they manifest Christ. It's fascinating. So think about it, in the New Testament, Christ, praised God. For virtues, I should say in the New Testament, well, yes, no, that's it is what I want to say Christ did give praise to God for virtues that in many ways we don't even think about in our culture these days. I mean, most people attend churches based upon what their kids want. You know, this is like asking your kids to develop their own educational curriculum and how they want to study. My goodness, can you imagine what that would be like? I mean, by the time they're 12 years old, they'd weigh 300 pounds, they would be totally illiterate. And all they could do is look at screens and press buttons. I mean, that would be their life. Proverbs 22:15 says that "Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child." And we know that a fool has no fear of God. That's where unsaved kids are. And the fear of God is the beginning of what? Beginning of wisdom. So really, you're going to let a child decide where you're going to grow and be fed and worship Christ? Well, a lot of churches understand that's how people think. So they try to create their own version of Disneyland, where children and youth are going to be excited, because that is, if you read any of the church growth movement today, they will tell you that if you want to grow your church, you must focused on children's and youth ministries. That is the key to church growth. And my response is biblically, that is the key to spiritual immaturity. Parents and adults never grow into spiritual maturity in those types of churches. Those types of churches will constantly be attracting unbelievers, the church will fill up with unbelievers. Many times, you hear them say, well, we want to church the unchurched. Well, really the unchurched are those people that are for the most part, unbelievers and what ends up happening? You fill up the church with unbelievers and so the unchurched, un- church the church, if that makes sense, I think I said that the way I intended. Well, the result is no discernment in a church. And its people mirror the world rather than Christ marriages eventually begin to suffer, families begin to suffer. Frankly, many churches today are nothing more than religious country clubs with the spiritual discernment of liberal Democrats. And they have the morality of a frat house on spring break. I mean, I see this all the time. I mean, think about it. There are numerous Christian denominations today that preach social gospel. Many Christian denominations, that see nothing wrong with same sex marriage and promote the LGBTQ agenda. They even ordain sodomites and lesbians to be their pastors, people who will never enter the kingdom of God, we read in First Corinthians 6:10. Folks, this is staggering. And it's satanic. A true shepherd will not allow this type of thing to happen. He will have a fruitful ministry. You can look at the people and you can see that they are people that love Christ, that have been transformed by the gospel.

One of the greatest mission fields today is the so called Christian church. I was thinking about this, this past week. Let me remind you of a few things that Jesus commended churches for in the Bible. I'm not going to give you the reference, but there's references for all of these. And this is therefore what we need to look for at church: moral purity, love of the truth, pursuit of holiness, devotion to the Word of God, good deeds, hard work, endurance, discernment, suffering, love, faith, righteous living, willingness to discipline sin, submission, repentance, loving the brethren, prayer, strong teaching and preaching, spiritual leadership, joyful attitudes, generosity, boldness, submission to God's sovereignty, and true worship. Folks, this will be the fruit of a true shepherd. This will be the fruit of true elders.

Let me give you just a short list of what Jesus condemned: lost love, compromise, tolerating sin, immorality, idolatry, deadness, lukewarmness, hypocrisy, false teaching, false preaching a different gospel, undisciplined living, disunity, sin, arrogant divisions, prolonged spiritual immaturity, abusing Christian liberty profaning the Lord's Supper, misappropriating spiritual gifts, unwillingness to forgive, and poor financial stewardship. This will be the fruit of a false Shepherd. But many of the saints at Corinth were a living testimony to the transforming power of the gospel that Paul preached. And this was the only letter of recommendation that he needed. That was his point. He had a living letter of transformed lives that loved and served and worshipped Christ. And I would encourage you to ask yourself, Is my life bearing spiritual fruit? I hope that it is. And I know for most of you it is.

So the life and ministry of a true shepherd will be marked by a virtuous reputation of fruitful ministry. And thirdly, a confident calling. Notice verse four, "such confidence we have through Christ toward God." You see, Paul was not arrogant. He was confident in his calling. He was confident that God had commissioned him to do and to say, what he was do doing, and what he was saying. In Colossians 125, he says, "Of this church, I was made a minister, according to the stewardship from God bestowed on me for your benefit, so that I might fully carry out the preaching of the word of God." In First Thessalonians two, beginning in verse four, "we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts. For we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with the pretext for greed--God is witness." You see, Paul was confident of his calling, as every pastor, as every elder should be. And frankly, every believer should be with respect to what God has called them to do within the realm of their spiritual influence. I mean, Paul knew what happened on the road to Damascus, talk about a calling. Paul knew how Christ, himself, had taught him for three years in the desert of Arabia. He knew that he had been given supernatural abilities. He knew that the Spirit of God had inspired him to write what he was writing. And he knew that God had even given him a tour in heaven. But he also knew that it was all of God's grace. It was not because of any merit of his own. In fact, in Ephesians three, verse seven, he said, "I was made a minister, according to the gift of God's grace, which was given to me according to the working of His power." First Corinthians 15:10, he said, "By the grace of God, I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me."

In my book, "Seven Key Principles for Effective Ministry: Nurturing Thriving Churches in a Postmodern Culture," I've devoted a whole chapter to this issue of a pastor being convinced of his calling. And there are essentially five divine tests of divine calling to vocational ministry that emerge from the study of the apostle Paul, in particular. I'll just give them to you. A man must have these five things: number one, a longing to know and serve Christ. Number two, a sense of urgency to preach the gospel. Number three, a pervasive feeling of inadequacy. Number four, a burden to shepherd the flock. And number five, a public confirmation of spiritual gifts, character and abilities. Dear friends, if a man does not have an unshakable conviction, that these realities are true in his life, he will have no certainty that God has called and gifted him to be a shepherd and therefore, he will never survive the inevitable difficulties of ministry.

Well, to be sure, the false apostles knew nothing of any of this. They weren't serving Christ, they were serving themselves. And so ultimately they were serving Satan. So Paul had no doubt whatsoever that God had called him to the ministry. And his confidence was anchored in the Gibraltar of something that is absolutely crucial in our understanding of our salvation. And that is the anchor of our union with Christ. He knew that he was in Christ and Christ was within him.

Notice verse four, "Such confidence we have through Christ toward God." In other words, it was a gift from Christ in relation to God, to be pleasing to God. And with confidence, dear friends comes courage, which can often be mistaken for arrogance. You see, he spoke with confidence and courage, and with authority because he was God's messenger. He knew the truth; he proclaimed the truth. He knew that he was united to Christ; this is what he was to do. He rejoiced in that and of course, that infuriated his adversaries. And every faithful pastor knows what that is like, you know? There's a constant assault on divine authority and anyone who proclaims that divine authority, I mean, people want authority for themselves, right? Strong convictions in our postmodern culture are considered arrogant. You ask the average millennial about, you know, absolute truth and they will reject every expression of certainty. They scoff at the idea that God has spoken in his Bible, and that is the end of the matter. This is what God has said, this is authority. This is absolute, authoritative truth. Well, such an idea these days is considered just the worst form of elitism, of bigotry, of intolerance. That kind of thinking is oppressive. You tell the average person today that God has said something about a particular issue and watch the response. Well, that's just your interpretation. Well, that's your truth. But that's not my truth. Well, who are you to tell me what to believe? Well, the Bible is full of myths and superstitions. So I can't believe any of that silly stuff. So, what happens in order to appeal to the culture, avant garde evangelicals, in other words, the kind of elite forward-thinking evangelicals have decided to conform to the culture rather than confront it. So what they do is soften the truth, so it won't be so offensive--let's lighten up on doctrinal things, let's don't be so cut and dry. After all, doctrine divides, right? So let's focus on style and methodology. Let's embrace the hermeneutics of humility. Because really, none of us can say for certain what the Bible says or what we need to believe.

But folks, truth is inextricably bound to God himself. Because God is truth and he has revealed himself in his Word, and he longs for people to worship him in spirit and in truth. In fact, we know that Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father, but through Me." So Paul came to this exceedingly immoral, idolatrous city of Corinth and he did just the opposite of what modern evangelical pragmatism would tell us to do. He cared nothing about coming in and in looking like them and being cool like them and talking like them and kind of using their methodologies and their style and their techniques to move an audience. None of that type of thing. In fact, what he did, you might say, seems counter intuitive. What he did is just unleash the truth of the gospel. And look what happened. Yeah, he didn't fill up auditoriums, but people were saved. You know, as my friend Dr. Culbertson said years ago, the President of Moody Bible Institute, he said, "What you win them with, you win them to." And he didn't win them with entertainment. He didn't win them with boosting their self-esteem and affirming them in their sin. He won them with the gospel. He said this in First Corinthians two beginning of verse two, he said, "For I determined to know nothing among you, except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you, in weakness and in fear, and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching, were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God."

You see, he knew that the only truth that can save is the truth of the gospel, that most all men will hate. But he was not ashamed of the gospel. For he knew that it was the power of God, unto those who believed to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Now, beloved, this is not arrogance. This is faithfulness to the God of truth. Paul knew he had no authority on his own, but his authority was from God. And it was because of this, that he was resolute in his devotion to God, who had called him to do what he was doing and called him to do it in the way that he was doing it, not in man's way. So he was bold, he was uncompromising, but he was not arrogant. He was not self-promoting as the false teachers were alleging.

Second Corinthians four verse seven, we read, "But we have this treasure," referring to the gospel, "we have this treasure in earthen vessels"-- A reference to a disposable clay pot that was used for human waste and garbage. That's how we need to see ourselves. That's how I've seen myself. I mean, I'm disposable. I'm nothing. The treasure is in me, the treasure is in you, but we're nothing. He went on to say, Why did God do that? "So that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves." He went on to say, "we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body of the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death, for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh." Folks, only a man who was confident in his calling, would sacrifice himself in such a way. Are you confident in what God has called you to do? And are you faithful ain doing it?

Well, the life and ministry of a true shepherd will be marked by a virtuous reputation, a fruitful ministry, a confident calling and fourthly, a godly presence. Let me explain this to you. And first of all, notice verse five, "Not that we are adequate in ourselves," he says, "to consider anything is coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate." You see, Paul took no credit for any success that he had in ministry, all of it went to God. I mean, he knew his own limitations. He knew that all wisdom and strength and power that made him adequate, all of that came from God. Jesus said, "Apart from me, you can do nothing." He understood that. Second Timothy two two remember he told Timothy, who was who was weak and vacillating. He said, "Be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus." Paul understood this in First Corinthians 15, nine, here's what he said, "For I am the least of the apostles." Talk about a guy that doesn't toot his horn. "I am the least of the apostles, and not fit to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God, I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me." Folks, that's where the power is. He understood that God's power is perfected in weakness, not in human strength.

We see this clearly in the Lord's repeated response to Paul's threefold implorations to have that thorn in the flesh removed when the Lord said in Second Corinthians 12 nine, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." And there we discover a most important truth. And that is this; God's all sufficient grace is the conduit of his inexhaustible power that is perfected in our weakness. And even as the Spirit empowered the Lord Jesus Christ, to endure the horrors of the cross, so too, is he sufficient to empower all of us who are united to him to endure the most grueling labors, the most trying temptations, the most cruel sufferings, that he brings our way. So Paul was a living example of the grace of God, the power of God; a man therefore, that I would call having a godly presence with God, or what Paul called "a man of God," First Timothy 6:11, a man who is quote, "full of the Spirit and wisdom,' Acts six three. Which by the way, are the qualifications that saints were to look for in deacons, and deaconesses; virtues not every man possesses. A man who according to First Timothy 4:12, in "speech, conduct love, faith and purity shows himself," or we could even add herself, "an example of those who believe." Boy aren't we all drawn to people like that? Men and women who just manifest the power of Christ in their lives? I've written on the subject as well, regarding pastors in particular, men like Stephen, like Paul, the apostles, and so forth. I'll share this with you, "By godly presence, I mean a man with a noticeable aura of godliness about him, both in and out of the pulpit. A man like Jesus. A man who possesses a palpable sense of humility and love that draws you into his presence. A man who exudes spiritual strength, confidence, boldness, wisdom, and a noticeable fervency that marks him as a man of God, and a man on a mission. A man so lost in the wonder of the majesty of God, so filled by the divine presence that nothing in this world causes him to despair or tempts him to distraction. This is that rare man whose authority enters a room with him and commands respect without ever asking for it. This is that exceptional man who has such a great likeness to Jesus, that he actually emanates his power in ways that are mysteriously transcendent, and profoundly influential. He manifests what Paul described as 'the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe it in accordance with the working of the strength of His might,' (Ephesians 1:19). A personal power that only comes from Him "who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us (Ephesians 3:20). Well, to be sure, dear friends, this describe the apostle Paul. A man whose adequacy was from God, not from himself; a man who had a godly presence, who needed no further commendation. And may I encourage you to ask yourself, How do I impact other people? What do other people see when they are around me?

Well, finally, not only will the true shepherd be marked by a virtuous reputation of fruitful ministry, a confident calling and a godly presence, but a new covenant message. In verse six, he says that he has made us "adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." You see, unlike the false teachers, he did not arbitrarily transport certain elements of the old covenant of the Mosaic covenant of law into the glorious new covenant of God's grace, like the false apostles, did. You see this in a lot of cults, you see this in seventh day Adventism and that type of thing. You see the gospel of God, the new covenant, does not require anyone to conform to certain external religious rites or rituals of Judaism or any other system of human achievement for that matter. The new covenant is actually a synonym for the gospel of Christ. Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, as we see in the windows around us. You see, according to Hebrews nine, verses 11 through 15, we read about the new covenant. Unlike the old covenant, the new covenant is not ratified by the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer, but by the blood of Christ. That's what Paul preached. It's Christ's accomplishment, not our own, that saves us. This is why Paul was singularly devoted to preaching the gospel, in all of its purity and power. He was a servant of, he says, "a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit." "Letter," by the way, referring to the onerous requirements of the law that could never save. All of those requirements were there to show us the holiness of God, in contrast to the sinfulness of man. And to help us see O, my God, have mercy on us, I need a Savior. I need help. I can't keep all of these laws. So you got to remember that the law was never intended to be a means of salvation, but rather, it was intended to be our tutor, to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith, Galatians 3:34. And we all know that indeed, "the letter kills but the Spirit gives life." Think about it. What Paul's saying is that the letter of the law produces guilt, it produces frustration, that actually produces damnation, unless we repent. No one is good enough to impress God with their own merits. "Whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at one point, he has become guilty of all," James two 10. Counts me out, counts you all out. If you've ever been around legalism, you know what this is like. It seems like there's a new law, a new ritual or a new something that you've got to do every day. And all of that just gives you the illusion of spirituality. But it can never save. I feel sorry for the Jehovah's Witnesses, and the Mormons, and other cultic people that are trying to earn their way to heaven. But with the new covenant, the Spirit gives life. How? He causes us to be born again. He indwells us and enables us to fulfill God's law; He imputes to us the righteousness of Christ. And as a result, we rejoice in the eternal life that is ours because Christ has paid the penalty for our sins and given us his righteousness. Folks, are you passionate about the gospel? I hope that you are.

Well, dear friends, I hope and pray that you've asked God to save you by his grace. If you haven't, and you are still under the wrath of God, and one day you will die and you will spend an eternity in hell. But the good news is, Christ is offered forgiveness through faith in him. And for those of us who know and love Christ, I pray that we will all emulate the life and the ministry of the apostle Paul, the ministry of a true shepherd and whatever sphere of influence he has placed us. May your life be marked by a virtuous reputation, a fruitful ministry, a confident calling, a godly presence and a new covenant message and then with Francis Havergal, we can sing, "Take my life and let it be, consecrated Lord to Thee. Take my moments and my days, let them flow in ceaseless praise. Take my heart, it is thine own, it shall be thy royal throne. Take my life and let it be consecrated Lord, to Thee." Let's pray together.

Father, may these indeed be the marks of each of our lives that we might bring glory to you and enjoy the fullness of your grace in our lives this side of glory. Thank you for the power of your word. May it bear much fruit for Jesus’ sake. And it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

It’s always an amazing thought to my heart to know that I have the opportunity to minister the word of God to you. And once again, we have that opportunity. So you take the infallible record of his word and turn to Second Corinthians chapter two. We're going to continue our exposition of this epistle under the heading this morning of "Gaining Victory over Heartache." Certainly a reality for many people who are struggling in serious ways. Let me read the text beginning in Second Corinthians two verse 12. Apostle Paul speaking here, "Now when I came to Troas for the gospel of Christ and when a door was opened for me in the Lord, I had no rest for my spirit, not finding Titus, my brother; but taking my leave of them, I went on to Macedonia. But thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place. For we are a fragrance of Christ to God, among those who are being saved, and among those who are perishing; to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other, and aroma from life to life. And who is adequate for these things? For we are not like many, peddling the word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God."

Heartache is the great risk of love. Most of us know that pain, the pain of betrayal. We all know that loving someone deeply opens up the possibility of being hurt deeply when that love is spurned. And certainly, the apostle Paul loved the saints in Corinth very deeply, and many of them hurt him deeply when they drank the Kool Aid that was passed out by those false apostles that infiltrated that church and turned many of them against him. Satan dispatched these men to slander Paul, to seduce the saints, who were already spiritually immature. They were babes in Christ. You will recall that they were worldly, heavily influenced by the pagan culture around them from which they came. They were divisive, they were hateful, they were selfish, they were disorderly, they were suing each other over trivial things. I mean, it was a mess. They flaunted their freedoms in Christ. They abused their spiritual gifts trying to show off making up their own version of tongues. It was so bad that someone cursed Christ in an unknown tongue and they thought it was from the Holy Spirit. So the church was a mess in many ways. And yet, there were some people there that were more mature, and they were all growing in Christ.

And by the way, I might add that churches that are immature, that are poorly taught, that are poorly shepherded are going to be undiscerning. And they're going to be easy prey for false teachers. And that's what was going on in Corinth. These wolves had come into Corinth, to assassinate Paul's character with trumped up allegations to somehow undermine his credibility and his authority as an apostle; to discredit his teaching and replace it with their own. This was heartbreaking to Paul. It was devastating. Now the slander was bad enough, but then to add on top of that, being rejected by people you love.

After writing First Corinthians to confront them on all of this, you will recall he had an intensely painful visit with them as we read in chapter two here in verse one, then he returned back to Ephesus. He wrote a severe letter to them that Titus had to deliver to them. And then he had to wait to hear how the people reacted; to hear whether or not they had repented and embraced him once again. So that's the context of what's going on here. Folks, it's hard to imagine the kind of emotional pain that the apostle Paul suffered. We know that he was beaten, he was stoned, he was imprisoned. I mean, the list goes on and on. In chapter one, beginning in verse eight, he describes some severe trial; we don't know really what was going on there. But he says, "For we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, of our affliction, which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened excessively beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life; indeed, we have the sentence of death within ourselves." And in Second Corinthians chapter four, in verse eight, he said, "We are afflicted in every way."

Worse yet, we know that Paul's ministry in Ephesus wasn't going well. There were a number of people that came to Christ as you will recall, but because of that, they were burning their idols, giving up their idols. And so all of the idol makers; that was a huge business there in Ephesus, those guys were really upset, so they attacked Paul and a riot happened there in Ephesus. Paul says in First Corinthians 16:9, was filled with "many adversaries," and so he has to leave and there's all kinds of problems going on for this. But folks, there's there is no pain like relational pain. That's the worst kind. And that's what's pictured so graphically here. We read about it as well in Second Corinthians 12, verse seven, he says, "Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations," referring to his opportunity to go into heaven and see those glorious things, "for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me-- to keep me from exalting myself!" If things weren't bad enough, he had to endure this.

Let me comment on that for just a moment, the term "thorn," "skolops" in the original language; refers to something pointed, something that produces great pain. And in this case, the vexing torment was a quote, "messenger of Satan." In verse seven, the term "messenger"--"aggelos"-- is used 186 times in the New Testament. And in every case, it refers to a person, either a human being or an angel. And given the context of Second Corinthians, where he's defending his apostleship against these false teachers that are trying to destroy him, it's reasonable to believe that this messenger of Satan refers to the leader of that pack of wolves. This should be no surprise Paul says in chapter 11, verse 14, "Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore, it is not surprising if his servants also disguised themselves as servants of righteousness."

Furthermore, I might add that the verb translated "torment" refers to harsh treatment from another person throughout the New Testament. So this thorn in Paul's flesh was probably a demonically possessed false apostle; a messenger of Satan, who treated Paul with such contempt. The language that is used is likened to being struck in the face. That's how bad it was. But sadly, a number of the people in Corinth believed this guy and others who were with him. He had his sycophants, as all these kinds of divisive people do. They believe the slanderous lies. This was heartbreaking to the Apostle Paul. And I might add for anybody that's in pastoral ministry, in whatever capacity, certainly as a pastor, ministry can be very, very difficult. Satan absolutely despises those in leadership. I can give you many testimonies of men that I have known over the years who had to endure such terrible things that they were afraid it was going to cost them their life and they gave up.

One example cited in A.T Robertson's, "The Glory of the Ministry," reveals why one pastor threw in the towel. Here's what he said. He wrote to a another pastor, missionary friend by the name of Jim. He says, "My dear Jim, I'm through. Yesterday I handed in my resignation to take effect at once. And this morning I began to work at an unnamed certain company. I shall not return to the pastorate. I think I can see into your heart as you read these words, and behold, not a little disappointment, if not disgust. I don't blame you at all. I'm somewhat disgusted with myself. Do you recall the days in the seminary when we talked of the future and painted pictures of what we were to do for the kingdom of God? We saw the boundless need for an unselfish Christian service and longed to be among men doing our part toward the world's redemption. I shall never forget that last talk on the night before our graduation. You were to go to the foreign field and I to the first church," and he names the church. "We had brave dreams of usefulness, and you have realized them. As I look back across 25 years, I can see some lives that I have helped, and some things which I have been permitted to do that are worthwhile. But sitting here tonight, I am more than half convinced that God never intended me to be a minister. If he did, I am not big enough and brave enough to pay the price. Even if it leads you to write me down as a coward. I'm going to tell you why I've quit. In these years I have found not a few earnest, unselfish consecrated Christians. I do not believe that I am specially morbid or unfair in my estimate. So far as I know my heart, I am not bitter. But through all these years, a conviction has been growing within me, that the average church member cares precious little about the Kingdom of God, and its advancement, or the welfare of his fellow men. He is a Christian in order that he may save his soul from hell and for no other reason. He does as little as he can, lives as indifferently as he dares. If he thought he could gain heaven without lifting a finger for others, he would jump at the chance. Never have I known more than a small minority of any church, which I have served to be really interested in and unselfishly devoted to God's work. It took my whole time to pull and push and urge and persuade the reluctant members of my church to undertake a little something for their fellow men. They took a covenant to be faithful in attendance, but upon the services of the church, and not one out of 10 ever thought of attending prayer meeting. A large percentage seldom attended church in the morning, and a pitifully small number in the evening. It didn't seem to mean anything to them that they had dedicated themselves to the service of Christ. So I'm tired. Tired of being the only one in the church from whom real sacrifice is expected. Tired of straining and tugging to get Christian people to live like Christians. Tired of planning work for my people, and then being compelled to do it myself or see it left undone. Tired of dodging my creditors when I would not need to if I had what is due me. Tired of the frightening vision of penniless old age. I'm not leaving Christ. I love him. I shall still try to serve Him. Judge leniently old friend. I cannot bear to lose your friendship. Yours as of old, William.

While all pastors and missionaries, and anybody involved in ministry is going to be a target of Satan, and it's going to experience great difficulties, it's interesting how some quit and others persevere. The early days of Charles Spurgeon's ministry the pain of slander and scorn was so great that his wife Susanna would hide the morning newspaper to protect him from further insults. He described his melancholy this way, quote, "The iron bolt, which so mysteriously fastens the door of hope and holds our spirits in a gloomy prison needs a heavenly hand to push it back." His ministry was very difficult. Spurgeon struggled with depression, but he never quit. Why do some quit and others persevere? I know of no one who has suffered like the apostle Paul. I sure haven't; I haven't even come close. I will admit there have been times, especially early on in my ministry here at Calvary Bible Church, that the pain was so great in dealing with wicked people that I prayed on numerous occasions that God would just take me out of the ministry or take me home. I would rather die than go on the way that it was. I know that pain. I was tempted to quit. But I will tell you that the text that we're looking at this morning was one of the texts that the Lord used to speak to my heart in those early days of ministry.

So how did Paul overcome the debilitating discouragement that he experienced? How did he gain victory over heartache? Well, this text is going to help us answer this question. And I might add that it applies to every Christian, not just those in ministry, as you will see, giving you a very simple outline, we're just going to have two headings. We're going to look at the tragedy and then secondly, the triumph. And under the triumph, we're going to look at five practical insights into gaining victory over heartache.

Well, first of all the tragedy and I've already given you some background, but remember, Paul's preaching in Ephesus eventually caused a riot. So he had to, he had to get out of dodge, as we would say. And so we read here in this text that he goes to Troas, which was a seaport on the Aegean Sea; it would have been in Western Asia Minor, the northwest part of Turkey; look at Greece go across the Aegean Sea, and that's where he would have been; 10 miles from the legendary city of Troy, home of Helen, remember that story in Greek mythology in the Trojan War, and all of those things.

So let's read more of the tragedy here in verse 12. He says, "Now when I came to Troas for the gospel of Christ, and when a door was opened for me in the Lord, I had no rest for my spirit, not finding Titus my brother;" when he says "the door was open for me in the Lord," that's a phrase that Paul commonly used to describe a favorable opportunity to preach the gospel; an opportunity where people were literally responding to the gospel. So he had this door open to him, but his heart was in turmoil. It was breaking over all of this that was going on in Corinth; all that was happening to him. And he was anxiously awaiting to hear from Titus, wanting to hear how they responded to First Corinthians; how they responded to the severe letter that he wrote. And he knew Titus would need to pass through Troas to return to Ephesus, but he couldn't find him there. So it says, and he says at the end of verse 13, "but taking my leave of them, I went on to Macedonia." So he went across the Aegean Sea to northern Greece. Folks, for Paul to have left an open door tells you that he had to have been severely depressed, really struggling. I can't imagine the loneliness, the anxiety, wondering what happened. I mean, there were no cell phones, no email, no way of communicating. I mean, think about that. But Paul didn't give up, even though as he says in chapter four and verse eight, that he was "afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed, but not despairing." Well, I wonder why.

Well, the second part of what he has to say helps us understand that we moved from the tragedy to the triumph. This is how he gained victory over his heart ache. Let me give you a quick answer, and then we're going to expand upon it. How did he gain that victory? He set his mind on things above, not on the things of this earth. He changed his focus by counting his blessings. He literally breaks into a doxology of praise, as he refocuses his thoughts.

Notice verse 14, "But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him and every place." My what are the abrupt change between the previous verses? Now, we're not sure why the sudden shift, I mean, there's no indication that suddenly he found Titus and he heard some good news. And we know that he eventually does hear some good news, but he doesn't talk about that until chapter seven. And even if that were so, he still would have known that the false apostles were still in that church, that his sycophants were still there, and some of the skeptics would still be there, and that there would be pockets of resistance that still needed to be dealt with.

By the way, this is the whole purpose of Second Corinthians, to deal with that. Remember, God refused to remove Paul's thorn in the flesh, this messenger sent from Satan; to keep him from exalting himself; that character would have still been there. So folks, the change here is not in circumstance, the change is in perspective; an obvious work of the indwelling Spirit of God. Here's an example of God's all-sufficient grace at work. Remember, in chapter 12, verse nine, The Lord answered him about the removing of the thorn, he said, "'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.' Most gladly," Paul says, "therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong." You know, this is reminiscent of Job isn't it? Remember, he finally saw the glory of God and in his sovereignty, and he was so overwhelmed by it that he repented of his pride, of his of his ignorance and of his presumption, even before God changed his circumstances. Causing Job to say, "I have heard Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees Thee."

Now I wish to draw your attention to five perspectives that really gripped Paul's heart that emerged from this text that really contributed to him gaining victory over heartache. Five essential preoccupations, if you will. Preoccupations of his heart that helped him transcend the inevitable sorrows of this life that are passing away and experience the blessings of the unseen spiritual world that will last forever; to get a little taste of heaven, this side of it. To keep him from losing heart when his heart is breaking. Before we look at this, I might remind you of what he says later in Second Corinthians 4:15, he rejoices in quote, "the grace which is spreading to more and more people may cause the giving of thanks to a bound to the glory of God. Therefore we do not lose heart. But though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen, are eternal." So how did he gain victory over heartache? Well, number one, he was grateful for God's leading in his life. He was grateful for God's leading in his life.

Notice verse 14, "But thanks be to God, who always leads." Folks, what a profound comfort to know that God's hand of Providence is always leading us, according to his perfect plan, according to his purpose. It's astounding to me to think that God governs all things, to pre-ordained ends; that his sovereignty is always at work. He's always at work in our life, as I say often, he's always up to something in our life. God leads us. I think of Psalm 23, where David asserts the sovereign ruler of the universe, and he condescends in such a way as to is to take up the task of shepherding for us in a personal intimate way. He says, "The Lord is my shepherd," my shepherd. "I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul. He guides me in the paths of righteousness for his namesake." You see, Paul celebrates this in his life as we all must do. Therefore, he could say with David, "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil." Why? "For you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me." Dear friends, are you grateful for God's leading in your life?

We get a glimpse of this in his testimony to Timothy in First Timothy one, beginning in verse 12. He says, "I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because he considered me faithful, putting me into service, even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor and a violent aggressor." My, talk about God leading in our life. He goes on to say, "Yet I was shown mercy, because I acted ignorantly in unbelief; and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant. With the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus. It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am the foremost of all. Yet for this reason, I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example, for those who would believe in Him for eternal life." Beloved, we can either fret in our misfortunes, or we can rejoice in our fortunes; we really have a choice. And certainly, that would include having a heart that is filled with gratitude. Oh, God, thank you that even in the midst of my pai and my suffering, thank you, that you are sovereignly at work in my life, and that you are leading me toward a preordained end for my good and for your ultimate glory. To know that, you will never abandon me, to know that there will be times that you will let me wander, but you will never let me go.

I was thinking about this, when our now five-year-old little granddaughter, she was probably maybe threeish or so, she had a tendency to want to wander off, as all kids do. We were in the mall, and we're always saying you hold Papa’s hand or hold Nana's hand, and of course, they're always pulling away, and they're wanting to wander off someplace. And I remember one time, we were in a particular store, and she kept doing that, and I thought, okay, let's just see what happens. So her grandfather kept an eye on her, but you know, how they have these round circles of clothes and all that type of stuff; she was wandering off and I just kind of kept my eye on her. And then eventually, she realized that she was alone. And all of a sudden, you hear the scream, and she doesn't know what to do. And she starts running around. And I thought, you know what, I'm just gonna let her panic here for a minute. People are looking and here's this child running desperately looking for Papa and for Nana. And some, I don't know if there was a clerk or who came and tried to comfort her; and about that time, I appeared and she came running toward me. And you know, the only good thing about, well the good thing about it is, I think she learned a lesson. The bad thing is I had to carry her for about the next hour. But that's the point, in such a more glorious way. Our heavenly Father is constantly watching over us. He's constantly caring for us. And we need to be grateful for his leading in our life.

Well, secondly, he was grateful for the privilege of serving Christ and sharing in his triumph. Look at the text again, "But thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ." Now, here, Paul uses a familiar metaphor that they would have understood; that of a Roman triumph and his opportunity here to serve under Christ, the conquering king of kings and Lord of lords. I want to read a description of this triumph, written by a theologian, a scholar, William Barclay. I can't improve upon this, this is really helpful. Here's what he says, "In Paul's mind is the picture of a Roman triumph and of Christ as a universal conqueror. The highest honor which could be given to a victorious Roman general was a triumph. To attain it, he must satisfy certain conditions. He must have been the actual commander in chief in the field. The campaign must have been completely finished, the region pacified, and the victorious troops brought home. 5000 of the enemy at least, must have fallen in one engagement. A positive extension of territory must have been gained and not merely a disaster retrieved or an attack repelled. And the victory must have been won over a foreign foe, and not in a civil war. In a triumph, the procession of the victorious general marched through the streets of Rome to the Capitol in the following order. First came the state officials and the Senate. Then came the trumpeters. Then were carried the spoils taken from the conquered land. For instance, when Titus conquered Jerusalem, the seven branched candlestick, the golden table of the showbread and the golden trumpets were carried through the streets of Rome. Then came pictures of the conquered land and models of conquered citadels and ships. There followed the white bowl for the sacrifice which would be made. Then were walked the captive princes, leaders and generals in chains, shortly to be flung into prison, and in all probability almost immediately to be executed. Then came the lictors, bearing their rods, followed by the musicians with their lyres, then the priests swinging their sensers with sweet smelling incense burning in them. After that, came the General himself. He stood in a chariot drawn by four horses, he was clad in a purple tunic, embroidered with golden palm leaves, and over a purple toga marked out with golden stars. In his hand, he held an ivory scepter with the Roman Eagle at its top, and over his head, a slave held the crown of Jupiter. After him, rode his family and finally, came the army wearing all their decorations and shouting, 'lo triumphe," which in Latin means triumph. As the procession moves through the streets, all decorated and garlanded amid the cheering crowds. It made a tremendous day which might happen only once in a lifetime." That is the picture, he says, that is in Paul's mind. He sees Christ marching in triumph throughout the world and himself in that conquering train. It's a triumph which Paul is certain nothing can stop.

You see, friends, Paul understood that victory comes through suffering. But victory does come. Notice again, verse 14, "But thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ." Not occasionally, but always, even when the world scoffs at us. Even when the world mocks us. Even when we suffer at the hands of wicked man, even when our hearts are breaking. He's always leading us as victorious soldiers in a triumphal procession. Folks, we are marching to glory. Someday the world will see the Son of Man returning in power and great glory, and we are going to be with him. Dwell upon that the next time you're in pain, right? The next time you are suffering.

Matthew 24, Jesus speaks of this, beginning of verse 29. He says, "But immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky. And then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the four winds from one end of the sky to the other." And dear friends, because as Paul says in Colossians, three, verses three and four, because "you have died and your life is hidden with Christ and God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory." Boy, talk about a triumph. The saints are going to accompany our glorious King. We read about this in Revelation 19 verse 14, let me read that in context beginning in verse 11, "And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood and his name is called The Word of God." And catch this. Here we are, "the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses." Magnificent imagery. "From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS."

Dear friends, this is the triumph that awaits us. And it's for this reason that there is nothing more important in life than serving our Lord, our Savior and our King. Lightfoot comments, quote, "The veil which now shrouds your higher life from others, and even partly from yourselves, will then be withdrawn. The world which persecutes, despises, ignores now will then be blinded with the dazzling glory of the revelation." And you're drowning in sorrow and unable to function over what? You see the point? Folks, you just have to change your perspective. Oh Child of God, the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. Yes, the pain is real. I've been there. It is real and I'm not in any way trying to mitigate that reality. But you simply must not lose perspective. Someday you are going to join in that triumphal procession. Someday every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. And the key to gaining victory over heartache is to stay focused on the glories of Christ, not the sorrows of your life. Remember, we are in Christ, right? We are eternally united to him, we have died with Christ. We've been crucified with Christ. We've been buried with Christ. We've been raised from the dead with Christ. We are now seated with Him in heavenly places. We read all of these amazing truths; we're going to be glorified with Christ. Therefore we can rejoice as Paul did and say, "Thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ." Dick Mayhew says, quote, "His life is our life, His punishments are our punishment. His death, our death. His resurrection, our resurrection, His righteousness, our righteousness, His ascension and glorification, our ascension and glorification," in quote. So naturally, we can be thankful as Paul did, knowing that he's always lead us in triumph in Christ, even when we think all is lost. That is what's ultimately happening. Even when our heart is breaking, and we think we can't go on. That is what God is up to. And the victory is certain.

So Paul was grateful for God's leading and grateful for the privileges of serving Christ and sharing in his triumph and thirdly, he was grateful for the privilege of proclaiming Christ. My what a story we have to tell. Verse 14 we read, "He manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of him and every place." And once again, Paul applies the metaphorical imagery of a Roman triumph where priests carrying censers would burn incense to carry praise to these made up gods. And this sweet aroma would also be mixed with the somewhat pungent smell, or I should say, that pungent smell of that incense would be mixed with all of the flowers, all of the garlands that would be spread out over everywhere. Moreover, according to D.E. Garland, he says, quote, "Filets and garlands bedeck 125 stall fed oxen with gilded horns being led as sacrifices by young men wearing aprons and handsome borders, and boys attending them carrying gold and silver vessels of libation. My goodness, what a scene that would have been. Well, obviously the sweet aroma that was carried about on the breeze that wafted across the spectators, and all of those in the triumph; that breeze would have would have carried the aroma of the incense and of the flowers. And that aroma would be one of triumph and joy to the victors. But that same aroma would be an aroma of defeat and death for the prisoners.

Well, the analogy is obvious. Again, the end of verse 14, he "manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place." Folks think about this, even as the sweet smell of garlands and the pungent odor of incense are distinct and quickly capture the attention of our olfactory senses, so too the knowledge of Christ, when the secret wind of the Spirit causes it to waft about through the faithful proclamation of the saints. It's going to be offensive to some, and it's going to be precious to others. When Jesus explained to Nicodemus the need to be born again, remember what he said in John three, beginning in verse six, "'That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit of spirit. So do not be amazed that I said to you, 'You must be born again.'" And he makes the statement, "'The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from, and where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.'" Aren't you thankful that the wind of the Spirit blew in your direction, and by the power of the Spirit, you saw your sin, you came to saving faith in Christ? And beloved, everywhere we go as believers, by the power of the Spirit, we manifest the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Christ in every place.

And for this, Paul was so grateful. Oh, dear child of God, let this sink in for a moment. What a glorious privilege it is to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ. There is nothing more important in all your life than that. Paul understood this in his life. Remember, in Ephesians, three, beginning in verse seven, he said, "I was made a minister, according to the gift of God's grace, which was given to me according to the working of his power. To me the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ." You see, Paul understood that contemplating the reality of this privilege is the greatest of all antidepressants. Folks, ask yourself, does this privilege of being able to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ, does this bring joy to your heart? Is this a passion of your heart? Are you just caught up in all of the difficulties of life, living for yourself? You know, I learned a number of years ago, and I have to confess that I have to pray that the Spirit will help me when these things come up, but I learned that when I'm experiencing relational pain, especially in the church, when I've been slandered, or you know, something's going on, that's really hard, I've learned that the best thing to do is just double down in your service to Christ. Because what Satan wants you to do is, 'oh, woe is me,' you know, get in the fetal position on the couch, put your thumb in your mouth, and just get all depressed and you just can't function. I am just not going to do that. You just can't do that. What a privilege we have to proclaim Christ. I'm going to double down. So I don't know, I guess I go into some manic mode and I'm writing emails and letters and I'm calling people and saying, 'I'm just going to fight all the harder folks.' That's what we have to do. Satan wants to distract us from being that sweet aroma of the knowledge of Christ in every place.

John MacArthur says, "No preacher should take light lightly his inestimable privilege of proclaiming the saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Whether or not preachers are successful, achieve popularity or fulfill their ambitions, it's immaterial. The satisfaction of having an eternal influence for Jesus Christ should be sufficient. The issue is not results, but privilege. The disheartened preacher is disheartened because he focuses on circumstances. The joyful preacher is joyful because he focuses on the eternal worth of his service to God. The disheartened preacher considers his difficulties, the joyful preacher considers his privilege." Dear friends, if you're struggling right now, with some great heartache, may I encourage you to focus on this privilege, and perhaps get on Facebook and just unleashed the gospel? Boy wouldn't that be nice? I mean, a lot of times, Nancy will show me something on Facebook, and I just start losing brain cells. I mean, it is absolutely absurd, watching people trying to get affirmation, putting pictures of themselves and you know, all of this silly stuff. Unleash the gospel, what a privilege we have. Be that sweet aroma of the knowledge of Christ in every place, go to the barbershop or the hairdresser, if you can get in. I understand that the dynamics right now, but, but what that's always a captive audience, to begin to share your testimony. And you watch people start squirming and getting on their phones. But oh, what a wonderful opportunity. You say, but Pastor, all that does is bring further pain and rejection. People don't want to hear that stuff. Well, of course they don't. They're spiritually dead. But it's the gospel that gives them life. Isn't that what happened with you? Well, of course, therein lies the problem. If that's your attitude, you're ashamed of the gospel. You fear man more than you fear God. It's a very dangerous place to be. Paul said in Galatians, 1:10 "For am I now seeking the favor of men or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.

And this leads us to the fourth preoccupation of his heart. Number four, he was grateful for the opportunity to be pleasing to God. What an amazing thought, verse 15, again, "For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved, and among those who are perishing." Do you realize that the sweet-smelling odor of the knowledge of Christ that was diffused in every place by the Ministry of the apostles, and that is diffused in every place by the Ministry of the saints today? Do you realize that odor, a sin is to the nostrils of God, do you realize that that is pleasing to Him? You see, folks, we proclaim Christ ultimately to God, not to men. It's important for you to remember that he is our primary audience, not men. And I must say, and I hope you hear this in the spirit that it's intended, when I preach, I really care nothing about the size of the audience, or even their reaction. In many ways, I don't even see those in front of me. I have an audience of one and that's God himself. And I preach to be pleasing to Him, and let him deal with everything else. Same is true when I write. I write ultimately for him.

This was the grueling passion of Paul's heart. In chapter five and verse nine, he says, "Therefore we also have as our ambition whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him." Is that the passion of your heart? Colossians 1:10, so that we are to "walk in a manner worthy of the Lord to please Him in all respects." First Thessalonians, two, four, "just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts." Folks, what an astounding blessing. What an amazing opportunity we have to be pleasing to God by sharing the knowledge of Christ to others. Is that a priority in your life?

Verse 15, "For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing; to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other, an aroma from life to life." You see, folks, if I can stick with the analogy here, the smell of the gospel will produce joy to repentant sinners who are longing to be reconciled to a holy God and be in fellowship with Him; to have their sins forgiven, and to gain the righteousness of Christ. But the smell of the gospel is going to produce guilt and anger and hatred and fear to those who reject Christ. Remember, they spend their life, according to Romans one, "suppressing the truth in unrighteousness." Constantly trying to keep a lid on what they know to be true about a holy God and their sinfulness. They don't want to hear it, they don't want to think about it. They love darkness rather than light. So you come along with the gospel, and oh my, that's the light. And as I say, it's like flipping on a light down in a cellar and suddenly you see the cockroaches running for cover. Isn't that how you feel? A lot of times when you get around unsaved people and you start sharing Christ, man, they just run for cover. But boy there's going to be some that will hear it and be saved. Men love darkness rather than light. But we are to be the light. Remember, according to Hebrews four, verse 13, for "the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing as far as the division of the soul and the spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and the intentions of the heart." People don't like that, but that's what the word does. The text goes on to say, 'And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do."

Oh, how grateful we should be for the opportunity to please God through our gospel witness, knowing that yes, it's going to be used to harden the hearts of some, but it will be used to soften the hearts of others. And this leads us to the fifth and final preoccupation that we see here that Paul dealt with. He was grateful for God's leading; he was grateful for the privilege of serving Christ and sharing in his triumph. He was grateful for the privilege of proclaiming Christ for the opportunity to be pleasing to Him. And finally, he was grateful for Christ who strengthened him. He says in verse 16, at the end there, "who is adequate for these things?" The answer is, of course, no one. We are only strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And we only tap into the power that is there when we live lives that are consecrated to him. When we are faithfully serving our master. Verse five of chapter three, he makes this clear, he says, "Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God." Jesus said, "'Apart from me, you can do,'" what? "'Nothing.'" But oh, what a joy it is to experience the power of Christ in your life. Lots of times we don't even realize it's happening until maybe it's over. In Colossians, one, verse 29, Paul says, "I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me." And back to our texts in verse 17. It closes this section and he says, "For we are not like many, peddling the word of God. The term "peddling" in Greek "kapeleuo" is an interesting term. It's used to refer to someone who is selling something or offering something that is secondhand through false or deceptive practices. And of course, here he's focusing in on these false apostles that have taken over the church in his absence. He's saying basically, I'm not like them. I'm not using the word of God as a means to promote my Judaistic opinions because that's what was going on largely; mixing law with grace and mixing other manmade philosophies in with Christianity, like so many people do, even to this day; To somehow seduce people into believing things that are not true. And also so they can line their pockets; make a buck off the gospel. I fear that most people in pulpits today are more entrepreneurs than they are true shepherds. But in verse 17, he just says here that, that we're not walking like many peddling something through the word of God, "but as from sincerity." The term "sincerity" in the original language is one used in this context that would speak of a life and message that can withstand the most intense light of divine scrutiny. In other words, he's saying, there's no pretense here, folks, I'm not coming to you in deceit. I am not putting on a charade here unlike the phony predators that have conned you, with a false gospel, filled with all manner of clever deceptions to make a buck off of you. My life and my message is sincere. And that's why he says at the end of verse 17, "but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God." In other words, God is our witness. And for this reason, Christ strengthened him right? He said in Second Corinthians Nine, eight, "God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed." That pretty well covers it.

I would say, oh, dear Christian, if your heart is breaking over some trial, may I encourage you don't give up. Look up. Don't give up. Look up. Remind yourselves of these great truths. Have a heart that is filled with thanksgiving; be grateful for God's leading in your life. Be grateful for the privilege of serving Christ and sharing in a triumph that is inevitable; that is coming. Be grateful for the privilege of proclaiming Christ, and for the opportunity to be pleasing to Christ. And then finally, be grateful for Christ who strengthens you. And when your heart is truly filled with this kind of grateful praise, for these kinds of things, you will see that God will restore your joy, even in the midst of a heart that is breaking. Let's be thankful to these ends. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for these great truths. May they bear much fruit in our lives. Especially Lord, during these times that we all experience when our heart is breaking. Bring these things to remembrance. And may they be so powerful in our mind and in our heart, that we are animated to praise and therefore opened up to the joy that you will bring to us as we get a sense of your soul satisfying presence. I thank you and I'll give you praise for these great truths. Bless us with them. In Jesus name. Amen.

Well, once again, we can come together via the Internet and worship the Lord. The Lord has been so good to us, I'm sure he has to you as well. We're thankful that no one to our knowledge has this virus in the church, but we still remain in our homes. And I'm still speaking to some cameras that are out there. And I miss you all, and we all miss each other. If they allow us to, we might begin meeting once again, even next Sunday, we'll wait and see; you'll be hearing from us. And when we do, we are setting into place some new policies, we'll be having two services, one beginning at 8:30 to 10. And then we'll have an hour in between and have another service. I will give us a chance to disinfect things and give us opportunities for social distancing. We won't have any Sunday school; we won't even use the Family Life Center. But you'll be getting more information on those things. And fortunately, we believe this will be temporary, but we want to do everything we can to protect you, to protect us from each other during this time.

But we come this morning once again to the Word of God. And I would invite you to take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter two. We will continue our verse-by-verse exposition of this epistle. And the title of my discourse to you this morning is "Lessons in Forgiveness." And we're going to be looking at verses five through 11. So follow along as I read Second Corinthians two, five through 11. But if any has caused sorrow, he has caused sorrow not to me, but in some degree--in order not to say too much--to all of you. Sufficient for such a one is this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority, so that on the contrary, you should rather forgive and comfort him, otherwise such a one might be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. Wherefore I urge you to reaffirm your love for him. For to this end also I wrote, so that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things. But one whom you forgive anything, I forgive also; for indeed what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, I did it for your sakes, in the presence of Christ, so that no advantage would be taken of us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his schemes."

Because we all struggle with an exaggerated sense of self-importance, because we all struggle with pride, because we can tend to be easily offended, many times, it's hard for us to forgive another person who has wronged us. Someone says something bad about us, and rather than ignoring it and trying to treat it with grace, we take it personally, we get defensive and we counter attack, which merely throws gas on the fire. And of course, we see this type of cycle happening all the time with cyber bullies, for example, on social media; and they've turned this into an art form. And since so many people on social media platforms get on there, in order to find affirmation for themselves, we see that there's a direct link between social media and depression. Because often the type of feedback, the type of affirmation they get, isn't what they wanted. And especially younger people tend to get very depressed and so it just fuels this anger. And this sense of wanting to get even with other people. In fact, in one study that I read that was quoting several recent studies, it said that teenage and young adult users who spend the most time on Instagram, Facebook and other platforms, were shown to have a substantially higher rate of reported depression than those who spent the least time and that rate is from 13 to 66% Higher. So what you tend to see in our culture is many people live in the cycle of attack and kill under attack. All you have to do is drive on the interstate and you see that. Certainly what you don't see is the idea of loving your enemy. You don't see people praying for those who mistreat you and forgiving those who seek to be forgiven. That's foreign in our culture. And many times we bring that into the church. We have this attitude of "go ahead and make my day." Just think of perhaps someone who's offended you. How do you think about that? How do you respond to that? What's your attitude? Are you bitter? Are you spiteful? Have they come to you and asked for forgiveness, and you kind of give lip service to it, but down deep, you really resent them? And perhaps you even slander them? If so, you’re going to struggle with what you're going to even hear today as we look into the text. And frankly, this is going to speak to all of us, because we all struggle at some level with these kinds of things. You really want to ask yourself, "am I a forgiving person, when people come and seek forgiveness?" What's your attitude towards people who mistreat you? Do you seek revenge or do you pray for their repentance? Are you forbearing? Are you patient? Are you gentle? Do you try to restore perhaps a sinning brother or sister in the spirit of gentleness? Or do you operate in the flesh and seek retaliation and so forth? Using the example of an abusive master, let me remind you of what Peter said, and First Peter two beginning in verse 18, he says "Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable. For this finds favor, if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrow when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God."

Well, certainly this is contrary to our flesh. Our flesh fights this kind of attitude. I think of the unimaginable torture that our Lord Christ experienced while hanging on the cross. And yet, he prayed to the Father, "'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.'" Now, obviously, dear friends, to respond in such a way when we have been injured, especially when we've been severely injured--to respond with that kind of Christlike love, requires a special work of the Spirit. Even in our new nature, we find our flesh fighting against that. And we need help from the indwelling Spirit. And we can be thankful knowing that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. Well, our text this morning, helps us get a little glimpse of how believers are to deal with these things, especially in light of our selfish proclivities, if you will; our flesh that wants to get even with people, and really not forgive them in our heart. And here we can learn some very important lessons in forgiveness.

Now, let me remind you of the context. The Corinthians really struggled with pride and self-will. They were a very divisive people. They were factious, and some had believed the slanderous attacks against the apostle Paul, that the false teachers had made known and some of their sycophants, other malcontents, kind of drank the Kool Aid, if you will, and believe Paul can't be trusted and so forth. And evidently, one of these guys confronted Paul publicly to try to humiliate him and verbally attacked him in what is called the painful visit, as we read in chapter two and verse one. But providentially, we see that there were enough mature saints in the church that they saw that this was wrong, and that this man needed to be dealt with. And so they were willing to discipline this man. And because he was unrepentant, actually disfellowship him, according to Paul's instructions. And fortunately, the excommunication accomplished what it was intended to accomplish, and that is repentance. But unfortunately, there were still those in the church-- probably those that belong to the "pro-Paul cult," if you will, and they were wanting a little more flesh. They wanted a pound of flesh more, shall we say. And they wanted this guy to pay more for his wickedness. And so Paul is coming in and saying, look, the guy has repented and I'm instructing you now to forgive him, to comfort him, to reaffirm him, to show love for him publicly. And as we examine what Paul said, under the inspiration of the Spirit, in the scriptures, I believe what we're going to see is at least four lessons regarding forgiveness, and we would all do well to learn them.

So, let's look at the text. He says, first of all, in verse five, "But if any has caused sorrow," referring to the offender, but guarding him by not using his name. "But if any has caused sorrow, he has caused sorrow not to me, but in some degree--in order not to say too much--to all of you." Beloved, here we see a heart of tender forbearance towards someone that has mistreated him. He speaks in rather vague generalities. He avoids mentioning his name; he says nothing even about the offense of the nature. And no doubt this man would have heard this letter. He may have been in the same room when it was read. Certainly he would have known the contents of it. Imagine the unnecessary grief, had Paul mentioned his name, and even described the offense once again. I mean, he didn't say "Well, yes, you know, Octavius caused me great sorrow when he called me a lying dog that was devouring all of you for personal gain, et cetera, et cetera." No, he didn't say any of that. And obviously, I don't know what all the issue was, but what we see here is Paul guarding him, and basically saying, look, his punishment was enough. He's repented. And what you'll notice here, and all through Second Corinthians, you'll see that Paul did not take this personally. Obviously, the man had caused great sorrow in the church, and sorrow even to Paul, but that's past, it's over. It's needs to be forgotten. It's forgiven. And so he says, "he has caused sorrow not to me, but in some degree--in order not to say too much--to all of you. When he says, "in order not to say too much," he's saying, you know, rather than exaggerating this thing, and blowing it out of proportion. So once again, he's guarding him. Of course, the man caused disunity and strife within the church. Everyone knows that. But Paul was basically saying, Look, don't single me out as if I need a pound of flesh here; as if my pride has been wounded and it would be an insult for you to somehow forgive him and restore him to fellowship. No, no, don't think of that at all. I seek no vengeance here, and neither should you. That's the point.

So the first lesson that we see here is don't take injuries personally. That's really hard to do. I mean, when somebody offends you, and I've had this happen so many times, I can't even keep track of them. But when somebody does that, you have to say to yourself, look, I don't know what's going on for this person. Now, certainly, if I've done something, and I need to repent of that and go seek their forgiveness, that's a whole different story. But when you hear of something and somebody's mad at you, you don't know what's happened, you have to say, look, I don't know what's going on with this person. I don't know what type of lies they have concocted in their head or heard from other people, some other malcontent who knows what kinds of exaggerations they have invented, and in their mind and to accomplish some personal agenda. I'm not sure what's going on with them. And certainly, I'm not sure what God is up to, in their life, in the agencies of divine providence; I don't know what he's up to, even in the life of the church or their family or whatever it might be. I mean, folks think of the times you've been perhaps falsely accused or demeaned, maybe even publicly, when someone says or does something that is profoundly embarrassing. You know, even when your conscience is clear. You know there's really nothing you can do about it; you're sorrowful, you're hurt, you're disappointed. And I'm sure Paul felt all of those things. I'm sure he was, he was righteously indignant--and rightfully so. But at the end of the day, we all have to say, what we see Paul saying here is, look, God is up to up to something here, in the life of this person, in the life of the church, this person has enormous problems. And, and we're just going to trust the Lord to deal with that, and we're going to deal with it biblically within the church. And many times, I have to say, look, whatever's going on with this person, I'm really not a part of it, I'm kind of the most available dog to kick. All I can do, Lord is trust in your goodness, trust in your Providence. I know you're up to something way beyond me here. Therefore, I just have to let you deal with it. And so then the bigger issue, as you've heard me say before, is what's for lunch? I'm just not going to let that person rob me of joy, rob me of fellowship with other people, and distract me from doing what God has called me to do. And that was certainly Paul's attitude here.

Paul realized, as we all should, that he was only a tiny little fish in the ocean of divine providence. Folks, when these things happen, God is up to things that are way beyond our comprehension. And so don't think of yourself as the center of the universe here, that needs to be treated in a special way or whatever. So I think of this situation, like the story of Joseph. You will remember the unbelievable mistreatment that he suffered at the hands of his brothers, when they sold him into slavery into Egypt. And yet, eventually, what does God do? God makes him, basically the prime minister of Egypt, and God used the treachery of his brothers to accomplish things that Joseph could have never dreamed of. Joseph forgave his brothers, you will recall, he calmed their fears. He comforted them. And in Genesis 50, verse 19, he says, "Do not be afraid, for am I in God's place?" The answer is obviously, yes. And he goes on to say, "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive," and so forth. So know that God is up to something in these things.

But a second lesson that I think we can learn from this, is don't keep stoking the fire. That's in essence, what Paul is saying, drop it, forget it, it's over. Rejoice. The person has repented. That's what we've prayed for. And now he's asking for our forgiveness. Let's forgive him. Don't keep reminding him of his sin. I mean, think of the father of the prodigal son. What did he do? He ran out to meet his son. He loved his son, he embraced the penitent with full forgiveness; he offered him gifts of acceptance, and that's what we need to do. We need to kill the fattened calf; we need to have a banquet of celebration. Beloved, this is how God treats us when we are repentant. He forgives, he comforts, he embraces us. The prophet Micah reminds us of just the forgiving nature of God in Micah seven beginning in verse 18. He said, "Who is a God like You, who pardons iniquity, and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of His possession? He does not retain His anger forever, because He delights in unchanging love. He will again have compassion on us; He will tread our iniquities under foot. Yes, you will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea." And the Psalmist tells us in Psalm 103 and verse 12, "As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us." In other words, he's taking them so far away, they no longer have any effect on our relationship with Him. In fact, the words "far" and "removed" in Psalm 103:12 are of the same word in Hebrew, meaning "to become far off" or "distant." And hear the term is used both as a noun and as a verb, and could be translated, as is "the distance from the east to the west." So he distances our sins from us. Yahweh takes our sins. He removes them as far away as possible. Beloved, can there be a more vivid picture of forgiveness?

I'm always deeply moved when I think of Hezekiah's praise to God for his undeserved mercy in delivering him from impending death and for forgiving his sins. We read about this, for example, in Isaiah 38. And in verse 17, Hezekiah says, "It is You who has kept my soul from the pit of nothingness, for you have cast," literally hurled, "all my sins behind Your back." Beloved, when we are truly repentant, God is truly forgiving. The idea here is that that he consigned our sins to oblivion; our sins are no longer a barrier between God and us. And contrast this to God's attitude towards a person who is unrepentant. In Psalm 90 and verse eight we read, "You have placed our iniquities before You. Our secret sins in the light of Your presence." What a horrible thought. But we also know that "when we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness." And my friends, this is the glorious, good news, even of the New Covenant, as the writer of Hebrews describes it in chapter eight, when regenerating grace bring sinners to repentance. And verse seven of that chapter, and following and especially in verse 12, the writer says, "'For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness,'" speaking for God here, "'and their sins and their lawless deeds, I will remember no more.'" Think about that--"'I will remember them no more.'" Now folks I ask you, how wicked would it be for us to remember what God has chosen to not remember? To remember no more? He takes our sins--when we're repentant--he takes our sins, he casts them into the depths of the sea, he removes them as far as the east is from the west, he hurls them behind his back, and yet we're gonna keep bringing them up? Well, you get the idea.

Now back to our text in Second Corinthians two. Not only are we learning here not to take injuries personally and don't keep stoking the fire, but number three: be quick to forgive and comfort the truly penitent. Be quick to forgive and comfort the truly penitent. Notice verse six. "Sufficient for such a one," he says, "is this punishment which was inflicted by the majority." Here the original language, the terms that are used, it really helps us see that he's speaking of the disciplinary actions that occurred as the result of a formal gathering of the whole church. The "majority," in other words, agreed to discipline this man; to excommunicate or disfellowship this man. Now think about it; unlike our modern era, with the church on every corner, this guy had no place to go. There was no Second Baptist in Corinth. This was like the only church. And the great sorrow associated with being removed from the fellowship that he once enjoyed with his Christian brothers and sisters brought him to a place of genuine, genuine repentance. You see, we need to understand that the severance of fellowship really heightens the type of breach that has occurred between a person that is unrepentant, and the God they claim to love. And of course, the purpose of discipline--of church discipline--is always reconciliation, never retribution. And that's what happened here.

And I might add that any church that does not practice church discipline is in flagrant violation of Scripture and shows that they really have very little love for sinners. Moreover, they have very little concern for the purity of the church. I know of a number of churches like this, and frankly, they bear little resemblance to a New Testament Church. And the people who attend those churches bear little resemblance to New Testament believers. Because what has happened is the church gets filled up with people living in blatant sin. It even happens amongst the leaders. And then little by little more tears grow within the church than the wheat; they become more goats than sheep, and truly "a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough," as Paul said, in First Corinthians five, six.

Beloved, whenever there is flagrant, hard-hearted, unrepentant sin, it must be dealt with. Jesus made this so clear in Matthew 18, beginning in verse 15, he says this, "'If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAY BE CONFIRMED. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.'" In other words, you treat them as if they don't even know Christ.

There's really just four stages in church discipline, first, you go to a person privately; you confront them lovingly, gently. But if there's no repentance, then you move to a second stage where you bring two or three, to witness the fact that they've either repented or not. If they are still unrepentant, then you tell the entire church to enlist them in prayer, as well as in calling this person to repentance--out of love, out of a desire to see them reconciled to God and to the rest of the body. And if they're still no repentance, then they are to be excommunicated. And folks, you must understand, to continue to fellowship with someone living in blatant sin demonstrates a profound lack of care for them, a lack of love for them, and certainly a lack of care for the glory of Christ. Because actually, you become a co-conspirator in their rebellion against God. You're watching them walking towards a cliff of divine judgment, and you're not doing anything. Christ is being dishonored; the transforming power of the gospel is being called into question, and you're acting as if nothing's wrong. Second Thessalonians chapter three and verse six, Paul says, "Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from every brother who leads an unruly life and not according to the tradition, which you received from us." And then a little later in verse 14, he says, "If anyone does not obey our instruction in this letter, take special note of that person and do not associate with him, so that he will be put to shame." Now, the same dynamic had occurred earlier in the life of the church in Corinth. You will recall that they had to discipline another member because of gross immorality. And in First Corinthians five, beginning in verse four, Paul says, "In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus, I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." In other words, let me just give him over to the consequences of his iniquity, so that he will be brought hopefully to a place of genuine repentance. Later on, in verse nine, he says, "I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people." Now he adds, "I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, and swindlers or with idolaters. For then you would have to go out of the world. But actually," he said, "I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother." In other words, a person living in flagrant sin who claims to be a Christian, "not to associate with any so-called brother, if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler--not even to eat with such a one."

So the saints at Corinth disciplined this man and by God's grace, he repented. And so in verse six, Paul says "Sufficient for such a one is this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority, so that on the contrary, you should rather forgive and comfort him, otherwise such one might be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow." Yes, the punishment was deserved, but it had its desired effect. And this is what Paul longed for. So now it's time to forgive. Now it's time to comfort. Now it's time to restore. And all of this is essential to unity within the church. And so a third lesson we can learn here is be quick to forgive and comfort the truly penitent. And folks, this is at the very heart of Christian love. And you want to ask yourself, Does this describe me? Is this the attitude of my heart? In Colossians, chapter three and verse 13, Paul says that, as believers we are to be characterized by quote, "bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone." Whenever I think of the way the Lord forgives my mind will go to Isaiah 55, verses six through nine. There you may recall, he describes how that, that when, when the wicked man forsakes his way, and the unrighteous man, his thoughts, and he returns to the Lord, the text says that "the Lord will have compassion on him"... for He will abundantly pardon." What an amazing thought. In fact, he goes on to essentially say that the extent of God's compassion is beyond our ability to comprehend. Therefore, the Lord goes on to say this, "'For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,' declares the Lord. 'For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.'" Oh, dear friends, what a great compassion the Lord has toward sinners, what a merciful and forgiving God, we have. And of course, we see this most vividly in the person and the work of Christ and his willingness, not only to forgive our sins, but to actually bear their punishment in his body on the cross. And beloved, this is our supreme example when it comes to forgiveness. Now think about this, how can we, who have been forgiven such heinous sins against the Most High God, not forgive the lesser sins that people have committed against us? How ridiculous is that? And of course, this was the theme of Jesus' parable. In Matthew 18, beginning in verse 21 and following, you will recall that one of the king's servants embezzled an enormous amount of money that he couldn't possibly repay. And what did the king do? He graciously and compassionately forgave the debt. However, that same servant refused to forgive a fellow servant who owed him some tiny debt. And of course, that's a great picture of ingratitude, and selfishness and pride. And when we act that way, we're making a mockery of the gospel of grace, whereby God has forgiven us a debt we could never pay. James two in verse 13, we read that "judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy." Beloved, please hear me, there is a very high price to pay for unforgiveness. You will become a very angry person that seeks revenge and that will consume you. It will consume every relationship that you will have; you will become bitter. You will become sour and sullen. You'll be that person with a chip on their shoulder. You'll be easily offended, always looking for a fight. Like constantly picking at a scab, the wound will never heal. You've been around those types of folks before, unforgiving folks, and suddenly they'll bring up some past offense and past injury that may have happened 30 years ago. And they will describe it as if it happened yesterday. And you know, dear friend, if this is you, please understand that Jesus says you're going to be given over to the most extreme forms of discipline, what Jesus called the torturers of life.

In Matthew 18, he went on to say this, in verse 32, regarding the king, and the servant, "'Then summoning him, his lord said to him, 'You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?' And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.'" You say, Well, what are torturers? Well, the various kinds of discipline that the Lord will bring upon those who are unforgiving, those who are so far out of fellowship with the Lord, that they would refuse to forgive someone that seeks it. It could include things like just the destruction of your flesh. I mean, your health begins to go, your marriage, your family, your testimony, all of it begins to fall into a state of disarray. Your effectiveness in service to Christ goes away. You question, you grieve the spirit, you just walk in the flesh, you ruin your life. Oh, dear Christian, be quick to forgive and comfort the truly penitent.

But there's a fourth lesson here. And that fourth lesson is this, reaffirm your love for the truly penitent through acts of private and public restoration. Let me give that to you again. Reaffirm your love for the truly penitent through acts of private and public restoration. Notice verse eight. He says, "Wherefore I urge you to reaffirm your love for him." He's urging them to do this. The term "reaffirm" is interesting. The original language, it means to "rule judicially," "to decide on" or "to make a formal declaration about something." In fact, Paul used the same term in Galatians 3:15 to describe the judicial, formal, ratification of a covenant. And the point here is he's urging them to do this with this repentant brother. They needed to restore him lovingly both privately, as well as publicly.

By the way with respect to church discipline, and stages one and two, when it's private, the restoration and the reaffirmation of love need to just remain private, you don't go tell everybody about all of that. But in stages three and four, the reaffirmation of love and restoration needs to occur not only privately but publicly. I mean, where sin has occurred publicly and where the discipline has occurred publicly, and where a repentance has occurred, then reaffirmation of love and restoration to fellowship must also be public. And that's what he's urging to happen here with this penitent brother. John MacArthur said this quote, "At its core, unforgiveness is a lack of love. Forgiveness, on the other hand, fulfills the royal law of love--for example, James two eight." He went on to say, "Forgiving love is a precious jewel, a rich treasure in the life of the church. Without it churches are torn, split, and fragmented. Churches that faithfully practice church discipline must also forgive penitent sinners. The greatest demonstration of love, both by individual believers and the church collectively is forgiving others."

Now, Paul continues in verse nine, and he says, "For to this end also I wrote, so that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things." Isn't that interesting? I find it fascinating. God was putting the saints to the test to reveal what was really in their heart. Now you will remember that they were a self-centered bunch, self-promoting, they were jealous. The church was just fraught with strife and divisiveness, factions; cliques had developed. "I am of Apollos. I'm of Paul. Well, I'm of Cephas, well, I'm of Christ." And so these people were promoting their own agendas. In fact, the word "puffed up" referring to self-promoting pride occurs six times in First Corinthians, so they were a puffed-up bunch. And people that are puffed up are not prone to forgiveness. They were accustomed to personal animosity, to all the sectarian rivalries and vengeance rather than forgiveness. So what does God do? He puts them to the test to see whether you are obedient in all things.

Now think about it. First of all, are you obedient in disciplining sin? Well, the answer is yes. But then secondly, and equally as important, are you willing to forgive a person when they are genuinely repentant? And the answer is also, Yes. Isn't that good news? They passed the test. You know, you want to ask yourself, "Is God putting me to the test in my life, in some area, perhaps in the area of forgiveness? Are there areas of unconfessed and unrepentant sin that I need to deal with?" Well, obviously, Paul celebrated their obedience and even commended them for it later on. In chapter seven, beginning of verse 12. Here's what he says, "So although I wrote to you, it was not for the sake of the offender, nor for the sake of the one offended, but that your earnestness on our behalf might be made known to you in the sight of God. For this reason, we have been comforted. And besides our comfort, we rejoiced even much more for the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all. For if in anything I have boasted to him about you. I was not put to shame; but as we spoke all things to you in truth, so also, our boasting before Titus proved to be the truth. His affection abounds all the more toward you, as he remembers the obedience of you all, how you received him with fear and trembling. I rejoiced that in everything I have confidence in you." I mean, folks, Paul is ecstatic here. He's watching these people grow in Christ. And this is the passion of every pastor's heart. It's the passion of every parent's heart. Don't you long to see your children grow in the grace and the knowledge of Christ? And when they say those things, and do those things that are Christ, like, you just kind of go, "Oh, my Thank You, Lord. How exciting is is to see them growing into maturity." And that's what's going on here with the Apostle Paul.

And to grow in Christian maturity, it means that we're going to be a loving people, which includes two things as we look at this text: confronting sin, and then forgiving sinners when they are repented. Both are equally as important. I'm reminded of Galatians six, beginning of verse one, Paul says, "Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, so that you too will not be tempted." Then he says, "Bear one another's burdens," literally the idea of getting underneath a burden of sin that a person has and helping them carry that; helping them deal with that. And then he says, "and thereby fulfill the law of Christ." Well, what's the law of Christ? Well, it's the law of love. We are to love our neighbor as much as we love ourselves. So this is the commandment. And this is what Paul saw happening with the people so we celebrate the restoration of the sinning brother back into the fellowship. In verse 10, he says, "But one whom you forgive anything, I forgive also; for indeed, what I have forgiven, if I forgiven anything, I did it for your sakes in the presence of Christ." I mean, folks here you see it very clearly. Paul's passion was for unity in the body of Christ. And essential to that unity is not only confronting the sin but forgiving the sinner. And he cared nothing about himself, he knew he wasn't the big issue. As I say, he knew he was just a tiny fish in the ocean of divine providence; he knew that God was up to all kinds of other things. So he wasn't going to take it personally, and get all bent out of shape. He wanted the glory of Christ to be put on display in his life, and in their life. And as Christians, we are most like Christ, when we forgive.

But notice that little phrase, "I did it for your sakes, in the presence of Christ." You see, Paul knew that he was living his life before Christ, that the Lord knows his every thought. And certainly the Lord knows all of our thoughts. You see, Paul lived, "coram Deo", the Latin that means "before the presence of God" or face to face in the presence of God." You want to ask yourself, "Is this how I live? Do I realize that he sees all of my thoughts, all of my deeds?" I like the way RC Sproul put it, quote, "To live in the presence of God is to understand that whatever we are doing, and wherever we are doing it, we are acting under the gaze of God. God is omnipresent. There is no place so remote that we can escape his penetrating gaze. And Paul knew that, and he reminded them of that great truth. This is how he lived. In fact, later in verse 17, he reminded them that he spoke quote, "in Christ in the sight of God." And he knew that both, confronting sin and forgiving sin, are attitudes and actions that never escaped the penetrating gaze of God and he would reward or judge accordingly. And all of this is so, so very important.

In verse 11, "so that no advantage would be taken of us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his schemes." Folks, to be sure, Satan tempts us to sin, as well as tempts us to ignore our sin and even ignore the sins of others. His goal is to fill the church with tears. And this cannot be accomplished if a church is serious about holiness. If a church is serious about purity, if a church is therefore serious about lovingly, disciplining, sinning saints, and then forgiving them, and restoring them and comforting them, when they repent. And furthermore, a church is going to forfeit divine blessing if it refuses to forgive, because forgiveness is really the fruit of love.

Well, in closing, may I just remind you, may I challenge you, examine your heart, don't take injuries personally. Don't keep stoking the fire when someone has repented and the thing is over; be quick to forgive and comfort the truly penitent and reaffirm your love for the truly penitent through acts of private and even public restoration. Aren't you glad that that's the way the Lord treats us? And I'm so thankful that we have a church that understands these things, I can truthfully say that I know that I'm preaching to the choir this morning. Nevertheless, it's great to hear it once again because it reminds us of God's grace for each of us. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. I pray that they will bear much fruit in our hearts, that Christ might be exalted in everything that we say and do. That people will see our love, not only for you, but for other people, and therefore be dumbfounded by just the way we treat each other, even when there is sin. And certainly when there is restoration and forgiveness, because we know that through that, you can use that living illustration of the gospel, to bring others to saving faith, help us to be that kind of people. So we commit all of this to you for your glory. In Christ's name. Amen.

Well, once again, we come together to look into the Word of God and see what the Spirit of God has for us. Having spent the last, about three weeks, I believe, dealing with the issue of the pandemic, looking at it from a biblical perspective, trying to bring encouragement and even exhortation to your hearts during this difficult season, I believe that now it's time to return once again to our verse-by-verse exposition of Second Corinthians. So if you will take your Bibles and turn there turn to second Corinthians chapter one. Notwithstanding the seriousness of the days in which we live and in an effort to not in any way minimize what we're experiencing, I believe that if we continue to just focus on all of our problems, that really can be counterproductive. I frankly, think it's unhealthy to deal with this all the time. Yes, people are sick. And yes, people are dying, and that's a tragedy. But people are always going to be sick, and people are always going to be dying. We live in a fallen world, and the wages of sin, obviously his death, but to obsess over this pandemic, 24/7, I believe is unhealthy. And I believe it can be dishonoring to the Lord and certainly distract us from the hope that we have in Christ and the glories that are ours in our inheritance. And it even distracts us from the opportunity to really fulfill the Great Commission. We need to be all about telling other people about the transforming saving truths of the gospel. And I might add that the inconveniences that we are experiencing and the uncertainties about the future, even the loss of income, it's tragic. Frankly, all of those challenges for us are minor, compared to what most people in the world are dealing with. Frankly, most people around the world are struggling just to find enough food to eat. Many of them are afraid of violence. They're afraid that someone will come in and take all that they have, even take their lives. Most people live in fear of starvation and disease and dying on a daily basis. And frankly, most people around the world would give anything to exchange their struggles for our struggles. So we want to keep this in perspective.

And this is certainly true of the first century saints in the nascent Church, the new church that was being birthed during that time. They were undergoing enormous difficulties in those early days of the church. And I might even add, on a lighter side, but if you're like me the media's 24/7 obsession with this Coronavirus, is beginning to to play on my mind. I was telling some friends the other day that I feel like I'm turning into that guy on television "Monk," the OCD germaphobe that was, I think he was the detective. I've never seen the show. I've seen these commercials and he's always wiping his hands and cleaning everything off. And that's how I think I'm getting and maybe you're getting that way too. It's like I've got a germ phobia. I'm afraid to touch anything. I'm afraid to get near anybody. I'm afraid to breathe the air. It's getting insane. And I'm even keeping a close eye on our stock of toilet paper. I mean, it's really insane when you begin to think about what's going on. People are lost and they're dying in this world; they need the gospel, and we're obsessed about toilet paper? I mean, really, it can get silly after a while.

Moreover, I must add one final thing while I'm on a roll here on all of this. I think if I hear one more news conference, where biased liberal reporters interrogate the President and his administration, in an effort to somehow make them look bad I think I will vomit. I believe I heard some amens. So may I humbly ask you to join with me by refocusing on matters that have eternal rather than temporal significance; matters pertaining to the gospel; matters pertaining to the church, and the body of Christ; which is to be the pillar in support of the truth. And may I also remind you before we look at our text of the Apostle Paul's encouraging words, of exhortation to the saints at Philippi, remember, he was writing from a prison cell, a prison cell. And he knew that he was soon going to be executed. And in Philippians, four, he said, "Therefore, my beloved brethren, whom I long to see, my joy and my crown, in this way, stand firm in the Lord, my beloved." He said, "Rejoice in the Lord always, again, I will say, rejoice. Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near, Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." And then he went on to say this, and this is my encouragement to each of you, "Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence, and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things, the things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me," he says, "practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you."

Now, with that brief introduction, let's go back to the context of what's going on. In Second Corinthians, you will recall that some wolves had infiltrated the ranks of the church, some false teachers. And these were predators that were spreading lies, false accusations about the apostle Paul. They were telling the people, you know, this guy is secretly immoral. This is why he's constantly suffering. God is punishing him. And they were telling the people that he was deceitfully manipulating them, that he was just a con man trying to get money from them. And he was also just a self-appointed false teacher who merely fabricated his message and distorted the true Word of God that we're teaching to you. So that was the message. Bottom line, they were telling the people that he was just a phony, and that you shouldn't listen to him. And so they sought to ruin his credibility by undermining his authority and destroying his character; to discredit his teaching so that they could teach their own deceptions. So, this was obviously very convincing to some of the people in the church, because some of them actually bought into the deception, bought into the slander. And of course, that was heartbreaking to the Apostle Paul.

So, Second Corinthians is a letter where he responds to all of this. His concern is not only to express his joy and relief, because most of them repented, but also to defend his apostleship and confront these false teachers. In Second Corinthians one, verses 12 through 14, you will remember he spoke of his proud confidence and how God had manifested himself through the apostle Paul, in his grace, in the power in his life, in his ministry, and his message. And he glories and what God has done in and through him. And he gives testimony as to how his conscience affirmed his moral, his relational, and his doctrinal integrity. But now, in chapter one, beginning in verse 15, through chapter two and verse four, where we will be this morning, he is going to zero in on more a specific bogus accusation attacking his trustworthiness. You will see that they were claiming that he was duplicitous, that he would say one thing but means something else; that he was therefore dishonest that what he said about spiritual things, about doctrinal matters, really couldn't be believed; that he was erratic. He was unpredictable. He was, he was vacillating. He was indecisive, so he can't be trusted. Don't pay any attention to him, he's a deceiver. He's just playing you. He's just using you. And what we're going to see is that the reason they were making such a charge, now catch this, is because...he changed his travel plans. Really? He changed his, yep, he changed his travel plans. Oh my goodness, you can't be serious. Talk about a flimsy feeble, unconvincing, unconvincing piece of evidence. But you know, that's what deceptive control freaks do. In order to advance their agenda, they must discredit their opponent, and they will come up with anything to somehow do that.

By the way, this is how dishonest, divisive, narcissistic politicians function on a daily basis. We see it all the time. And sadly, wicked people in the church can do the same type of thing; bullying tactics to somehow get people to believe that which is false about another person. Now, what we see here in Second Corinthians, especially in this passage, is not only helpful in learning how to spot this type of thing, but also how to defend against it. So I want to give you just a real simple four category outline, we're going to see, first of all, the tactics of deceivers. And then Paul is going to explain the defense of the gospel. And then thirdly, the appeal to God. And then finally, the motive of love. That's what we will be looking at. And it's my prayer and my confident assurance that you will be instructed, that you will be encouraged; you will be exhorted, as we examine this frankly, rather obscure passage of scripture that perhaps you've never studied closely. But I believe the Spirit of God has much to teach us here.

So first of all, I want you to notice the tactics of deceivers. Notice in verse 15, "In this confidence," he says, "I intended at first to come to you." Well, in what confidence? Well, we go back to the end of verse 14, he says that "we are your reason to be proud as you also our hours in the day of our Lord Jesus." In other words, he's saying, "you should be proud of me, as I am proud of you. I am your spiritual father." He mentioned this in First Corinthians four verse five. And he's essentially saying, "Look, folks, it was through my ministry and my gospel message, along with Timothy as well as Silas, that God saved you by his grace. And as a result, together, we anticipate--what he says here, "the day of our Lord Jesus," that day when we can proudly point to you as our spiritual children. In First Thessalonians chapter two, he says the same thing to the saints at Thessalonica. In verse 19, he says, "For who is our hope, or joy, or crown of exultation? Is it not even you in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy." So essentially, what he's saying is "folks look, had I been a con man who distorted the Word of God, a false apostle, that merely came to deceive you for my own benefit, then how can you explain your salvation? I was loyal to you, you have been loyal to me. So how do you explain this?"

Now, by the way, not everyone believed the deceptions. But obviously, there were a number that did. So again, verse 15, "In this confidence, I intended it first to come to you, so that you might twice receive a blessing; that is, to pass your way into Macedonia, and again for Macedonia, to come to you and by you, to be helped on my journey to Judea." Let me explain this. This is really interesting. You will recall in First Corinthians 16, verses five and six he revealed his initial plan, what we might call Plan A, that he would leave Ephesus, that he would go directly to Macedonia, and then, after that come to Corinth where he would winter. Because it's difficult to travel during the winter. But after writing First Corinthians, he altered his original plan. He came up with, shall we say, a plan B. And he decided to go from Ephesus, first to Corinth, and then go to Macedonia, and then come back to Corinth again the second time before he would go on to Jerusalem. And this way they would receive as he says, twice the blessing, twice the benefit of his fellowship, of his shepherding. And this, by the way, demonstrated just how much he loved them and how he wanted to be with them and minister to them. However, later in chapter one of Second Corinthians, verses 23, through the first verse of chapter two, he explains why he had to change from Plan B, back to basically Plan A, which, as we will see, was to spare them the rod of discipline, to avoid unnecessary conflict, to give the Holy Spirit an opportunity to work in their hearts and bring conviction and repentance to those who had sided with the false teachers against Paul.

So with that background in verse 17, he says, "Therefore, I was not vacillating when I intended to do this, was I? Paul uses an interesting word here, "vacillating." "Elaphria' in the original language, it means fickleness. It means levity of character or of behavior that is capricious, that is whimsical, that is impulsive. The type of person that starts to do one thing, oh, I think I'll do something else. That's what they were accusing him of. And he's saying, Surely you don't think that I changed my plans, on some whim? On some motive to just benefit myself, like men of the world? He went on to say "Or what I purpose, do I purpose according to the flesh, so that with me, there will be yes, yes and no, no at the same time? In other words, you think I do this according to the mood of the moment on the basis of self-interest? Obviously, that was what the false teachers were accusing him of. That he was somehow guilty of either prevarication. In other words, being deliberately vague and evasive, or just being a two-faced liar; speaking out of both sides of his mouth, as we would say, in our vernacular, they may have even been using Jesus words against him. Remember, in Matthew 5:37, Jesus said, "'But let your statement be, 'Yes, yes,' or 'No, no,'; anything beyond these is of evil.'" By the way, there, Jesus was condemning false vows. The people were taking oaths, or I should say making oaths in the name of the Lord and appealing to God as the punisher of all falsehood. And therefore, the oath would be binding when they did it in his name. And unfortunately, the people were misusing this. They felt as though they could tell little white lies to people. They didn't have to be truthful, if an oath wasn't attached to what they were saying. Therefore, they didn't have to be truthful because it wasn't binding. But Jesus was saying that look, even in your everyday speech, you should be truthful, you should mean what you say. If you say yes, it should be yes. If you say no, it should be no; you should never be evasive. You should never be duplicitous. But of course, the false teachers aren't interested in an accurate interpretation of what Jesus said. They didn't care about that. They have one thing in mind, and that's to score political points.

So again, Paul says in verse 18, "But as God is faithful, our word to you is not yes and no." I mean, he's simply saying, Look, you know that what God says is always true. And you know that I was sent to you by God to preach the gospel. Now, do you really think that he would send me and that I would speak on his behalf, if I was duplicitous? If I was vacillating? If I was whimsical or capricious, just a deceiver?

By the way, one of the things that I noticed, as I meditated upon this passage is that Paul is dealing with the same kind of tactics that Satan has used ever since the Garden of Eden. Remember what he did with Eve? He would spin what God said, and do something that God didn't say, get her off balance, get her confused, and then create doubt, and suspicion in God's character, in his plan, in his purposes, and then to get you to believe that somehow you're being hoodwinked; that maybe you're being treated unfairly. That maybe even you've been deceived, and then encourage you to reject what was said, and rebel without any consequences. Now, over the years, I've seen and experienced this kind of wickedness, in my life, especially in the church. I've seen this on a regular basis. People outside of this church, and even in our own church. And practically, the tactics of divisive deceivers kind of goes like this; I'll give you six of them very quickly. Number one, they will make mountains out of molehills. Number two, they will seize upon the very worst possible interpretation of the situation. Number three, like a poisonous spider, they spin facts into fiction in order to ensnare their victim. And then number four, they secretly keep a record of wrongs, whether real or perceived. And number five, they are always looking for more wood to fuel a fire, rather than water to extinguish it. And then number six, they're constantly recruiting other malcontents to join their cause. And this was what was going on there.

Let me give you an idea of what they would have would have heard there in that first church in Corinth. "So did you hear that Paul changed his plans? You hear about that? You know, I wonder what that's all about. I mean, really, I mean, it's hard to trust the guy who says one thing, and then all of a sudden, boom, he's going in a different direction." "I don't know. I'm just uncomfortable about this. Or maybe he never even meant what he said. I mean, clearly, he said he was going to come here first, and then nope, going to do something different. I guess he's unaware of what Jesus said, 'But let your statements be Yes, yes or no, no, anything beyond these is evil.' I don't know. Yeah, there just seems to be something going on here. I just don't like the smell of this thing. I'm not sure what it is. And I mean, I don't want to falsely accuse anybody, but there's something not right with this. I got a funny feeling about it. I mean, really, he makes special plans to see us before he goes to visit Macedonia, as if he really wants to spend time with us, as if he really loves us, as if he really wants to shepherd us and then whoops, changed my mind. I mean, really, who wants a pastor like that? How can this guy even call himself an apostle of Jesus Christ, if he vacillates like this? And you know, if you really think about it, if you can't trust the guy on the little things, how can you trust him on the big things?"

Well, you get the picture. Again, politicians do this all the time. False teachers do it all the time and wicked people, divisive people in a church, will do this as well. So these are the tactics of deceivers. Secondly, notice how Paul speaks of the defense of the gospel. In other words, he's going to use the gospel as part of his defense. Now, apparently, these false teachers were attacking the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so I find it interesting that Paul uses the full Christological title to describe him in verse 19, "For the Son of God, Christ Jesus," you just got to stop there, folks. Don't miss this. I mean, what an amazing truth and what astounding power there is in this title, and in this name. And here, Paul appeals to the highest of all witnesses. This "Son of God" who is faithful and true, as he said in verse 18. This reminds me by the way of a time when I was in Siberia, on one of my trips there teaching pastors, and I was asked to speak at some of the various churches in the area around Lake Baikal. And I went to one church one evening, church of about a couple of 100 people, in Angara. And I'll never forget it. The pastor was such a dear guy, he was a converted Russian Olympic boxer, a champion boxer, and he had come to saving faith in Christ. And so I remember coming into that church, it was meeting in an old Communist Party building, which was now a library, it was up on, I think, the second floor. And it was a huge room with these kinds of tall tables that you could fit probably six people around at least. And all of the people were leaning over on the tables, and they were praying. It was, it's their custom there to never pray seated, they either pray on their knees, or they're standing and they're leaning on something. It was a precious sight to see. And, and after a little bit, the prayer meeting was over. It was time to start the service, and the interpreter introduced me, and I remember standing before them and I began by saying something like this "on behalf of the saints at Calvary Bible Church and Tennessee, I greet you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." And as soon as I said, that, to my astonishment, they all jumped up. I had no idea. I thought, Oh, my goodness, I have said something wrong here. As soon as the interpreter said what I said, they jump, they stand up, and they immediately say something back to me. And so I looked at my interpreter, and he said, "and they greet you as well, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." And I thought, Oh, good. And I told the interpreter, I didn't know what just happened. And he kind of expressed that to them. And, and we all had a great laugh, but my what a, what a tremendous response. And what an appropriate response of the people of God when they think about the lover of our souls, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Well, "For the Son of God, Christ Jesus, who was preached among you by us--by me and Silvanus and Timothy--" "Silvanus is another name for Silas, "was not yes and no, but is yes in Him." In other words, we weren't duplicitous. Three of us have been called and gifted, to come to you to give you the gospel. And you believed and you were saved. Three of us have preached the transforming truths of the Word of God to you, the truth of who the Son of God is. And since two or three witnesses are required to verify the truth of something, here they are. Surely you don't think that my preaching was deceitful. But what they preached, which was the same message, was not. Surely you don't think that we are all duplicitous, vacillating, whimsical deceivers?

By the way, there's a great lesson to be learned here. Whenever you hear some accusation against someone, certainly against a pastor, you want to measure that against the pattern of that man's life and the pattern of his message, to see if that would in any way contradict the allegation. I mean, don't judge a man on the basis of some strange scenario that's really out of character, that is not indicative of who that man is, and what he has preached for many years. Or on the basis of some flimsy evidence tantamount to Paul changing his travel plans--on the basis of something like that; believe the worst about a man.

Verse 20, he goes on, he says, "For as many as are the promises of God, in Him they are yes; therefore also through Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us." My what a powerful statement. Think about it, he knew that the most all of them would agree that the covenant promises of God to believers are all ultimately fulfilled in Christ. In him they are "yes." In other words, I really want to camp on this for a moment; this is so precious to me. I'm a Gentile. Most of you are Gentiles. And may I remind you that all of the promises of God, were also given to the Gentiles; promises that were fulfilled in Christ. In fact, Jesus told his disciples in Luke 24:44, "all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses, and the prophets, and the Psalms must be fulfilled. And indeed, they were fulfilled in Christ. But we also, even as Gentiles, are the recipients of these blessings. I mean, this is what Paul said, for example, in Ephesians, two, beginning in verse 10, and by the way, this would have been the same truths that he would have given to the saints at Corinth. Remember there he says, "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, so that we would walk in them. Therefore, remember that formerly you the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision, by the so called circumcision, which is performed in the flesh by human hands. Remember that you were at that time, separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world. But now," oh, what precious words, dear friends, "But now in Christ Jesus, you who were formerly far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ."

The apostle Paul spoke of this as well in First Corinthians 1:30, where he declared that Christ Jesus "became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption." So, Paul is speaking here in verse 20 of the many "promises of God" affirming the fact that "in Him they are Yes." And I was thinking about those promises; there's so many, but fundamentally, they are rooted in the unconditional unilateral, irreversible, covenant that God made with Abraham in Genesis 12, and Genesis 15 and again in Genesis 17. An everlasting covenant that contained four elements. It contained the promise of a coming seed, referring to the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, that would become the Savior of all who would believe in Him. Also promises concerning a specific land, a specific territory. And the promises of a nation. And promises of divine blessing and protection for Abraham's posterity. And ultimately, we as Gentiles, have had been grafted into the vine that is rooted in the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant. Romans 11 is very clear about this. And indeed, according to Galatians, three and verse nine, Paul said, quote, "those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer." So I think of the promises that God has made, that they are true. The promises that he gave, for example, to Abraham, that was later reaffirmed to Isaac and Jacob. And then the Messianic Kingdom promises that he gave, for example, to David in the Davidic Covenant, in Second Samuel seven. So the promises of God that Paul speaks of would include all of these things, all of the promises about the coming Messiah, all of the promises about the kingdom that were given to the Old Testament patriarchs and to the prophets; all of these are fulfilled in Christ. Indeed, they "are yes in Him." The promise of a coming Messiah who would bring salvation to all who would believe in him, who will rule the earth in an intermediate kingdom, prior to the eternal state. The Messianic Kingdom where Jesus will reign as the last Adam; where he will reign from and over the realm where God first tasked the first Adam to rule and to reign--but where he failed, a visible reign in the realm where the Messiah was rejected, and where his people had been persecuted, a time in history when all aspects of the biblical covenants and promises will be fulfilled. A time of great blessings for the nations of the earth; all those who believe in the Lord.

And by the way, during this pandemic, dear friends I find myself often just longing for the Lord to come and snatch us away in the rapture of the church. To take us unto himself, and then to return with us to establish his promised earthly kingdom. And when I think of the promises of God that are yes, in Christ, my heart is stirred to worship, it is stirred to praise. And it is animated with anticipation. O, how I long for the Lord to return.

So back to verse 20, since all God's saving promises are true in Christ, "therefore," Paul says," also through Him is our Amen." Amen means mean, "surely," it's a transliteration of the Hebrew word. "A-mon," I think is how they pronounce it. A-mon."" And it was a term that was used to solemnly affirm the truthfulness of what has been said. And we say that a lot, we say "amen" after certain things, and that's what he's saying here. "Therefore, also through Him is our Amen, to the glory of God through us." And then he expands upon this firm faith that Christ is wrought within our souls. In verse 21 he says, "Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God." Now, this is interesting. The term "establishes" it means "strengthens" or "solidifies" or "makes us stand firm." And what's amazing, folks, when you think about this, God is currently in the process of establishing us together with each other in Christ. He goes on in verse 22, and says, "who also sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge." Now, I'm going to get technical for a moment, but I hope that it will become very clear to you. It's interesting here that he uses three aorist participles, or past tense participles, to affirm this amazing reality of this establishment that we have. And each of them are antecedent actions of the main verb, which is "to establish." And the grammar indicates here, therefore, that something has happened in the past, that has ongoing results. Well, what has happened in the past was certainly he has "established us," but also he has "anointed us", "sealed us", and "gave us"; in other words, he has given us the deposit of the Spirit.

Now I want us to look at this closely for just a moment. This is so precious. First notice, he "establishes" us in Christ, referring to our salvation, when we are born again, when we're united to Christ in saving faith. It's that marvel of being in Christ. I've recently written a book and it's just now been released one of my many books, entitled, "The Marvel of Being in Christ: Adoring God's Loving Provision of New Life in the Spirit." And I go into great detail about our union with Christ; an amazing doctrine. Beloved, think about this. Christ is not a a means to an end, but he is the all-sufficient and all glorious end himself. We now share a common spiritual life with Christ. He lives in us and we live in him; Galatians 2:20; Colossians three, three; we have died and our lives, our life is now hidden with Christ in God. So he first of all establishes us, but then notice, secondly, when we were established in Christ, we were also anointed with the Holy Spirit. And this happens at the moment of our new birth. "Anoint" denotes the idea of dedicating something, even commissioning something, consecrating something, someone especially to serve God. First Corinthians 12:13. Paul says, "For by one Spirit, we were all baptized," in other words immersed, "into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit."

So we have been established, we've been anointed. Thirdly, we've been sealed, God has sealed us. A seal, of course, is a token that assures that someone owns something, a piece of property, or whatever. And here, God's stamp of ownership is on all those who belong to Him. And that stamp of ownership that mark, is the indwelling Spirit of God, who instructs us and empowers us and guides us in our life and helps us put the glory of Christ on display. In Romans eight and verse nine, "If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him." The point is, those that have the Spirit of Christ, belong to him, that is the mark of ownership; we have been sealed in him. And certainly a transformed life that is devoted to the glory of Christ through faith and obedience is always the certain mark that individual belongs to God in Christ. In Second Timothy two, verse 19, Paul said, "The firm foundation of God stands, having this seal, "'The Lord knows who are His' and, 'Everyone who names the name of the Lord is to abstain from wickedness.'" Folks, what a joy it is to know that we belong to him, that nothing can separate us from his love.

And fourthly, we see that God gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge. A "pledge” refers to a down payment or a deposit. You might say he is the "earnest of our inheritance," the first installment of all the promises of redemption, that belong to the redeemed; all that awaits us. Romans 8:23, we have the "first fruits of the Spirit." He goes on to say "waiting eagerly, eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body." And in Second Corinthians five, verse five, Paul says, "Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the spirit as a pledge." And also in Ephesians, 1:13 and following, he says, "In Him, you also, after listening to the message of the truth, the gospel of your salvation--having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of His glory." Now, Paul's point here, in reminding them of all these magnificent realities that he has preached, and they have embraced in saving and transforming faith; the point of it all is simply this: how, in light of all of this, can you question my integrity simply because I felt it was necessary to change my travel itinerary? Really, folks?

So we've seen the tactics of deceivers, the defense of the gospel that he preached that changed their lives in eternal destiny. And thirdly, we see now that the appeal to God, notice verse 23, "But I call God as witness to my soul, that to spare you I did not come again to Corinth." You see, here, he's explaining why he didn't come to them, why he changed his plans. "Not that we lord it over your faith, but are workers with you for your joy; for in your faith you are standing firm." Then verse one of chapter two, "But I determined this for my own sake, that I would not come to you and sorrow again. For if I cause you sorrow, who then makes me glad, but the one whom I made sorrowful? This is the very thing I wrote you so that when I came, I would not have sorrow from those who want to make me rejoice; having confidence in you all that my joy would be the joy of you all." He said again, the reason he decided not to go to Corinth on his way to Macedonia, as he changed his plans to do, was to spare them of the rod of discipline, as I mentioned earlier. To avoid unnecessary conflict; to give the Holy Spirit of God an opportunity to do his work in their heart, to bring conviction and repentance; especially those who had sided with these false teachers and had joined in a mutiny against the Apostle Paul. He knew that those who believed those slanderous lies, those lies of the false teachers, and those who joined against him, needed time to really think about and pray about the severe letter that he had written them confronting them. I mean, we all know that you don't want to confront a man or a woman when their bloods up; when they're mad, let them cool down, let them think about it. Let them be encouraged by other godly people. Don't be guilty of provoking them more at a time when they haven't really cooled off and thought about things rationally and biblically; that just causes unnecessary confrontation. So he's basically saying, folks, look, I didn't walk, don't want to walk, into a hornet's nest. I didn't want to have to assert my apostolic authority. I didn't want to have to lord it over you. I didn't want to come in and let's get into big fight. I don't want to bring sorrow upon sorrow. My goal is always to work with you for your joy.

If I can add a little footnote here, folks, when you see me and the elders make a change in the church, maybe a change in ministry, or personnel or whatever. Please don't immediately think that this is some whimsical idea. Please don't think we're being duplicitous; that what we're saying is poorly conceived, that we just kind of up and changed our travel plans. But rather realize that there's a good reason for what we're doing. Reasons that have the glory of Christ, and your best interest at heart, knowing that we love this church and also know that, that we are privy to information that you do not have. And that in most cases we're not able to give to you. And if you knew what we knew, undoubtedly you would agree Oh, yes, that's absolutely the right thing to do. So, despite all of the hysterics, and all of the drama, that sometimes goes along with some change in the church, all of the accusations that start flying, and all of the weeping and wailing and the gnashing of teeth, know this dear friends, we can honestly say, as Paul did that we can call on God as witness to our soul. That what we have done is for his glory, and for your joy, for your good.

So having seen the tactics of deceivers, Paul's defense of the gospel and his appeal to God, finally, in closing, notice the motive of love. Even though his love was under heavy fire, he still loved them, verse four, he says, "For out of much affliction and anguish of heart, I wrote to you with many tears;" referring to the severe letter that he had written, "not so that you would be made sorrowful, but that you might know the love which I have, especially for you." Folks, Paul's passion was the truth of the gospel. His passion was for the purity of doctrine, for the purity of the church--for unity within the church for the glory of Christ. Why? Because of his great love for Christ, and because of his great love for the people. And I trust you share these passions. I would just challenge you to learn these lessons.

Well, beware certainly of anyone that stirs up divisions in the church. Beware of false teachers. Guard your heart against being sucked into whatever the drama is of the moment, but also celebrate the fact that we have been established in Christ. Celebrate the fact that he has anointed us he has sealed us and he has given us the deposit of the Spirit of God. Oh, what hope and joy and promise and peace we have in Christ. What a glorious future awaits us in him. Let's think about these things, especially during this difficult season. Will you join me in prayer?

Father, we are always humbled by the power of your word, and we are often moved to a place of deep reflection and joy when we consider the saving, transforming truths of the gospel, the inheritance that is ours in Christ. And we're also moved when we consider the dangers that are all around us, not only outside the church, but even within the church. And I pray that as we reflect upon what we have heard this morning, that by the power of your Spirit, you will bring conviction, you will bring encouragement, you will bring comfort and certainly peace and joy to each of us who know and love you. And if there be one that does not know you, as Savior, and Lord, I pray, as always Father that by the power of your Spirit, you will bring conviction to their heart. Help them to see the wrath of God that abides upon them, but the grace and the mercy that's available to them through faith in Christ, our Redeemer, save them by your grace, Father. Save our children, save our grandchildren, save our friends. We ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus, the Son of God, our Lord and our Savior. Amen.

Well, Greetings, everyone. It's a joy to be with you on this Lord's day morning. This is a very strange Lord's day morning because I'm looking out at only a handful of people. We've asked that people not come today because of the Coronavirus. And so this is going to be a little bit different, knowing that you're scattered all over, looking at the sermon this morning through the electronic media, just a word about the Coronavirus. We want to be cautious. We may do this again next Sunday. We're not real sure. But we will let you know. But I was thinking about the difficult times in which we live and especially in light of this virus that's going around and my mind went to Psalm 56, beginning in verse three, There we read, "When I am afraid I will put my trust in You. In God whose word I praise, in God, I have put my trust; I shall not be afraid. What can mere man do to me?" And I hope that is the testimony of your heart. And likewise, in Isaiah 26, beginning in verse three, we read, "The steadfast of mind You will keep in perfect peace." And I hope you have that steadfastness in mind. He went on to say, "because he trusts in You. Trust in the Lord forever, for in God the Lord, we have an everlasting Rock." And so with those words of confidence and trust, knowing that God is in control of all things, let's just bow our heads in a word of prayer, as we prepare our hearts for his word this morning.

Father, it is a joy to be in your presence. And to be a part of this service that is being broadcasted to our dear saints scattered around. I pray that by the power of your Spirit, you will speak to each of our hearts I pray that your word will go forth with with clarity, and conviction and bring comfort and encouragement. And I pray above all that Christ will be honored and all that is said and done. So we commit ourselves to you this morning in Jesus name. Amen.

I've entitled my discourse to you this morning "The Testimony of our Conscience." And I would invite you to take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter one. And we will be looking at verses 12 through 14. As we continue to make our way through this amazing epistle verse by verse. Let me read the passage to you. "For our proud confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, but in the grace of God, we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you. For we write nothing else to you than what you read and understand. And I hope you will understand until the end; just as you also partially did understand us, that we are your reason to be proud as you also are ours in the day of our Lord Jesus."

So here, the apostle Paul speaks of this concept of the conscience. The term "conscience" in the original language describes that faculty within us that distinguishes between right and wrong, between good and evil. And the conscience will either exonerate or accuse a person depending upon what they have done. You might think of the conscience as the little what we call idiot lights in a car. When a little light comes on your dashboard, you know that something's awry, something needs to be examined, something is wrong. That's what our conscience does. And of course, we all know what it is to have a guilty conscience. When we violate some moral or ethical standard in our life, something that we believe to be right, our conscience bothers us. Maybe no one else knows. Maybe we've done something that we know is wrong. We wish we hadn't done it. But we did it and we feel guilty about it. And maybe your conscience is alarmed right now. Perhaps you're involved in something that is sinful, something that you're ashamed of and you would be horribly embarrassed if anybody found out about it. That is your conscience speaking to you. But what's really fascinating is that when we violate our conscience long enough, the guilt tends to go away. It reminds me of a time when I was with a friend, and he asked me to drive his old Chevy pickup truck. And I got in, he got in on the other side and as I turned on the engine and started down the road, I noticed that there was a little light that came on the dashboard, something like, check engine soon or whatever. And I said, "Oh my did you know that your engine light is on?" And his response was, "oh, yeah, I know, that thing's been on for years. I don't pay any attention to it, I just ignore it." So I said, Okay. So sometimes people do that in their conscience. And eventually, they pay no attention to the light whatsoever. You see, your conscience will only hold you to the highest moral and ethical standards that are in your mind; that are in your heart. But if you ignore it long enough, those standards no longer have any authority in your life. And we all know people that can do things, and we would say seemingly, they have no conscience. I'm reminded of a Indian friend of mine, a Canadian, first; First Nations Indian, as they call them, up in Canada, a man that was an ex-con, he came to saving faith in Christ while he was in prison. And I remember talking to him about his background, he said that when he was a little boy, he watched his father and watched his mother shoplift and steal things here and there. And his father said to said to him, "Look, we have suffered at the hand of the white man for so long, it's not wrong to steal from them." And unfortunately, this was bothering the little boy's conscience. But when he heard that, he began to change his mind a little bit. And he said that his father also told him that, that after all, people get money from insurance companies. And so it's not like they're losing out on anything. And so with that example, and with that explanation, his moral, his ethical standards, were gradually lowered sufficiently to silence his accusing conscience. And so he would do the same things. His stealing gradually went from shoplifting to more expensive items, he began stealing things like chainsaws and trucks and cars, from ranchers, even horses and cows. And eventually he got caught and had to go to prison. But I remember one thing that he said, and I'm paraphrasing this, he said, you know, Dave, when I was doing all of those things, it really didn't bother me all that much until I heard the gospel. And once I heard the gospel, once I saw God's law, I was consumed with guilt, which God used to bring me to repentance and to faith in Christ.

So that's the purpose of the law, isn't it? The purpose of God's law is to show us God's holy standard. And it drives us to the gospel that saves us from the curse of the law that we have violated. And then suddenly, when we see how the law of God reveals His character, we see our sinfulness all the more vividly. When we see his law, it teaches us what is pleasing to him, which in turn causes us to literally pant after his law after his word to delight in it. For example, in Psalm 119:131, the Psalmist says, "I opened my mouth and panted, for I longed for your commandments." He went on to say in verse 143, "Trouble and anguish have overtaken me, yet your commandments are my delights." And when this happens, we can say with the apostle Paul, in Romans 7:12, "The law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good." And in verse 22, he says, "For I delight in the law of God, according to the inward man."

But there's something else that God has revealed to us about our conscience that is really fascinating. And that is, when we are born again when we come to true saving faith in Christ, God cleanses the very conscience that he has revived. It's a fascinating concept. That same conscience that didn't feel anything suddenly screams of our guilt and our bondage to sin. And yet when we come to faith in Christ, he cleanses that conscience. We read about this in Hebrews nine and verse 14, where the writer says, "The blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God." It's an amazing thing, isn't it? At the point of original regeneration, the accumulated guilt and shame that we experience deep within our conscience is suddenly cleansed. And according to Hebrews 10:22, our hearts have been "sprinkled clean from an evil conscience." And when this happens, we can say, with David, "I acknowledged my sin to You and my iniquity, I did not hide, I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the guilt of my sin."

But there's something else that is fascinating, when we consider the conscience, a well-informed conscience, a conscience that is anchored in God's standard of righteousness. And that is, when we are falsely accused our conscience will exonerate us, even if the evidence appears to say otherwise, even if our friends believe a lie, a fully informed conscience will overturn the false verdicts of a slanderer. And that is at the heart of this passage that we're looking at here this morning. Remember the context, Satan had commissioned and empowered some false apostles to really hunt down the Apostle Paul. They were vicious wolves in sheep's clothing. In other words, they looked like real apostles, real pastors. They looked like that, they talked like that. They acted like that as though they were true messengers of God. But in reality, they were vicious predators. But the people in the church couldn't see it. They were sheep, and they began to follow these men. And we know that they came from within the early church, and this happened a great deal back then, as it continues to happen today. They were phony believers who had superficially attached themselves to the church; they saw how they could make money and gain recognition and power from naive and ignorant Christians. They were, you might say, the original televangelists, the original charismatic prosperity teachers, the original mega church charlatans and so forth. But their most delicious prey happened to be the Apostle Paul, and all who believed his apostolic message. You will recall, Paul described them, probably one man in particular, as "a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me," Second Corinthians 12 seven. And also in Second Corinthians 11 in verse 13. He describes him he says, "Such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. No wonder for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore, it is not surprising if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their deeds."

And of course, we know that the same kind of predators fill pulpits to this very day. In fact, the greatest enemies of authentic Biblical Christianity has been and will always be, religious people, especially those who claim to be Christian. You will recall in Matthew seven that Jesus warned that hell will be the abode of many who called him Lord, Lord. He described them as those who said, they prophesied in his name and we, in your name, we cast out demons and in your name, we perform many miracles. But we know according to Jesus words that these people will never enter the kingdom. He says only those who have entered in through "the narrow gate" the narrow gate of genuine repentance, brokenness of heart over sin; crying out to God for saving grace. And they will be the ones, who by God's grace and power, will do the will of the Father. But in Matthew seven, Jesus described the leaders of this pack of wolves as, quote "false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves." Verse 15.

So back to the context, these ravenous wolves infiltrated the ranks of the Corinthian church and began spreading lies about the Apostle Paul. They accused him that he was secretly immoral, which was the reason why he was constantly suffering and being persecuted. They thought that that was a sign of God's judgment upon him. They said that he was deceitfully manipulative, that he was just using people for his own gain; that he was nothing more than a con man trying to line his own pockets. They also accused him of being a self-appointed false teacher, who merely fabricated the message that he gave and distorted the true word of God. Bottom line, they said that he was a phony that couldn't be trusted. So they sought to ruin his credibility. They sought to undermine his authority. They sought to discredit his teaching so that they could replace it with their own. And they were obviously very convincing in their slanderous attacks, because unfortunately, many people at the church in Corinth believed them. And that's when it's really heartbreaking. To hear slanderous lies about you is bad enough, but when friends believe them, that is especially difficult.

So you may recall Paul left emphasis, and went to Corinth to confront these men. It was called the sorrowful visit, as we read in chapter two and verse one. It didn't go well, evidently, one of these guys publicly insulted the apostle Paul, there was some kind of altercation. And yet shockingly, most of the church did not come to his aid; did not defend him. So Paul is heartbroken. So he goes back to Ephesus, he writes what is called the severe letter, as we read in verse four of chapter two, he had Titus deliver it to them. And later we learn from Titus that, or he learned from Titus that they had repented of their rebellion against Paul. So in Second Corinthians now, his current concern is not only to express his joy and his relief, but also to defend his apostleship and to confront the false teachers. And here in Second Corinthians, one, verses 12 through 14, Paul expresses his proud confidence in how God manifested his grace, and manifested his power in his life and ministry, and glories in what God has done in and through him.

And so verse 12, he says, "For our proud confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience." In other words, he knew for certain that he had dealt with the people there in godly sincerity and faithfulness, virtues that he rightly attributes to the grace of God in his life and not to himself. He knew for certain that God had called him and empowered him to be an apostle, despite his weaknesses. And he knew for certain that he had faithfully and accurately proclaimed the Word of God, the Gospel, that's why so many of them had been saved. So in verse two, or I should say in these two verses, he gives testimony to how his well-informed, and you might say his truth saturated conscience, really affirmed three things. His conscience affirmed number one: his moral integrity. Number two: his relational integrity, and finally, his doctrinal integrity.

So again, notice verse 12. "For our proud confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and godly sincerity, not in fleshly, wisdom, but in the grace of God, we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you." So first, we see how his conscience affirmed his moral integrity. Notice what he says. He knew that he had conducted himself first of all, "in holiness." Holiness means to be set apart from sin and set apart unto God; to be morally pure. Now, I don't want you to get the wrong idea about holiness because sometimes, we tend to do this. Yes, to be holy means to be set apart from sin. Actually the term means other, totally other, utterly transcendent set; apart from any kind of corruption, unapproachably and unimaginably pure in morality. And therefore we know that no sinner can ever enter into the presence of a holy God, apart from the imputed righteousness of Christ, the Son of God, who was infinitely holy. He was the Holy One of Israel.

Now, understand this, while Jesus should never be considered some kind of smiley face God that winks at sin, he is also not to be thought of as some kind of a bad tempered school principal with a perpetual scowl on his face. And sometimes people in our circles can mistakenly see Christ as stern and unapproachable, as austere and demanding as if he's always kind of standing there, shaking his head with his arms folded, kind of in disgust, disappointed in us pointing his finger at us and anger and sometimes shouting at us. And others see him as one who is kind of put off by us that he kind of holds his nose when he gets close to us. Because we're so filthy and so on, kind of like the first time a child is asked to bait his own hook. Perhaps you've seen this, I've seen this before, and my children and my grandchildren, they have that grimace on their face, and they kind of turned their head away and they slowly reached to grab a nightcrawler but when they feel that revolting slime, they drop back and disgust. Some people may not admit it, but that's how they see Jesus. That's how they see God. But Jesus said, in Matthew 11:29, "'I am gentle, and lowly," or "humble in heart." If you want to know who Jesus is, that's who he is. Gentle means meek and mild. In other words, he's not harsh, he's not easily angered. His arms are never folded in frustration, but they're always open in affection welcoming us to him, and he's also humble or lowly, which means he is meek and he is accessible and approachable.

Reflecting on this passage, the Old English Puritan, Pastor Thomas Goodwin, made a very astute observation. Here's what he said, "Men are apt to have contrary conceits of Christ. But he tells them His disposition there," in other words, in this text, "By preventing such hard thoughts of him, to allure them unto Him the more. We are apt to think that He, being so holy, is therefore of a severe and sour disposition against sinners, and not able to bear them. But no, says He, I am meek, and gentleness is my nature and temper." Now, some will say, well, yes, but according to Revelation one, in verse 14, we read that that "His eyes are like a flame of fire." We read that "His feet are like burnished bronze, when it has been made to glow in a furnace and His voice was like the sound of many waters." It goes on to say that "Out of His mouth comes a sharp two-edged sword; His face is like the sun shining in its strength." Well, yes, that is true, but that's how he must be perceived by the impenitent, not the penitent. By the unredeemed, not the redeemed. That is how he must appear to those who reject him, not to those who receive him, in humble repented faith, to those who are broken over their sin and weary of their suffering; for those who are desperate for forgiveness and mercy and grace; for those who are humble and contrite of spirit and who tremble at his word. His arms are always outstretched. He is always welcoming us, because he is gentle and humble in heart. Remember that he delights in mercy. He is a high priest; a faithful high priest that sympathizes with our weaknesses. He is the one who ever makes intercession for us. He is the one who was our advocate before the Father's bar of justice. In fact, in Hebrews chapter five and verse two, we read how he "deals gently with the ignorant and the wayward." And that's why we read, again, in Matthew 11:29, Jesus says, "'Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 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, for My yoke is easy, and My burden is light.'"

Now, my point with all of this is when Paul said that he conducted himself "in holiness," this is what he meant. Yes, he was morally pure, but he was also gentle and humble in heart like Jesus. And frankly, this should be the defining virtues of every Christian, of every believer; all of us who were debtors to his grace. So the great Apostle Paul would have been meek and mild and humble and approachable; an accessible man with his arms always open to those in need of the Savior. So yes, we see here that as he says, he knew that he had conducted himself in holiness, but also, he knew that he had conducted himself in "godly sincerity."

This is an interesting concept. This is the quality of being honest, of being straightforward in attitude, and in speech. This carries the idea of having no pretense, no duplicity. No devious motives, no saying one thing but meaning something else. We might say that he was the real deal. Now, the term "sincerity" in the original language, literally means "tested by the light of the sun," which is a fascinating concept. In fact, it comes from a compound word in Greek, "eili". Which means "the sun's heat," and "krino," which means "I judge." And together they denote the purity of something that has survived the testing, and the searching of the blazing light of the sun. In fact, the term sincerity is well illustrated by a first century testing procedure that people would use to determine the genuineness, you might say the structural integrity of a piece of pottery. You see dishonest potter's would use wax to cover up cracks in a pot that they were trying to sell. And when they would put the wax on it, it would make a crack virtually invisible to an undiscerning eye. So a wise consumer would take the piece of pottery, and they would hold it up to the sun, then oh, I'm beginning to see some cracks there. And if you held it there long enough, guess what would happen to the wax, it would begin to melt. So the sun's rays would expose the pretense. So the point here with the Apostle Paul, with the idea of godly sincerity, is simply this; when examined and tested by the searching in the searing light of divine holiness, Paul's life would certainly reveal cracks. Every sinners got a crack or two or many cracks in their pottery, you might say. But none of those cracks were concealed with the wax of religious hypocrisy. Paul's conscience confirmed this to be true.

Now it's also important to note that grammatically, both his holiness and his godly sincerity are qualified by of God. In other words, both virtues are godlike. God is the object and he is the source of all holiness and sincerity. And remember this folks when you experience a person who is holy, who is gentle and humble in spirit who is set apart, who is morally pure, so to speak, and a person that's filled with godly sincerity. What a joy they are to be around. For in their Christlike example, we get a little glimpse of God. He is the object, he is the source of every righteous virtue. In fact, Paul says in First Corinthians 15, verse 10, "By the grace of God, I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me." And to the Ephesians, he described, what is "the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe these are in accordance with the working of the strength of his mind, which he brought about in Christ." And so it's always God who animates and empowers us to be holy and sincere. And to the Colossians. Paul wrote, "For this purpose, also I labor, striving according to His power," not my power, but his power, "which mightily works within me." And what a powerful reality that is. What a powerful testimony, and what a motivating truth to know that we can live a life, a holy life, a life of godly sincerity, by the power of the Spirit of God, come what may.

Now the point is, this was Paul's conscience. He knew all of this to be true, no matter what anybody else said. He knew that these allegations were without merit. And he knew that God knew that he lived his life in such a way. Now, we must understand that Paul also knew that he wasn't without sin. He wasn't in a state of sinless perfection, that won't happen until we get to heaven. If I could put it this way, he knew that there were cracks in his pot. We all have them. Some are quite obvious. Some have been covered over with the wax of our hypotheses, and some are hidden in the inner part of the pot. Paul knew that he wasn't sinless. In fact, in First Corinthians four beginning in verse three, he says, "But to me, it is a very small thing that I may be examined by you, or by any human court; in fact, I don't even examine myself." There, he's speaking of the great danger of being far too influenced by man's opinions, whether they're good or bad; criticism can cause you to either become weak and just kind of wither away, or praise can fuel your pride and make you desire more of it. So Paul was not saying he was close to all criticism, you know, beyond just wise, loving feedback; nor was he saying he was closed to all praise. To be sure, we all need some of that. But what he's saying is, look, I know I've got holes in my pot, but my only concern is the approval of the Lord. You know, not so much what you say or what I even think of myself, I care supremely for the approbation of my master. And when I know in my heart that I am serving him in humility, and in faithfulness to his commands, than the judgments of man, whether they are pro or whether they are con, mean little in comparison. He went on to say in verse four, "I am conscious of nothing against myself. Yet I am not by this acquitted; but the one who examines me is the Lord." Of course, self-examination can sometimes produce the wrong verdict, can it? Whether guilt or innocent. But he didn't worry about that, he didn't seem to care much about the opinion of other people about himself. But certainly he had to care at some level when his apostolic authority and his apostolic message was being threatened in the church, he had to protect them from the wolves.

If we go back to the passage in First Corinthians four that I was mentioning, Paul went on to say, "Therefore do not go on passing judgment before the time." In other words, avoid premature, uninformed, definitive verdicts. You Corinthians, be careful with that and all believers, you can't judge the motives of a man's heart, whether they're good or bad, you only see the outside, God sees the inside. Plus, we're all prone to see the speck in our brother's eye and not see the log in our own. It's interesting how self-interest is the secret bribe of judgment in our own heart. Paul went on to say, "But wait until the Lord comes who will both bring to light the hidden things in the darkness." In other words, those things that are unknown even to us, those things concealed and protected from scrutiny by the darkness of our own judgment. He says that he is going to "disclose the motives of men's hearts." In other words, he is going to make plain, or transparent, those secret thoughts. "And then each man's praise,"" he says will come to him from God." So again, while Paul's conscience was clear, he knew that he was not without sin. In fact, John tells us in First John one eight, "If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us."

But I also want to make another point about this, it's very important for us to bear in mind, allow me to make a very important distinction based on what the Apostle Paul has said, as well as many other passages of Scripture, there's a difference between remaining sin and reigning sin. In Romans six beginning of verse 12, Paul said, "Do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness." In other words, how foolish is it to obey the lusts of your mortal body that is temporal and die. Even though the sin principle, that law of sin, remains in our body, remember this dear friends, we are not subject to it. It no longer reigns over us, we do not have to obey its lusts. Romans 8:13, Paul says that we are to "put to death the deeds of the body." We must remember folks that sin cannot be domesticated, it must be eradicated. To say it very practically, you don't sleep with your pet cobra. I must add something else that can be very practical in our own personal pursuit of holiness. And our own personal pursuit of godly sincerity. And that is to remember that this world is not our home. Aren't you glad that it's not our home? Paul knew this. The apostles knew this. I love how Peter puts it in first Peter two nine. He says "You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation of people for God's own possession." In other words, he's reminding them and reminding us, that you are no longer part of this sphere of influence. And he went on to say in verse 11, "I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul." And to be sure we're all strangers. We are all aliens in this world, this god hating system ruled by Satan; this kingdom of darkness filled with sin and sickness and death. This realm filled with tornadoes like we just experienced a week or so ago; these viruses; the people that think it's okay to kill babies; this place filled with lying, greedy politicians and so forth. We're aliens, we are strangers to this, to this world. We are united to Christ in glory. And, you know, folks, the older you get, and I'm seeing this more and more in my life, the older you get and the more you walk with Christ, the more you see the glory of his grace in your life, the more you see him work in the lives of other people and the more you experience the wickedness and the misery of this world, the less you want to be a part of it. All of that loosens your grip upon this world and causes you to want to separate yourself from it more and more. And even as Paul had to modify his flesh, that is to starve it from finding satisfaction, we must all do the same. And when we do that, we can say with Paul, back to verse 12 of our text here this morning, "our proud confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and godly sincerity." And then he says, "not in fleshly wisdom." The idea that we have not conducted ourselves in these ways, that phrase "not in fleshly wisdom." Another way of thinking about this is not in the foolish philosophies of fallen man that will inevitably exalt man and diminish God, not in the idiotic psychological theories and therapies of of spiritual cadavers that can no more bring genuine help and hope to fallen man, or even to believers, than a dung beetle can build a space shuttle. He said, I didn't come to you that way. But I came in, he says, "but in the grace of God." In other words, only through the power of God's grace revealed to us in the person and work of Christ and in his Word; only through that power, can we be reconciled to God, can we live in joyful obedience to him. That's how I came. And he says, "We have conducted ourselves in the world," but in the grace of God, "we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you." And I think that last phrase, he's basically appealing to their conscience. It's like, "people, you know this to be true."

So his conscience, first of all affirmed his moral integrity. And secondly, his conscience affirmed his relational integrity. You will recall how Paul was falsely accused, for example in Second Corinthians 10, beginning in verse 10 we read, "For they say, 'His letters are weighty and strong, but his personal presence is unimpressive and his speech contemptible.'" In other words, oh, he writes real tough, real mean when he writes, but when he comes in your presence, not that way at all. He's just phony. You know, it's kind of like people that post things on Facebook, you know, they're big talk, or they're mean, they say these horrible things. But all of a sudden, if they see you face to face, they cower in fear, especially when they know that what they said is untrue. That's what they were saying of him.

Verse 11, of that text, Paul says, "Let such a person consider this, that what we are in word by letters when absent, such persons we are also in deed when present." So don't accuse me of writing something and then when I get in your presence, I'm something altogether different. So in an effort to deny those false charges, and defend his relational integrity, go back to our text in verse 13. He says, "For we write nothing else to you than what you read and understand. And I hope you will understand until the end, just as you also partially did understand us." In other words, there was nothing obscure about my correspondence with you, you know that none of it disguised my motives. There was no hidden meaning in any of this. There's nothing deceptive, nothing manipulative. Everything that I wrote was clear and compelling and consistent, and straightforward. No different than the way I conduct myself when I'm in your presence face to face. And it was obvious from what he wrote it, that there was no merit to this accusation. He was not in any way trying to defraud them. He simply wrote the inspired Word of God, that they could read and understand, as he says in his text, so that they could gain a greater apprehension of divine truth.

Now, what's interesting, by using the words "read" and "understand," Paul employed a very interesting play on words in Greek that emphasize that what he wrote and who he was, we're in complete harmony with one another. You can even hear it in the Greek the word. "Read" is "anaginosko" And the word "understand" is "epiginosko." So they sound alike. The similarity in sound therefore, and in other words, the way they rhyme, illustrate that his message and his character conformed to one another. There is no dissonance. There was no discord. There was no disconnect. Now, to be sure, each of us must make sure that what we say, is always consistent with who we are. We often put it this way, we need to practice what we preach. I fear that is missing in the church today. You remember what Jesus said in Luke 6:46 says, "'Why do you call Me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I say?'" Why do you merely give lip service to my lordship in your life and then live in disobedience?

You see, the point that he's trying to make is: genuine faith produces obedience. Spurious faith produces disobedience. Jesus says you will know them by their fruit a tree will be known by its fruits. Just prior to that, verse 44, Jesus said, "'For each tree is known by its own fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they pick grapes from a briar bush. The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil; for his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart.'" And if I can put this very practically a husband who says he loves his wife, as Christ loves the church, but fails to manifest a gentle and humble heart, like Christ, is duplicitous. A woman who says she submits to Christ as her loving head but refuses to subject herself to the loving headship and servant leadership of her husband and tries to rule him instead, is duplicitous. Young men and young women who profess Jesus as their Savior, and claim that he is the Lord of their life, and yet they have no desire to present their bodies as a living in a holy sacrifice acceptable to Him; those type of people are duplicitous. And God does not bless a hypocrite. He chastens them. And what a wonderful thing to know in your heart, that who you are on the inside is exactly who you claim to be on the outside. And that was Paul's conscience here before the Lord. You see, Paul was not a hypocrite. Even in what he wrote in First Timothy one, five, he said, "But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith." And he went on to describe the importance of keeping faith and a good conscience in verse 19, which he warned, "some have rejected and suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith." And then Peter says in First Peter three and verse 16, "keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame."

I'm constantly dealing with pastors and church leaders from all over. And one of them in particular that I've been dealing with of late had been slandered by, and actually he's continued to be slandered by some very vicious wolves that infiltrated his church, brought destruction to a small startup church, destroyed his health, his family's health, almost caused him to give up. And one of the things that he said, and that not everyone will say, certainly been my testimony as well. One of the things that really keeps you going in those dark and difficult times is not only, not only the fellowship with your friends, and especially your wife, as he said, and certainly the Word of God, but beyond all of that, the great comfort, perhaps the greatest comfort, is a clear conscience. A clear conscience, knowing that whatever is being said, is not true. And knowing that the Lord knows it.

So knowing his conscience was clear, Paul says in verse 13, "For we write nothing else to you than what you read and understand, and I hope you will understand until the end, just as you also partially did understand us." And what he's saying here is, I want you to understand this totally, I want you to understand this completely, that what I wrote and who I am, are in perfect harmony with one another. I know you know this to some degree now, but I want you to know, the fullness of this reality. Understand this "until the end." "End" literally means completely, totally, entirely.

And so in closing, not only did his conscience affirm his moral integrity and relational integrity, but also finally, his doctrinal integrity. And we see this at the end of verse 14. He says that, "we are your reason to be proud as you also are ours in the day of our Lord Jesus." And what he's saying here is this: you ought to have proud confidence in me, as I do in you, because it was through my ministry and the gospel message; along with Timothy who was with me, it was through all of this, that God saved you by His grace. And as a result together, we eagerly anticipate the day of our Lord Jesus. That day when we will stand in the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy. He described a similar thing to the saints in Thessalonica. In First Thessalonians two, beginning in verse 19, he said, "For who is our hope, or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not even you, in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy." So where he's going with this is simply to say, look, had I been a con-man trying to use you, trying to distort the Word of God as a false apostle; had I come to you in deception, just to deceive you for my own benefit, then how can you explain your salvation? That we have "reason to be proud in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ."

Beloved, false teachers can distort the Word of God and they do it all the time, and 1000s of people will follow them. They will follow their phony lifestyles, their superficial teachings. The world is filled with religious charlatans; entrepreneurs that can fill buildings, with people with all kinds of activity. They can pack auditoriums; they can fill stadiums, but their message will never save sinners and sanctify saints it will not happen. That's, in essence, what Paul is referring to here. I mean, just look, you people came to saving faith in Christ. And now we're looking forward to the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. Again, let's remember there's a big difference between a crowd and a church. And much of what passes today is nothing more than country club, cultural Christianity. But Paul's message was truly God's message, the gospel message that is the power of God unto salvation to all who believe, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. In other words, the proof was in the pudding. And he's reminding them of this. In fact, in chapter two and verse 17, he said, "For we are not like many, peddling the Word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God." And in chapter four, verse two, he went on to say "we have renounced the things hidden, because of shame, not walking in craftiness, or adulterating the Word of God, but by the manifestation of truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God." And that's what he is doing here in this passage.

Well, dear friend, may I ask you, do you have a clear or an accusing conscience? If it's an accusing conscience, I would plead with you, as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, to come to Jesus. His arms are outstretched. He is gentle, and he is humble in heart, and he will save you and his blood will cleanse your conscience. In fact, the writer of Hebrews tells us, "that for the joy set before him he endured the cross." What joy was that? What's he referring to? Well, it's the joy to see sinners come to him. That's what brings great joy to the heart of our blessed Savior. If I could leave you with an analogy, imagine if your family was sick and dying of some dreadful disease and you secured an antibiotic that would cure them. Then you come to your family that you love so much and you say, "I have the cure here," but they say no, no, we don't want that. We will use our home remedies and we will try to survive on our own. And as they get sicker and sicker and they begin to die, you plead with them. And then finally, you have a son, then a daughter that comes and says, Dad, let me let me try your medicine. What do you think the dad feels when that child comes to them? He feels inexpressible joy. And that's what Jesus feels when we come to him, because this is his heart: come to him and he will forgive your sin. He will cleanse your conscience. He'll not only cleanse it, he will inform it with truth. And when you come to saving faith in Christ, you will find that everything changes. And as we walk in fellowship with him, by the power of his Spirit, we will be more conformed into his likeness, so that our life like Paul's life, can manifest holiness and godly sincerity. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that speaks so directly to each of our hearts. I pray for that person that may be within the sound of my voice that knows nothing of the gentle and the humble in heart Savior, the Lord Jesus. I pray that the beauty of his holiness and his love for them will draw them unto him that today they might be saved. And Father, for those of us who know and who love you, I pray that we will once again recommit ourselves to living lives for your glory, in loving and joyful obedience to the lover of our souls. That in all things Christ might have the preeminence for it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

It is always a privilege, a joy and honor to be able to minister the word of God to you. And we're able to do that again this morning. And we're going to do it by looking for the final time at the concept of God of all comfort in second Corinthians chapter one. We're going to look at a few verses in verses one through 11. As we prepare our hearts for what the Spirit of God has for us this morning, I might say that I have lingered long upon this topic, because it is so rich. It is so important, especially in these days of mounting persecution, persecution against true Christianity, here in the United States and around the world. And while none of us may suffer the kinds of things that the apostle Paul suffered, we know that all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, Second Timothy 3:12. And as we endeavor to live lives that honor Christ in this fallen world that is so hostile to him, we're going to experience more and more of that kind of persecution, some of you have experienced it already, others of you will. I've talked with a friend this last week, who's not a part of this church. He works in the IT department of a rather large company here in Nashville, and his job is being threatened because he refuses to attend the inclusivity workshops that is really nothing more than forced LGBTQ indoctrination, and he refuses to join them when they have the special parades downtown, the gay pride parades and so forth. By the way, imagine them requiring employees to attend a biblical morality workshop. You see the point, imagine having a traditional family parade downtown Nashville. And I know a number of you are experiencing similar forms of Christian discrimination right now. But I want us all to be able to rejoice in the comfort that is ours, because we are united to Christ; the comfort that God gives that he makes available to all who are willing to suffer for his sake. And also, I want you to be reminded of the kind of love that we need to have for those that do not know Christ, that remain blinded to their sin, including those who hate us. And it's this love that must continue to drive us to present the gospel to them and what a joy it is to see people come to Christ, right? We've seen some of that in the last few weeks, even here in our own midst.

So there's three important concepts that we've studied that emerge out of verses one through 11 of Second Corinthians one, we've seen over the last couple of weeks, that God indeed comforts those who are afflicted, and Paul was greatly afflicted, as you will recall. But then secondly, we see that believers are comforted, to comfort others. That's what we're going to look at this morning. And then finally, prayer unleashes the power of God, we're going to see that as well. So let's pick it up at verse three, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction," and here's why, "so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God." So this moves us to our second point in this little outline, and that is that believers are comforted to comfort others.

Now we all understand that we have cells in our human body. And each cell has a function. Each cell is to help the rest of the cells and the rest of the organs. And that's the way it's supposed to be as well, in the body of Christ. We are all a cell, shall we say, are all organs; we all need to work together. And what's interesting is that God uses the comfort that he provides us in our affliction, to equip us to comfort others in their affliction. It's an amazing thing, so we are comforted to comfort others. Now how does this work? Well, to be sure, the Spirit of God comforts us in ways that we can't fully understand. John 14, verse 16, Jesus says, "I will ask the Father and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever." That is the spirit of truth. And the term "Helper" comes from a Greek term "parakletos," it means advocate or comforter or helper. Now, we know that the Spirit of God sent the comforter and that he dwells within us, right? But what's interesting is that the activities of the Holy Spirit are far more than just comforting. We know that he is the one for example, who convicts the world of sin, righteousness and judgment. He is the one that glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ by transforming sinners, and saving us by his grace and causing us to become more like Christ. We know that he is the supernatural and the sovereign agent of regeneration, baptizing all believers into the body of Christ. The word of God tells us that he indwells, he sanctifies. He instructs, he empowers believers for service. He seals us for the day of redemption, so many things. But we also know that he is the comforter. And he does this in mysterious ways. But what you will find is that he always does this in conjunction with the exhortation of his word, through the use of his word. And we've all experienced that kind of comfort, haven't we, in the midst of some great trial, suddenly, some passage of Scripture, as I say, just leaps off the page at you and touches your heart like never before. Maybe it's something you hear in a sermon, something you read in a book, the lyrics of a hymn. In fact, I might put it this way, you will not find any kind of lasting soul satisfying comfort in your life, apart from the ministry of God's word, it's not going to happen. I'm reminded of Psalm 19, beginning in verse seven. There David says, "The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul." And here he is speaking of the Word of God in different ways versus the law of the Lord. It's perfect, restoring the soul. That he says "the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart." Another aspect of comfort, "The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever. The judgments of the Lord are true; they are righteous all together. They are more desirable than gold, yes, then much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them, Your servant is warned; in keeping them there is great reward." And of course, that great reward includes the astounding benefits of the Word of God that were just mentioned in the previous verses.

Now, when Jesus asked the Father, to send the Helper, certainly he knew that the Helper would be needed in our lives, especially in the realm of comfort. And it's interesting in John 14:26, we read "But the Helper," again the parakletos, "the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and bring to remembrance all that I said to you." And in chapter 15, verse, verse 26, he says, "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me, and you will testify also." So the divine helper is going to use his word to bring comfort to those that He indwells. The comforter is going to use his Word in a way that brings peace and tranquility and understanding and instruction to our heart. He is going to bring these things to remembrance. He's going to bring his word to bear upon our soul, and he is going to use others in that process, especially those who have the gift of exhortation, the ability to speak comforting truth from the Word of God.

Now practically speaking, if you are in need of comfort, you must go to the God of all comfort by going to his Word and by fellowshipping with those people who have been afflicted and who have been comforted by the word of God so that they too can comfort you. Now, let me explain something to you. This is a fascinating concept in describing spiritual gifts. In Romans chapter 12 and verse eight, we see the Spirit of God speaking through his inspired apostle Paul, using the same term parakletos. He says, "He who exhorts, in his exhortation," and here he's describing the spiritual gift of exhortation. The word exhort comes from "parakaleo" and exhortation is "paraklesis." It's all rooted in that same word. And it's a compound word in the original language. "Para" means alongside and "kaleo" means to call. So this is the person with the gift of exhortation, is one that can come alongside, that can call alongside, they can speak alongside; so joined together they constitute the title "parakletos," or, as you've heard the spirit called the "paraclete" the Helper, the advocate. And this is used not only to describe the Holy Spirit, as I've just noted, but also the Lord Jesus Christ. In First John two and chapter one we read, "If anyone sins, we have a "parakleton," "an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous." Now stick with me, back to Romans 12 and verse eight, "He who exhorts in his exhortation." What's fascinating is that the Holy Spirit has uniquely gifted some people with the gift of exhortation, "paraklesis," one who, on behalf of and empowered by the Spirit of God can come alongside those in need; fellow believers to minister to them the word of God in their time of need to help them understand and apply his word. And of course, this is going to vary according to individual people and their circumstances.

Sometimes, it's admonishing someone who has allowed some kind of life dominating sin to overcome them. Or maybe it's to instruct and correct someone, that's deceived by some kind of error. And many times, these things really come out in the midst of suffering in the midst of anguish, or to comfort someone who is hurting, or to strengthen someone who is collapsing under the weight of some great trial. But in every situation, the agent of comfort is always God. The God of all comfort, and the instrument that he uses is the word of God. And the messengers that he uses is all of us, especially those with the gift of exhortation. When I reflect upon those who have had the greatest impact in my life, especially in times of great suffering, they have always been mature saints. They've always been older saints, with the gray hairs, many of them white hairs. But they've always been people who have suffered greatly for the cause of Christ. And they've also been people who are gifted greatly with biblical exhortation, men of the word. Some of them I've been able to talk with personally. And many of them have been with the Lord for hundreds of years.

If I could give some practical advice to you, young people, when you're in need of comfort, don't go to your friends. Go to somebody older and wiser. Somebody who's hurt, somebody who knows the word; some man or woman, look for somebody with gray hair with worn out Bibles, and calloused knees. Those are the people that God can use to bring you comfort, and to bring you clarity. Also, don't go to some secular counselor or some psychologists. They know nothing of the Word of God or the God of all comfort. They know nothing of the power of the word, the power of the Spirit. And also I might add, be careful even going to a lot of so called pastors. I was meeting with a prominent Christian leader this last week and we were talking about this and I told him that, you know, frankly, I would say most of the pastors in Nashville, Tennessee, I would not allow to teach Sunday school in my church. I hate to say that and I know that sounds hideously arrogant, but I wouldn't. Many are unsaved apostates, and many of them are nothing more than entrepreneurs. I might also add a practical note, I would encourage all of you to read biographies of great men and women of the word people who have suffered. We even see this in Hebrews chapter 12, and verse one, with respect to those who are found in Scripture, it says, "Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses, surrounding us," which by the way, was a reference to the enduring faith of the examples that were set before them in chapter 11, he goes on to say, "Let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin, which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance, the race that is set before us." Of course, that great cloud of witnesses surrounding us are witnesses of God's faithfulness of his power of his mercy, of his grace and his love, especially in times of great uncertainty and suffering, these are the people we are to imitate. These are the people that we should study, let us run our race like they did with unwavering courage and with confidence in who God is. Because true faith as the writer of Hebrews 11 and verse one says, "is the assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things unseen." And folks herein we find comfort.

Now, let me give you an example of a great man of God outside of Scripture that has brought comfort to my life, as maybe he has to yours as well. And I would recommend this is a biography of William Carey. He lived, he was born in 1761, died in 1834. He was called the father of modern missions. And there is a biography about him written by his great grandson, S. Pierce Carey, who was a distinguished Baptist minister and missionary statesman, who became famous for his writing as a Christian author. And it the biography by the way that I'm recommending to you was, was published in 1923. But Carey was an uneducated cobbler from England, who taught himself Latin, Hebrew and Greek. But he also was a man with a burden for the lost. And so God ultimately led him to India, around the close of the Revolutionary War, which would have been around 1783 and following. By the way, during that, that time in history, there was really no such thing as a foreign missionary. It was completely foreign to people, especially in Great Britain. And he had a model, the motto of his mission was, quote, "expect great things, attempt great things." Well, as you read his story, you will soon discover that he was faced with enormous hardships, lots of suffering. Once he got to India, he lost one of his young children. His wife went insane and eventually died. His second wife eventually died. Most of his life, he lived in extreme poverty. It got better later on, but still he had nothing. He endured enormous persecution, not only from the pagans there in India, but from the British government. But God was faithful to bless his efforts, as God began to save people and to use the influence of the gospel to impact that culture. A people that did just hideous things they, they would do things like stick hooks in their back and swing from poles as part of a ritual. They had widow burning where if a young widow would lose her husband, she would climb into a pile of wood and all and they would set her on fire and just horrible things.

But God gradually began to build his church, helping Car toey survive and to learn the customs and to learn the languages; a number of languages and to translate them into the Word of God, and to print them; to print the scriptures in various languages and dialects. And then he gradually brought other people to come and co-labor with him. And according to his biographer, quote, "He produced six grammar as being often the first groundbreaker of Bengali, Sanskrit,” which that grammar was 1000 pages, "Marathi, Punjabi, Teluga and Kanarese. Not to mention a Bhotia grammar." Went on to say three dictionaries he compiled, "Bengali, Marathi, and Sanskrit as well as Bhotia vocabulary. That Bengali dictionary," he says, "with its 80,000 words in three volumes, resulted from the toil of 30 years, and was for long, the standard work." Professor H.H Wilson of Oxford said quote, "Local terms are here rendered with the correctness which carries knowledge of the people’s manners and his long domestication amongst them, enabled him to attain in his scientific requirements and familiarity with natural history; qualified him to employ and not infrequently to devise characteristic terms for the animal and vegetable products of the East." End quote: and on and on it goes. But later in his life and ministry in the year of 1812, his mission printing works, and huge warehouse burned to the ground in unimaginable horror. And while some translation manuscripts and some of the printing presses were removed in time, most everything was lost. It was a loss of 10,000 pounds in those days, which today would be $14 million. Talk about affliction. Talk about a man of sorrow. Much of his life's work went up in smoke. One man by the name of Thomason came in the afternoon to console the people and he said this, quote, "The scene was indeed affecting the long printing office reduced to a mere shell, the yard covered with burnt paper, Carrie walked with me over the smoking ruins, the tears stood in his eyes." Now, before I read what's next, I want to remind you what we've been talking about. And that is the power of the God of all comfort. Carrie said this quote, "In one night, the labors of years are consumed. How unsearchable are the divine ways. I had lately brought some things to the utmost perfection I could and contemplated the mission with perhaps too much self-congratulation. That the Lord has laid me low, that I may look more simply to Him." He also wrote to his niece Eustace, back in England, here's what he said, "This is a heavy blow, as it will stop our printing the scriptures for a long time. 12 months hard labour will not reinstate us, not to mention loss of property, manuscripts, etc, which we shall scarcely ever surmount." But a catch this, "I wish to be still and know that the Lord is God and to bow to His will and everything, He will no doubt bring good out of this evil and make it promote his interests. But at present, the Providence is exceeding dark. No lives were lost. We cannot tell him what was the cause of the fire." And then writing to his family back in England, he said, quote, "Much ground must be labored over again, and I have suffered most, but we are not discouraged. We are chastened and not killed. Cast down but not destroyed, perplexed, but not in despair." Oh, dear friends, what a magnificent example of the God of all comfort, who comforted one of his own through His Word. And now who in turn is comforting us through his testimony? Isn't it amazing how that works?

Now, please understand, God doesn't comfort us when we suffer because of our sin. A loving father doesn't comfort his son in his sin. He chastens the ones that he loves, we understand that. But when we come to repentance, then he comforts us as we seek to honor him. I think of David's grievous sin with Bathsheba. Remember in Psalm 32, he said, "When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long." Well, there's no comfort there. He went on to say, "For day and night, Your hand was heavy upon me. My vitality was drained away as with the fever heat of summer." But then as we read on he talks about how when he acknowledged his sin, God forgave him and he was comforted. And that's why he began that psalm in verse one saying "How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, who sin is covered. How blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, and whose spirit in whose spirit there is no deceit." And in verse seven, he goes on, and he says, "Thou art my hiding place, Thou does preserve me from trouble. Thou does surround me with songs of deliverance." And at the end of verse 10, he says, "He who trusts in the Lord, lovingkindness shelter around him. Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous ones, and shout for joy, all you who are upright and heart." Beloved, only the God of all comfort can animate that kind of sincere, heartfelt joy. What's more, God's comfort, included new, intimate, personal instruction in verse eight. The Lord says, "I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go, I will counsel you with My eye upon you."

We see a similar situation in Peters trial, and I'd like to take you to some of these concepts with Peter, you will recall in Luke 22:31, Jesus said, "'Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.'" Peter learned the hard way, didn't he? That God used his failure to humble him and bring him to a deeper state of dependence and trust in the Lord his God, but also to equip him to strengthen others. And because of this, he could comfort the saints that were later scattered abroad, because of persecution. And he would say this to them in First Peter five, beginning in verse five, "God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble." Again, a lesson that Peter learned the hard way. "Therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you." And let's admit it, that's very hard to do when we're suffering. When we're enduring some kind of persecution, to somehow cast our cares upon him. It's contrary to our flesh. Our flesh demands an audience with God; God, this isn't fair, you owe me an explanation. I demand my day in court to prove my case. Or maybe we're not that ungodly, but rather we say to ourselves, I'm going to take charge. Thanks, God, I've got this. I'll handle things in my own way.

But as we look at this text, we see Peter using an interesting phrase "mighty hand of God." That was a figure of speech describing God's sovereign rule over our life. Now you must understand that God is always at work in our lives, and sometimes his mighty hand is the mighty hand of testing. And perhaps you're experiencing that right now. Perhaps you're experiencing the grip of his hand in your life. Sometimes it's the mighty hand of testing, you will recall, and the gnawing pain of relentless suffering. Job mistakenly thought that God had abandoned him. And in Job 30, verse 20, we read, "I cry out to Thee for help, but Thou does not answer me. I stand up and Thou does turn Thy attention against me, that has become cruel to me with the might of Thy hand, Thou doest persecute me." Sometimes it might be the hand of divine chastening. We read about this in God's promise to cause Israel to repent, to restore her and one day rule over her in his kingdom. In Ezekiel 20 verse 33, we read, "'As I live,' declares the Lord GOD, 'surely with a mighty hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with wrath poured out, I shall be king over you.'" And in verse 37, "'And I shall make you pass under the rod, and I shall bring you into the bond of the covenant.'" So sometimes his mighty hand is the hand of testing sometimes it's the hand of chastening. Sometimes it's the hand of deliverance. Exodus three beginning in verse 19, we read, "'But I know that the king of Egypt will not permit you to go, except under compulsion. So,'" now I love this, "'I will stretch out My hand and strike Egypt with all My miracles, which I shall do in the midst of it, and after that, he will let you go.'"

Now, having said that, back to what Peter is talking about here, with respect to the mighty hand, in First Peter five, five, this is the mighty hand of testing that he's describing. Regardless of the purpose of his outstretched hand of testing in our lives, he's telling us that we need to humble ourselves under it, we need to willingly submit to it. Remember, Jesus said in Luke 14:11, "'Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.'" This is why I often say, we should never ask why in the midst of our afflictions. But ask what. God does not owe us an explanation, nor could we understand it, were he to give it to us. Instead of saying, God, why is this happening? We should say, God, what should I do to give you glory in the midst of this trial, I know that you're up to great things in my life, I don't understand all of this. And I plead with you to deliver me from the pain of this affliction, whatever it might be. But though you slay me, I will trust in you. And it's for this reason that we can rejoice knowing in First Peter five, notice what he says at the end of verse six, "He will exalt you at the proper time." Beloved, God's timing is always perfect. His purposes are always perfect. His plan is always perfect. And his hand of testing can also be the hand of deliverance in our life, as it often is. And there is the blessed hope of all of the redeemed, the confident hope that he will never leave us, nor will he ever forsake us. And He will exalt us at the proper time, which I've discovered is seldom "my" time, but it's always his perfect time. And because of these eternal truths, we learned to not only be receptive to God's purposes, but also confident in them. And that's why he says in verse seven, "Casting all your care upon Him, because He cares for you." What a precious statement. It is believed by most that here Peter is reflecting back to the words of David, the psalmist, in Psalm 55:22, where we read, "Cast your burden upon the Lord and He will sustain you, He will never allow the righteous to be shaken." Well, that's a passage that I've leaned on many times, haven't you? You know, in the furnace of affliction, we have a choice to make. We can either rely on ourselves or we can rely on God, being convinced that he cares for you; that he has ordained our suffering for our good and for His glory, that he's always working in it. And that one day, he will deliver us from it. O, child of God, it is so easy to forget that God is good, you know, that even in suffering, he is intimately acquainted with all our ways. And as we read, in Psalm 56, verse eight, he puts our tears in the bottle of his remembrance. One of the things that you will find in Israel in the archaeological digs is they find a lot of little, little glass bottles that were made somehow, in even dating back to the first and second century, where the Jews would make these little vials that looks like little test tubes, they're different colors. And those were symbolic of that verse, that God captures our tears in his bottle, he remembers them. And it's easy to forget, isn't it, that he is intimately acquainted with all of our suffering? Hebrews four verse 15, "For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weakness." If you're struggling here today, do you remember that? Does this bring comfort to your soul as it should? Goes on to say, "But one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need."

And then back to First Peter five, in verses 10 and 11, he said, "After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ," let me stop there for a moment. Here, Peter is reflecting back to the beginning of his epistle, where he encouraged them to live triumphant lives even in the face of adversity, because they have been according to chapter one, verse two, "chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father." So he says, "After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ" is the one who is going to bless you. This is what he's wanting them to think about. The God of all grace has called you to his eternal glory in Christ. It's amazing, isn't it, though we can suffer and we can be confused, sometimes we can be terribly discouraged, we must also be excited because there is a victory celebration that's going to come. God in all of his glory is going to celebrate that time with us.

By the way, as I think about Peter writing this, remember, he knew that he was going to be crucified at the end of his life. Jesus had told him that. Well, Scripture doesn't tell us this, I have to believe that as he was writing this, under the inspiration of the Spirit, tears were streaming down his face, down his cheeks. Can't you see his hands quivering in exhilaration as he writes these great truths as the Spirit of God guides him to write what he knows to be true? And can't you see Peter's wife, perhaps even sobbing with him? As her heart longs for relief, as together their heart races with adrenaline in the anticipation of glory. Tradition tells us that before Peter was crucified, he had to watch his wife being crucified and that he knelt before her and he kept saying, "remember the Lord, remember the Lord, remember the Lord." And perhaps he even quoted to her some of these things that are written here.

But as we come back to what Peter said, in verses 10 and 11, it says again, "and after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ." I want you notice something here, God is not only the God of all comfort, he is the God of all grace. Isn't that interesting? Now, mind you here, grace is far more than unmerited favor, though it is that. But grace is the transforming and sanctifying power of God that is available to all who trust in Christ, to all who have been born again. God's grace, you see, is comforting grace, and it is far stronger than any suffering that we could ever experience. Peter says, It is his grace that has called us to his eternal glory in Christ. Boy, you talk about power, there's power in God's grace. It's not something static. God has initiated and secured our salvation by his grace, right? This is the grace that has called us out of darkness and placed us into his marvelous light. This is the grace that caused us to be born again, to be resurrected from spiritual death to spiritual life. This is the grace that has saved us. And it is the grace of God, that delivers us from the power of sin and empowers us to live triumphant lives for the glory of Christ. Talk about comfort. And where does that comfort come from? From the Spirit of God, who has written the word of God; to exalt Christ to bring comfort to us, so that we can comfort others. It's an amazing chain. And notice what he will continue to do during the seasons of comfort, or seasons of suffering. It says, "the God of all grace...will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you." By the way, these are all terms, almost synonymous terms, that speak of supernatural empowerment. To help us stand firm in the battle and give no ground to the flesh, no ground to the enemy in his forces of darkness.

Let me tell you what these four terms mean. The term "perfect" in the original language means to restore or to repair. It was even used medically to describe the setting of a bone. Well, Peter who didn't Christ is speaking here from experience, isn't he? He knows what it's like to be restored, to be repaired, to have the bone set. The term "confirm" means to make one resolute and determined. You might say it means to fortify a person, to give a person courage, to persevere in trials, to help a person stand firm in the face of temptation, and to be steady in one's faith. And the term "strengthen" means to strengthen a person to be able to bear up under suffering, without ever wavering in their faith. This is what the God of all comfort does. And the term "establish," it literally means to establish you firmly. It speaks of the divine enablement that helps us lay a firm foundation of trust and confidence in him. And it even speaks of God's ability to strengthen; a personal quality or aspect in our Christian character. So we will always be able to endure. Beloved, this is what the God of all comfort and the God of all grace does. And he does it through his Word, especially via his people. One of our young ladies sent me a precious letter last week, thanking me for a sermon that ministered to her directly in some profound way. And I think about how this all works. The Spirit of God spoke to me, comforted me, helped me to understand the word I speak the word of God. She hears the Word of God, she finds comfort in the Word of God. So what does she do? What happens to her? Shall I say, well, as we read out right here, she was "perfected, confirmed, strengthened and established" just a little bit more by the word of God. And this is interesting; she then reciprocates to me, and she brings comfort to me and encouragement to me, so that I, too, may be just a little bit more perfected, confirmed, strengthened and established. Now I have a lot further to go than she does, probably. But isn't it interesting how the Spirit of God works? And now what am I doing? I am comforting you with the same truths. What a precious thing it is to see the hand of God at work in one so young. That's rare. We see that quite often here Calvary Bible Church and I rejoice in that.

Now let's go back to Second Corinthians one as we begin to wrap this up. And with all of this background, verse six and seven will be a little clearer to you. Paul says, "But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; or if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient enduring of the same sufferings, which we also suffer and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers of our sufferings, so also you are sharers of our comfort." Beloved, here, we see that none of us suffer alone, right? This was the case with the the Corinthians. When one member of the family suffers, we all suffer, we know what that's like. But likewise, when one member of the family experiences the comfort of God, we all rejoice with them, and we are all comforted with them. You know, this is one thing that I confess is hard. That's hard as a pastor and I know the elders will agree with this. You know, I'm privy to many private sufferings that goes on in this church. A number of you know that you're on my heart, because we've talked; a number of you even this week. I'm privy to those sufferings, and I hurt with you because I love you, you're part of my church family. And I find that my prayer list tends to grow longer and longer, here of late. And often, even as I did this morning, I just cry out to the Lord, Lord, I can't even keep up with it all. People are struggling in so many ways with so many different issues. All I can do is give it to you. But I also get to share in your divine comfort. And sometimes no one else knows what God has done in your life but it is profoundly encouraging to me to see him comfort you, to bind up your wounds to soothes the aches in your soul.

Well finally, as we've seen, God comforts the afflicted, believers are comforted to comfort others. And then we see that finally, prayer unleashes the power of God at the end of verse 10. Notice he says, "and He will yet deliver us, you also joining and helping us through your prayers, so that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the favor bestowed on us through the prayers of many." Now, while Paul praises God for his deliverances, he doesn't forget the secondary cause of the faithful prayers of the righteous. Charles Spurgeon said, "Gratitude to God must never become an excuse for ingratitude to man. It is true that Jehovah shielded the apostle of the Gentiles, but he did it in answer to prayer. The chosen vessel was not broken by the rod of the wicked, for the outstretched hand of the God of heaven was his defense. But that hand was outstretched because the people of Corinth and the saints of God everywhere had prevailed at the throne of grace by their united supplications."

O child of God, never underestimate the power of prayer. We know that the prayer, "the effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much," James five verse 16. And I praise God for the earnest prayers of so many intercessors here at Calvary Bible Church, but I wish there were more. And for this reason, Paul implored the believers at Rome, in chapter 15, verse 30, of Romans, he says, "Now I urge you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me, in your prayers to God for me." People will often ask me, "Pastor, is there anything that we can do for you?" Yes, you can pray for me. You can pray for the elders; we need to pray for one another.

In Ephesians six, verse 18, Paul said, "With all prayer, and petition, pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints, and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness, the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in proclaiming it, I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak." Well, I'm not in chains, at least not yet. I may be eventually, we may all be, but I need your prayers. We all need to pray for one another. We need to do this privately. We need to do this corporately. We have opportunities every other Wednesday night here in this area. Every other Thursday night now out in Mount Juliet. We have opportunities with our Wi Fi groups, with the heating plant here early on Sunday morning. We have a group of young men that meet with a couple of our older young men and the high school guys that meet with a couple our, not too much older, but a little bit older young man every Sunday night. I've been with them to see what God is doing there is amazing. To hear some of these young men pray, it just brings joy to my heart. But this is what we all need to be doing. We are not to forsake the assembling together, as is the habit of some as we read in Hebrews 10:25 and sadly, it seems to be the habit of most when it comes time to pray.

Dear saints, your prayers glorify God by demonstrating your dependence upon him, then your confidence in him. It is an act of worship. Our lowliness in prayer is an expression of our weakness and our acknowledgement of his greatness of his power. Can there be any greater expression of adoration for the Lord our God, than to be on our face before him in supplication? Asking him to help us give glory to his name? I think not. Well, may I challenge each of you. Let's learn well the great truths of the God of all comfort. And let's rejoice in the way that he comforts us. And let's be all about comforting others because of the way he is comforted us, using his word as the instrument of that comfort that the Spirit of God can use.

And then finally, I encourage you all get serious about your prayer life. Who you are on your knees before a holy God is who you are, nothing more. Paul said in First Thessalonians five you don't have this on the screen. But in verse 17, he said, "Rejoice, always pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." May we continue to be that kind of people. And may we, as Paul told the Thessalonians, "Excel still more" in all of these areas. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these truths, encourage our hearts with them. May the seeds that have been planted here today bear much fruit, for your glory and for our joy. We ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus, our Savior, and for his sake. Amen.

We return once again to Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 11. We've been away from our verse-by-verse exposition of this gospel, because of the holidays, and this morning we're going to examine verses 27 through 33, under the heading "By What Authority."

Let me give you the context before I read the passage. This scenario occurred on the Wednesday of the Passion Week, just a couple of days before our Lord went to the cross on our behalf. And the day before Jesus had purged the temple and occupied its precincts, which further infuriated the Jewish leadership, who had for some time determined to kill him. He had been, for three years, exposing their hypocrisy, their greed, their corruption, their ignorance, their works righteousness system; he challenged their authority. And that's something you never do to a narcissist. And so they were furious with him. So they had three years of pent up hatred for Jesus. But they were afraid to push him too far, because the people were truly impressed with him, albeit for all the wrong reasons. So once again, the Jewish authorities decide they're going to trick Jesus into saying something that would expose him as a fraud, as a blasphemer, perhaps even an insurrectionist. So with this in mind, we come to Mark 11, verse 27.

"They," referring to Christ, and his disciples, "came again to Jerusalem. And as He was walking in the temple, the chief priests and the scribes and the elders came to Him, and began saying to Him, 'By what authority are You doing these things, or who gave You this authority to do these things?' And Jesus said to them, 'I will ask you one question, and you answer Me, and then I will tell you by what authority I do these things. Was the baptism of John from heaven or from men? Answer Me.' They began reasoning among themselves, saying, 'If we say, 'From heaven,' He will say, 'Then why did you not believe him?' But shall we say, 'From men?' --they were afraid of the people. For everyone considered John to have been a real prophet. Answering Jesus, they said, 'We do not know.' And Jesus said to them, 'Nor will I tell you, by what authority I do these things.'"

Obviously, this is a passage that deals with the issue of spiritual moral authority. And I would ask you, by what authority do you function in your life? By God's authority, by man's authority, by your own authority? Many Christians will say, "Well, the Bible is my authority." And yet, often when you look at their lives, you see that some of the things the Bible says they will agree with but other things they won't. So it's easy to pick to choose. And others will have some other religious document that they believe is their authority. Muslims have the Koran, and so forth. For many people religious tradition is their authority, or some religious denomination. Perhaps one of the most dominant ones in our country, perhaps even around the world, is the Roman Catholic Church. They have three sources of authority: scripture, tradition, and the magisterium. And they believe that all three are equal sources when it comes to spiritual religious authority. When it comes to Scripture, they reject sola scriptura; you will see as part of the five solas in this worship center. Sola scriptura was one of the dominant themes of the Reformation; the reason why the Protestants broke away from the Roman Catholics. Sola scriptura simply meant that scripture was the sole, and infallible authority for the Christian faith. But they rejected that because they would say, no man is fallible. So God uses two other forms of authority to help safeguard his word. And one of those forms is tradition. Tradition being passed down from the apostles to the early church fathers and so forth. In fact, they would argue that tradition actually preceded Scripture. They would say that the official canon of the Bible was not established until around 382 AD at the Council of Rome, which again, they would say, would refute this idea of sola scriptura. By the way, that is false. The church did not establish the canon, it recognized it. A book is canonical because it was declared to be the word of God and the people of God recognize that, and there was consensus regarding that, especially with the Old Testament. That consensus was was finalized basically by the time of Christ. And the Gospels and Paul's letters were considered canonical by AD 90. And canonicity was based upon three things: their divine qualities, the consensus of God's people, and the connection to an apostle. People recognize that and based upon these three factors, the Canon was recognized by the people and then officially recognized by around the fourth century. But Christians coalesced around the Old and New Testament books very early.

Dave Harrell

I might also add that Roman Catholics include the Old Testament and New Testament apocryphal books in their canon. These are books that are considered by most as esoteric or suspicious; even heretical. It actually came from a Greek adjective, "apokryphos," which means private and "apokryptein," which was the verb that means to hide away. And so it literally, early on, meant to be a text to be read in private. But it later came to mean that which is esoteric or that which is suspicious or heretical. And the Old Testament apocryphal books that they have added to Scripture were written sometime between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New Testament. And they were not considered canonical by the Jews, even of Jesus time, nor by most of the early church fathers. And the New Testament apocryphal books were written in the second and third century and many of them include systems of doctrine, that are contrary to, or even antithetical to, other doctrines in the canon of Scripture.

So they believe in Scripture, but also you have to have tradition for your authority, but you also have to have one more thing and that is the magisterium, which is a compendium of Creed's and councils and articles of faith and traditions. Ex cathedra pronouncements by infallible Popes; and all of this is considered authoritative and binding upon the souls of men and women, even if it contradicts Scripture. Some of you may hold to that. In other words, Roman Catholicism as your authority, and sadly because of this, you have numerous heresies--that salvation is not by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone--but it's by faith plus works; grace plus works and so forth. You have the unbiblical concept of the mass where you have repeated sacrifices and the substance of the bread and the wine supposedly, become truly the body and blood of Christ. So, you have this constant infusion of grace in the sacraments which is blatantly unbiblical. You have the veneration of saints, the veneration of church relics, the immaculate conception or the sinlessness of Mary, and her ascension into heaven, her perpetual virginity, literally the worship of Mary. You have punishment and purification in a place called purgatory. And you have the infallible pope that can say just about anything. And now of course, he's blessing that which God calls an abomination with respect to same sex marriage and so forth.

Well, for others, the spiritual authority is really society. Its culture. It's what you were taught at home, what you were taught at school, what you were taught at the university, kind of the spirit of the age--after all majority rules, right? Some people just trust their gut. If it feels good, I'll do it, as long as it doesn't hurt somebody else. That's my authority. And for some, maybe you're a synchretist. You just combine all kinds of different beliefs, different philosophies, different religion, until you come up with your own. And frankly, that's where most people are at.

But the most important question before us today, dear friends, is, what is your spiritual authority? And if I can put it a little bit differently? What authority does Jesus have in your life? Is he the Lord and the master of your life? Or do you just say he is, and then go and do your own thing? Along with this, we need to remember who Jesus said he was? Is he really God? Or was he just a man? If he was truly God, how do we know how to obey his authority? What happens if we don't? So all of these were issues that the first century Jews, and many of the Gentiles were grappling with, and what every person should answer correctly. So let's look closely at what happened here, and then let's allow the Bible--God's Word, which should be our spiritual authority--to answer these questions. And we're going to do so under two headings this morning. We're going to look at number one, the attack on his authority. And then number two, the consequence of rejecting His authority. And I pray that each of you will listen very carefully, as well, especially you young people. Because the authority that governs your life, will determine the eternal destiny of your soul.

So let's look first of all, at what happened in this historical narrative under the heading: the attack on his authority. Verse 27, "They came again to Jerusalem. And as He was walking in the temple," let's stop there. Remember, the temple area was filled with courtyards, there were hundreds, perhaps several 1000 people constantly milling around. And rabbis would typically walk around, and they would teach groups of people. That's what Jesus was doing. Luke adds a little bit more of a perspective regarding what was happening in Luke 19, beginning in verse 47, we read, "And He was teaching daily in the temple; but the chief priests and the scribes, and the leading men among the people were trying to destroy Him, and they could not find anything that they might do, for all the people were hanging on to every word He said. And then in chapter 20, bringing it right to where we're at, in Mark 11, this is what Luke says, beginning in verse one, "On one of the days while He was teaching the people in the temple and preaching the gospel, the chief priests and the scribes with the elders confronted Him, and they spoke, saying to Him, 'Tell us by what authority You are doing these things, or who is the one who gave You this authority?'" Now we read in that passage that he was teaching and he's preaching the gospel. May I remind you what that is. What he would have said to them had to do with the holiness of God; that God is infinitely holy and that we are a sinful people, that we have violated his law. That we are depraved people. We have an inability to save ourselves, frankly, to even see our sin unless God does something. And therefore, it is crazy to think that through keeping laws or rituals or whatever, that somehow you could merit God's grace in saving you. He would teach them about the inevitability of divine judgment and eternal hell. He would speak to them about the love of God and the promises of God and, and all of the authority that is in his word. He would speak to them how the saving truths of Christ and his kingdom were veiled in the types, and the shadows of the law; and how they were promised in the writings of the prophets until John the Baptist announced Jesus as the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world; the long-awaited Messiah of Israel. In fact, we read in Luke 16, verse 16, that he said, "'The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John; since that time the gospel of the kingdom has been preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it.'" What does that mean? They are passionately, with great zeal and with great fervor, demonstrating their need for Christ, and crying out to him for saving faith. But what he said was incredibly contradictory to what they had been taught. And horribly blasphemous, because he actually is telling them that he had the authority to forgive sin.

Of course, we know this from other passages. Remember when they took the paralytic and they cut a hole in the roof and they dropped him down in front of Jesus, in front of the crowd, and Pharisees and the scribes are watching all of this. And in Luke 5:21, Jesus said to him, "'Friend, your sins are forgiven.'" And of course, the Pharisees at this point, they were apoplectic. I mean, they just exploded in rage. And in verse 21 they said, "'Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?'" And then Jesus responded in verse 24, "'the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.'" This is what Jesus was teaching and preaching in the temple.

We have other examples of his authority to forgive. In John one and verse 12, we read very familiar passage, "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right." In other words, to them, he had the authority to make them "children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born out of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God." We have another public acclamations of his authority to forgive in John seven, verse 37. We read, "Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood up and cried out"-- can't you imagine this? They're having a feast and all of a sudden, Jesus stands up, and he cries out so everybody can hear--"'If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me as the Scripture said, 'From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.'" Likewise, in Matthew 11, beginning of verse 28, Jesus said, "'Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 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. For my yoke is easy, and My burden is light.'"

Furthermore, you will remember after Christ's death, this was at the very heart of Peter sermon, recorded an Acts four beginning in verse 11, where he said, "He," referring to Jesus, "IS THE STONE WHICH WAS REJECTED BY YOU, THE BUILDERS, BUT WHICH BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone. And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved." So these are the essential truths of the gospel, that Jesus would have been preaching in the temple, that infuriated the Jewish leaders.

So again, "He was walking in the temple, and verse 27 goes on to say that as he was doing this, "the chief priests and the scribes and the elders came to Him and began saying to Him, 'By what authority are You doing these things or who gave You this authority to do these things?'" Now, they knew full well what the answer was, because he had clearly and publicly stated it before. For example, in Matthew 11, verse 27, we read that, "'All things have been handed over to me by My Father.'" Plus they witnessed His authority over the demons, did they not? All the people had seen this. In fact, in Mark 1:27, in light of that, we see that, "they debated among themselves saying, 'What is this? A new teaching with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey Him.'" And in John five, beginning in verse 21, we read Jesus words, "For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom He wishes. For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son.'" He goes on to say in verse 26, "'For just as the Father has life in Himself, even so He gave to the Son also to have life in Himself; and gave Him authority to execute judgment, because He is the Son of Man.'" And then in verse 30, "'I can do nothing.'" Jesus said, "'on My own initiative. As I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I do not seek My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.'" There is where his authority is from. He had made that abundantly clear. The scribes and the Pharisees knew it. John 6:38, Jesus said, "'I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.'" And of course, they witnessed the power of His authority, even from the response of the crowds. You remember, after Jesus finished his sermon on the mount, recorded in Matthew five through seven, in chapter seven, verse 28, we read, "When Jesus had finished these words, the crowds were amazed at His teaching; for He was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes." You see, what they were used to, were the scribes and the Pharisees just quoting what other rabbis had said; not speaking on their own authority.

So again, Mark 11:28, "They began saying to him, 'By what authority are You doing these things? Who gave you this authority to do these things?'" Basically, what they're challenging him on is, is your authority, human or divine? Are you speaking the Word of God or the word of man? Because they thought in their minds, if he says his authority is divine, then we can say, he's a blasphemer. And we can insist upon his execution. So they're setting a trap, and waiting for Jesus to step in it. And if he says, it's not divine, then well, he's a fraud. And once again, he's doomed.

Verse 29, you learn a very clear lesson. Don't ever try to outsmart God. Don't ever try to trick God. Verse 29, "Jesus said to them, 'I will ask you one question, and you answer Me, and then I tell you by what authority I do these things.'" And here's the question, verse 30, "'Was the baptism of John from heaven or from men? Answer me.'" By the way, answering a question with another question was a common thing for rabbis to do. But this was a real quandary for these guys. They had to choose between two very difficult and frankly, dangerous, choices; two equally difficult alternatives. Because the people recognize John the Baptist as a true prophet of God, who called them to repentance, who declared Jesus to be the Messiah.

So in verse 31, we read, "They began reasoning among themselves saying," Ooh. By the way, "ooh" isn't in there, okay? But I hope you see that I think you could kind of put it in there in your mind. Can't you see these guys? It's like, guys, we got to huddle here, we got a big problem. "If we say 'From heaven,' He will say, 'Then why did you not believe him?'" Well, what were the things that they should have believed if John was from heaven? By the way, this is rather comical, I think, because John the Baptist, he made it very clear what he thought of these guys, and he exposed them. Remember, in Matthew three and verse seven. "But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, 'You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore, bear fruit in keeping with repentance; and do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham for our father'; for I say to you that from the stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham. The axe is already laid at the root of the trees; therefore, every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. As for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I and I am not fit to remove His sandals; He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in His hand and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.'"

So they're thinking, My goodness, if we say, John, the Baptist authority is from heaven, then he will say, Well, then why didn't you believe him? Verse 32, But shall we say that his authority is "From men," then we got to deal with the people, right? The text there in verse 32, goes on to say, "they were afraid of the people, for everyone considered John to have been a real prophet." So what did these unparalleled theological experts--the wisest of the wise, the spiritual authorities--have to say to all of this? Now, mind you, there'd be all kinds of people gathered around, waiting to hear this. Don't you know, you could heard a pin drop?

Verse 33, "Answering Jesus, they said, 'We do not know.' Now, the text doesn't say this, but I would imagine Jesus said, "Say what?" "I did not, or we didn't, we do not know." "A little bit louder."" We do not know." Jesus said to them, "'Nor will I tell you by what authority I do these things.'" You see, friends, these men knew the answer, but they stubbornly refused to submit to it, and therefore, to submit to Jesus, and they had murder and violence in their heart. So they stood before himself condemned. If you want an example of the unpardonable or the unforgivable sin, here it is. It is the deliberate, conscious rejection of the truth that has been given to you through the convicting work of the Holy Spirit of God--the very Word of God, from the very lips of God. And we don't have Jesus here today, but we have his Word. And that is the authority. Three years of undeniable examples of his deity in his miracles. Three years of irrefutable, compelling, divine truths. And now because of their persistent, hard-hearted rejection, the door of opportunity will be forever closed. Frightening thing. The light of divine revelation will now be forever extinguished.

Perhaps like some of you, they rejected Jesus warning, recorded in John 12, beginning of verse 35. "Jesus said to them, 'For a little while longer, the Light is among you. Walk while you have the Light, so that darkness will not overtake you; he who walks in the darkness does not know where he goes. While you have the Light, believe in the Light, so that you may become sons of Light.'" Well, they rejected the Light, and so there would be no further Light. They would be sealed now, permanently, in the darkness that they loved.

And this brings us to our second category of thought, and that is the consequence of rejecting his authority. And folks, this is where the rubber really meets the road. Jesus said, "'Nor will I tell you by what authority I do these things.'" This is a terrifying condemnation. They knew exactly what Jesus had said, they knew exactly who he claimed to be. It was irrefutable, but they rejected him. And they found every possible reason to condemn him. Satan had blinded their minds as we read in Second Corinthians four, four. And by extinguishing the convicting light of truth, Jesus acted consistently with what he said in Matthew seven in verse six. "'Do not give what is holy to dogs, do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under their feet and turn and tear you to pieces.'" You see, friends, these men loved the darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. So God judicially sealed them forever in the darkness that they loved. Jesus said in Matthew six, verse 22, "'If the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!'" And one day they will be according to Matthew 22:13 thrown "'into the outer darkness; in that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"

This is not easy to preach, but I want to give it to you as clearly and as forthright as I possibly can because I fear that some of you may be perilously close to having the light forever extinguished from you; that some of you might be forever sealed in the darkness that you love. Here we see an example of the wrath of divine abandonment where God judicially seals hard-hearted unbelievers in their unbelief. This is a terrifying form of judgment. You know, Jesus saw this coming when he entered Jerusalem on his final journey. Remember Luke 19:41, we read, "When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and he wept over it." The idea that he cried aloud over what he saw; it was breaking his heart. And here's what he said, "'If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes.'" We see this illustrated in a number of passages of Scripture. You may recall if you go to the book of Nehemiah, in Nehemiah chapter nine, verses five through 37, there's a long confession there and a recitation of God's mighty acts; it's probably written by Ezra. And it was read by a group of Levites to the people. And in verse 30, of Nehemiah nine, we read this, "You bore with them for many years, and admonished them by Your Spirit through Your prophets, yet they would not give ear. Therefore, You gave them into the hand of the peoples of the land." Isaiah speaks of this in chapter six, familiar passage, beginning in verse nine. When God commissioned Isaiah, He said, "'Go and tell this people: Keep on listening, but do not perceive; keep on looking but do not understand.'" Then he tells him "'render the hearts of this people insensitive, their ears dull, and their eyes dim, otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and return and be healed.'" We read more of this in Isaiah 29, beginning in verse nine, where he says to the apostate rebellious people, "Be delayed and wait, blind yourselves and be blind; they become drunk, but not with wine, they stagger but not with strong drink. For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep, He has shut your eyes, the prophets; and H has covered your heads the seers." In other words, when you deliberately blind yourself to the truth, you will be blinded by lies. And that's what happened to the people. They refused to heed the words of the true prophets. So God allowed them to be deceived by the false prophets. And he judicially seal them in the lies they embraced.

In fact, Paul later described the same condition in Romans 11, verse eight, "Just as it is written, 'GOD GAVE THEM A SPIRIT OF STUPOR, EYES TO SEE NOT AND EARS TO HEAR NOT, DOWN TO THIS VERY DAY.'" You realize this is why Jesus began speaking in parables. It was an act of judicial hardening. Matthew 13, verse 12, he says, "'For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have abundance;, but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. In their case the prophecy of Isaiah is being fulfilled which says, 'YOU WILL KEEP ON HEARING, BUT WILL NOT UNDERSTAND; YOU WILL KEEP ON SEEING, BUT WILL NOT PERCEIVE; FOR THE HEART OF THIS PEOPLE HAS BECOME DULL, WITH THEIR EARS THEY SCRCELY HEAR, AND THEY HAVE CLOSED THEIR EYES, OTHERWISE THEY WOULD SEE WITH THEIR EYES, HEAR WITH THEIR EARS, AND UNDERSTAND WITH THEIR HEART AND RETURN, AND I WOULD HEAL THEM.'"

We read about this as well, how it will happen during the days of the Tribulation, under the rule of the Antichrist. Paul speaks of this in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse 11. He said, "For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth but took pleasure in wickedness." And certainly, that is occurring even now, in our culture, as it has been down through redemptive history. Paul spoke of this so clearly, you will recall in Romans one, beginning in verse 18, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness." In other words, they try to keep a lid on the truth so it won't spring forth, and they have to deal with it. So they will suppress the truth in unrighteousness because, "that" he says, "which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them." Later on in verse 28, we read that he finally gives them over to "a depraved mind," he says, "and just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind"-- literally a worthless mind, a mind that cannot function as it should--"to do those things," he says, "which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving and merciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them." And certainly, we can see this being played out in our society today. We live in a postmodern, post-Christian world, that does not recognize the authority of God as it is revealed in Scripture. They do not recognize the authority of Christ. People no longer believe in absolute moral truth and so skepticism and subjectivism and relativism now rule the day. You hear people saying often, "these folks have no moral compass." And it's true. And as a result, all viewpoints no matter how absurd, or how contradictory, must be considered equally valid, unless of course, it is a viewpoint that comes from the Bible. So biblical values have been replaced by laws that impose a godless, immoral, oppressive social agenda on our country. The priority of the left today includes absurdities like climate change, white supremacy, DEI, racial reparations, abortion on demand, adherence to Coronavirus group think, transgenderism, unquestioned allegiance to the LGBTQ ideologies; and certainly, the woke cult in our country has successfully divided our country into oppressors and the oppressed. And Satan's end game through the use of this cultural Marxism that receives its authority from Satan himself is to somehow legalize unrighteousness and criminalize righteousness and then prosecute those who refuse to submit.

Reminds me of the Israelites after they had settled in the Promised Land. They were filled with apostasy and idolatry, gross immorality, And in Judges 17 verse six, we read, "In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what is right in his own eyes." Dear friends, you must understand that Jesus Christ has the sovereign authority over all that he has created. And he repeatedly demonstrated this in his incarnation and affirmed this. In Matthew 28, verse 18, he declared, "'All authority has been given to me on heaven and on earth.'" And He has revealed the essence of his authority in his word, because Christ is the living word. As we read in John one, for example, the same one who spoke the universe into existence is the one that imparted revelation to the prophets, often being personally there with them. And we know that the Father sent the Son as his Messenger, and then the Holy Spirit superintended, the inscripturation of the message that he was delivering through his inspired writers. And this resulted in divinely authoritative, and inerrant words written in the original autographs. And for this reason, Paul says in Second Timothy three, this passage that you're also familiar with, beginning in verse 16, "All Scripture is inspired,"--"theopneustos" in the original language--it is God breathed; God breathed out the word of God that we have in the canon of Scripture. "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training and righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. Dear friends, can there be any greater proof of the authority and the sufficiency of Scripture, when it comes to my life and how I need to live my life to honor God, and to enjoy his blessings? I don't need a psychologist. I don't need a philosopher. I don't need psychotherapy. And I certainly don't need the government. I need the Word of the living God who created me.

So the question is, is Jesus and His word, your sole authority? Or do you just give lip service to his lordship in your life rather than genuinely obeying him from the heart? Jesus addressed this in Luke 6:46. "'Why do you call Me 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say?'" He went on to say, "'Everyone who comes to Me and hears My words and acts on them, I will show you whom he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid a foundation on the rock; and when a flood occurred, the torrent burst against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who has heard and has not acted accordingly, is like a man who built a house on the ground without any foundation; and the torrent burst against it and immediately it collapsed, and the ruin of that house was great.'" Dear friends, I fear that for some of you.

I wish to give you an example of what happens when people depart from the authority of Christ and his word; one that we would be familiar with in our culture. We're all familiar of Harvard and the other Ivy League schools that are so antisemitic. And you know, all of the full blown woke stuff that we've seen on the news and so forth. That reminded me of something. Harvard was founded in 1636, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, by English Puritans that migrated to New England. And they would have believed, as we do, the five solas of the Reformation. They saw a need to train clergyman in their new Commonwealth; men who would proclaim the saving truths of the gospel; truths so instrumental in the founding of our country, and frankly, inherent in our Constitution. And at Harvard, even today, there are tablets flanking the Johnston gate which read, quote, "After God had carried us safe to New England and we had builded our houses provided necessaries for our livelihood, reared convenient places for God's worship and settled the civil government, one of the next things we longed for and looked after was to advance learning and perpetuate it to posterity dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to the churches when our present ministers shall lie in the dust. And as we were thinking in consulting how to affect this great work, it pleased God to stir up the heart of one Mr. Harvard (a godly gentleman and a lover of learning then living amongst us) to give one half of his estate, it being an all about 1700 pounds towards the erecting of a college and all his library. After him and other 300 pounds others after them cashed in more in the public hand of the state added the rest. The college was by common consent appointed to be at Cambridge. A very pleasant and accommodating place and it is called according to the name of the first founder, Harvard College. Alright, there's the history. But now, because they gradually, little by little, at times imperceptibly, rejected the authority of Christ and his word, we see an institution that is not only hostile to Christianity, but it is violently opposed to it, even their seminary. I went to the website of Harvard Divinity School and here's part of what they said, "Students come to Harvard Divinity School from a variety of spiritual and religious backgrounds, including non-religious backgrounds." In other words, you can come to Harvard Divinity School, you don't have to be a Christian; goes on to say, "Some of our students come with a faith tradition. We have a number of students that are not affiliated with a religious tradition. What all Harvard Divinity students share in common is a willingness to explore the complexities of religious thought, and life through academic curiosity and practical encouragement." Another part of their statement has the goal. And the goal of the training is, quote, "to study religion with attentiveness, to issues of diversity in regard to race, class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, religious tradition and ideology." And it went on to say, "to foster a welcoming and inclusive community among our faculty, students, alumni and staff." And then finally, it says, "to commit to ecological sustainability and good environmental stewardship." I mean, that's just woke insanity. It has nothing to do with the gospel, with the Word of God; the authority of Christ in His Word. Contrast that with The Master's Seminary, I went on their website. And here's part of what they had to say--here's what they're trying to produce, "to have a ministry that pleases God, pastors must prioritize His Word. Our doctrinal statement carefully outlines the seminaries teaching position on major biblical doctrines. It is the framework for every class, syllabus and lecture." And in their preamble, they said this, "The affirmations which follow carefully specify our teaching position with regard to the major biblical doctrines and thus provide a framework for curriculum and instruction at the seminary. They also provide an anchor to protect the institution against theological drift. For this reason, members of the Board of Directors, administration and faculty members are annually required to sign a statement affirming agreement with this statement of faith." And their goal is to produce "a well-rounded pastor and preacher; The Master of Divinity program prepares you to handle God's word precisely and shepherd God's people effectively." You see the difference?

I'm reminded of what Paul told Titus in Titus two and verse 15. He said to the young pastor, "These things speak and exhort and reprove with all authority. Let no one disregard you." What things was he talking about? Well, the things in verse one, "Speak the things which are fitting for sound doctrine." That's what you teach. With all authority. I have no authority over you, whatsoever. The only authority that I have is what comes from God through his word. There's the authority. He even said, in verses 11 and following, here's the type of thing you've got to teach, "For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, and instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, and righteously in the present age looking for the blessed hope in the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds. These things speak and exhort and reprove with all authority. Let no one disregard you."

Dear friends, new revelations conjured up in the imagination of someone's mind has no spiritual authority. Self-appointed, phony apostles have no spiritual authority. Creeds and councils and tradition, and a pope has no spiritual authority. The government has no spiritual authority when it comes to faith and practice. Nothing apart from the Word of God recorded in this canon of Scripture has any binding spiritual authority on the souls of men. And for this reason, Paul charged Timothy to preach the word right? "Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and turn aside under myths." The grammar in the original language indicates that when they hear the truth, they will deliberately, consciously reject it. And when that happens, without realizing it, the myths will take them over and deceive them as an act of divine judgment. Beloved, every time you have an opportunity, you need to speak the truth of the Word of God. Unleash its power on people. Never underestimate its power, "for the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, both joint and marrow, to judge the thoughts and the intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare in the eyes of Him with whom we have to do."

So this morning, I pray that you will examine your heart. Ask yourself, is the Lord Jesus and his word my authority? Or is it something else? Is my authority from God or from man? When I raise my kids, do I look at the authority of the Word of God or the authority of man? When I conduct my business do I look at the words of God from the Bible or something else? When I choose a wife or a husband? Or whatever it is? Do I go first and last to the only divine authority? Or do I come up with my own? Dear friends, once again the destiny of your soul depends upon how you answer that question. And so I leave it with you that by the Spirit of God, he will bring conviction to your heart. And if you don't know Christ, today is the day that you need to believe on him. Place your faith in him. Repent of your sins and cry out for his saving grace and he will absolutely forgive your sins and change you in ways that you cannot imagine. And then the authority of his Word and of his person will not be onerous, it will be the very desire of your heart. Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. I pray that by the power of your Spirit, they will find access into every heart and that you will do what only you can do. And that is to save sinners and sanctify saints. We thank you, we give you praise in Jesus name. Amen.

I've chosen as my text this morning a passage out of Romans chapter 13. If you will take your Bibles and turn there, Paul's epistle to the Romans, we're going to look at verses eight through 14. And I've entitled my discourse to you "Awaken the Day is Near." Let me read the passage. Romans 13, beginning with verse eight, "Owe, nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. For this, 'YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET,' and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, ' YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR ARS YOURSELF.' Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. Do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is near. Therefore, let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts."

As we embark upon a new year, I believe it's appropriate for us to begin with an understanding and a firm conviction of how important it is for us to be sober minded as believers; especially as it relates to the schemes of the devil as he tries to destroy us, destroy our families. And therefore we need to awaken ourselves, awaken our life, to a greater sense of obedience and service to Christ. We're very familiar with that term that's batted around all the time, the term "woke." It's really a nebulous, liberal buzzword that encompasses an obsession with social inequalities, real or perceived, such as racial injustice or sexism, LGBTQ discrimination, and so forth. And of course, all of this has fueled the morally bankrupt groups like the alphabet mafia. Black Lives Matter, DEI, which is now collapsing under its own stupidity--thankfully; and even the pro-Hamas movement that we are dealing with today. Of course, none of this can coexist with biblical Christianity, yet it is being forced upon us at alarming rates. And very successfully, I might add, even in so-called "woke" churches. We are commanded in Romans 12 nine to quote, "Abhor what is evil; cling to what is good." And Paul said in First Thessalonians 5:21 that we are to "abstain from every form of evil." Evil is essentially everything that God opposes. It can be classified really under two headings, moral evil and supernatural evil. Moral evil, is that evil and that enemy within us; supernatural evil is that enemy outside of us. Moral evil is basically sin that dominates human life; wickedness that violates the law of God. It's the abominations that God describes. There's a number of them, especially the abomination of sexual immorality, homosexuality, transgenderism, murder, idolatry and so forth. In fact, Proverbs six beginning of verse 16, we read, "There are six things which the Lord hates, yes seven which are an abomination to Him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans feet that run rapidly to evil, a false witness who utters lies, and one who spreads strife among brothers." So those types of things would be consistent with moral evil that we are to abstain from and to abhor.

But then there's supernatural evil, that's demonic evil; the unmitigated wickedness that characterizes Satan's world system. And we're all aware of First John 5:19 that says that, "The whole world lies in the power of the evil one." The world certainly is the the supernatural expression of evil against which we all wrestle as believers. Abhoring what is evil and abstaining from it and clinging to what is good will always be the mark of a true believer and distinguish true believers from false believers. R.H Mounce said, quote, "To love God is to regard evil with horror. Unfortunately, familiarity with a culture that is shaped by the forces of Satan has lulled to many believers into a state of general tolerance for whatever deviant behavior is in vogue at present. We are to abhor evil, because it is the enemy of all that leads to Christlikeness." As I have written elsewhere, it is appalling to witness the creative yet blasphemous ways the Bible is distorted among many professing Christians in their effort to embrace everything from homosexuality to transgenderism, as if such things are morally acceptable in God's eyes. Worse yet, such blatantly unbiblical positions are boldly touted as being examples of Christian love, when just the opposite is true. When the eternal souls of men and women are at stake, there can be no greater act of hatred, than to make people comfortable in their sin, and thus doom them to God's righteous judgment, like the false prophets, who, according to Jeremiah, 23:14, and 16, "strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one has turned back from his wickedness. All of them have become to Me like Sodom, and her inhabitants like Gomorrah...They are leading you into futility; they speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the Lord."

So what must we do as we face a new year? How can we fortify ourselves against all of the things that we see surrounding us that are evil? All of the damning deceptions? How can we protect our children from them? How can we honor God in the battle? How can we enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ in the midst of the types of things we are experiencing in our culture?

You know, I was thinking about this, with respect to the term "woke" as Christians; we need to be woke in the biblical sense, right? This was Paul's concern for the persecuted saints at Rome, that we read in our text this morning, especially in verse 11, he says, "Do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us, nearer to us than when we believed." So he says, "Do this," well do what? Curse the Romans? Obsess over all of the evil of that day? Compromise with the world so that somehow they will like Christ? And like us? No, he says, instead, "lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light." And that's what we want to understand better this morning so that we can apply these principles to our life in a very practical and real way in the days ahead.

You will recall in Ephesians six, the Apostle Paul speaks to us about the armor that we need to wear in this battle against Satan's world system. He says beginning in verse 11, "Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm." And then, as you will recall, he goes on to describe the various pieces of armor that symbolizes our need for sound doctrine for truth, for holy living. Likewise, Paul said in First Thessalonians, five, beginning in verse four, "But you brethren, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief." There the day is referring to the "day of the Lord" that has been described previously. The day of the Lord is for the people of the night, the time of judgment, the people who prefer darkness rather than light not for people of the day. He went on to say, "for you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness; so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober. For those who sleep do their sleeping at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love and as a helmet, the hope of salvation."

So Paul's admonition in our text here this morning, especially in verse 12, will further elucidate these great principles in a very practical way. He says, "The night is almost gone, and the day is near. Therefore, let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light." And again, I find it fascinating--he's addressing persecuted saints, trying to encourage them, helping them to know what they are to do. And by the way, they were persecuted in ways that are far beyond what we are experiencing. And they were about to experience things even far worse. But there is no call here to political activism. There is no call here to rebellion against the government, as evil as that government was, but rather his overall emphasis, in this chapter, is to live submissively as living sacrifices, especially as it relates to fulfilling our obligation to love one another, in light of the end of the age.

Isn't it true that when we are besieged with evil all around us, it's easy for us to focus our attention on the evildoers, right? And neglect our own heart. We can get angry at all of the wicked things that we see, that we experience; the unfair things, the insane things that we see, that's indicative of the wrath of divine abandonment on our country, consistent with Romans one, where he finally just gives people over to a worthless mind, literally a mind that cannot function. It's easy to shake our fist at all of those things, and neglect the issues of our own heart, and that's what Paul is dealing with here. And that's what we must hear as well. We must love our enemies enough to give them the gospel, to pray for them. And most importantly, we must love the Lord our God, with all of our heart, all of our mind, all of our soul, our all of our strength. And when we do this, we will be obedient to Him. And we will love one another because dear friends, we need one another, especially in great times of difficulty. We need fellowship, we need to be around other believers. And we need to love them; and this is the heart of the apostle's admonitions.

Let me give you the context here. You will recall that Paul has just explained the astounding doctrine of the justification of faith, along with the amazing truths pertaining to Israel's election, defection and salvation as we read in Romans 9,10 and 11. And then beginning in chapter 12, he addresses the very practical issues concerning the Christians attitude toward God, toward fellow believers, and all people, even civil authorities. And now in verses eight through 14, he summarizes these great truths by drawing our attention to the second commandment, that we should love our neighbor as ourself. Again, persecution can lead to frustration, it can lead to anger, it could lead to hatred, it can wear us down and cause us to become self-focused. And so without us realizing it, we can become just the opposite of who we are to be and how we are to think and how we are to function. For example, how we are to love our neighbor as delineated in that great Treatise of love that's found in First Corinthians 13. Allow me to read the opposite of what the Apostle Paul says. And I'll try to make that very practical for each of us. If we are impatient, unkind, jealous, we love to brag about ourselves, if we're arrogant, rude, demanding, controlling, easily offended; if we keep a record of wrongs if we try to justify our unrighteousness; if we tolerate error and untruths in our life, if we gossip and love to expose, ridicule, criticize, and harm those we don't like, rather than trying to cover their sin and support and protect and restore them. Or if we are always suspicious of others, and immediately believe the worst in them. If we have a reputation as one who has no desire to restore others to righteousness, especially those people that we don't like, if we quickly give up hope that God's grace will restore a person that has fallen, if we give up on others easily instead of enduring with them with a steadfast faith in God's redeeming and restoring love. If that is us, dear friends, then our love bears little, if any, resemblance to Christ's love for us. And we stand guilty as charged, do we not?

We all struggle with these things, even more so when difficulties are pressed upon us. And as a result, we forfeit God's blessing in our life. We grieve the spirit, we can forfeit the Spirit's work in our life, and quench that work. Little by little, we become ruled by our own flesh rather than the spirit. And worse yet, we undermine our witness for Christ. Because in our life, the way we function, is dishonoring to him. So I've chosen as a real simple outline, to look at this passage this morning-- three categories that I hope will help us all grasp what the Spirit of God is saying through his inspired writer. We're going to see the priority, the function and the urgency of love.

First of all, notice what he says with respect to the priority of love. He says, "Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another." Now, you may recall that he has just exhorted Christians to pay their taxes to civil authorities. And he now focuses on the same obligation to pay our debts in our private life, namely, the debt of love. A debt that can never be fully paid. I mean think about it, none of us can say you know, I have loved all I need to love, my obligation is now finished; none of us can say that. The 20th century theologian H.C.G. Moule, said this, "The Christian is to allow no debt to remain outstanding except the one that can never be paid off-- the debt to love one another. The obligation to love has no limit."

Now, as a footnote, this is not a prohibition against borrowing money, as some people will claim. Jesus permitted that, for example, in Matthew 5:42. He said, "'Give to him who asks of you and do not turn away from Him who wants to borrow from you.'" In fact, borrowing and lending money were permitted under the Mosaic Law, according to Exodus 22 and verse 25. However, nowhere in Scripture are we justified to borrow more than we can afford to pay back or for the reason of purchasing luxuries that we really don't need and we can't afford. But we can also conclude, even from this statement, that the financial debts are to be paid promptly. And in this connection, we read according to Psalm 37:21, "The wicked borrows but does not pay back." It's like the one who runs up his or her credit card, buying more than they can possibly pay back and eventually they drown in debt. And then they get bailed out by somebody else and we all pay for it with higher interest rates, right? That's how that whole thing works. But Paul's use of the imagery of debt here, you must understand this--it extends far beyond the issue of personal finances. It speaks of the Christian's perpetual obligation of love. That's his point here. We are debtors to God for the undeserved mercy and grace of his love that he is lavished upon us. We are to love the Lord our God, and to love our neighbors and because of God's transforming grace, the Holy Spirit dwells within us. And therefore, we have all of the necessary resources to make payments on all of this.

First Thessalonians, four nine, "you yourselves are taught by God to love one another." And is this not the first fruit of the Spirit? In Galatians, five and verse 22, the Holy Spirit that prompted us to come to repentant faith, that caused us to see our sin for what it was and to see who Christ is, and what he has done for us--that same Holy Spirit prompts the believer to obedience, that is the desire of our heart. Especially in the realm of self-sacrificing love. You see, obedience will be the natural desire of that transformed heart, and what an amazing resource we have in Christ, to help us love as we should. In fact, we read in Romans five, five, Paul reminds us that, "The love of God has poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us."

You see, the point with all of this is when we submit to the Holy Spirit, in our daily walk, we have at our disposal, the supernatural power of the indwelling Spirit that produces within us an inexhaustible reservoir of self-sacrificing love with which we can love others. So the key is walking by the Spirit, being obedient to the Spirit of God, as He has revealed Himself in His Word. And when we do that, this love is going to be a fruit that just naturally grows on the vine of our life. May I ask you, is this kind of love a distinguishing characteristic of your life? Would those who know you best say that it is? But our love must not only be extended to our brothers and sisters in Christ, but even to the unsaved. Our first obligation is to fellow Christians. We read this, for example, in John 13, beginning in verse 34. "'A new commandment,'" Jesus says, "'I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you that you, also love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.'" So fellow believers are to be the first priority in love. They are to hold a special place in our hearts. In fact, Paul speaks of this in Romans 12 and verse 10. He says, "Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor," verse 13, he says, "contributing to the needs of the saints." Then he says, "practicing hospitality." The term "practicing" in the original language carries the idea of vigorous effort, intentional effort; using our home to help those in need, does that describe you? Is that a desire of your heart?

This, by the way, is at the heart of our philosophy of missions here at Calvary Bible Church, to first meet the needs of our own people, meet the needs of others as best we can around the world who know and love Christ. Our priority of benevolence is first to the saints. We see this for example, in Galatians six and verse 10, where Paul says, "while we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially to those who are of the household of faith." And Paul even exhorts us to love fellow believers in his letter to the Colossians. He said this in Colossians, three beginning in verse 12, "And so, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing with one another and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so that so you also so also should you. Beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity."

But again, our love must be extended to all men even unbelievers, even our enemies, which is a fascinating thought; very difficult for us to comprehend. I'll try to make it clear. Jesus made this clear in Matthew 5:44. First of all, he says, "'You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.'" And Paul said in Romans 12, verse 14, "Bless those who persecute you; bless and curse not." Now, if you're like me, the natural response, typically of my flesh, is not to bless, but to retaliate. You know, to get even, to curse them somehow. But I have to make a choice to love. And by the way, the more we walk by the Spirit, the easier that choice is. So we are to pray for them. To seek to do them good. He goes on in verse 20 and following, "'BUT IF YOUR ENEMY IS HUNGRY, FEED HIM, AND IF HE IS THIRSTY, GIVE HIM A DRINK; FOR IN SO DOING YOU WILL HEAP BURNING COALS ON HIS HEAD.' Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." And this would include being obedient to the list that's found with respect to love in First Corinthians 13. And it would also include praying for the lost, giving them the gospel--doing all we can to somehow demonstrate the love of Christ to them so that they would come to repentant faith.

But I would also add, and this is very important, because sometimes people get confused with this. This is not a call to pacifism. This is not a call to pacifism or allowing evil to go unpunished or unrestrained. Loving your neighbor would include defending them from criminal attacks, from deceptive practices and even grievous sin in the church. I mean, there is a place for church discipline--Matthew 18. And there is a place to reject a factious man--Titus 3:10. There is a place for turning away from those who cause dissensions and hindrances in the church--Romans 16, 17 and following. There is even a time for war--Ecclesiastes three and verse eight. Which I might add as a necessary component of divine justice, and an extension of capital punishment. Genesis nine six tells us, "Whoever sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed." Now, the misguided pacifist will say, "Well, how can you harmonize a call to arms with Jesus blessings on meekness; we are to love our enemies, turn the other cheek, return good for evil?" Well, the answer is, in every case, when Jesus called for these virtuous attitudes, the issue was always the need for the mortification of pride that inevitably seeks retaliation for personal offenses. That was the issue. Jesus' passion was a call to surrender our fanatical, rabid commitment to personal rights and vengeance. That's just so natural for us and replace those attitudes with the love of Christ. But never do these admonitions apply to the very appropriate, and many times necessary, need for defense and retaliation against criminal offenses in the military aggression of evil men. I can assure you, if Hamas terrorists break into my house, I'm not going to reach for a Bible track, I'm gonna reach for my gun. I'm gonna love my family enough to protect them. I'm not going to say well, here's my other cheek, you know, go ahead and do these vicious things. I hope you understand that. God even considers capital punishment, as I said earlier, as a logical extension in war. And that is even a deterrent to crime as indicated in Deuteronomy 17, verse 13, where he warns, quote, "Then all the people will hear and be afraid and will not act presumptuously again."

So all of that to say God's call for us to love our enemies and turn the other cheek carries the idea of mortifying our self-centered pride, and our natural proclivity to retaliate when we are personally offended. It's not a blanket call to pacifism. So verse eight, "Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another." There's the priority of love. Now secondly, notice the function of love. The end of verse eight, "for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law." And here we see that this all-embracing love has a function and what is it? Well, it fulfills the law. And that is our duty. We cannot be obedient to God's law, if we do not love as we should. And Paul is merely repeating what Jesus said about the law being summed up in the commandments to love, as we read in Matthew 22, beginning in verse 37, where Jesus said, "'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.'" Now bear in mind, no man is saved by keeping the law. I hope you understand that. "By the works of the law," according to Romans 3:20, "no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin." So Paul is not saying that, hey, if you just really love other people, the way you should, then you will fulfill the law and be saved. By the way, no one could ever love perfectly. No one could ever love the Lord perfectly.

And secondly, we know that salvation is always by grace through faith. Romans three verse 21, we read, "But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested." In verse 24. He says, sinners are "justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus." So how does love fulfill the law? Very appropriate question. I'm glad you asked. There's many places we could go to answer that, but Romans eight, beginning in verse three helps us. There we read that God, "condemned sin in the flesh," referring to how sin and that condemnation was poured out upon the flesh of Christ on the cross--in order that "the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." Beloved, this is so exciting, as Christians, think about this, we are no longer concerned about somehow meeting the requirements of the law in order to be saved. Right? All of that was taken care of on the cross. That's the great doctrine of justification; whereby the imputed righteousness of Christ causes God to say that we are now declared as righteous. But what he is saying here is that the requirement of the Law is now being fulfilled in us as the Holy Spirit works through and in us to cause us to walk in faith and obedience. It's the Spirit that empowers us to love. Again, bear in mind, the Law reflects the character of God. And for this reason, the Law is still perfectly valid, in that sense. But now, as we walk "according to the Spirit," as the Apostle says, God Himself fulfills the requirements of the Law in us and through us. And by our love for God and others, we put his holiness, and we put his glory on display. Beloved, this is the function of love; to fulfill the law by the power of the Holy Spirit that causes us to manifest the love of God in our lives, to the praise of his glory.

But there is more. As we love God and our neighbor, it is unimaginable what God does. Because when we do that God reciprocates in ways that are inconceivably precious. When we do that, the Triune God discloses himself to us, in intimate and powerful ways. We read about this in John 14:21, where Jesus said, "'He who loves Me shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and he will disclose Myself to him.'" In other words, he will cause me to be manifested in a more intimate way to you, to make me more fully known in you, to reveal more of who I am in you. In verse 23, went on to say, "'and We will come to him and make Our abode with him.'" The term "abode" means to settle down, to make your home permanently. What a magnificent promise to experience the soul exhilarating joy of the presence of the Triune God deep within our soul. And the key to that is being obedient in loving others, even when we are persecuted.

Next, verse nine of chapter 13, Paul is going to illustrate what love looks like. He's going to cite five specific Old Testament laws. The first four are taken directly from the 10 commandments and the fifth from one that is cited in Leviticus 19 and verse 18, if you want to be technical. He says this in verse nine, "For this, 'YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET,' And if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.'" I love the way Hendrickson explains Paul's emphasis here, very helpful. He said, quote, "You shall love and therefore not commit adultery, but preserve the sacredness of the marriage bond. You shall love and therefore not murder, but help your neighbor keep alive and well. You shall love and accordingly not steal anything that belongs to your neighbor, but rather protect his possessions. You shall love and as a result, not covet what belongs to your neighbor, but rejoice in the fact that it is his." End quote. And by loving in such a way, we love our neighbor as ourselves.

You ever thought about that how you love yourself? Boy, I love myself warts and all, right? I am hopelessly biased in my own favor. I mean, I can see the speck in your eye, a mile away, I can't see the log in my own. That's how we love ourselves unconditionally. That's how we are to love our neighbor. We're blind to our own faults, right? We simply don't see our own faults typically. And when we do, they don't bother us that much, until the Spirit of God really gets a hold of us. Bear in mind that sin manifests itself primarily in the context of relationships. Our love of self warps our personality and it creates a myriad of manipulative and destructive interpersonal styles of relating. I mean, we could go around this room and just start pointing out each other's interpersonal style of relating, you know, and we can see that some are obnoxious, some are strange, others are controlling. Others are bossy, critical, angry, arrogant, goofy, flamboyant, rude, on and on it goes. And seldom do we realize how we impact other people. Because we're so comfortable with our interpersonal style of relating; it works for us. It's how our flesh functions. But boy we can sure get upset when somebody else's interpersonal style of relating bugs us; bothers us; causes conflict in us. But whether we like a person or not, we still must choose to love them. You've heard me say this jokingly before--and I sincerely mean this--I love all of you, but I wouldn't want to go camping for a week with all of you. I mean, that's just how it works, right? We're all different. But we love one another, and we care for one another.

Paul then adds this summary statement in verse 10, "Love does no wrong to a neighbor." Unless the guy's a jerk. Oh, no, no, it doesn't say that--I'm sorry. "Love does no wrong to a neighbor, love therefore is the fulfillment of the law." Indeed, love does no wrong to a neighbor because it's seeking the neighbor's highest good. You know agape love is that self-sacrificing love; that love of choice. It's the opposite of self-love, that is really at the heart of sin. And bear this in mind the next time you attack or ignore a neighbor, or the next time you deliberately seek to injure someone you don't like. When you do that you are not fulfilling the law. You're violating it and you're bringing reproach upon Christ. And you will forfeit blessing in your life and even bring about divine chastening, because typically that will become a pattern in your life. Don't you love being around people that really love other people? I mean, you can, it's like you can see it just almost immediately when you're around them. And then there's those others where it's kind of like, you know, when you turn the magnets where they won't come together, you know, you've got that, that can go on too. Well, even when you have that kind of person, you need to love them. And maybe by God's grace, they will come around.

So we've seen the priority of love, the purpose of love and then now we move into, I should say, the function of love, and then we move finally to the urgency of love. And I'll close with this. In verse 11 he says, "Do this, knowing the time that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed." So when he says, "and this do," he's referring to all the preceding admonitions, don't just read them, don't ignore them; don't be just a hearer of the word. But be a doer of the word. Why? Knowing the time, literally the season, the era in which you live-- which in this context, he's referring to the last days, the age of apostasy that will culminate in our Lord's return. And here the apostle is basically making an appeal to eschatology, to the imminent return of the Lord. And "this do, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep." "Ypnos" in the original language, we get "hypnosis" from that or "hypnotism." And many Christians live as if they're, they've been hidden and hypnotized by the world. They're spiritually asleep. They're oblivious to all the things going on around them. They're unresponsive to the Word and the will of God; there's no sense of urgency. They just kind of live out their life, looking for the next tailgate party. There's no imperatives in their life; there's no passion to present themselves as a living and holy sacrifice to God, which is pleasing to Him. Because He is coming, he's watching and he's coming. And that's what Paul is saying here. Make it a priority here--to love in this way, to do these things.

In fact, many people have no interest in Bible prophecy. "It's so confusing. Let's don't even study it. We don't know when he's going to come. So let's just don't worry about it." Well, that's not at all what the Lord tells us, what Christ inspired John to write in Revelation one and verse three. He said, "Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it, for the time is near." By the way time there's the same word that Paul uses here in verse 11. The season, the era of Christ's return, the next great epoch of redemptive history, will be the imminent return of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I must ask you, is there anything pertaining to your spiritual life that you would say is really urgent? Pressing, burning? Well, what Paul is saying here, he's exhorting us to make this something that is urgent, the things that he's been talking about here in this text. You know, we expect apathy from non-believers, they're blinded by their sin, they're at enmity with God. They hear the things of God and they think it's stupid. They can't believe anybody would believe any of these things, or live for any of these things, because they're spiritually dead. We were the same way until the Spirit of God changed us. But obviously, this was a serious issue, even for the saints in the first century. The imminent return of Christ and all of his glory was a powerful motivation in Paul's life, and it should be for us as well. First Corinthians 15, verse 34, Paul said, "Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God, I speak this to your shame." So again, he writes in verse 11, of Romans 13, "And this do, knowing the time that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep." It's time for you to be woke, Christians--woke in the biblical sense. To be awakened to a life of greater obedience and service to Christ, especially with respect to our love for him and for one another. He even shook the lethargic saints in Ephesus, in Ephesians five verse 14, he said "Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." You see, there is no place for indolence in the Christian life; there is no place for apathy. There is no place for just kind of letting things go. Beloved, we are at war. And if you don't see that, you're a fool. You have been blinded. We are at war; the king is coming. That's why Paul said in Ephesians five, verse 16. "Therefore, be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise, making the most of your time because the days are evil. So then do not be foolish but understand what the will of the Lord is." Think about this the next time you post something on Facebook, the place where our culture tends to go to worship the idol of self, to get affirmed, to promote themselves. To put that real practically, can you imagine the apostle Paul, if they had Facebook and social media in that day, posting things about himself, all the trivia about his life? I mean, can you imagine a post like "Well, hey, had another run with the Scribes and Pharisees today. Took them to task, they got mad, as usual, getting behind on my tent making. You know, anybody that needs a tent let me know, sales are kind of slow right now. Oh, and still struggling with aching joints; the olive oil is not working. If anybody has any recommendations, let me know." You see what I mean? We laugh, don't we? Because those things are utterly absurd to the priority of seeing men and women come to saving faith in Christ and loving them enough to share the gospel. We are to be like Christ, we are to be about the business of the Heavenly Father. And in his first letter, Peter admonished believers in First Peter four, verse 7. That, quote, "The end of all things is at hand; therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer." And similarly, James wrote, in James five verse eight, "Be patient; strengthen your hearts for the coming of the Lord is at hand." In other words, it's the next major thing that's going to happen in God's timetable.

So dear Christian, be careful. Don't let the world squeeze you into its mold so that you begin to think and act like them and lose perspective of what's really important. Again, verse 11, "And this do, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed." In fact, it's now 2000 years nearer than when they believed right? And here's the urgency of it all, in verse 12, he goes on to say, "The night is almost gone, the day is at hand." Night speaks of the darkness of Satan's kingdom. Some men love the darkness rather than the light, because their deeds are evil. In this age of spiritual blindness and unbelief and rebellion against God the Most High, is almost gone. It carries the idea of it's nearly over, it's ready to draw to a close, the next thing will be the return of the King. And then he says, "and the day is at hand." That's a New Testament term used to describe the dawning, as it were, of Christ's glorious appearing. Obviously, it's used here, and serves as a stark contrast to the night of evil and deception and wickedness and rebellion.

So Paul exhorts us all to be motivated to love, to obedience, because it's urgent. "The night is almost gone, the day is at hand. Therefore," he says in verse 12, "let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light." The laying aside is used in other passages. It even carries the idea of changing your clothes. You might say here, folks, it's time to take off your pajamas and put on your armor. Because we're at war. That's the idea. Break away from your old way of living; all the worldliness; all the immaturity.

Verse 13, "Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing"--interesting term. It carries the idea of a binge party, an occasion for excessive eating or drinking with moral debauchery, normally ensuing. And he says, "drunkenness"--behave properly, not in drunkenness, "not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality." My that's a fascinating term in the original language. It means "shameless immorality." Don't we see that today? The way immorality is flaunted in our culture, there is no shame anymore. It carries the idea of indulgence and in sensual pleasure that is unrestrained by any kind of convention or morality. To put it real practically, it's the spring break mentality. It's the honky tonk mentality. It's the strip joint mentality. Break away from that, don't have any part of that. And then he says, as well, "not in strife or jealousy." Strife or just referring to bitter conflict--sometimes that can lead to violence. But instead, verse 14, "Put on," it literally carries the idea of clothing yourself, "put on the Lord Jesus Christ." The verb "put on" carries the idea of decisive action. It’s something you better see, you better commit yourself to, it's urgent--"put on the Lord Jesus Christ." It is a deliberate choice to let Jesus Christ be the armor that you wear. That's the idea; to be like Him, to live to the praise of his glory.

Then he says, "and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts." "Make no provision," the original language helps us understand that this is referring to this idea of not allowing anything to have any kind of evil to have a place in our thinking. We don't want to think about that, we don't want to see it, we don't want to act on it. Give it no opportunity--no opportunity for the flesh in regard to its lusts. Then in Ephesians four, verse 24, Paul says, the same thing, "put on the new self." What is the new self? The one that has been transformed, right? The one that has been clothed in the righteousness of Christ. This is, again, the glory of regeneration. Where there's a spiritual resurrection--we once were dead--he causes us to rise from spiritual death to spiritual life; we become a new creature in Christ, the old things pass away, the new things come. Our every desire, and the disposition of our mind and our heart, is now going in a radically different direction. Unless we allow ourselves, to once again, fall back into sin. Put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. May I challenge you, dear church family, make this your New Year's resolution. May we be a church that is known for our love. May we be a church that abhors what is evil, and clings to that which is good, that abstains from every form of evil. May we be a church that is fully awake to the reality that the night is almost gone and the day is at hand? Folks live in light of the return of our glorious Savior and King. These are dark days. Yes, absolutely. But my, they're exciting days, are they not? What a contrast God has given the world to see the light of Christ emanating from us, from our lives as our lives redound to the glory of God, and they see Christ in us. So let's be the light that we should be. And that it's manifested primarily in our love for Him and our love for one another. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. My, they speak so directly to each one of us. And rightfully so, because it is your spirit that has written them. And it is your spirit that illuminates our hearts, so that we cannot just understand them intellectually, but we can embrace them wholeheartedly, in the very core of our being and live them out with great joy. So we pray to that end that you will help us to do as you have asked us to do and that in so doing, we might enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ and that others will come to a place of genuine saving faith. We ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus and for his sake. Amen.

Thanks to each of you musicians that lead us so effectively and with such excellence, and humility, and love for Christ, we appreciate that very much. So, will you take your bibles and turn to Micah chapter five. We're going to look primarily at verse two, along with a number of other passages. Micah chapter five. For some of you, the pages in your Bible are still stuck together in that particular section. Amazing passage of scripture here that I would like to deal with under the heading "Bethlehem's King Prophesied."

Let me read the text. Micah five and verse two, "'But as for you, Bethlehem, Ephrathah, Too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you, One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel. His goings forth are from long ago, from the days of eternity.'" Clearly, God's redemptive purposes were ordained in eternity past, even as we have just read, and what a comfort that is to the redeemed, especially as we witnessed the catastrophic consequences of the wrath of divine abandonment upon our country, and we experience all manner of wickedness all around us. And how thankful we can be that according to Second Timothy, one, beginning in verse nine, God "has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity, but now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." And because of this magnificent reality, the Lord has given us a great commission. As you will recall, we read about this in Matthew 28, beginning in verse 19, we are to, "'Go therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.'" And this Christmas Eve, this morning, actually, which is the eve of Christmas, I hope to help you get lost once again in the wonder and the praise of who Christ is as we reflect upon his incarnation.

The Christmas story is filled with marvelous mysteries and captivating drama that animate the heart of every twice born saint to new levels of adoration and praise. And I wish to remind you this morning of some essential truths pertaining to Christ, that sometimes we forget, and certainly in our culture truths that are utterly eclipsed by all of the materialism and debauchery and everything else that this particular season now embraces. Because the more we know about Christ, frankly, the more we will love him. And the more we will long for his presence.

Now by way of introduction, in Luke two, we learned that the angel of the Lord appeared to a group of shepherds one night, as they were caring for their sheep on the hill surrounding Jerusalem, which would have been a grazing area for animals that were to be used for temple sacrifices. And they had no idea that the final sacrifice, the Lamb of God, was about to be born. Nor were they aware that they were the divinely chosen recipients of the angelic announcement that's recorded in Luke two beginning in verse 10. They, "said to them, 'Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.' And suddenly there appeared with the angel, a multitude of the heavenly hosts praising God and saying, 'Glory to God and the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom he is pleased.'" Wouldn't you have loved to have been there, to have seen that. Ah, we will see much greater things will we not?

Well, immediately they went straight to Bethlehem, the city of David, which was on the southern slope of Mount Zion just a few miles away. And then Luke tells us in verse 18, that "they made known the statement which had been told them about this child." And then in verse 19, and "Mary treasured all these things, pondering them in her heart." Imagine what would have gone through that young girl's mind. To think, "I have given birth to my Creator." The one who is utterly unapproachable, and holy, and transcendent, has taken on human flesh. And I now hold him in my arms. The one I caress; the one I nurse is the ruler of heaven and earth, the Messiah of Israel. The little hand that holds my finger is the omnipotent hand that will hold the royal scepter. How can this be? And it's astounding is it not, that the Christ child would be lying there in a feeding trough. There's the royal monarch in a place where animals would normally eat. He's not in a house or even a palace but in a stable. And then suddenly, the shepherds come. Don't you know they were sprinting as fast as they could go. They're wild eyed and out of breath, and they're trying to describe what they saw and what they have heard; trembling, shaking as they speak. And certainly Mary and Joseph had to have been speechless.

It's also interesting, as I think about it, prior to giving birth, Mary's comprehension of what was about to happen and the magnitude of her praise, really, as recorded in Luke one is a testimony of the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit, and her profound grasp of the Old Testament scriptures as a teenager. So Mary would have understood that what the shepherds told her was clearly a fulfillment of prophecy. One prophecy, in particular; the same prophecy later spoken to the terrified Herod who inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. Inquired of the, of the Magi--I should say, the chief priests and the scribes--and then later on the Magi come as we've just read. And you will remember that they told him where he was going to be born, and it was in Bethlehem. And they quoted Micah five two. "Herod, we can tell you it's recorded in Micah chapter five and verse two." Of course, it wasn't designated as such in that day. But I'm sure they read it to him. "But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel. His goings forth are from long ago from the days of eternity." What an amazing prophecy, one that was given roughly 700 years before Christ was born. Prophecy that no doubt Mary pondered in her heart.

And as we look at this text, I believe there are at least four spiritual truths that emerge from the prophecy; each one pointing to the glory we have Christ. And I'd like for us to just examine them briefly here this morning, as an act of worship. We're going to see first of all, the birthplace of the king. Then secondly, the rule of the King. Thirdly, the sending of the king and finally, the eternality of the king. Now, it's always important that we understand the context of a passage that we are examining. So let me help you remember this. The context of Micah's prophecy pertained to what was going on in Israel. In that day, the northern kingdom of Israel, was about to fall to Assyria when Micah began his ministry, which by the way, focus primarily on the southern kingdom of Judah where he was from. And unlike his contemporary, Isaiah, who addressed the court of Jerusalem, Micah, preached to the common folks like us, the Calvary Bible Church folks. And sadly, the reign of Ahaz had brought spiritual lethargy to the people and decay, hypocrisy, idolatry, and morality. All of those kinds of things. In fact, they violated the most basic tenets of the Mosaic Covenant. In chapter six, verse eight, he reminds them of what the Lord required of them, quote, "To do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God." But they weren't doing any of those things. It was all a show of religion. In that day, Judah was a very prosperous nation. Their culture was marked by affluence. They were militarily invincible, convinced that they were blessed by God, but their outward prosperity concealed their inward wickedness and rebellion against God. You may recall in Isaiah five there is a graphic picture of their corruption, which frankly, is a perfect portrayal of the United States of America. Judah was characterized by materialism and greed and drunkenness, and debauchery of all sorts. They redefined morality. They called evil good and good evil. They were haughty and defiant. Their leadership and their judicial system was corrupt. All of these things are in Isaiah five. And they fully embraced religious syncretism, where they would combine many different beliefs into one religion, like our modern ecumenism. And the Old Testament sacrificial system included the worship of some of the most vile forms of Canaanite fertility god-worship; worship of Baal and so forth. In fact, the land was filled with high places where those hideous practices would occur. So God commissioned his servant Isaiah, I mean Micah, to prophesy to them and Micah actually means "who is like the Lord." And his message was basically this folks-- Because God is infinitely holy and because of his covenantal relationship with Judah, he must judge you for your sin and your disobedience. But eventually, he will establish his kingdom and he will install his king who will reign in righteousness. And here we see a biblical theme that emerges all through Scripture, and that is salvation always comes through judgment.

And he gives a warning in chapter five and verse one, he says, "'Now muster yourselves in troops, daughter of troops; they have laid siege against us; with a rod they will smite the judge of Israel on the cheek.'" And although Assyria was the immediate threat, eventually, according to Second Kings, chapter 24, and 25, in 586 the Babylonians laid siege to Jerusalem. Burned it, plundered it, and they captured Zedekiah the King who did evil in the sight of the Lord, the text tells us and then in a hideous act of barbarism, they brought all of the sons of the King before Nebuchadnezzar and he then slaughtered all of Zedekiah sons before him and then put out the king's eyes, so that the massacre of his sons would be the last thing he ever saw. And then he shackled Zedekiah in bronze fetters and brought him to Babylon. So this was Micah's inspired prophecy of impending doom, because of their sin. But this horrific judgment was followed by a message of hope, a promise of salvation, a promise of future blessing. Because God is faithful to his covenant, because of God's unchanging covenant to their forefathers; and this hope is presented to us here in this text.

So first, I want you to notice what is said concerning number one, the birthplace of the king. And yes, Jesus is the King of kings, the Lord of lords. So when you see the baby in the manger, look beyond that and know who he really is. Again, verse two, "But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you, One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel." Now let's look at this closely. "Ephrathah" means fruitfulness or abundance. And Bethlehem was known for its vineyards, its olive groves. But it is also the ancient name for "house of bread." Used to distinguish it from other towns that had the same name, like Bethlehem of Zebulon, and so forth. And Bethlehem here refers to where David was born, as we read in First Samuel 17, in verse 12. And already, we begin to see the initial sketchings of what would later become a divine masterpiece, painted on the canvas of redemptive history; you begin to see what God is doing here. And we live in such a remarkable age, because now we can look back, and we can see these things and see what they were pointing to, and see very clearly what God is saying. And for this little seemingly insignificant place, "Too little to be among the clans of Judah", one would be born, who cares for seemingly insignificant people, like you, and like me, that those who abide in him might be productive and bear much fruit.

Now, why of all places would the incarnate king choose to be born in such an insignificant village just a few miles south of Jerusalem? I mean, if I was in charge, I'd want him being born in Rome, you know, or at least Jerusalem. But Bethlehem, really? Well, I think there's a couple of reasons. First of all, we must remember that Bethlehem was a royal city of ancient days. Since Jesus was born the King of Israel, it was only fitting that he be born in the city where Israel's Great King David would have been born. You see, over 1000 years before the Messiah was born, God made an unconditional covenant with David in Second Samuel seven, promising him that that he would raise up from his loins, a descendant, the coming Messiah, that would establish David's kingdom forever, an eternal kingdom, whereby the whole world would be blessed through the coming of seed of David. A promise that was so profound that David was left speechless, he was overwhelmed with awe.

But another reason why he would be born there in Bethlehem, is Bethlehem's history is a picture of its coming Messiah King. Let me explain this to you; Bethlehem has a double meaning. It can mean house or place of bread, and also house or place of fighting and war.

The Hebrew noun "lehem", we would spell it L E H E M, means food, bread or grain. But the verb "laham," L A H A M, means to eat or use as food. But what's interesting is the identical verb also means "to fight" or "to do battle." And this suggests that the ancient Hebrews linked the act of military conquest with that of eating. Because frankly, hunger was what drove most nations to fight against each other so they could survive. But bread in Scripture is the symbol of life. Like manna from heaven, God gave to his people in the wilderness.

And Jesus spoke of this, as you will recall, in John six beginning of verse 33. The "'bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven and gives life to the world.'" And then in verse 35, "'I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.'" Now, obviously, fighting and war produces death and sorrow; both of which characterized our Savior king; a man of sorrows acquainted with grief. In fact, conflict was his daily fare, along with all who follow Him. And when a man eats of the bread of life, he declares war on Satan, the god of this world, and we are at battle constantly. In fact, Jesus said in Matthew 10, beginning in verse 34, "'Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth; I did not come to bring peace but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter in law against her mother-in-law, and a man's enemies will be the members of his household.'" And I know a number of you experience that even more profoundly at Christmas. I often hear from people in the church saying, "Boy, I dread going to see my family. I love my family, but they hate Christ. And it's just a battle the whole time we're there." Well, to be sure, both life and death marked the past, as well as the future history of Bethlehem. You will recall in Genesis 35, God changed Jacob's name to Israel and said to him, "I am God Almighty, be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall come from you. The land which I gave to Abraham and Isaac, I will give it to you, and I will give the land to your descendants after you.'" And what's interesting is on the heels of that covenant, Jacob's beloved wife, Rachel, died in childbirth. And she was buried in Bethlehem, where he sat up a pillar over her grave. And as Rachel was about to die, she named her son Ben-oni, meaning son of my sorrow. But Jacob named him, Benjamin, which means son of my right hand. And Benjamin was one of Jacob's 12 sons, and eventually from Jacob's son, Judah, came King David. Ultimately, the greater King, the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ would come from him.

And what a marvelous picture of that greater Son that would be born to Mary in that same place. When you think of what happened with Rachel. Like Rachel, Mary could have called her son Ben-oni meaning "son of my sorrow." But God the Father would ascribe to him an even greater name of our honor, even greater than Benjamin, "son of my right hand." He would call him Jesus, which means "He saves" or "Yahweh is salvation." We know of this very clearly, do we not, in Acts four verse 12, where Peter says, "And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." So it was Bethlehem where Rachel agonized in the birth of Benjamin. And that was a place that became a symbol also of the painful waiting of the sons of Israel, for their Promised Messiah.

Furthermore, Rachel was the ancestress of the northern tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, through Joseph, and Benjamin in the south. And when the Babylonians later came to carry them off into exile, the Lord spoke through Jeremiah the prophet, and said in chapter 31, verse 15, "'A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.'" And what a sad harbinger of yet another atrocity that would take place in that same region, because it was Bethlehem, where the enraged Herod slaughtered all the male children as you read in Matthew two. And according to verse 17, "Then what had been spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: 'A voice was heard and Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children; and she refused to be comforted, because they were no more.'"

Now, when we move forward in the history of Bethlehem, we discover some more reasons for its royal greatness and symbolism. About 900 years after the death of Rachel, a Moabitess journeyed to Bethlehem, and her name was Ruth. There she became a servant. And a wealthy man named Boaz found her and took her unto himself as his wife. And Boaz, we know, was a type of Christ, the One who became Ruth's kinsman redeemer. And Ruth was included in the physical lineage of the coming Messiah as we read in Matthew chapter one, and verse five. And then Boaz, I always want to say Bozo, because as a little boy, I said that and I got in a great deal of trouble. I thought it was really funny. But it's funny when I preach, I still want to say Bozo, but it's Boaz, okay. Boaz and Ruth had a son named Obed, who became the father of Jesse, who lived in Bethlehem, who had a son named David. So it should be no surprise that the Son of David, the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, would be born in that same royal place, as Micah prophesied. And it should be no surprise, that in the providence of God, Caesar Augustus would demand a census to be taken, and that everyone be required to register in the city of their birth.

And it should be no surprise, therefore, that Mary and Joseph would embark upon about a 70 mile journey through treacherous terrain, with her in an advanced stage of pregnancy, to make their way to Bethlehem, their tribal home in Judea. And the Scripture doesn't say this, but I would be surprised if Mary and Joseph did not, quote, Micah's prophecy, with the cadence of the hooves of the little donkey that bore the virgin mother and her child. And surely she pondered this when the shepherds told her their announcement, "Today in the city of David, there has been born for you, a Savior, who is Christ the Lord." It's also fascinating, in Luke chapter two verses one through seven, the inspired author is very careful to precisely reveal the sequence of events that led Joseph and Mary from Nazareth to Galilee, to Bethlehem of Judea. So this is very, very important.

Now, why not just register in Nazareth? Right? I mean, God could have allowed that to happen. But as I thought about this, the answer would be number one, to demonstrate the sovereignty of Almighty God, who alone can orchestrate the events of history through the miracle of divine providence, to accomplish his purposes, and that's what we see here.

Why would Caesar Augustus decide to have a census at that particular time? Why would he quarrel with Herod at this time? Why would he choose to tax Judea and make it a province instead of making it a separate kingdom. When you think of all these things, you can just see the providential hand of God working to accomplish his purposes. So I think about this kings and rulers, and presidents and congressmen and women and senators and all of that. They may think that they devise their own plans, but ultimately, it is God who directs their heart; even to act wickedly, to accomplish his purposes.

So why not register in Nazareth? Well, not only to demonstrate the sovereignty of God, and his ability to providentially work all things to accomplish his purposes, but also, I believe, to confirm the inspired truth of Scripture. I mean, think about this. As Alva J. McLean said, quote, "Upon the fulfillment of the jots and tittles rests the veracity of God." It is true, right down to the jot and the tittle.

And I think, thirdly, to underscore the supreme importance of interpreting scripture, including the rest of Micah's prophecy concerning the Messianic Kingdom, literally. But as we consider the picture that is painted here, by the village of Bethlehem notice also the prophet speaks of her as being, quote too little to be among the clans of Judah. I mean, folks, this place was not even large enough to be one province, I mean, it was a place of absolute insignificance. I mean, this was the little David amongst the Giants, shall we say? Yet, notice it says, "From you, One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel." Is this not a picture of Christ's great love for us? And for the character of his subjects? Did not the king say that we must enter his kingdom as little children, right? No agenda, no haughty spirit. Just simple, helpless, dependent, faith believing. Did he not say in Matthew five and verse three, "'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.'" And in First Corinthians 1:26, the apostle Paul says, "Consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise." And he went on to say, "and the weak things of the world ashamed the things which are strong." And finally, the reason is that "no man should boast before God." I'm so thankful that Christ came unto those who are too little, in the eyes of the world to even be noticed; people like you and me. And to know that our names were written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world. We were betrothed to the bridegroom, to be his bridal church before time began. Our names are written on the very heart of God, the One who created us, the one who saved us. Christ Jesus, you might say, is the savior of the little ones like us.

So we've seen the birthplace of the king. Secondly, the sending of the King, Micah goes on to say, "One will go forth for Me." This is an amazing statement that the Father would send forth his Son. John five, in verse 36, Jesus said, "'The works which the Father has given Me to accomplish--the very works that I do--testify about Me, that the Father has sent Me.'"And in John seven, verse 28, and nine, "Jesus cried out of the temple, teaching and saying...'I have not come up Myself, but He who sent me is true, whom you do not know. I know Him because I am from Him, and He sent Me.'"

It's always an amazing thing that when we consider the triune Godhead in salvation, though the Father sent the Son, we know that the Son voluntarily did the will of the Father. He set aside his glory that he might purchase our redemption. And all of this was empowered and accomplished by the person and the work of the Holy Spirit. It was the Father's love, that would cause him to send his only begotten Son to be our Savior. But it was the sons love that he would suffer and die in our stead. But also it was the Spirit's love to cause the virgin to conceive of the Incarnate Son, that the Word might become flesh and dwell among us, that we might behold his glory.

It was the Spirit's work, to empower the Son of Man, and to sustain him, even in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the cross of Calvary. And then to inspire the written word that we might know saving truth. And it's also the Spirit's work even to this day, to convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment, and cause us to be born again. And then to seal us unto the day of redemption. So don't ever forget, though the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are one in essence, they are three distinct persons, each equally deserving honor and praise. But often we tend to ascribe most of the honor to the Son, rather than also the Father and the Spirit. But as we can see, each member of the Triune Godhead has played, and will continue to play, a significant role in our redemption. So the Father sends forth his son, is conceived by the Holy Spirit; and yet, it's the Son that descended to earth and takes on human flesh.

And this leads us now to the rule of the King; number three. Notice what the Prophet says, "From you, One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel." Now some will be quick to say, well, that rule was quite a failure. I mean, after all, he came into his own, his own didn't want anything to do with him. Right? They crucified their king. Jesus came preaching the kingdom to the Jew, first, to the lost sheep of Israel, as the text tell us; to the chosen people of the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants. And they said, "We will not have this man to reign over us," right? The people asked, "Is this the son of David?" Matthew 12:23. But the Pharisees insisted that his miraculous works were not a testimony of the Holy Spirit working, but attributed those works to the power of Satan; unimaginable. Self-imposed blindness; blasphemy, which sealed their fate. Only judgment remained. Indeed, Israel rejected their king, they crucified the Son of Man, but this was precisely according to God's plan.

You remember what Peter said, and Acts two, "Men of Israel," beginning of verse 22, "Listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know-- this Man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men, and put Him to death." You see, what escapes the notice of the critic is that the promised King was also the promised Lamb, the final and the perfect sacrifice that came to make atonement for sin that we might be saved. And from the beginning of His earthly ministry, the Savior King preached, as we read in Matthew 4:17, "'Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.'" And did not Pilate say to him, in John 18 and verse 37, so "'Are you a king?'" Jesus answered, "'You say correctly that I am a king. For this, I have been born. For this, I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth.'" But also did not John the Baptist say in John 1:29, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."

And we know in the book of Revelation, that it is the Lamb that is worthy to open the seals of judgment that are recorded there in Revelation. We know that the wicked will make war on the Lamb and he will overcome. We know that the glorious light of the Lamb will illumine the New Jerusalem. So the long awaited Messiah that came to earth must wait a future fulfillment, when the king will return in all of his glory. And during the interregnum, this interval between the King's first and second coming, the kingdom has taken on a form that's called the "mysteries of the kingdom of heaven" as we read in Matthew 13:11, referring to the truths not disclosed in the Old Testament related to the gospel and to the church. But make no mistake dear friends, the King is coming again and he will be King over Israel as he has promised. Paul spoke of this in Romans 11, beginning of verse 26. The Christ will be king of Israel when quote, "all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.' From the standpoint of the gospel, they are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God's choice they are beloved for the sake of the ; the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable."

So the inspired Prophet reveals not only the birthplace and the sending and the rule of the King, but finally the eternality of the king. He says, "'His goings forth are from long ago, from the days of eternity.'" This phrase reveals the existence of the Messiah from eternity past to eternity future; from before time began through the coming millennial kingdom on earth and throughout the eternal state. "His goings forth" he says, "are from long ago." And certainly Scripture gives testimony to this truth. The incarnate Christ appeared in the Old Testament as the angel of the Lord on several different occasions. You will recall that in Genesis 16, he appeared to Hagar near a spring in the desert and commanded her to return to Sarah. In Genesis 18, he appeared to Abraham, where he promised his elderly wife, Sarah, a son, and that out of Abraham, a great and powerful nation would arise, and all the nations on earth would be blessed through him. We also read in Genesis 31, he came to Jacob in a dream, and in chapter 32, 97 year old Jacob wrestled with him all night, after which the Lord blessed him and changed his name to Israel. And in Exodus three he appeared to Moses in the burning bush; in Joshua five he appeared to Joshua near Jericho, with a sword drawn in his hand and he appeared to Gideon, in Judges six, when he said, quote, "'The Lord is with you mighty warrior go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian's hand, am I not sending you?'" We know as well in Daniel three he appeared in the furnace of fire with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. And dear friends, he will appear yet again when he returns in the blazing glory of his holiness and the fiery wrath of his indignation when he comes to judge the nations of the world and establish himself as King of kings and Lord of lords. We read a verse in Revelation 19, verse 15, "And from His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it, He may smite the nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wind press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh, he has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.'"

Now all of that, to say that, as the prophet describes so clearly, yes, indeed, "His goings forth are from long ago, from the days of eternity." It is absolutely incomprehensible to think that the Savior King has not only existed as the second member of the Triune Godhead from all eternity, but again that he set his love upon us. That is the wonder of it all. Second, Timothy one verse nine that I mentioned earlier, we read that, "His own purpose and grace was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity, but now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus." And Paul said in Titus chapter one, verses one and two that we were, quote, "chosen of God." He goes on to say that we have, quote, "the hope of eternal life, which God who cannot lie, promised, long ages ago." "Pro cronon" in Greek; before time; before time began, can you imagine that? I can't. What was it like before there was time, right? There was no time. There was no space. We read in Scripture that God created both time and space. And so we were chosen before time began. This is the eternality of the king. God set his love upon us, Scripture tells us before the foundations of the earth and under his sovereign control he orchestrated all of the events in my life and in your life, if you know Christ, to bring you to a place where you finally saw who you really were, and you were convicted of your sin, and you set aside all of the arrogance and all of the excuses and all of the ridiculous self-righteous stuff that you came up with to somehow justify yourself before a holy God. And he broke your heart over your sin, and you cried out to him as the only hope of salvation and he saved you by his grace. And all of that was set into motion and ordained before time began. Isn't it interesting that he has ordained the length of our life? We read that in Psalm 139, "In thy book, they were all written the days which were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them." In fact, Psalm 139 tells us that he was sovereignly in control, certainly, when we were conceived in our mother's womb. He superintended our development and our birth. The psalmist says "Thou just form my inward parts; Thou didst weave me in my mother's womb. Thine eyes have seen my unformed substance." Absolutely astounding. To know that before you were even born, he knew the color of your eyes, the color of your hair, the color of your skin. He knew the shape of your nails, your heights, the shape of your face, what your smile would look lik, the sound of your voice, the sound of your laughter. You know, not only knew all those things, he created all those things. He even knew that you would rebel against him and violate his law, that you would reject him and ignore him; that you would actually be his enemy, unable to save yourself from his justice, and his wrath. And yet, knowing all of this, he continues on with his plan of redemption, that cannot be thwarted; that was set into motion and ordained in eternity past.

And through his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, the god baby comes into the manger. And as Paul says, in Romans five, eight, "God demonstrates His own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." And this is precisely what Micah goes on to prophesy in verse four. "And He will arise and shepherd His flock and the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God. And they will remain, because at that time, He will be great to the ends of the earth. This One will be our peace."

Well, dear friends on this Christmas Eve, I pray that you will ponder these things even as Mary did, as Joseph did, and as the redeemed have done throughout redemptive history, that you will make it a priority to ponder these truths in your heart. And that you will also proclaim these truths in every opportunity that you have, especially through all of the social media, stuff that we have available to us today. Unleash the gospel and watch what God can do. And then finally, won't you pray, "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

Let's pray together, Father, that is the cry of our heart. Thank you for the magnificent truths pertaining to our Savior and our King. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

Will you take your bibles and turn to Matthew's gospel; Matthew chapter one; we're going to look at verses 18 through 25, under the heading "Christ our Sovereign King." And I might say ahead of time that I'm not going to get real deep into every single phrase here, but use this as kind of a general launching pad into understanding more of who Christ is and exalting him. Let me read the passage, Matthew chapter one; familiar passage beginning in verse 18. "Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother, Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. And Joseph, her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly. But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, 'Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save his people from their sins.' Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: 'BEHOLD, THE VIRGIN SHALLBE WITH CHILD AND SHALL BEAR A SON, AND THEY SHALL CALL HIS NAME IMMANUEL,' which translated means 'GOD WITH US.' And Joseph awoke from asleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin, until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus."

What a wonderful privilege we have, as twice born saints, to contemplate the glories of Christ, to reflect upon the one who is our Creator, the one who is our Savior and King; especially in these difficult days. We all are aware of how God has essentially lifted his restraining grace on our country and we're watching the effects of wickedness all around us. Our country is drowning in depravity. People are trying to satisfy every perverted lust that they have. And God is allowing them to experience the tragic consequences of their wickedness. And that sin splatters on all of us; we all have to deal with it at some level. Moreover, each of us have our own troubles. We all falter under the weight of disappointment, distress, depression at time, dangers, disease, and even death. Most of you, even this morning, are carrying heavy burdens as you come here. It's part of life in a fallen world, right? Sometimes it's worse than others. Some of you are laboring under poverty. Others are dealing with pain--physical pain, sickness, wayward children, broken marriages, and on and on it goes. And we know that Satan has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they are unable to see the light of the glory of Christ. And we know that people without Christ love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil. Proverbs four and verse 19, says, "The way of the wicked is like darkness; they do not know over what they stumble." But thankfully, there is light in Christ, amen? There is light in Christ. In fact, Jesus said in John 8:12, "'I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness but will have the Light of life.'" And in Acts 26, verse 18. At his conversion, Jesus told Paul that he was going to send him to the Gentiles, quote, "'To open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me.'" And friends, we know that this light was prophesied some roughly 700 years earlier. In Isaiah chapter nine and verse two we read this, "The people who walk in darkness will see a great light; Those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them." And it is my purpose this morning to help you behold the glorious light of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we do this by contemplating the infinite perfections of his person and his work as we see the one who is full of grace and truth through the eyes of faith.

And the reason this is so important is not only because it's an act of worship, and worship is pleasing to Him, but also it is a soothing balm to aching souls. And I want to impress that upon you this morning. This was Jesus’ earnest prayer on behalf of his disciples on the eve of his crucifixion. You will remember in John 17, verse 24, he said, "'Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am'"-- and here's why--"'so that they may see My glory which You have given Me.'" And that should be our prayer. That we would see his glory. That was Jesus’ Prayer, it should be ours as well. Beloved, the apprehension of the glory of Christ should be the very air that we breathe as believers. We are forever united to the one who has created us, who has saved us by his grace. One day, and perhaps very soon, we will see him face to face. And what on earth could be more worthy of our affections than this? Especially during the Christmas season, right? What better way to prepare ourselves for the inevitable trials of life, and our own inevitable departure from this earth? What better way of finding refuge from our trials than contemplating the glory of the One in whom we are forever hidden?

You know, the inspired Apostle Paul understood this and he practiced this in Second Corinthians four. Beginning in verse eight, we read, "we are afflicted in every way." But he went on to say later, "we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison." Then he says this, "While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." And, folks, my goal this morning, is to help you turn your eyes away from the temporal and to gaze into the eternal and see the glory of our Savior. And when we do this, you will find that by the power of the Spirit, you will be able to transcend the inevitable difficulties of life. Beholding the glory of Christ will always be the daily habit, frankly, of the mature saint who longs to know more of the one in whose image they are gradually being conformed. And in whose presence they will one day spend eternity.

The apostle Paul spoke of this in Colossians, three, remember in verse one, he says, "Therefore if," or it could be translated, "since"-- "you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things," what? "Above"--not below--"keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not all the things that are on earth." And here's why, "For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God."

The Psalmist understood this and spoke of this in Psalm 16, beginning in verse eight, "I have set the Lord continually before me; Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will dwell securely. For You will not abandon my soul to Sheol; Nor will You allow Your Holy One to undergo decay. You will make known to me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; in Your right hand there are pleasures forever." And dear friends, what better way of experiencing God's love for us than to meditate upon the glory of Christ? This is, according to Romans five, five the "hope that does not disappoint," right? The hope that does not disappoint. And here's why. "Because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us." And what does the Holy Spirit use in this mystical way to communicate and help us understand and experience the love of Christ? He uses his word and he uses his people. And no wonder the Apostle Paul would testify in Philippians, three, eight, "I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ."

So, let's exalt the one who has purchased our redemption. There are four amazing themes that I believe emerge from this passage of scripture that I think can fan the embers, hopefully the flames of our worship of Our Lord. We're going to see four things, first of all, his royal lineage. Secondly, his physical lineage. Thirdly, his virgin birth, and finally, his eternal sonship. And mind you, these are just a few aspects of who he is.

Now, here in Matthew 1:18, through 25, we have a detailed announcement of the birth of Jesus Christ that emphasizes that Mary had been betrothed to Joseph yet she was pregnant. Not because of some immoral union with Joseph, but because of the Holy Spirit. Also, we see that Joseph is called, quote, "The Son of David." Very important. And the son's name has to be called Jesus, "for he will save his people from their sins." But also we see that this Jesus was to be the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy of a virgin birth of a son, whose name shall be called "Immanuel," God with us, referring to Isaiah seven in verse 14. And this detailed information was extremely important to the Jewish people that day because they would have to verify his claim to be the Son of David, the Messiah King. Later on in Matthew 22, Jesus will ask the Pharisees, the leaders of Israel, in verse 42, "'What do you think about the Christ, whose son is He?'" In other words, he's saying what is his genealogical record? What is his ancestry? From what Jewish line has he descended? And, "They said to Him, 'The son of David,'" which was the most common messianic title used in that day. Now, Jesus knew that they knew, and the Jews kept meticulous, genealogical records. He wasn't trying to find out, hey, do you guys realize...he already knew that? Because he knew that no one could possibly hold a position of authority or responsibility without verification of their genealogy. And so he wanted to press that upon their minds that yes, they knew his genealogy. Jesus then went on in that passage to demonstrate that not only must Christ be the physical descendant of David, but also as the Messiah, he would have to be the, quote, "Son of God," which they could not understand. And they could not believe--actually, they would not believe it.

Jesus was therefore not only underscoring his royal lineage but also asserting his deity. This was so disconcerting to the Pharisees that in verse 46, we read, "No one was able to answer Him a word, nor did anyone dare from that day on to ask Him another question." Now, here's what's fascinating. Notice what precedes Matthew's account of the birth of Christ in verses 18 and following. That, of course, is the genealogy of Christ.

And so we come to my first point here, we're going to see his royal lineage. Verse one of chapter one simply says, "the record of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of David, the son of Abraham," and then it continues on in great detail. Now, it's amazing, because here we learned that Jesus was by birth, the one that was promised to Abraham in Genesis 12, verses one through three--the covenant that was made over 2000 years before Jesus was even born. And he is also therefore, a descendant of King David, therefore, the son of David, the Messiah King, who would fulfill the covenant promises that were given to David in Second Samuel seven; the promises of a future son that would establish David's kingdom forever and so forth. And we'll not take time to go through this record in detail, but I want you to understand that this was never disputed by the meticulous Jewish leaders, never disputed. It's intriguing that Matthew's genealogy moves forward from Abraham to Joseph, who was Jesus legal, not physical, but legal father. This was crucial, because the royal line must be passed through the legal father, the Jews would have understood this, they would have looked for this. And since Jesus had no human father, his royal lineage had to come from a father that the Jews would consider to be his legal father. One that could adopt him and grant him all the rights and privileges of sonship. And of course, Joseph was, you might say, his foster father. This was never in dispute. In fact, in Luke four and verse 22, Jesus's teaching in the synagogue in Nazareth, and the people were speaking well of him, and they were saying quote, "'Is this not Joseph's son?'" Now, there may well have been a second reason of Matthew's record done to underscore the claim of the virgin birth, it may have been an attempt to distinguish this virgin birth from other virgin birth myths that were floating around in that time of history. The ancient Babylonians had their versions, the Sumerians, the Acadians, even the Buddhists and the Hindus. The Greeks, for example, believed that Zeus empowered a snake to impregnate the Virgin goddess Olympias, who bore a son whose name was Alexander the Great. So you have all of this ridiculous stuff floating around. Furthermore, Matthew's account, along with Luke's later on, would also serve to refute some of the wild claims that Jesus was the son of a Roman soldier, or others were saying that Joseph merely defiled Mary out of wedlock.

Now, allow me a digression here. I believe it's worthwhile as we look briefly at this royal lineage. There is a fascinating footnote deserving our attention in verse 11. It says, "Josiah became the father of Jeconiah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon. After the deportation to Babylon; Jeconiah became the father of Shealtiel", and so on. Now, what is fascinating, if you look in Jeremiah 22 and verse 30--you don't have to do that, I'll tell you what's there--God pronounced a curse on Jeconiah, who is also called Jehoiachin or Coniah; he ruled only three months before he was taken into captivity, but the curse said that he would never have a son that would sit on the throne of David. So obviously, this would eliminate Jesus. If he had been in Joseph's bloodline, but God remedied all of that, because Jesus' bloodline to the throne of David came through Mary from Nathan, Solomon's brother, not Solomon. Jeconiah's line. Now, don't you know that the Jews would have spotted this if it had not been true and use it to their advantage. In fact, if there was one single cell of blood from that line, he would have been disqualified, and they would have pointed it out. He could not be in the line, descending from David through Jeconiah. So God bypassed that curse, through the virgin birth, yet at the same time, giving Jesus the royal right to reign as the legal heir of the father, as well as the blood heir of his mother who descended from David through Nathan. Notice in verse 16, "Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, by whom Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah." "By whom," you don't see this in English, but in Greek, this is in the feminine, not the masculine gender, which clearly indicates that Jesus was not born by Joseph, but by Mary. Once again, we witnessed the miracle of the inspiration of Scripture, where the Holy Spirit superintended human authors to precisely record the stunning miracle of divine providence. So Matthew establishes these crucial truths from the very outset of the gospel. But Jesus had to be more than the legal heir of the throne of David; he had to be more than a royal king, he also had to be fully God; to be the perfect and holy sacrifice. That would be the propitiation for our sins; a sacrifice of infinite value necessary to atone for sin. Moreover, he also had to be fully human, in order to die in our stead, and take him upon himself the penalty of our sin, as our substitute, in order to conquer death through the resurrection, and thus guarantee the resurrection of all who trust in Him.

So Jesus had to also be the physical descendant of David--human blood, the human blood of Abraham, and David had to flow through his veins. Their very DNA had to make up his physical body. And it's interesting to demonstrate this, the Holy Spirit did two things. First, he follows the genealogical record with a detailed account of his divine conception in his virgin mother, Mary, in verses 18 through 25. But then, secondly, he carefully details a second genealogy, inspired by another author, Luke, we read about this in Luke three.

And we'll look at this briefly under a second heading. We've seen his royal lineage and now we're going to look at his physical lineage. And if we were to take time, we go to Luke three and look closely at verses 23 through 38. And this is actually Mary's genealogy. So unlike Matthew's genealogy that starts with Abraham, and moves forward in time to Joseph making it, shall we say Joseph's genealogy. Luke's genealogy begins with Jesus and moves backwards in time, all the way to Adam, making this Mary's genealogy, and this demonstrates Jesus's actual bloodline. So Matthew traces Jesus' ancestry beginning with Abraham, whereas Luke stresses his identification, shall we say, with the entire human race. Jesus is a son of Adam. However, unlike the disobedient Adam, Jesus is the obedient second, Adam. While at the same time, he is indeed the true son of God. Now bear in mind, Joseph and Mary's claim that they had remained sexually pure, even though she's pregnant--that they remain sexually pure in this period of betrothal and that the child that she bore was conceived by the Holy Spirit, that He is going to be the Messiah and so forth--that was a story that certainly the people would have found laughably absurd. Ridiculous. Imagine Mary trying to explain what the angel said to her right? Just imagine, yeah, the angel met with me, Luke 1:32. And here's what he said, "He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end." Yeah, right. And as soon as the leaders would hear this, they would instantly go to the genealogical records to refute this, to refute that. There was absolutely no possibility that these two young people; these nobodies, these teenagers, were speaking the truth. But instead, what's fascinating is that genealogical records corroborate their story. Matthew immediately establishes Jesus ancestry connecting it with the Old Testament and with Israel, but Luke waits until Jesus is into his ministry. Jesus would have been somewhere in his 30s when his claims to be the Son of God would have absolutely shaken the Jews to the core and infuriated them.

And Luke also makes it clear in chapter one that indeed this was a virgin birth. Notice, verse 34, "Mary said to the angel, 'How can this be since I am a virgin?'" verse 35, "The angel answered and said to her, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason, the holy Child will be called the Son of God.'" And when we see this emphasis, even in the genealogical record, we are amazed at all of it. Notice in chapter three and verse 23, "When He began His ministry, Jesus Himself was about 30 years of age, being, as was supposed, the son of Joseph." "As was supposed," or "so it was thought." And see what Luke is going to make clear is that Joseph was not Jesus' father. What a marvelous thing God did in these accounts, not only to prove Jesus royal lineage, but also vindicate and protect young Mary and Joseph from certain scorn.

Now, after considering the marvels of both his royal and physical lineage, let's reflect for a moment upon his virgin birth. Number three, in our little outline back to Matthew chapter one and verse 18. And again, my purpose here is not to carefully exposit every word of the text, but rather to focus just primarily, here at least, on the virgin birth. There we read in verse 18, "Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit." Now, it's important for us to understand a bit of the culture of that day. A Hebrew marriage was arranged by contract between the families of the bride and the groom. And this contract was sealed by a dowry, a "mohar," paid by the groom's family, to the father of the bride. And this was to pay for the wedding expenses. The weddings were typically quite expensive. They typically lasted seven days,; we get off easy in our day, right? The bride's father would also hold a portion of the dowry and trust for his daughter as a life insurance policy for her if the husband were to die, and if he divorced her, the husband would never see any of the money until his father-in-law died. And then there would be an inheritance.

And a Jewish wedding custom typically included two very sacred stages. First, you have the "kiddushin" which was the betrothal period, the engagement period, and that included a contract and it was considered legally binding. They were even considered legally married, even though the actual wedding had not taken place. And the betrothal period typically would last about 12 months. And then that was done primarily to prove that the bride was not pregnant, and that the couple were dedicated to sexual purity.

And then the second stage beyond the kiddushin was the "huppah," the marriage ceremony. And obviously Mary's pregnancy required a great deal of explanation. In verse 18. We read "before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit." And so knowing he was not the father, Joseph's reaction was to be expected. Right? Verse 19, "Joseph, her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, desired to put her away secretly." And he could have demanded her public humiliation. In fact, he could have even demanded a stoning, based on Deuteronomy 22. But because of his godly compassion, and his undying love for Mary, he chose instead to pursue just a private divorce. But notice what happened in verse 20. "But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, 'Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for that which has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.'" Now Joseph knew that what Mary had told him about the angelic announcement was, in fact, true. But don't you know, that would have been hard to deal with as a young man.

The angel went on in verse 21, "'She will bear a Son ; and you shall call His name Jesus, for it is He who will save His people from their sins.'" Then again in verse 22, and following, "Now, all this took place that what was spoken by the Lord, through the prophet," referring to Isaiah seven and verse 14, "might be fulfilled saying, 'BEHOLD, THE VIRGIN SHALL BE WITH CHILD AND SHALL BEAR A SON, AND THEY SHALL CALL HIS NAME IMMANUEL,' which means 'God with us.'" Verse 24, "And Joseph arose from asleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him and took her as his wife and kept her a virgin, until she gave birth to a son and called his name Jesus."

Beloved, please understand, without a virgin birth, there would be no incarnation. You see, had Jesus been some illegitimate son, his claim to deity would be demonstrably false. Think about this, the work of redemption demanded a theater upon a god man. It required one who could supernaturally fuse the human nature with the divine and to some indissoluble bond. That's what we have in the incarnation of Christ. A man had to suffer punishment only God could endure, thus requiring birth. And as we think about it, a man had to be our substitute, to bear our punishment for all who would believe; yet only God could fully bear the entire wrath of God. A sinless man had to die, yet only God is holy, right? Human flesh had to go to the grave, yet only God could overcome the grave.

And think about this, how could Christ be our faithful high priest that could sympathize with all of our infirmities unless he were both human and divine. Neither man alone, nor God alone could accomplish these things. Both the human and the divine natures had to be supernaturally fused together. And that's what we see even in these genealogical records, an inscrutable mystery beyond our finding out. It's staggering to think about the two natures of Christ. I've reflected upon this on many occasions, and by the way, this is part of what it means to contemplate the glories of Christ. I mean, think about this, even as a fetus, growing within Mary's womb, he was, according to Hebrews one three" upholding all things by the Word of His power." He required milk from his mother's breast. Yet according to Colossians, 1:17, "In him all things hold together." In his humaneness, he would grow hungry. We would read how he would grow thirsty, weak and tired, yet in his divinity, he could multiply the bread and the fish in the water and the wine. And while on the boat with his disciples, remember how he slept in utter exhaustion, only to rise as the omnipotent ruler of the universe and calm the sea and the storm with a word.

Furthermore, his human nature, we know has now ascended into heaven, yet because of His divine nature, he continues to be omnipresent. Promising, according to Matthew 28 and verse 20, "'I am with you always, even to the end of the age.'" We know as well that in his humaneness, according to Hebrews four, verse 15, "he was tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin;" meaning he could not sin. In fact, in his divinity, he was not even tempted internally. Because as we read in James 1:13, God cannot be tempted with evil. Jesus had no sin nature; therefore, he could have never sinned. We read, for example, in Hebrews seven, verse 26, that he was, quote, "wholly innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners.": First Peter 119, he was "a lamb unblemished and spotless." Second Corinthians 5:21, "He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

So indeed, in the incarnation, we see this virgin birth, allowing this fusion of the human and the divine. And I might add that this was also prophesied in the "protoevangelium" or the first evangelistic message, that we read in Genesis three and verse 15. You will remember that passage; after cursing the physical serpent, God turned to Satan, the spiritual serpent that had seduced Adam and Eve in the garden and promised that there would be a perpetual battle that would occur from that day on, and here's why. He says, because you're seed--referring to Satan's offspring; unbelievers--and her seed; her descendent Christ and all who belong to him, would be at war. The term "seed" can be understood in a collective sense, referring to all who would make up the progeny of Satan and Eve. But he can also be understood as a singular, final and glorious product of a woman; one born without the seed of a male, but from the woman and the Holy Spirit. And Paul attests to this, for example, in Galatians, chapter four and verse four, we read "But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman." No mention of man, confirming Jesus virgin birth once again, as well as his humanity.

So we've reflected a little bit on his royal and physical lineage, his virgin birth, and now finally, think about his eternal sonship for a moment. Notice in Matthew one, verse 23, "BEHOLD, THE VIRGIN SHALL BE WITH CHILD AND SHALL BEAR A SON, AND THEY SHALL CALL HIS NAME IMMANUEL,' which translated means 'God with us.'" And the angel reveals more about the Son when he appeared to Mary in Luke 1:32, "he will be called the Son of the Most High."

So not only was Jesus Christ, the Messiah, king of Israel, fully God, yet fully man born of a virgin, but also, and this is so incredible, he was the eternal Son of God before he was conceived and born. He did not become the son of God at his incarnation. Scripture teaches that a father/son relationship pre-existed in eternity past. That relationship between the Father and Christ the Son. Again, Galatians, four, four, "But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman." Romans one verse three, God promised his son who "was born of a descendant of David, according to the flesh." Now, some will argue that Jesus assumed the role of a son at his incarnation, a subordinate role that he did not have prior to the incarnation. And often they will use Hebrews chapter one and verse five, which is a quotation from Psalm two seven, as a proof text. And there we read, "'You are My Son, today I have begotten you, I will be a Father to Him and He shall be a Son to Me.?'" Now, since "begetting" normally speaks of a person's origin, and since sons are typically subordinate to their fathers, that would seem to support this view. And indeed Christ, though he was equal to God, voluntarily submitted to the Father, to do the Father's will. He willingly set aside his divine attributes in his incarnation. We read about this in Philippians, two and John 5:19. But we must understand that the context of Psalm two, that we read here in Hebrews, one must be understood figuratively, not literally, "This day have I begotten thee," is a reference to the eternal decree of God, not a specific event, and a point in time.

Let me explain this a little bit more. Since the term "begotten" can speak of the origin of one's offspring, it's natural to assume that the begetting of a son speaks of his conception. In other words, a point in time when a child comes into existence. And many apply this understanding to the conception of Christ. But there are big problems with this view. Number one, it was the Holy Spirit, not the father, who conceived the incarnate Christ. And this alone eliminates the idea of the Father begetting, or shall we say, originating the Son, in Psalm two and, and John 1:14. This obviously must refer to something other than conception.

But secondly, in John 1, verses one through three, it makes it very clear that Christ is not a created being. He is a pre-existent, self-existent, one. There we read that he was in the beginning with God. So what does this beginning refer to? If it's not to origin, I mean, other passages speak of Christ as the only begotten of the Father, John 1:14, verse 18; John 3:16, verse 18; Hebrews 11, verse 17. You see, the term "only begotten" in the original language, can mean something far more than merely the origin of one's offspring, it literally can mean "one of a kind," one of a kind. We see this in the created order. Every creature begets its own unique offspring, doesn't it? After its own kind, right? Genesis one. Every offspring bears the exact likeness of its parent. And when applied to Christ, this would emphasize his utter uniqueness and the likeness to his father. We see this explained, for example, in Hebrews chapter one and verse three, "He is the radiance of His glory, and the exact representation of His nature." So when the Holy Spirit uses the term "begotten," he's not speaking of origin. But rather, dear friends, he's speaking of the absolute uniqueness and oneness of essence between the Father and the Son. All of which is consistent with the essential oneness found in the Triune Godhead. Moreover, scripture's primary use of the title, "Son of God" reveals that it speaks of his essential deity and absolute equality with God, not his voluntary subordination or submission to the Father. And this was precisely the issue in John five, that infuriated the Jewish leaders when they charged Jesus with blasphemy. According to verse 18, we read, because He not only had broken the Sabbath," but also said that God was his Father, making himself what? Equal with God. So again, the title "Son of God" speaks of his deity and equality with God, not his submission to the Father.

So when we consider Christ as the Son of God, the only begotten of the Father, don't be confused by thinking in terms of procreation. But rather understand these concepts as conveying the transcendent truths pertaining to the essential oneness shared by the members of the Triune Godhead, and the utter uniqueness of Christ in his perfect likeness and essence to the Father, and the Spirit. They are co equal and con-substantial. They are all one of the same essence. And what an unfathomable concept this is. And here again, we gaze beyond the temporal into the eternal as we contemplate the glory of Christ. In his incarnation, he remained the eternal Son of God; he remained fully divine, yet he became what he previously had not been--fully human. Gregory of Nazianzus, the fourth century Archbishop of Gaston and Opal, and theologian said this quote, "He remained what He was; What he was not, He assumed."

In fact, Jesus did not give up his human nature, even after his death and resurrection. I want you to catch this now, he did not temporarily become a man, but rather in his divine nature was permanently joined to his human nature. When we see Christ, we will see one in whose image we reflect; he will look human, he will not be some something that you can't imagine. I guess that will be true at some level, but you understand what I'm saying, I think. He appeared to his disciples, as a man after his resurrection, did he not? They saw the scars of nail prints in his hands, he had flesh and bone. He ate food, he was taken up into heaven while talking with his disciples, and the angel promise in Acts 1:11, "This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven." And I think about Stephen, when he gazed into heaven as he was being stoned, and he saw Jesus. According to Acts 7:56, he saw Jesus as, quote, "The Son of Man standing at the right hand of God." And in John's vision, in the book of Revelation, he sees Jesus in his resplendent glory, and yet he describes him as quote, "One like a Son of Man," Revelation 1:13. As Paul said, in Philippians, two, beginning in verse eight, He is the one who "humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, so that the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

Dear friends, I pray that it will become more and more of your habit, to contemplate the infinite perfections of the glory of Christ. And through the eyes of faith, you will see not so much all of his glory, because that is beyond anything that we can really imagine, but what you will see is what's recorded in Scripture, you will see the one who is full of grace and truth. And when you apply that to your life, you will be so overwhelmed that you will transcend the temporal and begin to exist more in the eternal.

As the old hymn says, "Turn your eyes upon Jesus, Look full in His wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory, and grace." So this Christmas season, let's take extra time to ponder the glory of Christ and may our hearts resonate with the humaneness, who captured this essence of the angelic praise. When he wrote "Christ by highest heaven adored, Christ, the Everlasting Lord, late in time behold Him come, offspring of the virgin's womb. Veiled in flesh the Godhead see, hail the incarnate deity; pleased as man with me to dwell, Jesus, our Immanuel. Hark, the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn king." Let's pray together.

Father, we thank you that You have given us the eyes of faith to look beyond this world in which we live and to see the glory of Christ first. And I pray that for each one of us that know and love Christ, that we will make it indeed, our habit more and more. To pensively reflect on all that he is. The one who is full of grace and truth. And Lord as we do this, we know that by the power of your Spirit, we will experience more fully all that we have in Christ, even though the fullness of it all awaits glory. But until that time, may this be the priority of our heart as believers. So we commit to you and we thank you for all that you have done for us , for it's in Christ's name and for his glory that I pray. Amen.

We return once again to Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn there, Mark chapter 11. We're going to be examining verses 22 through 25, under the heading, "Essentials of Effectual Prayer." The great 19th century Scottish preacher, Robert Murray M'Cheyne, once said, "What a man is on his knees before God, that He is and nothing more." How do you see yourself as a Christian? What measure do you use to accurately assess who you really are? Does your self-evaluation match God's evaluation of you? Dear Christian, the most accurate measure of our true character is our secret devotion to God in prayer. What we are on our knees before God, that we are and nothing more. Christ was in constant prayer. Don't you think we should be as well? After healing many people with various diseases and casting out many demons, we read in Mark one verse 35, "In the early morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went away to a secluded place and was praying there." Matthew tells us in chapter 14, verse 21, and following, that Jesus after feeding "5000 men who ate besides women and children...Immediately He made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to the other side while He sent the crowds away. After He had sent the crowds away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. And when it was evening, He was there alone." And in Matthew 26, beginning of verse 36, we read, "Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and He said to his disciples, 'Sit here while I go over there and pray.' And he took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved, and distressed. Then He said to them, 'My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with Me.' And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face, and prayed, saying, 'My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet, not as I will, but as You will.'" Jesus said in Matthew six, verse six, "'when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father, who is in secret. And your Father who sees what is done and secret will reward you.'" And Paul said in First Thessalonians five and verse 17, that we should "pray without ceasing." We need to just be in a constant state of communion with our Lord.

Our passage here in Mark 11 is very instructive regarding the essentials of effectual prayer. There will basically be three that we will look at. Let me remind you of the context; Jesus has entered into Jerusalem and been he's been hailed as the Messiah, they're long-awaited deliverer. Then the next day as Jesus and his disciples return to Jerusalem, he cursed and unproductive fig tree which was a powerful parable, portraying the pretense of spirituality that was indicative of the people and to give a preview of the coming destruction upon the temple. And there Jesus symbolically denounced the nation Israel for their unbelief. Next, Jesus cleansed the temple; he physically removed the criminal merchants that had occupied its precincts. Men that were working on behalf of the high priest. Jesus claimed possession of the temple, we believe, for probably two days, Monday and Tuesday of the Passion Week. And there he ruled as sovereign. And every stratum of official Judaism came and challenged his authority. They did this publicly, and he not only defeated every one of their arguments, he humiliated them. And during this time, Matthew 21 records Jesus speaking three parables that clearly condemned Israel. There was the parable of the two sons in Matthew 21, verses 28 through 32, that speaks of the rebellion of the nation, then the parable of the wicked husbandman in Matthew 21, verses 33 through 46, which speaks of the retribution of the nation. And then the parable of the wedding feast in Matthew 22 one through 14, which speaks of the rejection of the nation. And we know that during that time, some of the Pharisees and even some of the Herodians, approached Jesus to ask whether it is proper to pay tribute to Caesar. And Jesus answers them, you will recall, with the illustration of the coin, we will read more about that in Mark 12. The Sadducees approached Jesus with their favorite question about the resurrection because they didn't believe in a resurrection; they didn't believe in an afterlife. And he answers them and literally rebukes them openly for their ignorance of the scriptures. And again, we will see this more when we get to Mark 12. And later in Mark 12 we also read what was going on during this time there was a Pharisaic lawyer that asks a legal question of Jesus. He says, "which is the greatest commandment?" Mark 12:28. Jesus answered, 'The foremost is , "HEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD; AND YOU SHALL LOVE TEH LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOULD, AND WITH ALL YOUR MOND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH." The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these. ‘The scribe said to Him, 'Right, Teacher; You have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM; AND TO LOVE HIM WITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL THE UNDERSTANDING AND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE'S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all burned offerings and sacrifices.' When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, he said to him, 'You are not far from the kingdom of God.'" Not far, but not in, which was a shocking insult to the Pharisee. And then we read, "After that no one would venture to ask Him any more questions."

And then, on the heels of that, Jesus went on to prove his Messiahship by means of an appeal to David, out of Psalm 110. So, I'm telling you all this to help you see that by now, the antagonism of the Jewish religious leaders was absolutely at a boiling point; that they were afraid to do anything to him, because the people were in awe of Jesus, albeit superficially so; they didn't really understand who he really was. Jesus had been living among the common people outside of Jerusalem all this time, but now he has invaded the very territory of the Sadducees and the Pharisees. Worse yet, he has publicly humiliated them by not only taking over the temple, but by completely besting them in all of their arguments.

Now, back to our text. If we look at Mark 11, actually, in verse 19, we can kind of get the flow here. "When evening came, they would go out of the city. As they were passing by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots up. Being reminded, Peter said to Him, 'Rabbi, look, the fig tree which You cursed, has withered.'" And then we come to our text for this morning. "And Jesus answered, saying to them, 'Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be taken up and cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says is going to happen, it will be granted him. Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them. And they will be granted you. Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions.'"

Now, as we read this, it's appropriate to ask why such an abrupt transition in the narrative. Peter says to him, "Rabbi, look, the fig tree which You cursed, has withered." And then Jesus answers and says, "'Have faith in God.'" Then he teaches a lesson on prayer. At first glance, there was this, would seem to be a non sequitur. It doesn't seem to follow; it doesn't quite connect. But when you understand the context, when you understand what was happening at that moment, in time, it becomes very, very clear what Jesus was doing. Bear in mind that the Jewish leaders now are trying to kill him. And soon they would succeed. And soon after that the temple, which was called the House of Prayer, would be destroyed. Now think about it. Jesus has been with the disciples. He's been teaching them. He's been providing and protecting them. He's been encouraging them, strengthening them, but in a few days, he's going to be gone. They're going to be all on their own. They will be utterly dependent upon the power of prayer, to access God when Jesus is gone, therefore, now catch this. Therefore, they must be absolutely confident that they have access to the same power that withered the fig tree. And I wish to explain and apply this passage under three headings. I hope this will be helpful to you. And think of it this way, effectual prayer--in other words, prayer that God hears and answers--requires three essential convictions. Number one, we must be confident of God's power. Secondly, confident of God's character. And thirdly, conscious of God's forgiveness. Want you to examine your heart, as we look at this. And I might say that it's been my experience over the years and dealing with so many people, that what we are about to examine is foreign to a lot of Christians. So let's pray that the Spirit of God will help us see these things.

First of all, let's understand the issue of being confident of God's power. Notice again, how the Lord's teaching on prayer follows this miraculous withering of the fig tree, that he has cursed. Now, obviously, this isn't by coincidence, it's by design. You see, what the Lord wanted to do is give them a living illustration of what God can do. One, that they would remember, one that they would never forget. Because what was happening symbolically in the withering of the tree was going to happen in reality, especially in AD 70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans, but first they must learn the essentials of effectual prayer. And that begins, it begins by remembering his supernatural works in the past. And this is what bolsters our confidence in who God is and what he can do in the present. Notice again, in Mark 11, verse 21, "Peter said to Him, 'Rabbi, look, the fig tree which You cursed, has withered.'" Matthew adds this in Matthew 21, verse 20, "Seeing this, the disciples were amazed and asked, 'How did the fig tree wither all at once?' And Jesus answered and said to them, 'Truly I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, 'Be taken up and cast into the sea', it will happen.'" Obviously, Jesus is using hyperbole here to make his point. Then he says, "'And all things you ask and prayer, believing, You will receive.'" So what we see here is the profound importance that God places on remembering the miraculous works of deliverance that he has performed in the past. And this is what fortifies us in our prayer life. And the key is the word "remember"-- the word "remember." Let me give you some examples. In Exodus 13, verse three, Moses said to the people, "Remember this day in which you went out from Egypt, from the house of slavery; for by a powerful hand, the Lord brought you out from this place." And repeatedly, God instructed Moses to tell the covenant people to remember the powerful acts of God on their behalf in the past, in order to prepare them for what they would encounter in the future as they entered into the land of Canaan. Earlier we read out of First Chronicles 16, the story of when they brought the Ark of God and placed it inside the tent, which David had pitched for it, and they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before God; and then David assigned Asaph and his relatives to give thanks to the Lord. And in verse eight, we read, "Oh, give thanks to the Lord." He says, "Call upon His name; make known His deeds among the peoples. Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; speak of all His wonders, seek the Lord and His strength, seek His face continually." And here it is, folks "Remember His wonderful deeds, which He has done, His marvels and the judgments of His mouth." Psalm 105, beginning of verse five, the Psalmist says, "Remember His wonders which He has done, His marvels and the judgments uttered by His mouth, O seed of Abraham, His servant, O sons of Jacob, His chosen ones! He is the Lord our God, His judgments are in all the earth."

And think about what David did when he was in the depths of despair, fearing for his own life, because in the enemies were about to destroy him; he was desperately in need of deliverance. We read about this in Psalm 143, verse five. It says, "I remember the days of old; I meditate on all Your doings. I muse on the work of Your hands, I stretch out my hands to You; my soul longs for You, as a parched land." And, folks, this is so instructive to us. I mean, think about those times when we are in the depths of despair. When terror has overwhelmed us, where there is great sorrow or there is great pain. What we learn here is one of the things that we need to do. In fact, the very first thing we need to do when we call out to the Lord is remember who he is and what he's done. Oh, Lord, in the midst of my pain, right now, I am crying out for deliverance. My mind goes back to all that you have done down through redemptive history, my mind can rehearse those things that I read in the Old Testament, and what I can see in the New Testament, and what I can see in my life, thank you for that. Therefore, I will trust you come what may. Isaiah spoke of this in Isaiah 46, beginning in verse eight. "'Remember this," he says, "and be assured; recall it to mind, you transgressors. Remember the former things long past, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, 'My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all my good pleasure.''" But friends, I would ask you, is this characteristic of your prayer life? When you come before the Lord in prayer, do you take time to remember what he has done?

If not, you're going to lack confidence in God's power. You will operate in the flesh. And frankly, your prayers will, in many ways, be an insult to God's character. I encourage you to emulate Asaph. We read about him some earlier today and Psalm 77, for example, there's a record there of a communal lament where he expresses past and present fears and wonders if God is willing and even able, to deal with his concerns. And as one of God's chosen servants to lead the people of Israel spiritually, Asaph would have been accustomed to traversing the oceans of sorrow. And I'm sure he had weathered many a gale in his own life and his ministry. And often the storms of trials associated with serving the master can tempt one to even be drowned in your own tears. We can all identify with his agony of soul. Here's what he says in Psalm 77, beginning of verse one, "My voice rises to God, and I will cry aloud; my voice rises to God and He will hear me." So in other words, he begins by just voicing his complaint to God, rather than allowing his depression to cause him to sink even further into some self-centered morass. He verbalizes his problems before the throne of grace. He goes on to say, "In the day of my trouble, I sought the Lord." In verse four, we read, "You have held my eyelids open; I am so troubled that I cannot speak." You know what those sleepless nights are like, don't you? I do. We've all been there. It's easy to sink further into a quagmire of depression and despair, to doubt God's goodness, to somehow think that he's abandoned us. How can we have confidence in God's power and goodness, if these deceptions are somehow ruling our mind? We can't. So we need to do what Asaph did in Psalm 77. He says this beginning in verse 11, "I shall remember the deeds of the Lord; surely I will remember Your wonders of old. I will meditate on all Your work and muse on Your deeds." You see, again, dear friends, rehearsing God's mighty acts in the past, bolsters our confidence that he could certainly perform them yet again. In particular Asaph recalls the Exodus, perhaps the most glorious of all the deliverances in the history of Israel, when the earth trembled, and God miraculously delivered them beginning in verse 13. We read "Your way, O God, is holy. What god is great like our God? You are the God who works wonders; You have made known Your strength among the peoples. You have by Your power redeemed Your people, the sons of Jacob, and Joseph. The waters saw You O God; the water saw you, they were in anguish; the deeps also trembled. The clouds poured out water; and skies gave forth a sound; Your arrows flashed here and there. The sound of Your thunder was in the whirlwind; the lightnings lit up the world; the earth trembled and shook. Your way was in the sea and your paths in the mighty waters, and your footprints may not be known. You led Your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron." Folks, this is the stuff of effectual prayer. This is what one does when one is confident in the power of God.

But secondly, we must be confident of God's character. Notice again, verse 21 of our text and Mark 11. "Being reminded, Peter said to Him, 'Rabbi, look, the fig tree which you cursed, has withered.'" And Jesus answered saying to them, 'Have faith in God.' Interesting statement, "have faith in God." You see, by itself, faith is powerless. Contrary to the teachings of so many charlatans in the word faith movement, our confidence you see must not be in our faith, but in the object of our faith. Namely, in the character of God. Faith is merely the door to having access to the power of God. Our faith is what successfully invokes God's supernatural power to accomplish his purposes, for His glory, whatever that might be. And most of the time, we don't really know what his purposes are, but we relax in them. In fact, I was thinking about this, it's easy for me to blur that line, in my thinking, in my prayers. It's easy for me, wanting God to somehow make me more glorious than what I would deserve; to somehow answer my prayer just for me personally, in some special way, because I'm deserving of this as if I'm the number one priority rather than him. And I'm thankful that the indwelling Spirit can help align my prayers to the will of God. Because we don't know how to pray as we should, right? We read about this in Romans eight, verse 26, "The Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words." There's some kind of inner Trinitarian communication that occurs, even while we're praying. "He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints, according to the will of God." I might add that the Spirit's work in our prayers, really parallel, Christ's high priestly work of intercession. But at the most fundamental level, we've got to have faith in God. And He will always respond consistent with his character. He will always respond in perfect holiness. He will always respond in perfect righteousness, judgment, according to his will, and according to his timing; always for the purpose of bringing glory to himself. Because you and I are merely incidental to his purposes. We can be confident knowing that he will never act contrary to the infinite perfections of his character. And it is this confidence that is so essential for effectual prayer. First, John 5:14, "this is the confidence which we have before him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, and whatever we ask, we know that we have the request which we have asked from Him." Practically, think of it this way. Father, it is my great desire to be healed from this dreadful disease. Father, it is my great desire to be healed from what has tormented me from years or to be delivered from this horrible situation? It is my will that somehow, we have a government that isn't corrupt, and oppressive. Father, I've got a whole list of things, but I am absolutely confident as I cry out to you with my requests, that you are going to hear the cry of my heart and you will act consistent with your holy character. I know that whatever your answer will be, it will be holy, it will be just, it will be righteous. And ultimately, it will be good for me and mainly for your glory. And therefore I know that you're always up to something grand and glorious in my life, something that I might not even experience and enjoy until glory. So I trust in your good purpose, to bring glory to yourself. Because I trust in your character. Because I'm united with you, I will one day experience the fullness of what that means.

So Jesus instructs them "'Have faith in God.'" And of course, what he's thinking is, things are gonna get really rough pretty soon. So you need to trust me, I'm not going to be here. And know that there is nothing that can thwart my purposes. Know that there is nothing that can separate you from my love. Know that I can do all things. Verse 23 goes on, "'Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be taken up and cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says is going to happen, it will be granted him. Therefore I say to you, all things which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them and you will, and they will be granted to you.'" Interesting phrase, "all things for which you pray and ask." Obviously, this would not include anything and everything that we would throw before God as if there's, you know, carte blanche; whatever we want, he's gonna give it to us. But anything that we pray and ask that is consistent with his will, to bring glory to his name. I was thinking about the Lord Himself. Remember, in the depths of the unimaginable agony that he experienced in the Garden of Gethsemane? Jesus cried out to the Father in Mark 14:36, saying, "'Abba! Father! All things are possible for You; remove this cup from Me; yet, not what I will, but what You will.'" And folks, this has to be the attitude of our heart.

Now, it's also very important that we do as we read in the text of verse 24, that we "pray and we ask." James four two says, "You do not have because you do not ask." We know that it goes on to talk about how that many times we ask with the wrong motives, right? But to be able to say, you know, Father, I do not know your will on this particular matter but it is certainly my desire that you grant my request. But as always, I will submit to you, and in the humbleness of my heart, I know that you can do all of these things, but I don't know what your will is. But certainly, this would be the cry of my heart. John 16, beginning of verse 23, knowing that he would soon depart, and his disciples who would be left alone, he said, "'Truly, truly, I say to you, if you ask the Father for anything in My name, He will give it to you. Until now you have asked for nothing in My name; ask and you will receive so that your joy may be made full.'" Oftentimes, people will say, Well, how do I know what the will of God is on a matter? Well, many times we don't know. But much of it, we do know, because it is written in His Word. If you want to know what the will of God is, become a student of his word and his will, will become part of your will, because you will understand who he is, how he thinks, what he's up to, what would bring honor to him. I marvel at the Lord's provision for his own, how he blesses us. You know, I was thinking, as I was contemplating these great truths, you know, as a father, and as a grandfather, there is nothing that I wouldn't do for my kids, or my grandkids. You all know this, you're the same way. There's nothing I wouldn't do for them. Except granting them some wish, that I knew was absolutely stupid, and foolish, and it would destroy them. Right? And many times, I know what that is, and they don't. Often, especially teenage logic, you know, it ends up two plus two is five and you know, it snot going to be five. But I'm always deeply touched when my kids or my grandkids ask me for something when they want my help. It reminds me of what Jesus said in Matthew seven, beginning of verse seven, "'Ask and it will be given to you. seek and you will find, knock and it will be open to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man is there among you who, when his son asks for a loaf, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, he will not give him a snake will he? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven, give what is good to those who ask Him!'" And so here again, we see the holy, gracious character of God.

But Jesus adds yet a third component of effectual prayer. And this is really intriguing. And that is,we need to be conscious of God's forgiveness. Let me explain what I mean by this. He goes on in verse 25 to say "'Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you and your transgressions.'" In other words, when you pray, be conscious of the fact that you have been forgiven, and therefore you need to have a forgiving spirit towards others.

Verse 26, "But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions.'" Just as a side note, because some of you might ask this, in some of your Bibles that might have a little parentheses around it. Verse 26 is actually absent from the earliest and most important Greek manuscripts and was not part of Mark's original text. Its presence in the latter manuscript tradition is best explained by the insertion by scribal copyist imitating Jesus words recorded in Matthew six where he did say this in verse 15. "But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions."

Now, back to the text here, what Jesus is saying is this. We've got to have a forgiving heart when we come before Him and petition him in prayer. Because to do otherwise would somehow insult the grace that he has given us. Now, bear in mind the forgiveness Jesus is referring to here is not our eternal pardon, that one receives and justification, which is a comprehensive, a total acquittal from the guilt and just penalty of sin based solely on God's grace. That's not what he's talking about here. Instead, Jesus is referring to our unwillingness to forgive others that will inevitably result in divine chastening in our life. It carries the idea of holding a grudge against a fellow believer, that's the idea, which I might add, always betrays an exaggerated sense of self-importance. And I've also known that those who tend to be easily offended are always those that have a hard time forgiving other people. Think of someone perhaps that has offended you or injured you in some way? Maybe, at work, maybe in your family? I've even heard of it happening in the church, you know, think about that. What's your attitude towards them? Is it one of bitterness? Do you look for opportunities to slander them? To get other people to join your cause against them? You won't speak to them. Do you seek revenge? Or do you seek reconciliation? Big difference? Do you seek to destroy them? Or are you willing to suffer indignities with grace and humility; with forbearance, with patience, trusting God to accomplish his purposes in the ordeal; in you and in them and other people? Bearing in mind Ephesians 4:30, to "be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you." Yes, but pastor, you don't understand what he did to me, or what she did to me. Oh, my, well, in that case, you need to get your pound of flesh? Absolutely. I mean, you can't forgive a person like that. That person doesn't deserve your forgiveness. Aren't you glad God doesn't try to get his pound of flesh from us? Think about that. We certainly don't deserve his forgiveness.

Over the years in counseling, I think of those times when I sit down with someone, and will say, okay, how can I help? And suddenly, they just unload on me. All of the things that someone has done to them. I mean, it's like suddenly you get sucked into outer space with them in this world of offenses; often, things that happened years ago. And they describe these things in vivid detail. Many people will literally have notebooks. I've had spiral notebooks filled with all that has happened. I remember one lady saying here, "I want you to read this." And I said, "no, I'm not going to read it. You know, Scripture says we're not to keep a record of wrongs. Why don't you just summarize it for me? And then let's deal with it here." You see, that's an unforgiving heart, and when you're that way, the wound, the wound never heals. And frankly, if that is you, you're self-absorbed. You're self-centered, you're self-righteous and you're self-deceived. And you wonder why you're miserable. And why everybody that knows you is miserable when they really get to know you, and they don't want to be around you. You see an unforgiving heart is certain proof that you're walking in the flesh and not with a spirit. You grieve the Spirit, you quench the Spirit. And folks, unforgiveness will inevitably produce bitterness and hatred and revenge, and it will imprison you in a dungeon of negative emotions. It's a very sad thing. You will be filled with self-pity, alienation, broken relationships, a fruitless powerless Christian life. I mean it's the opposite of First Corinthians 13 verse four and following, "Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own; is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things endures all things. I mean, what a mockery to petition God in prayer when you mock his grace in forgiving you, by not forgiving others. That's the point. And see, Jesus knew this with the disciples because remember, they're always bickering, wondering, you know, who's going to be first in the kingdom. You know all that stuff. Psalm 66:18, "If I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear." James two verse 13, "Judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy." Micah tells us this in chapter seven, verse 18, "Who is a God like You, who pardons iniquity and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of His possession?" You see folks, we are most like God when we forgive, when we have that kind of an attitude, and that is essential for effectual prayer.

So again, "forgive" he says in verse 25, Mark 11. "If you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions". And as I mentioned earlier, Matthew 6:15, Jesus said," If you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions." The idea of divine chastening. Using the example of an abusive master, Peter said this in First Peter two beginning of verse 19, "Servants," literally slaves, "be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable. For this finds favor, if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right, and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God." I'm sure you're like me, my flesh wars against that. That's where you feel that battle between the spirit and the flesh right? Galatians five. And while suffering unimaginable torture on the cross, Jesus even loved his enemies and prayed in Luke 23 Verse 34, "Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing."

I want to camp on this forgiveness concept for just a few more minutes as we wrap this up this morning, I was thinking how we would all do well to learn the lessons in forgiveness found in Second Corinthians two, verses five through 11. Let me give you real briefly the context. Remember, Paul had dealt with a sending member in the congregation there in Corinth, a man was sexually involved with his stepmother. First Corinthians five talks about it. The church then officially excommunicated him and as a result, the man repented. And now it's time to forgive and extend mercy. So in Second Corinthians two, verse five, Paul says, "But if any has caused sorrow," and he's referring to the offender but he's guarding him by not even using his name, "but if any has caused sorrow, he has caused sorrow not to me, but in some degree--in order not to say too much--to all of you." It's interesting. Here we see the heart of tender forbearance towards this man who mistreated Paul as well as the rest of the congregation. And he not only avoids mentioning his name, he doesn't even say anything about the nature of the offense. That's a heart of forgiveness. Imagine the unnecessary grief and shame Paul would have placed upon the penative sinner had he mentioned his name and then elaborated on the injury. "Yeah, well, so and so over here, you remember, he did this"...No, he's not doing any of that. He's protecting him. He's diffusing the whole thing. The man had been punished enough. He's repented. So he says, "he has caused sorrow, not to me, but to some degree--in order not to say too much." In other words, I'm not going to exaggerate this thing. I'm not going to blow it out of proportion. So folks, lesson number one, when it comes to forgiveness, don't keep stoking the fire, drop it, drop it, rejoice, the person has repented. They've asked for forgiveness, move on. Don't keep a record of wrongs. Don't keep reminding the offender of his or her sin. Psalm 103, verse 12. We see God as our example here, "As far as the east is from the west so far has He removed our transgressions from us." In other words, so as to no longer having any effect on our relationship with Him. How wicked it would be for us to remember what God has chosen to remember no more. As we read in Hebrews 10, I think it's verse 17.

So don't keep stoking the fire. Second, be quick to forgive and comfort the truly penitent. Verse six "Sufficient for such a one is this punishment which was inflicted by the majority." You see, the great sorrow associated with being removed from the fellowship of his Christian brothers and sisters, produced what it was intended to produce, and that's genuine repentance. And then there can be genuine reconciliation. Church discipline really provides a living illustration of the broken fellowship that an unrepentant person has between him or her and God. And certainly the purpose of church discipline is reconciliation, never retribution. Verse six again, "Sufficient for such a one is this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority, so that on the contrary, you should rather"--catch this now-- "forgive and comfort him, otherwise such a one might be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow." Yes, the punishment was deserved, but it had its desired effect. This is what Paul longed for. When we've been offended and perhaps severely; do we have a longing for that person to see their offense? And to be reconciled to God because he has been more offended than we are? Is that the passion of our heart? Or do we want our pound of flesh? So now it's time to forgive and comfort. Which by the way, are two essentials for genuine restoration. So be quick to forgive and comfort, the truly penitent. I mean, this is it. This is at the heart of Christian love, beloved. And you want to ask yourself, does this describe me? Paul says in Colossians 3:13, that we are to be characterized by quote, "bearing with one another and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone." Again, this is our supreme example in forgiveness. And how can we, who have been forgiven the most heinous of sins against the Most High, not forgive the lesser sins that have been committed against us? That's the point.

If we don't have that kind of an attitude, we're just really out of fellowship with the Lord and it is going to hamper our prayers. A third lesson is we need to reaffirm our love for the truly penitent through acts of private and public restoration. Notice verse eight, he says, "Wherefore I urge you to reaffirm"-- "kyroo" in Greek, the original language; it carries the idea of "to rule judicially" or "to decide" or "make a formal declaration of something." "I urge you to reaffirm your love for him." In other words, he's asking them to be reaffirming, both privately and publicly in loving restoration. Now, I know oftentimes people or unrepentant. People will ask me, "Well, how can you forgive somebody that's unrepentant?" Then most of the time, that's the case by the way, and the answer is simply this well you pray for them with a forgiving heart that sincerely, passionately desires their repentance and their restoration and reconciliation; first with God and then with you. And if that doesn't happen, you move on. That's between them and God at that point. This is precisely the kind of situation dear friends in which we are commanded to turn the other cheek, Matthew 5:39. "Yes, but he or she did and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah..." Well, yeah, that's really bad and I'm sorry that's happened. We need to pray for his or her repentance and reconciliation. But you also know that you deserve far worse, so do I. So let's be open. Let's pray. Let's have an attitude of forgiveness. And pray that God will do a work in their heart. Now, granted, there are some times where people are so evil, that we have implications against them like the imprecatory psalms. I mean, there are times where you say, "Lord, I pray that you will pour out your wrath upon their unholy head." We understand that because God you have been offended. And there we're defending the glory of God. But my, so often what we do is we hold grudges against people, rather than going to them, like in Galatians six and try to restore them in a spirit of gentleness. So many times, I've had people mad at me, I have to laugh about it. Because, I mean, sometimes I deserve it, really, I truly do. And other times, I truly don't. But you know, whatever is the case, when fellowship is broken, you have to have an attitude of forgiveness and you try to be reconciled and if people don't do that, then you just have to move on. You just have to love them and let God deal with them in his own time. We've got to be like the father of the prodigal son, right. I mean, we're praying for the son to come down the road one day and then all my word there he is, well, what do we do? We run out to meet him. We kill the fatted calf, and on it gone, it goes. Proverbs 19:11, it's "man's discretion, makes him slow to anger and it's his glory to overlook a transgression." So friends, I exhort you, learn to forgive. Otherwise, you will remain bitter. And you will demand redress of your injuries, and you'll just stay that way. I won't take time to go through it. But in Romans 12:18 and following it says, "if possible, as much as it is up to you be at peace with all men." Don't be ruled by your wounded pride. Learn to forgive. Otherwise, you will forfeit blessing in your life. You will live under a cloud of divine chastening, and God will not answer your prayers, because you're out of fellowship with Him.

So in summary, this is what Jesus wanted his disciples to do. And by extension, all of us. Effectual prayer, prayer that God hears and answers, requires us to be confident in its power, to be confident of his character, and to be conscious of God's forgiveness of us, so that we too will forgive others. The disciples had to learn this, they did learn this, and so too should all of us, amen? Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that speaks so directly to each of us. Thank you for your goodness and your Grace. And oh, Lord, thank you for forgiving us. Thank you for providing a way, for we, as sinful people, to be reconciled to you as a holy God, through your gift to us, your Son that paid the penalty for the sins of all who would trust in Him. And Lord, not only have you forgiven us, but you have radically changed us. You've given us a new heart, a new mind, a new song, a new nature. And, most importantly, you have imputed to us the righteousness of Christ. So that no, even as we sin, and certainly we do, you do not see our sin, but the righteousness of your son, our Savior, and whom we are forever hidden. So we thank you for these eternal truths. May they bear much fruit in our lives. In Christ's name I pray. Amen.

This morning we returned to Mark's gospel chapter 11. So if you will take your Bibles and turn there, we will be examining verses 12 through 2 under the heading "Jesus Curses Fruitless Religion." Follow along as I read this text, beginning in verse 12 of Mark 11. "The next day when they had left Bethany, he became hungry. Seeing at a distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to see if perhaps He would find anything on it; and when He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. He said to it, 'May no one ever eat fruit from you again!' And His disciples were listening. Then they came to Jerusalem. And He entered the temple and began to drive out those who were buying and selling in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who were selling doves; and He would not permit anyone to carry merchandise through the temple. And He began to teach and say to them, 'Is it not written, 'MY HOUSE SHALL BE CALLED A HOUSE OF PRAYER FOR ALL THE NATIONS'? But you have made it a ROBBERS' DEN.' The chief priests and the scribes heard this and began seeking how to destroy Him, for they were afraid of Him, for the whole crowd was astonished at Hs teaching. When evening came, they would go out of the city. As they were passing by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots up. Being reminded, Peter said to 'Him, Rabbi, look, the fig tree which you cursed has withered.'"

Dear friends, there is nothing more offensive to God than hypocrisy. To pretend that somehow you are worshipping Him; and perhaps you do so with your lips or with some of your actions, but in your heart it is a lie. Pretend religion. No fear of God. No love for God, no passionate, personal pursuit of holiness in your life. No hunger for his word. No obedience really to his word. In fact, for many people that claim to be religious, those types of things never enter into their mind. No secret devotion to God, in intimate communion, no prayer life. Only superficial, perfunctory meaningless worship, living as if he really didn't even exist. God described this going on in his ancient people. In Isaiah, chapter 29, beginning in verse 13, he says, "'People who draw near me with their words and honor Me with their lip service, but they remove their hearts far from Me. And their reverence for Me consists of tradition, learned by rote.’” In other words, hollow ritualism. Doing what is expected, without any real understanding, without any passion, just routine ceremony. And frankly, we see the same thing here in our culture. I call it Sunday in the South. Sunday in the south, you go through the motions of worship, but it really doesn't mean that much to you. Your mind is elsewhere, typically self-focused, where it has been all week. Sadly, many people will come to church every Sunday, with the same attitude as the ancient Israelites, whom God described when they listened to his prophet Ezekiel but had no intention of really hearing and applying what he said we read about this in Ezekiel chapter 33, beginning in verse 31. God says, "'But as for you, son of man, your fellow citizen who talk about you by the walls and in the doorways of the houses, speak to one another, each to his brother saying, 'Come now and hear what the message is which comes forth from the Lord.' They come to you as people come and sit before you as My people and hear your words, but they do not do them. For they do the lustful desires expressed by their mouth, and their heart goes after their gain. Behold, you are to them like a sensual song by one who has a beautiful voice and plays well on an instrument; for they hear your words, but they do not practice them.'" And sadly, many churches cater to this kind of religious pretense with sensual music, ear tickling sermons, that entertain but do not edify, that comfort but never convict.

So indeed, dear friends, as we look at this passage here today, we want to examine our hearts in light of all this because we're all prone to various forms of hypocrisy. It's so easy to pretend to love Christ, to act religious, to say the right things, and perhaps to even be Orthodox in your doctrine. But in fact, you're doing nothing more than promoting yourself, or trying to convince yourself that you are more spiritual than you really are. And in a desperate pursuit of affirmation, the self-promoting hypocrite will seek every spotlight to be seen, will grab every microphone to be heard, and will attack everyone who refuses to bow to his or her demands. Now these can be true believers ruled by the Spirit, or by the flesh rather than the spirit. Like the fleshy Corinthians, you will recall, in First Corinthians three. "Men of flesh," the first few verses, it describes them. "Infants in Christ," unable to digest deep doctrinal truths. They're filled with jealousy and strife, they walk like mere men, meaning they live as if they're not even saved. Or there can be those believers in a church that are just factious and divisive. Every church has them. I'm sure we have some here. First Corinthians 11 tells us that that's going to be true in every church. Or they can be unbelievers who are Christian, in name only, like the false prophets that Jesus described in Matthew seven, whose quote, "bad fruit betrayed that they were a bad tree that produced it. There in Matthew seven, beginning of verse 20, we read, "'So then, you will know them by their fruits. Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.'"

Well, we see this very clearly in the legalists of ancient Judaism. What was going on for far too many was just a pretense of worship. They would come to the temple and just pursue empty ritualism. They would perform external obedience to somehow merit God's grace, a works righteousness system of religion. In fact, Jesus said in Matthew 15, beginning of verse seven, "'You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you: This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. But in vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men?'" Well, this hollow kind of worship again is horribly offensive to God. And this is why Jesus assaults the temple.

We want to examine this text under two real basic categories, number one, here we will see empty religious pretense, illustrated by a barren fig tree. And then secondly, empty religious pretense assaulted by the Messianic priest King, referring to the Lord Jesus. So first of all, let's look at this empty religious pretense that's illustrated by the barren fig tree beginning in verse 12. "On the next day when they had left Bethany. He became hungry. Seeing at a distance of fig tree in leaf, He went to see if perhaps he would find anything on it. And when he came to it; He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. He said to it, 'May no one ever eat fruit from you again!' And his disciples were listening." This is a very intriguing scenario, is it not? Imagine what the disciples were thinking? What on earth is going on here? Well, let's bear in mind that throughout Scripture, we see a fig tree as something that was very important, very important fruit in ancient life. It provided wonderful, delicious fruit. I've been in Israel, I love to eat those figs. They are absolutely delicious. And frequently a fig tree is used as a symbol of the nation Israel. We read about this in Hosea nine as well as Joel one, but also a symbol of peace and prosperity. Figs were one of the fruits described to the children of Israel as part of the blessing of the promised land. In fact, in First Kings four and verse 25, describing the prosperity of Solomon's reign, we read "Judah and Israel lived in safety, every man under his vine and fig tree." Moreover, divine judgment upon his people often included the destruction of their fig trees by marauding invaders, as we would read in Jeremiah five and verse 17. Now, what's interesting with the fig tree, as it begins to sprout leaves, figs would normally produce at least some immature, and even edible fruit. In this case, the tree had some leaves, but no fruit. Mark 11:13, "it was not even the season for figs," it says. So it's especially interesting that this particular tree offered the pretense of being fruitful, and yet it was barren. Unlike most fig trees that would have leaves, there would be some fruit on it, even though it wouldn't be fully developed. I also find it interesting as I think about it, it takes three years from planting a fig tree until it bears fruit. And this reminds me of the three years of Jesus's ministry that should have produced the fruit of repentance in Israel, but it did not. So, seeing this unproductive, barren tree that was planted in good soil and through its foliage should have borne at least some fruit, but it did not, Jesus cursed it. What a powerful parable. This is designed to portray the pretense of spirituality, the pretense of godliness, if you will; hypocrisy that really produces no love of God from the heart. I find it interesting as well in Isaiah five you may remember that great text. There we read how God cursed his vineyard, which was symbolic of the house of Israel. He cursed them because of their hypocrisy, and because of their apostasy, their idolatry. And in that text, we read how that he gave them everything that they needed to bear fruit. He planted them in the right vineyard of the Promised Land. On a fertile Hill, he says he removed all of the stones and planted the choicest vine. And in verse five of Isaiah five we read then he expected it to produce good grapes, but it only produced worthless ones. "Beushim," inedible sour berries. Verse seven he goes on to say , "For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel and the men of Judah His delightful plant. Thus He looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed; For righteousness, but behold, a cry of distress." Justice and bloodshed as well as righteousness and distress, is really a play on words. In Hebrew, it says that he looked for "mispat" and he got "mizpah." He looked for "sadaqa" and he got "seaqa." And as a result, he pronounced judgment upon them.

By the way, the things that he accused them of, and certainly of which they were guilty, are the very things that we see in our country today. Greedy materialism, drunken, dissipation, defiant debauchery, sexual immorality, redefining morality so that you call good evil and evil good. Haughty humanism, which is the wholesale tolerance of every imaginable form of wickedness, crooked politicians and judges, corrupt spiritual leaders, and on it went. And as a result, soon Babylon came and destroyed them. So too here, in Mark 11, Jesus curses the fig tree. And what he's doing here is symbolically denouncing the nation of Israel for their unbelief. For indeed, he came into His own and His own did not receive him. And to this day, Israel is a nation that is a spiritually barren tree awaiting the second coming of Christ when God will soften their hearts. Bear in mind, according to Romans 11 and verse 25, currently God has hardened their hearts until the time, or the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so when the very last person in the church age is saved, and God then comes and snatches us away in the rapture, God will then judge the both the apostate church and apostate Israel, in Daniel's 70th week, the time of the tribulation. And according to Romans 11:26, we read "And thus all Israel will be saved." But what a powerful lesson to all of us how God hates hollow professions of faith, how he hates pretend Christianity, that fails to manifest Christ like humility, and a love for Christ, a love for His word love for God's people, and a burden for the lost.

By the way, this type of hypocrisy, this type of pretend Christianity is really something that cannot be seen often in our heart, especially those who are steeped in it over a long period of time. It's not like people all of a sudden wake up one day and say, "You know what, I think I'm gonna pretend to be a Christian." That's not how it works, but rather, they get a little bit of religion, and they begin to do a few things and they're around other kinds of superficial hypocrites. They begin to learn what to say and what not to say and what to do and what not to do. And then their religious peers or the church, their denomination, begins to reinforce what they think is true of themselves, that they are godly, that they are to be obedient to the Lord. But in truth, they will be weak in doctrine. They will love shallow preaching, shallow teaching, shallow worship, they will be undiscerning. They will typically attach themselves to religious organizations or denominations or churches that have lots of programs, lots of things going on, that provide the illusion of spirituality. But it's hollow, because there is no heartfelt love in those people. And folks, we must guard against that. We must guard against this. And as a result, their hypocrisy is affirmed by all of the trappings of religion around them. And by the way, it's even worse when people are Orthodox in their doctrine. And yet, they really have no love for Christ, and you do not see it manifest in their life. Well, this was true of apostate Judaism in the first century.

Again, quoting Isaiah 29:13. Jesus excoriated the scribes and the Pharisees for their hypocrisy. Matthew 15 Seven that I read earlier, "'You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you, 'This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. But in vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.''" And of course, this fruitless display of religion could be manifested in the temple. And this was what was so infuriating and offensive to Jesus. The apostle Paul perfectly described the heart of their character and their conduct. In Romans 10, beginning of verse two, he says, "For I testify about them, that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God." Indeed, as Paul said, in Philippians, three and verse three true worshipers of God are those who, "worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh." Well, the opposite was going on in Jesus day. So cursing the fig tree, Jesus, again, symbolically denounced the nation, Israel for their unbelief. And in verse 20, we read that it withered from the roots up. And we know about 40 years later, Israel was cut down when the Romans came in, and destroyed Jerusalem and the temple.

So we move from the empty religious pretense, illustrated by a barren fruit fig tree, to secondly, this empty religious pretense, assaulted by the Messiah priest king. And what a shocking thing this must have been to the Jewish people, the day before they had hailed him as their Messiah. And now they're watching him come in and do a number on the temple precincts. Verse 15, "Then they came to Jerusalem. And He entered the temple." Now, the term temple here "hieron" in the original language, is a reference to basically the temple campus that would accommodate 1000s of worshippers. It had various courts and inner courts and so forth, the most inner court being the Holy of Holies. And the Holy Place, which was designated by another term "naos" the most outer court was called the Court of the Gentiles. And that's where all of these shenanigans were taking place. Okay? Non-Jews were allowed in the outer court of the temple. And this is where the priests had basically set up their own mini mall, all right? Where they were making money, non-Jews were allowed out there, but the priests could also be out there. In fact, the high priest, Annas was, shall we say, the kingpin of all of this, he was kind of like the mafia Don? Or what would you call him like a mob boss, perhaps that's kind of what he was. In fact, the Court of the Gentiles was called the bazaar Annas. And this marketplace was comprised of a variety of franchises. And what would happen is, merchants would literally purchase a franchise right from the high priest so that they could sell wine and food and salt and oil and sacrificial animals. And the big thing here was exchanging money, because you have to have the right currency to purchase the temple offerings. And what they would do is charge exorbitant fees to change the money. It was basically extortion. And what's interesting is, whatever they sold a percentage of, it went to guess who? The high priests and other priests who had a cut on all of the loot.

And worse yet, according to the Levitical law, you have to have sacrificial animals that pass the inspection of the priest. You beginning to see how the fox is guarding the henhouse here? Well, of course, only those purchased from the priests would make the cut, and historians indicate that they would pay as much as 10 times for their sacrificial animal. You know, as I thought about this, we can't be too shocked. I mean, this stuff still goes on today, doesn't it? It's called faith healers and prosperity teachers, make billions off of desperate, naive, ignorant people collecting seed faith donations. I remember this one guy, I forget which one he was he was selling prayer hankies for 20 bucks, you know, hundreds of gimmicks. In fact, the whole word faith movement is nothing more than a Christian drug cartel. It's basically what it is. It's popularized on certain television networks. You've heard me say before, it's just a religious version of World Wrestling. I mean, everybody knows it's fake, but it's entertaining and a lot of people get sucked up into it, and they give all of their money, hoping to somehow buy a miracle. Somebody sent me a video clip the other day, it was a clip of one of the prosperity, charlatans. His name was Jesse Duplantis and he was interacting with some others, including Kenneth Copeland, on this large platform in front of a bunch of people. And he was bragging about being not a millionaire, he said, but a multi, multi, millionaire. In fact, he said the reason Jesus, this is a quote, I wrote it down. "The reason Jesus has the reason Jesus has not yet come is because Christians aren't giving enough." Well, you're familiar with this, you see churches, you know, they’ve become mega malls, Disney World. They got fitness centers, and coffee shops and all kinds of things like that. Even theaters, restaurants. So much of contemporary gospel music that I used to be a part of when I used to counsel many of the artists and the and the people in that industry, the executives, is filled with this type of thing. They're constantly giving themselves awards, you know, the Dove Awards. I always wonder why not pastor awards, right? And the pastor of the year is Joel Osteen or whatever. I mean, that's kind of how it would work. Well, by the way, in other words, I'm very familiar with what would go on behind the scenes in that and I can assure you that Jesus would have never been nominated. Never.

So like the first century Jewish con artists, we've got hucksters today, that make 1000s of dollars, fleecing people, just like the money changers. So having seen this kind of sacrilege, in his father's house, Jesus returns to the temple, and he physically removes the religious phonies. I wish I could have seen that. And thereby he pronounced his condemnation upon Israel's worship. Verse 15, "He entered the temple and began to drive out those who were buying and selling in the temple, overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who were selling doves; and He would not permit anyone to carry merchandise through the temple." Now, I am aware that there are people who are shocked that this passage of Scripture, they cannot believe Jesus behavior. What happened to the gentle Jesus, the Jesus who is just filled with love. And unfortunately, people that think this way, simply do not understand the holiness of God. Holiness is actually the all-encompassing attribute of his infinite perfection, his purity and his power. People don't understand that people have a low view of God and a very high view of themselves. And his holiness is really the very essence of his glory. You will recall that God gave us a terrifying vision of his glory when he manifested it visibly in the pillar of cloud and fire that once covered Mount Sinai, and then led the Israelites through the wilderness to the promised land. And in Scripture, every time we see a demonstration of God's glory, we behold his holiness. Again, the all-encompassing attribute of his infinite perfection, purity and power.

And beloved, it is a zeal for God's glory that unleashes the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives. This is what produces genuine worship, and makes false worship, pretend worship disgusting, even to ourselves as it is to God. And a zeal for God's glory, causes our lives to redound to the glory of God and our souls to be flooded with the inexpressible joy of his presence. And you want to ask yourself, Do I have a zeal for the glory of God? Do I have a passion for the holiness of God? If not, please know that this kind of zeal simply cannot exist apart from a soul captivating, a sin destroying vision of the majesty of God. And if you cannot see the majesty of God, you will never understand what I'm trying to communicate to you, nor will you ever understand why Jesus was so incensed when he came to his Father's house. This is what's greatly missing in our evangelical culture today. Many worship what David Welch describes as a quote, "weightless God." Here's what he had to say, "It is one of the defining marks of our time that God is now weightless. I do not mean by this that he is a ethereal, but rather that he has become unimportant. He rests upon the world so in consequentially as not to be noticeable. He has lost his saliency for human life. Those who assure the pollsters of their belief in God's existence may nonetheless consider him less interesting than television. His commands less authoritative than their appetites for affluence and influence. His judgment, no more inspiring than the evening news, and his truth less compelling than the advertisers sweet fog of flattery and lies. That is weightlessness." End quote. Dear Christian, Don’t miss this. Jesus is God, he is infinitely holy. He is utterly separate from sin. And the temple was his Father's house that was to be the place where the divine presence would rest. And the infinite holiness of God, throughout Scripture, was always associated with God's presence in the temple. And unless you understand some of this, you will never have a zeal for God's glory and for His Holiness.

I want to camp on this concept for a moment and elaborate on the idea of God's presence in his holiness. You will recall, in Genesis chapter three and verse eight, we read, Adam and Eve, "heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden." The little phrase there "from the presence of" literally in the original language is "from before." And this is a technical type of terminology that is used to describe the sanctuary in the temple. In other words, God is walking now in the garden, and his presence is being manifested. In fact, grammatically, the Hebrew verb translated "walk"--"mithalek," is a unique kind of participle, indicating God's presence moved about constantly in the garden. I might add that the only other place this verb appears in this particular grammatical construction in the Hebrew is in passages describing God's presence descending upon the sanctuary. For example, in Exodus 33, nine whenever Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord would speak with Moses. So what we read there in Genesis three is Adam and Eve hid themselves from God's presence that was moving about in his Edenic sanctuary.

Now what happened when they sinned? Well, they were removed from his presence in the garden. They violated one law, just one thing, that God asked, Do not eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. My point with this, dear friends is God's abiding presence will be withdrawn from his people when they disobey him. The ultimate punishment being death. We saw this in the garden, but we also see it in the sanctuary of his temple. Whenever his laws would be violated, especially those in Leviticus 26, his presence would be removed. And ultimately punishment would even include for the Israelites, being exiled from the land which contained the temple.

Let me elaborate upon this a little bit more because I want you to grasp the weight of all of this. It's interesting that God arranged both the Garden of Eden and the sanctuary to the tabernacle and temple, in an East/West orientation. Really interesting as we look at this. The scripture in Genesis chapter two beginning in verse eight, we read that, "The Lord God planted a garden toward the east in Eden." And the Hebrew word for East, "qadim" literally means faceward or frontward, indicating God's presence was in the western part of the garden. Genesis 3:24, "He drove the man out; and at the east of the Garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life." In other words, to prevent sinful man from returning to the west. Later Cain was driven to a land east of Eden, Genesis 4:16, away from God's presence. And throughout the Old Testament, we see an East/West arrangement of the tabernacle and the temple, an orientation that's attributed to the garden. It's also fascinating. East is always the direction of idolatry in the Old Testament. In Ezekiel eight verse 16, the Prophet says, then God "brought me into the inner corner of the Lord's house. And behold, at the entrance to the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about 25 men with their backs to the temple of the Lord and their faces toward the east; and they were prostrating themselves eastward toward the sun." He's describing idolatry there. And in Exodus 27 verses 13 through 16. We read how that the altar in the tabernacle and later in the temple was positioned to the east of the edifice. And the only entrance to the Holy of Holies, positioned in the most westward part, opened eastward. Meaning that the priest had to approach the holy of holies from the east, to the west, to enter into the Holy of Holies. And it's interesting that just as God stationed his cherubim in Eden to guard the eastern entrance, so too God's presence above the Ark of the Covenant was entered from the east. And the cherubim served as the guardians of his holy presence, the divine presence that hovered over the mercy seat between the outstretched wings of the cherubim. And each year on Yom Kippur, the high priest would move from the east outside the camp and move westwardly toward the Holy of Holies. For example, when he would enter the tabernacle, he would pass by the sacred objects like the menorah, that probably symbolized the tree of life. And finally, he would enter into the Holy of Holies to offer the blood of the sacrifice, to propitiate, or to satisfy, the wrath of God that originally drove man away from God outside of the garden. What we see there is a reversal of the exile from God, experienced by Adam, and through Adam to all mankind. And we know, as we think about Israel, only through the shedding of innocent blood in their sacrificial system that God initiated, which pointed to Christ; only then could the nation be reconciled to God. And only through faith in his shed blood, can we be reconciled to God and only through Christ. Can Israel eventually be restored and fulfillment of both the Abrahamic and the new covenants? And there are there are numerous other passages that we don't have time to look at here that are undeniable parallels between Eden and the earthly temple. But the point that I'm trying to make here, that I'm laboring to make on your behalf, is that the ineffable presence of God is something that should overwhelm us. And it was this very presence that would be manifested in the tabernacle, and later the temple. And we could spend hours studying all of the stipulations that God had gave to protect the sanctuary, to protect from ritual impurity.

And I fear that a lot of these concepts, especially with respect to the holiness of God, and the glory of God, have been lost in our culture, where we worship a weightless God, a God that winks at sin, that tolerates everything and anything. This has manifested many times in modern worship; that is typically irreverent, bereft of awe. If you notice, there's very little that is transcendent these days. There is very little that is dignified today. Today, even in churches, everything has to be casual and flippant, lacking in dignity. It's interesting, because you think about the holiness of God, illustrated even in the portable sanctuary. Israelites could enter the courtyard, but bear in mind, they could not enter the tent in the tabernacle. Ordinary priests were allowed to enter into the holy place, but only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies one time per year. And what's interesting is God's holiness was even manifested in the craftsmanship of the tabernacle, and in the items that were used. Again, I want to show you how serious God is about his holiness. The two outer courts were constructed mainly by bronze, but gold was used in the inner court. Even the curtains that covered the frame of the tent reflected degrees of holiness. The innermost layer was made of fine linen that was manufactured from a plant and considered to be the purest of material. And then the next layer was of goat's hair. And then the outer layer was made of animal skins; skins were associated with death and were therefore the least holy. As you study the Scriptures, you see that there were differing levels of uncleanness that required various kinds of ritual purifications after being defiled. What God was constantly communicating to his people and what has been lost in our culture today, even in evangelicalism, is we can no longer discern between what is clean and what is unclean. We can no longer discern what is holy, and what is common. T. Desmond Alexander, in an excellent book "Face to Face with God: A Biblical Theology of Christ as Priest and Mediator," wrote this, quote, "Those who enter the holy place must conform to a level of holiness that exceeds what is expected of others. Leviticus 10 provides a vivid illustration of the danger posed by approaching God inappropriately." He went on to add, "The world of the Israelites is transformed by God's continual presence among them, as they reflect on the regulations and rituals that accompanied the construction of the portable sanctuary. They quickly appreciate that holiness is associated with perfection, purity and wholeness, whereas uncleanness is linked to imperfection, impurity and incompleteness." He went on to add, "Since holiness and uncleanness are associated with perfection and imperfection, respectively, it follows that holy living demands perfect behavior. The moral standards are reflected in the covenant obligations that God places on the Israelites to underline their importance the principal obligations of the Sinai covenant which God speaks directly to the Israelites at Mount Sinai, are later inscribed by God on stone tablets, and placed within the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies. God expects the Israelites to obey Him and keep His covenant so that they may become a holy nation, Exodus 19."

Well, obviously, all these matters pertaining to God's holiness, were carried over into the temple. And yet dear friends, it was against this unimaginable purity, that Jesus comes into the temple and sees all of this wickedness. Bear in mind that Jesus was an observant Jew in his life, to offer himself as the promised consolation of Israel. Remember at his birth, Jesus was presented at the temple in Luke 2:21. He was circumcised on the eighth day, according to the law, his mother Mary's ritual "mikveh" immersion, was in obedience to the purification laws. Even his dedication was accompanied by prescribed sacrifices, according to what was said in the law of the Lord, we read about this in Luke 2:24, a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons, coming out of Leviticus 5:11. His family, according to Luke 2:39, performed everything according to the law of the Lord. And this continued as they made annual pilgrimages to the temple for Passover. Jesus even performed the Jewish mitzvah on his 12th year when he reached puberty, Luke 2:42. And we read how Jesus even spent several days after Passover in the synagogue, which was located within the temple precinct, sitting at the feet of the rabbis. So my point with all of this is to help you see that throughout his life, and throughout eternity, Jesus had a holy and high regard for the temple.

Even the apostle Paul was an observant Jew in connection with the laws of the temple and assisted fellow Jewish believers that had become Christians in performing their temple obligations. We read about this in Acts. Perhaps now you have a better understanding of Jesus's zeal for his father's house, and part of his messianic role was to align the functions of the temple to the will of God. But that cannot happen ultimately, until he returns in judgment when Israel repents, in brokenness, and in mournful acknowledgement of their sin, especially as relates to the rejection of their Messiah. Then Israel will be saved, and it will be restored. Only then according to Malachi, three four will quote, "the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years." In fact, Zechariah describes the glory of his future coronation ceremony in Zechariah, six beginning of verse 12, "'Behold a man whose name is Branch,'" which by the way, was a messianic title that Zechariah used in one of his earlier visions, "'Behold, a man whose name is Branch, for He will branch out from where He is, and He will build the temple of the Lord. Yes, it is He who will build the temple of the Lord and He will bear the honor and set and rule on His throne. Thus, He will be a priest on His throne and the counsel of peace will be between the two offices'"-- referring to the priest and the king that typically fought amongst one another, because he will be both priest and king.

So with all of this background, Jesus runs off the merchants, verse 17. And it says, "And He began to teach and say to them, 'is it not written, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations?'" For all the nations. We will see this ultimately in the millennial kingdom. You may recall in his dedicatory prayer for the temple, in First Kings eight, Solomon prayed in verse 41, and following, "'concerning the foreigner who is not of Your people, Israel, when he comes from a foreign country for Your namesake, (for they will hear of Your great name and Your mighty hand and of Your outstretched arm); when he comes and prays toward this house, hear in heaven, Your dwelling place, and do according to all for which the foreigner calls to You, in order that all the peoples of the earth may know Your name, to fear You, as do Your people Israel, and that they may know that this house which I have built is called by Your name.'"

We know that even Gentile proselytes worshipped at the temple. And many of them, like many of the Jews, were godly people. And how embarrassed godly Jews must have been, even in Jesus’ day to invite someone to church, so to speak, and to see all of this wickedness. You recall the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, who according to Acts 8:27, came to Jerusalem to worship. So again, he begins to teach. And at the end of verse 17, he says, "'But you have made it a robber’s den.'"

And then in conclusion, "The chief priests and the scribes heard this, and began seeking to destroy Him." Naturally, right? They were being exposed. You know, lies, demand tolerance. But truth welcomes scrutiny. And we read that "they were afraid of Him, for the whole crowd was astonished at His teaching. When evening came, they would go out of the city." In other words, they would return back to Bethany. "And as they were passing by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered from its roots. Being reminded, Peter said to Him, 'Rabbi look, the fig tree which You cursed, has withered.'" So indeed, there will be no harvest in that temple. And that temple even would soon be destroyed. O, dear friends, the power of Christ, to both bless as well as to curse. May I challenge you to examine your heart with respect to your own attitude towards worshiping the Lord? Is it a pretense? Is it merely Sunday in the South? Or is it a genuine expression of your love for God, and your passion to live for his glory, that your life would redound to his glory, that others would see Christ in you. If that is not the case and it's a mere pretense, I would plead with you to repent of that wickedness, lest God judges you severely. And if your worship is indeed as it should be, know this, it will not be something that only happens on Sunday morning. Sunday morning will merely be the ultimate expression of what you've been experiencing all week long. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that exposes each one of us. My how easy it is for us to play the hypocrite. Forgive us, wherever we do that. And give us a zeal for your glory, a passion for your holiness. And we know that that can only come by the power of your Spirit working in us through the use of your Word, and the fellowship of your people. So we commit that to you. And Father, for those that do not know you, perhaps those who are Christian in name only. I pray that your convicting work will be powerful, even this day, that they too might come to a place of genuine repentance and enjoy the miracle of the new birth. For it's in Christ's name that I pray. Amen.

Would you take your bibles and turn to Mark's gospel. We are returning once again to our verse-by-verse study of the gospel of Mark; and we are in Mark 11. And in a few minutes, we will look at verses one through 14. And actually, this is, and I'm somewhat embarrassed to say this, the second part of the Royal Entrance and False Coronation, that I preached on, I think, September 24. So we've had a little bit of a break there. I will review some of part one so that you get the connection, Lord willing. But before we look at it, may I just say, it is such a privilege to be able to come together and study truth in this age of deception. I'm sure you're like me, you just get so tired of being gaslighted, right? Of seeing one thing and having somebody tell me that that's not what you're seeing; to be constantly lied to. And so to have the word of God, and to be able to look at it, to read it, to study it; and to experience the Spirit wrought change that it produces in our heart, is something that we should never lose the wonder of.

I was thinking this week, we're all very familiar with the things going on in Israel. I just finished a four-part series on that, and we see the wickedness of the false religion of Islam and the types of things it can produce. And certainly, we are also experiencing in our culture, one of the most deadly destructive false religions that that I've seen in a long time, and it's basically the woke cult of Cultural Marxism. With its diversity, equity and inclusion, its social justice deceptions, is one of the deadliest false religions Satan has ever devised. A fanatical system that demands complete devotion and demonic religion, preparing the world for the rule of the Antichrist. And as you think about it, one of the things we must do, as we come together as believers is understand how Satan works. We're warned to be aware of the schemes of the devil. And certainly, this particular cult is invading our country and many others around the world. From kindergarten to 12th grade, from our universities to big tech; big business, journalism, science, entertainment, government, military-- the woke lunacy has successfully taken over every institution that can transmit their immoral and tyrannical agenda. Every institution except two. Every institution except the two that God has ordained: Christian marriage and the church. And it is not able to take over Christian marriage and the church, though they are trying with every breath. And what we are doing today is one of the primary reasons why they will not take over Christian marriage and the church. We belong to Christ. And we will continue to thrive regardless of the persecution because we are submitting ourselves to the most powerful, supernatural weapon in the universe. And that is the Word of the living God.

In Second Corinthians 10, verse three and following the Apostle Paul reminds us, "For though we walk in the flesh"--in other words, though we have human limitations--"we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses." And certainly, there he's speaking of our weaponry of the word and prayer. He goes on to say, "We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ." And beloved, that must be our motivation, yet again this morning, as we come together and submit ourselves to the teaching of the Word of God.

Now with that, let me read our text in Mark 11. Actually, I'm going to go through verse 11. So Mark 11, beginning in verse one through verse 11. "As they approached Jerusalem at Bethpage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, He sent two of His disciples, and said to them, 'Go into the village opposite you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, on which no one yet has ever sat; untie it and bring it here. If anyone says to you, 'Why are you doing this?' you say, 'The Lord has need of it'; and immediately he will send it back here.'" They went away and found a colt tied at the door, outside in the street; and they untied it. Some of the bystanders were saying to them, 'What are you doing, untying the colt?' They spoke to them, just as Jesus had told them, and they gave them permission. They brought the colt to Jesus and put their coats on it; and He sat on it. And many spread their coats in the road, and others spread leafy branches which they had cut from the fields. Those who went in front and those who followed were shouting: 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; blessed is the coming kingdom of our father, David; Hosanna! in the highest!' Jesus entered Jerusalem and came into the temple; and after looking around at everything, He left for Bethany, with the twelve, since it was already late."

This is an amazing passage that has astounding theological significance, historical significance; especially as it relates to the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. By way of review, in everything that Jesus did up to this point, as recorded in the gospels, was orchestrated to reach a high point on the day of what is commonly called the triumphal entry. Remember, he has raised Lazarus from the dead, that got enormous attention. He encountered then the rich young ruler, he gave sight to two blind men in Jericho. We see the conversion of Zacchaeus, the rich tax collector. And then he gives his parable in Luke 19, concerning a nobleman--referring to Christ--who travels to a distant country--referring to Heaven--to receive a kingdom; in other words, to receive official authority to reign and then he returns to rule over his kingdom. Then we read about Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem, over the tragedy that the Israelites could not see; that this was the time that the things that would make for peace, as Jesus said, and now he says that they will be hidden from your eyes, and therefore the earthly kingdom that they longed for would be postponed for a future time. Even his time of arrival in Jerusalem, was precisely the date promised by Daniel in Daniel 9:25. A prophecy given over 600 years earlier. Even his mount, a colt; the foal of a donkey was consistent with Zechariah's prophecy in Zechariah nine and verse nine; a prophecy given a few years later, probably around 550 or so BC. So everything that Jesus did, pointed to the day of his messianic presentation foretold by the Old Testament prophets. Prophets that predicted the manner, the moment and even the meaning of the king’s final offer to Israel, for indeed he came to present himself to Israel as the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy.

Following his entry, as we're going to see later, he will speak a new series of parables about the kingdom. He will do battle with, one last time, with the religious elite, and then state his last lament over the city. And then he will give his last and his longest eschatological discourse concerning the prophetic program of the end of the age, including the parenthesis of time and events which must intervene between his departure and his return again as King of kings. There in His Olivet Discourse, in preparation for that interregnum, he will emphasize two main events. Number one, God's judgment on Israel, especially in Jerusalem, involving the destruction of the temple. And also secondly, the glorious return of Christ to finally consummate the age and establish his earthly kingdom.

So, in our text this morning, we can see God's kingdom program and how this fits in to where he is going. This is the certain hope of the redeemed. The Messianic kingdom of our Lord will be a glorious metamorphosis one day that will merge the old world under the rule of the Antichrist into the radically new world under the rule of Christ; a renovated, a reconstituted earth that will exist under new and perfect conditions. And then, may I remind you that when death is finally defeated--death being the last enemy--the mediatorial kingdom will merge into the universal kingdom. As Alva J. MClain said, quote, "The mediatorial kingdom of our Lord will constitute the glorious consummating era of the first order of things and will serve as the divine bridge between the temporal order and the eternal order." End quote. And Paul spoke of this in First Corinthians 15, beginning of verse 24. "...then comes the end, when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when he has abolished all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy that will be abolished is death." And then in verse 28, "When all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all." What a glorious promise. The mediatorial kingdom will no longer exist as a separate entity from the universal kingdom of God, but rather as an everlasting part of it. But may I remind you that even after the millennial kingdom, the Lord is going to continue to reign, but not on a separate throne, not a messianic throne, and the other, the Father's throne. Instead, the two will reign together in perfect unity. We read of this, Revelation three verse 21, "'He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne." So there's a little bit of an overview of where all of this is ultimately going, hitting some of the highlights of eschatology.

Now, let's return to the historical record here of our Lord's royal entrance and false coronation. Again, this is an official offer that had to be made to the nation, as a whole, to determine their final decision. As we read in Scripture, this was the time of Israel's final visitation to receive their king. But because they will ultimately reject their Messiah, the kingdom is going to be temporarily withdrawn and postponed on Earth awaiting a day, yet future, when he returns. Now, before I get into the weeds here of some of this text that is really fascinating, I want to answer a question that someone posed, and it's a fair question. How could Jesus offer kingdom blessings to these people? How could that be a genuine offer when he knew that they were going to reject it? Well, first of all, a holy God cannot lie. And so he would never say something to trick people or to deceive them, nor would he ever need to do so. First Peter two verse 22, we read that Christ, "committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth." So it wasn't like he was trying to trick them or deceive them in any way. Moreover, the kingdom blessings of the Abrahamic covenant were always conditioned upon Israel's national repentance and belief, something that only God could almost ultimately accomplish in them through the regenerating work of the Spirit of God. For example, in Leviticus 26, beginning in verse 40. We read, "If they confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their forefathers, in their unfaithfulness which they committed against Me, and also in their acting with hostility against Me--I was also acting with hostility against them, to bring them into the land of their enemies--or," he goes on to say, "if their uncircumcised heart becomes humbled so that they then make amends for their iniquity, then I will remember My covenant with Jacob, and I will remember also My covenant with Isaac and My covenant with Abraham as well, and I will remember the land."

So of course, Jesus' kingdom offer to Israel was genuine, even though he knew they would reject it. I mean, think about it--is God's offer of salvation and eternal life disingenuous when it is presented to those he knows will reject it? Of course not. In Genesis two, you will recall that God offered Adam life if he obeyed by not eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. But death if he disobeyed, which he did. And God in his sovereignty and omniscience, knew that he would. I might even add that the necessity of Christ's saving work on the cross was decreed in eternity past. So it's not like if Adam hadn't have sinned, then Christ would have never gone to the cross. So again, God's sovereign plan even involved Adam sin; he knew that that would happen, and yet Adam had a real choice. So again, God's offer of salvation was genuine.

If I can give you another example, it was God's plan all along for David to be the one through whom the Messiah would come and the eternal dynasty over Israel ultimately exist. And yet, in First Samuel 13, verses 13 through 14, we read that God would have given Saul a permanent kingdom over Israel if he had obeyed; a genuine offer. But Saul disobeyed. And yet that did not mean that God's offer was disingenuous. So again, Christ's entrance into Jerusalem was a genuine, official and final, offer to the nation as a whole, to determine their final decision.

Now, something else is important as we approach this text, and I want you to get your mind wrapped around the scene here. Those of you that have been to Israel, you can kind of see in your mind's eye where the Lord would have been, you must understand that the Lord Jesus Christ did not enter his city with joy. But he did so with immense sorrow, with tears running down his cheeks. In Luke 19 verse 41, and following, we read about this. "And when He approached, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, 'If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes. For the day shall come upon you, when your enemies will throw up a barricade before you and surround you and hem you in on every side, and will level you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.'" And of course, that happened literally a few years later, on April 9th 70, AD. Titus laid siege, actually in the summer, he slowly starved the inhabitants. And the Romans systematically slaughtered all of them, attacking one part of the city at a time. By the way, many of the people that heard Jesus and were there at the triumphal entry, endured that and died there. They utterly destroyed the temple. And they took many captives to Rome to be mocked and butchered in the Roman circus and gladiatorial bouts.

So with all that background, now we come to Mark 11 verse one, "As they approached Jerusalem at Bethpage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives." Let's pause here. Remember now multitudes, literally 1000s of people are with Jesus, following him from Jericho. They're going to the Passover and many others from Bethpage, which was a small village close to Bethany, which was the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus where he had been. John 12, beginning of verse one, we read that Jesus visited them six days before the Passover. No doubt he wanted to find comfort in fellowship, to find strength in fellowship, knowing that he was about to be the Passover lamb that would be slain. And again, this now is Passover. 1000s of Jewish faithful are making their annual pilgrimage. In fact, census records of that era 10 years later, tells us that there were 2.6 million worshipers with 260,000 lambs that were slaughtered, which would be a minimum, one for every 10 people. And there's every reason to believe that there was more than that, there on that day when Jesus came. So that's the scene here.

"As they approach Jerusalem, at Bethpage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, He sent two of His disciples and said to them, 'Go into the village opposite you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, on which no one yet has ever sat; untie it and bring it here.'" Dear friends, such foreknowledge and omniscience is yet another illustration of the deity of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse three, 'If anyone says to you, 'Why are you doing this?' you say, 'The Lord has need of it'; and immediately he will send it back here.' They went away and found a colt tied at the door, outside the street; and they untied it. Some of the bystanders were saying to them, 'What are you doing, untying the colt?' And they spoke to them, just as Jesus had told them, and they gave them permission. They brought the colt to Jesus and put their coats on it; and He sat on it. And many spread their coats in the road and others spread leafy branches, which they had cut from the fields."

Now, I have preached on this before, some of you will remember what I'm about to say, but it's important for you to see something that's going on here. First of all, you've got two donkeys, you've got a mare, and a colt; they would have probably been the same size. Mark and Luke also tell us very specifically that no one has ever sat upon the coat. Now, why is this significant? Being raised with horses, and having worked with training horses, I can tell you that it would be an absolute miracle for someone, for anyone, to sit on a coal that has never been ridden. You would hope that there'd be some real soft ground around there because you're going to be on it in just a moment. It's interesting, in Genesis nine, God warned Noah of a drastic change that was going to take place that he would experience with the animals on the ark. He said in verse two, and "'The fear of you and the terror of you shall be on every beast of the earth.'" And certainly, that is what happened when the animals got off; it's part of the curse, we see that to this day. All creatures are terrified of man. And you must understand that donkeys are herbivores. They're also highly intelligent. But herbivores are naturally afraid of carnivores. I am a carnivore, I love meat. You are carnivores, too. We can eat some of the other stuff, but we especially like meat. Now, another thing that's interesting, if you know anything about donkeys, is they have excellent eyesight, and excellent hearing abilities. And they are able to smell things highly developed sense of smell. They're quick to spot predators. And you've probably heard them when they do they sound ridiculous with their baying. We've got five of them that live 500 yards from us. And every time a coyote or anything gets near, you'll hear that ridiculous sound. And that's why you see, by the way, many people around here and they're in their fields with their cattle, they'll have a couple of donkeys because the donkeys are able to protect them from wild dogs, coyotes. They've even been known to kill mountain lions. So these are serious little fellas but they're also; they also have an issue, because they are so sensitive to predators. They have a very difficult time trusting human beings; they live in constant fear because of the curse. Now you think about all of this with what the text says, you know, try putting a human garment, that to a horse or a donkey smells like a carnivore, try putting that--just put the garment on them, I mean, that's where you're gonna have to start and watch what they will do. And then try riding that young male donkey, who thinks all of a sudden, he's on the menu for dinner. A donkey that's never been ridden. And then let's add to that, let's take all of these carnivore's robes, garments, and let's put them on the road and ask him to walk on them. And let's even add to that, all kinds of these palm leaves. And to make it really interesting, let's have 1000s of people stand next to him, and scream and shout and wave palm branches. Folks, I can tell you that even a highly trained crowd control police horse would freak out with all of that. But obviously, the creator calmed his little creature down and was able to mount him and to ride him. I believe dear friends, what we see here is a foretaste of millennial blessing. That promised time of restoration and regeneration, both physically and spiritually when the King returns in all of his glory, for example, Isaiah 11, beginning in verse six gives us a glimpse of that. It will be a time when, "the wolf will dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young ones shall lie down together and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play by the cobra's hole, and the weaned child shall put his hand in the viper's den." You see, this will be a time of national restoration for Israel. This will be the time of the kingdom age the disciples and multitudes were longing for. This is why they were shouting "Hosanna!" thinking that Jesus now is going to inaugurate this kingdom. That glorious time when all of the redeemed will reign with Jesus, the Anointed One, as Daniel prophesied. In Daniel seven verse 27, "'Then the sovereignty, the dominion and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the people of the saints of the Highest One; His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom, and all the dominions will serve and obey Him.'"

So Beloved, I believe that hidden here, in this amazing scenario, is an example of the power of Jesus to miraculously cancel the effects of the curse in this young donkey that had never been ridden. And this was a subtle affirmation that he is saying, in essence, yes, I am the Almighty, I am the creator. I am the promised Messiah, the one who will one day accomplish all that I have promised. The pristine happiness and peace of Eden in the time of the regeneration, a time of tranquility that's even evidenced here, in this little scenario with the donkey.

And he goes on verse eight again, "And many spread their coats in the road, and others spread leafy branches which they had cut from the fields." By the way, throwing your garments on the road was an ancient custom whereby king's subjects would do this as a demonstration of their utter submission to the lordship of their ruler. And palm branches, in that day, and biblically, are always symbolic of the joy of salvation. So imagine the scene, this enormous multitude, that's in front of Jesus, and behind Jesus, and they're shouting, verse nine, "Hosanna!" to the Son of David. "Hosanna" means "save now", son of David. An exclamation of both supplication, as well as adoration. "Blessed it is he who comes in the name of the Lord." And there is a quotation from Psalm 118 and verse six; part of six Psalms known as the Hallel. "Hallel, meaning "praise." And these psalms were sung at Passover, celebrating their deliverance from Egypt.

So they're thinking in their mind, here's Jesus now, and he's going to save us from Rome; not save us from our sins so we can become fit citizens to enter into the kingdom, but to save us from Rome. Here's the great miracle worker, the one that has fed 1000s; that has cast out demons, healed the sick. Here's the one who has given sight to the blind, even raised the dead. Surely this is the one who will now deliver us from Roman bondage. Surely this is the one now that will meet all of our physical needs, bringing the long-awaited kingdom. You know, as you think about this, it's like many people today who believe in a fabricated Jesus for the wrong reasons. People that are more concerned about temporal blessings than eternal blessings; they have no thought of eternity. And certainly these people, ancient Jewish people, felt like they were good to go for the kingdom. After all, they're sons of Abraham, they keep the law, etcetera, etcetera. They had no conviction of personal sin. No understanding that because of sin, they're separated from a holy God, and that they were in desperate need of being reconciled, and the only one that could reconcile them would be the Lord Jesus Christ. They didn't understand that. People today don't understand that. People today like people then, are looking for what they believe would be a well-deserved utopia.

In fact, the people shouting here in the first century were kind of like, I guess you could say, the original entitlement generation. But like most people today, they did not bow down and worship the Lord Jesus Christ. And I shudder to think of the eternal judgment that awaits. Those people even today, the god mocking politicians and professors of our day, that promote all of the blasphemous deceptions that are part of our culture, intersectionality and radical feminism, the critical race theory. Oh, how these people need the gospel, dear friends. How they need the gospel and how we should love them for the sake of the gospel and give them the gospel. Let them see the gospel in our lives. The social justice warriors, Black Lives Matter, anarchists, prosperity preachers. The ayatollahs and every other religious phony that mocks Christ. Vile men and women who prey upon desperate, and yet depraved souls, concerned only with the things of this world. And so many people go to church looking for a Jesus that's going to somehow meet all of those physical earthly needs with no thought of who he really is. And no thought of the desperate need that they have to be saved by his grace.

Verse nine, "Those who went in front and those who were following, were shouting: 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; blessed is the coming kingdom of our father, David; Hosanna, in the highest!'" And yet again, they failed to understand that Jesus did not come the first time to be crowned, but to be crucified; to be an atonement for sin, that people who believe in Him could be reconciled to a holy God because of his imputed righteousness, because we have none of our own. And tragically, they failed to make the connection even with Zechariah nine and verse nine where we read "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; he is just in having salvation; lowly, and riding on a donkey; a colt, the foal of a donkey."

They fail to understand that even their religious leaders In Israel--the scribes and the Pharisees, the Sadducees-- even those people had fabricated a deliverer of their own making. One that bore no resemblance to who Christ really was. And that's why they hated him. And certainly they did not know as they're shouting "Hosanna" that Jesus had initiated all of this as a judgment against them, causing them to affirm his messianic credentials. With full throat exuberance, crying out "Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest!" And yet by the end of the week, they will say we will not have this man reign over us, "Crucify Him." Sadly, many today do the same thing.

I want you to notice the first thing that Jesus did when he entered Jerusalem. Very important, verse 11, "Jesus entered Jerusalem, and came into the temple." You see, this was his priority. This was his destination. And then we read, "and after looking around at everything, he left for Bethany with the 12, since it was already late." So he, I guess you could say, is reconnoitering the temple. He comes, he sees what's there. Of course, he already knew. But he looks at it. And all of this sets the stage for what's going to happen the next day when he assaults the temple and occupies its precincts.

Let me give you a little preview of where this is going to take us as I wrap this up this morning. What Jesus saw was disgusting. What Jesus saw, was blasphemous. Later in verse 17, we read "'Is it not written, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations'? But you have made it a robbers' den.'" You see, it had become a place where phony religious leaders and their merchant associates would exploit worshippers by charging exorbitant fees for sacrificial animals. And to make it even worse, they would charge exorbitant fees to exchange their foreign currency. So they had a real racket going on. And you see, the temple was supposed to be a place of sanctity and worship. Why? Because God's presence was to be manifested there. This was his father's house. This was always the heart of Israelite worship. It was instituted by God. The temple was the place where his word was taught. And his infinite perfections were manifested, and exalted. But hypocrites and greedy con artists had taken over its precincts and its teachings. You know, Jesus saw this even at the beginning of his earthly ministry. Remember in John two, verses 13 through 16, we read that for at least a day he physically occupied the precincts of the temple grounds, and he evicted the corrupt merchants from the temple courts. And you must understand that all of this is a graphic picture of Israel's apostasy and her need to repent, which Jesus preached throughout his ministry. His message was always one of genuine worship. But that could only work through repented faith in the person in the work of Christ.

Here I'm reminded of what happened, even at the onset of Christ's ministry. You remember, in Matthew four, verse one we read, that he was "led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil," remember that? And that was the same place where Israel was tempted and tested and failed. But where Christ now the Messiah succeeds. And then next in Matthew four beginning of verse five, we read this, "Then the devil took Him into the holy city, and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, 'If you are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written, 'He will command His angels concerning you.' and 'On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.'" Think about this, why would Satan take Jesus to the temple? The answer is simple. Because that's where the presence of his father existed. It was sacred, it was precious to him. And what father would only let his son perish. That's Satan's whole goal in that scene. But if Jesus had cast himself into his father's protective care, he would have exploited the privilege of his sonship that he had set aside in his humiliation. Moreover, he would have acted independently from the will of his Father. And thus forfeited his status as the spotless Lamb of God, and thus violate the plan of God. My point with this little illustration is to simply underscore how precious the temple was and is to Jesus. Satan understood that. Satan knew how Jesus' great love for his father would be a powerful influence on him. And how the most precious place on earth to be near that protective love would be the temple. In fact, I find it interesting. Jesus first recorded words in the Gospel were in response to his parent's question concerning his continued presence in the temple, Luke 2:49. They're looking for him and he says to them, "'Why is it that you were looking for me? Did you not know that I had to be in My Father's house."' And it's no wonder why Jesus disciples reacted the way they did when Jesus ran the money changers out of the temple the first time at the beginning of his ministry. In John 2:15, we read, "His disciples remembered that is it is written, 'Zeal for your house will consume me.'" Oh, dear friends, would that we share his zeal for genuine worship? A genuine love for the truth.

Now, while the temple was the centerpiece of Israel's worship, where God's people went to worship Him, through the mediation of a priest, the church is now described as the temple of God in the New Testament. Jesus is the builder. The apostle Paul uses temple imagery to depict believers both independently as well as corporately. We read how the church is a spiritual edifice, the abode of the Holy Spirit. In fact, in First Timothy 3:15, we read that it is, "the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and the support of the truth." And in the New Testament, we read how we are living stones in God's temple. We offer spiritual sacrifices, right? But sadly, many in the church today are like the first century Israelites who praise Jesus for what they believe he can do for them on Earth; for they have no understanding, no desire to worship the Father in spirit and in truth in the church. And sadly, many churches cater to this. They become centers for entertainment, promoters of superficial, even false worship; are a place where entrepreneurs that disguise themselves as pastors can make millions of dollars. And, folks, we've got to all guard ourselves against this personally, as well as corporately. But I want you to remember that during the Tribulation, another temple is going to be built. A third temple and it will be desecrated by the Antichrist; you read about this in Christ's Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24. You also read about it in a Second Thessalonians two. And then after that, when the Lord returns, a fourth temple will be built by the Lord Himself, in the millennial kingdom. You read about that, for example, in Ezekiel chapter 43. In fact, Jesus actions, as we're going to see, in cleansing the temple, were really an initial fulfillment of Messiah, purifying the religious worship of his people. Malachi speaks of this at the end of the Old Testament, talking about when the Lord returns in Malachi three, beginning in verse one, "'Behold, I am going to send My messenger and he will clear the way before Me'"--referring to John the Baptist. "'And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant, in whom you delight, behold, He is coming,' says the Lord of hosts. 'But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap. He will sit as a smelter and purifier of silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, so that they may present to the Lord offerings in righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years.'" Oh, what a glorious day that will be. As the Prophet said, a day when "the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." My how I long for that day. To get out of all of this corruption and filth and deception, and immorality, and chaos and violence.

And then finally, when the messianic kingdom comes to an end, at the conclusion of that 1000 year reign, we read in the Bible prophecies that Satan will be released from the abyss. And he will lead a final rebellion against Christ in the holy city of Jerusalem. We read how God will then destroy the rebels with fire from heaven, and Satan will be cast into the lake of fire forever, Revelation 20. And then we read how God will uncreate the universe, a complete annihilation, Second, Peter 3:10, for example. There we read, "the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat and the earth and its works will be burned up." In verse 13, he goes on to say, "But according to His promise, we are looking for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells." In fact, Jesus said in Matthew 24, verse 35, "'Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.'" And then we read how a new Jerusalem will come. It'll be the capital city of the new earth, Revelation 21 and verse two; imagine that scene. But there will be no temple in the eternal state, no more temple. Revelation 21, beginning in verse 22, the Apostle says, "I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the Lamb." It's as if we will be living in the Holy of Holies.

Well, may I challenge each of you to worship the Lord Jesus Christ for who he truly is. He is the Messiah King. He is the Savior of all who trust in Him. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords, who will return as he has promised, who will judge the nation's and judge all who mock him, who ignore him, who live as if he does not exist. Would to God that you not be amongst those. For one day, you will stand before him, either in triumph or in terror, but your knee will bow, as will mine. Every knee will bow, every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. Because he is Lord, dear friends, we must bow before him every day of our life we should worship him. And our worship includes our love for him, our love for others even the lost; our love for his Word, our desire to have intimate communion and fellowship with him in the secret devotion of prayer. We should praise him, offer him our gratitude, our obedience, or service. We should hunger and we should thirst for righteousness because one day we will see Him face to face. And I long for that day. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. Thank you that we can worship you, truly, in spirit and in truth. Thank you that we know who Jesus really is. Not because we're so smart, or we're so good. For none of those things are true. But we know these things because of the Spirit wrought regeneration within our souls. Because by your grace, you gave us eyes to see. And you have given us your word, and your spirit that illuminates your words so that we can understand it, and we can apply it to our lives. So for this, we are eternally grateful. And we long for our Lord to come and to take us away. But until he does, may we be found faithful and serving him. We ask all of this in the precious name of Jesus, our Savior and for his sake. Amen.

We come now to the fourth and final discourse on Israel and Bible prophecy. I know some of you would like for me to continue this on and on, and I will assure you that from time to time I will add things, but I think it would be appropriate to wrap this up today. We will be looking in a few minutes primarily in Revelation chapter 11. But I've got a number of other passages that we will look at before we get there.

By way of introduction, I've noticed on the news even this week, how people are constantly asking the question, why such global, perennial, antisemitism? What on earth is causing this? And nobody really has an answer. Why are there so many brainwashed fools on Tik Tok siding with Osama bin Laden? How can that possibly be? Why such hatred, of according to the Guinness Book of Records, the oldest minority in the world? According to the Pew Research Center, there are 14 million Jews around the world and they represent 0.2% of the global population. Why such hatred of these people? And how did the Jewish Phoenix spread its wings and rise out of the ashes of the Holocaust to become one of the most prosperous and powerful nations on the planet? How can that be, despite overwhelming odds against them? And of course, the big one is, so what's the solution for all of this? Is this really a land dispute? A two-state solution will solve it all? Nobody could be that naive, and yet some are. But to be sure, there is no consensus. There is no compelling explanation or answer.

And then the final question that really nobody's asking, except they will think it in their mind is simply this, what will the future of Israel be? Well, given the last three discourses that came from this pulpit, hopefully you will be able to answer all of those questions from a biblical, theological and prophetic perspective that you will be able to explain in general, where the world is heading, including Israel. The outline that I gave you really has five parts. We look number one it God's choice of Israel. Secondly, Satan's hatred of Israel. Thirdly, God's judgment on Israel. Fourthly, God's protection of Israel. And now today we're going to look at God's salvation, and restoration of Israel.

And of course, all of this is consistent with the promises that God gave to his covenant people Israel, through Abraham, through Isaac, Jacob, through David and certainly the terms of the New Covenant. In fact, God promised their eventual salvation and restoration. To Moses in Deuteronomy four, beginning in verse 30, "When you are in distress and all these things have come upon you, in the latter days you will return to the Lord your God and listen to His voice. For the Lord your God is a compassionate God; He will not fail you nor destroy you, nor forget the covenant with your fathers which He swore to them." And again, through the prophet Ezekiel, God heralds a future spiritual regeneration for Israel when they are gathered from among the nations. Ezekiel 36, beginning in verse 24, "'For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes and you will be careful to observe My ordinances. You will live in the land that I gave to your forefathers; so you will be My people and I will be your God.’” Likewise through the prophet Ezekiel, in chapter 37, beginning in verse 21, "'"Thus says the Lord God, 'Behold, I will take the sons of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and I will gather them from every side and bring them into their own land.'"'" And then in verse 23, "'They will no longer defile themselves with their idols, or with their detestable things, or with any of their transgressions; but I will deliver them from all their dwelling places in which they have sinned, and will cleanse them. And they will be My people and I will be their God.'"

Now, let me take you back to last week. And by the way, if you haven't been with us in the three previous discourses, some of this may be foreign to you. So I would encourage you to go back and to listen to those and that way you will be able to get caught up. But I want to go back to the discussion about God's pre- kingdom judgments, and God's protection of Israel, which is ultimately going to lead to the final point in our little outline that we'll look at today, with respect to God's salvation and restoration of Israel. As I said before, I believe that it's possible that the battle of Gog and Magog could be fought prior to the tribulation. I favor this view, but no one can be certain of its timing. But certainly we know it's going to happen. And this, plus the rapture of the church, will thrust the world into absolute chaos. That will bring in the first Seal Judgment that we read in Revelation six, the Antichrist will arise at that point, and he will make a covenant with Israel, a peace treaty, he will be a leader that will arise out of that vacuum of leadership in the world. And at that point, the Muslim nations will be left virtually without political clout. And this will allow the Jews to rebuild the third temple, something that they're terrified to do now. And what's fascinating, as we think about how God is going to save a very unregenerate Israel, and restore them, what we see is that immediately upon the removal of the saints, in that great snatching away, God is going to raise up two witnesses in Jerusalem, to preach the gospel. And we were going to see this in Revelation 11 in a moment. In fact, Paul tells us in Second Thessalonians, two and verse seven, "he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way." "He who now restrains," meaning he who prevents the Antichrist from functioning, will do so until "he," I believe referring to the Holy Spirit is taken out of the way. And may I remind you, that God will always provide for himself a witness somewhere on Earth, even as he did in the days of Noah.

So God will raise up two witnesses in Jerusalem immediately after the rapture of the church, and their preaching will obviously be sound theology, that will be the model for, according to Revelation seven, for the "144,000 seal from every tribe of the sons of Israel." So there's going to be the greatest evangelistic campaign in the history of the world during that time. And all of these 144,000, along with the two witnesses, will be proclaiming the gospel. And they are going to teach obviously the gospel, the finished work of Christ and the absolute necessity of the infinite and eternal efficacy of his shed blood for spiritual salvation. At that time, they will remind the Jews that Moses, and all of the prophets, taught that salvation is always a matter of the heart, and cannot be obtained through the blood of bulls and goats. And they will explain how the New Covenant principles actually existed even before the Old Covenant fulfilled its temporary purpose. But they will also remind them that the new covenant will include, as we read in Scripture, a holy place in Jerusalem. An altar for animal sacrifices; a Zadokian priesthood and a Melchizedekian high priest; you read this in Ezekiel 40, through 48. And so we know that the Jews during the time of the tribulation, the pre kingdom judgments, also known as Daniel's 70th week, will build a Third Temple. And at that point, they will reinstitute legitimate sacrifices on a Jerusalem altar, as a memorial of what Christ has done, as well as an outward corporate purification, a sanctification, ceremonial sanctification, as was the case in the Old Testament Levitical system. But that will not--the temple that they will build that the Antichrist will desecrate--will not be the fourth and final temple, the millennial temple that will be built when the Lord returns.

But the Antichrist now is going to allow all of this as part of the peace covenant with Israel. And according to Daniel 9:27, we read that, "in the middle of the week," that's a week of seven years, "he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering." And he will kill the two witnesses that that are proclaiming the gospel, and he will claim to be God, this is the abomination of desolations, which brings Jesus warning in Matthew 24:16, "'Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.'"

Now more on these two witnesses, and here we come to Revelation 11. And again, this is to help you have a little better understanding of God's promise to save and restore Israel. And I might offer a word of caution here. I mean, whenever we come to the prophetic literature, it's important to have a hermeneutic that honors the authorial intent, and the context and the language of the passage. So therefore, we want to embrace just the normal meaning of language and avoid the temptation to try to reinterpret or redefine or spiritualize the kingdom message. I have a great aversion to those, many that I love and respect, who would say, "Well, I know that's what God said, but that can't be what he meant, so let me tell you what he meant." A literal interpretation, consistent with the original message, and intent of the Old Testament authors will demonstrate that the New Testament does not transform, or somehow transcend the Old Testament storyline, but rather, it is a continuation of it. It all fits together. And we want to be very careful because to somehow reinterpret the plain meaning of an unambiguous text will inevitably do violence to the plain meaning of that text. And so as we approach these passages with that type of a hermeneutic, we will also see that Daniel's 70th week, and the millennial kingdom, is distinctively Jewish, pertaining to Israel, not to the church. Even the many components of the Old Testament Sabbath will be reinstituted. And this will continue into Messiah's reign. You see, the removal of the church will set into motion, the consummation, and the culmination of Israel, not the church. The church has been taken out and the Israelite components of the new covenant will produce the perfect blending of heart regeneration unto eternal life along with the distinctive Israelite theocratic functions that God has promised. And of course, this is going to be very foreign to us. Because when we think of worship, we think of the church and how we do worship here. But it's going to be radically different in the millennial kingdom. So you must bear in mind that what God does with Israel in the theocratic kingdom, will have unique purposes, I should say, within Israel. Moreover, as we will see, this will be God's way of taking the, quote, "natural branches” of Romans 11, referring to Israel, and the ones that were broken off during the church age and grafting them back into the tree of Abrahamic blessing.

So with that background, that introduction, we come to Revelation 11. These two witnesses, I'm going to hit kind of the highlights here, the first two verses, we see that the Jews were measured, or marked off, as belonging to God, and those whom He will preserve and protect during the final 42 months, or three and a half years of the tribulation. While the Gentiles, whom he does not claim, as his own will, quote, "tread underfoot the holy city." And they will do that under the leadership of the Antichrist. But then what we see is God raising up these two preachers with supernatural powers, who will be able to counter the prophetic signs and wonders of the False Prophet. And you can read about those particularly in Revelation 13, verses 11 and following. And the goal of his campaign, obviously, is to deify the Antichrist. Now, since the Antichrist is the final ruler, in the, quote, "times of the Gentiles," he will be ruling over a revived Roman Empire group of European nations. And this whole scene is going to, frankly recapitulate the vile symbiotic relationship between Satan and the ancient Gentile rulers that we've seen down through recorded history, along with their puppet priests and prophets that serve them to accomplish all of their nefarious purposes.

As a footnote, because I know some of you are going to ask, and I won't get into all of it, but I believe there's compelling evidence that the Antichrist will be a Gentile, and the false prophet will be a Jew, not a Gentile. But even as the ancient rulers of Rome, once controlled the masses, both politically and religiously, once again, Satan will continue this strategy under the rule of the Antichrist and the False Prophet. So the Lord raises up these two witnesses, of his saving grace, as well as of his escalating wrath. And these two powerful creatures will become a thorn in the flesh to the Antichrist and the False Prophet. So I want to look at verses three through 14, here under three categories, we're going to see their magnificent ministry, their morbid death, and finally their miraculous resurrection.

So first of all, let's look at their magnificent ministry, verse three, "'And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1260 days, clothed in sackcloth.'" You know, it is fitting for God to offset the false signs and wonders of the antichrist and the false prophets, so God raises these men up. And you have to remember as well that biblically, a testimony must be validated by two witnesses. And here "witnesses" is the plural of "martys;" we get our English word "martyr" from this. And indeed they will be martyred for their testimony, and we read that, "they will prophesy." Prophesy means "to preach" or "to proclaim, to speak forth." You must understand that New Testament prophesying is forth telling, not foretelling. And these two witnesses will proclaim the gospel, they're going to warn about further judgment coming out upon the earth; they're going to warn about an eternal hell. And they're going to do this, it says, for "1260 days," that's the final three and a half years of Daniel's 70th week. And I must add that this parallels the apostolic witness in the Second Temple, in Acts five and verse 20, where the angel of the Lord, you will recall, opens the gates of the prison, and he commanded them to quote, "Go your way, stand and speak to the people in the temple, the whole message of this Life." So that's going to happen here again.

Now I want you to notice in verse three, they were "clothed in sackcloth." This, of course is coarse cloth made of camel hair, or goat hair, often accompanied with ashes, worn by men, as well as women, in times of great distress. And it was worn by the prophets to call attention to some great wickedness amongst the people in the society, and to call them to repentance. Or sometimes it was to warn them of imminent judgment and punishment, as we saw, for example, in the days of Elijah, or in the days of John the Baptist. And all of this is part of what we see happening here. Plus, this was the proper Jewish response to intense grief. They did this for example, when they mourned the desecration of the temple. And this is going to happen again; they're going to mourn what's going on in the temple; what the Antichrist is doing, his tyranny. And of course, many Jews, as well as many Gentiles, who have come to faith in Christ will be massacred, while others have fled into the wilderness for protection. And remember, once the Antichrist enters into the Holy of Holies of the temple, and blasphemously establishes himself as God, the temple complex, along with the entire land of Israel, will be thrust into a state of ritual defilement. However, restoration and purification can only be accomplished by the Messiah, who will return physically. And at that point, he will defeat the desecrator he will cleanse the land and he will finally rebuild and consecrate the temple.

So verse four, "These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth." Now taken out of context, you wonder what the world is that mean? Well, John would have understood precisely what he was hearing. John would have known the background of this statement, one that Zechariah had prophesied almost 600 years earlier. You read about it and Zechariah four and there the Lord predicted the rebuilding of the Jewish temple, after their long exile, and it would be led by two men, the high priest Joshua, who was the spiritual leader, and Zerubbabel, who was the civil leader. And there we read of the same symbols as here in Revelation 11, " two olive trees and two lampstands." That symbolic of the oil of the Holy Spirit's power that would perpetually fuel the lamps of divine truth pertaining to saving grace. In Zechariah four six we read, "'Not by might nor by power, but my by My Spirit,' says the Lord of hosts." And then Zechariah four, verse 14, we read how Joshua and Zerubbabel are described as, quote, "the two anointed ones who are standing by the Lord of the whole earth." But like most prophecies, what we have in that text is both a near and a far fulfillment; as we see here in Revelation 11, for "these are the two olive trees, and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth," which is almost an exact quote of Zechariah four verse 14. The near future fulfillment of that prophecy was when the two witnesses were raised up as the lampstands of God shining for the light of saving truth. They were empowered by the Holy Spirit in those days to bring spiritual revival to Israel and rebuild the post exilic temple. The far future (cough "excuse me"), fulfillment is when these two witnesses are once again raised up in Revelation 11. They will shine forth the light of truth. Men empowered by the Holy Spirit not by demonic spirits; men, who will bring spiritual revival to Israel resulting in national conversion whereupon the Lord himself will establish his earthly kingdom and build his millennial temple.

Now, who are these men? Well, there's lots of speculation; can't be dogmatic. But I believe the most compelling evidence points to Elijah and Moses in Deuteronomy 18, verse 15, Moses prophesied that the quote, "'Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your own countrymen, you shall listen to him.'" And then in verse 18, the Lord said, "'I will put My words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.’” And to this day, the Jews are convinced the prophet will be Moses himself. Malachi four, verse five, "Behold, I'm going to send you Elijah, the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. And He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the land with a curse.'" And we know that John the Baptist came, did he not? He came Luke 1:17, he came "'in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous, so as to make ready people prepared for the Lord.'" But this does not necessarily preclude Elijah from appearing again. So we know both Moses and Elijah were fearless prophets that boldly confronted the tyrants of their day, preached the Word of God without compromise. And both Moses and Elijah appeared with Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration, where you will recall the Lord peeled back his flesh in some miraculous way, and allowed the effulgence of his glorious Shekinah, to burst forth, to blaze forth a preview of Second Coming glory.

And it's also fascinating to note that the miracles performed by the two witnesses during this three and a half years are very similar to the ones performed by God through Moses and Elijah. They will be able to destroy their enemies with fire, we read, and that's what Elijah did, you will recall, he called down fire from heaven. Revelation 11, verse six, "These have the power to shut up the sky, in order that rain may not fall during the days of their prophesying." And we know that in First Kings 17 that's what Elijah did, he pronounced a three-and-a-half-year drought on the land, the same period of time as the two witnesses here in Revelation. Again, verse six, "and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood, and to smite the earth with every plague as often as they desire." And likewise, we know that Moses turned the waters of the Nile into blood, he performed numerous plagues against Egypt. And finally, another thing that caused me to think that these two witnesses that God will raise up will be Moses and Elijah, is because these two witnesses will be supernaturally translated into heaven. In similar fashion, as Elijah, for example, who never physically died, but was taken into heaven, in a fiery chariot. And God himself buried Moses, secretly disposing of his body. And likewise, God himself will intervene, we know in some supernatural way with the departure of the two witnesses, even as he did with Moses and Elijah. But again, the text doesn't specifically identify them, so we cannot know for sure we can only speculate.

Well, we learned more about their magnificent ministry in verse five of the Revelation 11, "And if anyone desires to harm them, fire proceeds out of their mouth, and devours their enemies. And if anyone would desire to harm them in this manner, he must be killed." So by implication, many will desire to harm them. And, folks, this makes perfect sense. Think how people today hate the bold proclamation of the truth of the gospel. And it's going to be worse during the time of the tribulation because we read from the text that during that time, there's going to be these unimaginable plagues in the trumpet and the bowl judgments. Men and women are going to be crying out for the mountains and the rocks to fall on them, according to Revelation six and verse 16. and hide them "from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the lamb for the great day of the wrath has come." So they're going to know who is causing all of this. And it's not going to be Satan, it's going to be God, the Lord Jesus Christ, the wrath of the Lamb. And isn't it amazing, even at that, they will not repent. So by now the people of the world have rallied behind their new messiah, the Antichrist, they're mindlessly obeying him and worshipping him, and their disdain for anyone that would dare to preach Christ would exceed all other hatred combined. So these preachers will need to be able to protect themselves. Enemies who are going to attack them, and fire from their mouth will devour or consume them. And of course, this will only fuel the world's rage against them.

Verse six, "These have the power to shut up the sky, in order that rain may not fall during the days of their prophesying." That's going to be three and a half years. "And they have power over the waters to turn them into blood and to smite the earth and every plague as often as they desire." And what's fascinating here is, remember that in the third trumpet judgment, God is going to poison a third of the world's fresh water supply. So now, on top of that, you have a three-and-a-half-year drought, which will result in just unimaginable catastrophic terror upon the earth; life on the planet will begin to grind to a halt. And the world will know that all of this is because of the wrath of the Lamb. And yet these invincible indefatigable preachers are preaching that very lamb; so they will hate him, they will hate them.

We moved from their magnificent ministry to their morbid death, verse seven. And, "When they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up out of the abyss, will make war with them and overcome them and kill them." I might add that this is the first time we are introduced to the beast in the apocalypse. The "beast"-- "therion" in the original language; a term describing a vicious carnivore, a beast of prey like a lion or like a tiger. And so this is referring to an animal with a ravenous appetite that functions basically out of instinct; cruel, violent. And this will be the nature of the Antichrist, who is called the beast I might add, 36 times. More of him in chapter 13 and chapter 17.

And notice it comes up "out of the abyss." This is mentioned seven times in Revelation. And it describes a mysterious subterranean cavern on Earth that extends into the bowels of the earth through some kind of a shaft that God has sealed shut for the purpose of incarcerating the most vile demons. You can read more about this in chapter nine, under the fifth trumpet. Now I might add that this is not Satan who's represented by a dragon but rather, a man empowered by the demonic forces released from the abyss and that's, of course, the Antichrist. So here we learn that after the divinely decreed duration of their ministry, God allows the Antichrist to finally overcome them, and to kill them to the utter jubilation of the world. Verse eight, "And their dead bodies will lie on the street of the great city, which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified." Obviously, this is a reference to Jerusalem, which will be the primary staging area of their ministry, as well as I might add, the headquarters of the Antichrist, as we read in Second Thessalonians two. The city will be so infected with evil by now and wickedness that it is likened to Sodom and the original enemy of Israel, the nation of Egypt. The figurative likeness of these two places underscores just the loathsome depths to which the Holy City has now fallen. And so what we have here is a ghoulish, macabre scene, just kind of beyond anything that we can imagine. However, what we've seen with respect to what Hamas has done to those in Israel, gives us a little glimpse of this.

In verse nine, we read, "Those from the peoples and tribes and tongues and nations," which by the way, is a technical term for the Gentile world, "will look at their dead bodies for three and a half days, and will not permit their dead bodies to be laid in a tomb. And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry and they will send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth." My friends, can there be any greater demonstration of rejection than this? Obviously, the world is watching, and we know because of technology, that would be an easy thing to do. At this point, all of the politicians and all of the news anchors and all of the rioters that we see today, they're going to be rejoicing. I mean, this is going to be Christmas and Mardi Gras rolled into one. It's ironic, the whole Gentile world will celebrate the death of those who came to give them eternal life. Apparently great throngs of people are going to assemble to see this barbaric display. You know, within two to three days decomposing corpses will begin to bloat and omit the putrid odors of future fraction. And while this is going on, the wicked are going to be laughing. They're going to be celebrating the prowess of the Antichrist, and in their minds the defeat of Christ. But what they do not know is that the King of kings and the Lord of lords is about to return, in vengeance and in glory.

Notice what happens, thirdly, in the miraculous resurrection, verse 11, and 12. And "after three and a half days, the breath of life from God came into them. And they stood on their feet; and great fear fell upon those who are beholding them." That's got to be one of the greatest understatements in all of the Bible. "And they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, 'Come up here.' Then they went up into heaven in the cloud, and their enemies watched them." Can you imagine what the news anchors are going to say when this happens? Suddenly, these decomposing bodies returned to their original state and they stand up. There's no record that they said or did anything. All they did is respond to the divine summons, "Come up here." And they're caught up in the clouds. It reminds me of First Thessalonians 4:17 where we will be quote, "caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and thus we shall always be with the Lord." Some of us will refer to this as the two-man rapture. You know, you might want to ask the question, Well, I wonder why God didn't allow them, at that point, to start preaching the gospel again? You know, why did he just take them up? I mean, talk about having their undivided attention. The answer, dear friends, is because by this time, their fate has already been judicially sealed. God has sealed them in their unbelief. And it would be useless to present the gospel to them. The day of grace is over, judgment has come.

You know, I might add that, throughout Scripture, we see that it is the convicting work of the Spirit, not signs and wonders, that brings people to a place of genuine saving faith. Jesus said in Luke 16:31, "'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone rises from the dead.'" Right? Now notice what else happens in verse 13. "And in that hour there was a great earthquake, and a 10th of the city fell; 7000 people were killed in the earthquake." 7000 people or could be translated persons, in fact in the Greek it's "onoma anthropon." And it's really means "names of men." And this unusual expression is thought to refer, and again, you can't be dogmatic here, but it probably refers to 7000, prominent men or leaders who served with the Antichrist there in his headquarters. And then we read, "and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven." And this is a reference primarily to the Jews that will still be--some of them--will still be inhabiting the eastern part of Jerusalem, in the region of the temple; ones that will be saved at that moment.

You know, whenever I think of these things, a couple of things goes through my mind. One is how this is an amazing picture of God's mercy and grace on me, a sinner, the one that deserves nothing, who rebelled against him and yet by the power of his love, and his mercy and his grace, the Spirit of God wrought new life within me and saved me, even as he will, his covenant people. And then I'm also reminded of God's promise to that end, in Romans 11, beginning in verse one, Paul says, "God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be!" And in verse four, we read, "But what is the divine response to him?" He says, "'I have kept for myself 7000 men, who have not bowed the knee to Baal'. In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God's gracious choice." And then in verse 26, we read, "the partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and thus all Israel will be saved."

Now, this section was really an interlude between the seventh trumpet in the final bowl judgments that will immediately precede Christ's return and at this point, this interlude ends actually in verse 14, it says, "the second woe is past, the third woe is coming quickly." So just by way of just a quick recap, they build the temple, the Antichrist desecrates the temple, God raises up these witnesses, they are murdered, and all of this is going to be followed by the terror of the Gentiles and devastating earthquake. And all of this points to the coming of Christ and the end, finally, the end of Gentile domination, and the salvation of his covenant people Israel. And you will remember that when the Lord's feet touches the Mount of Olives, the word of God says that it will part; it will divide, even using the same term as the division of the Red Sea. And that will do two things: it will provide an East/West escape route, as we read about in Zechariah, 14 in verse five, through the eastern side of the city, across the Kidron Valley, and through the Mount of Olives toward the Judean Desert. But it will also block the Antichrist--block the enemies of Israel, from escaping to the north or the south, and they will be trapped in the Kidron Valley, also known as the valley of Jehoshaphat, which means "God will judge" and there, even as God judged the Egyptian charioteers that we're pursuing Israel, they too, will be utterly destroyed. And then the Messiah will return and deliver Israel physically, as well as spiritually as we read in Zechariah 12, verses 10 through 14. And at that time, the Lord Jesus will enthrone himself in the millennial temple. Zechariah eight and verse three, "Thus says the Lord, 'I will return to Zion and dwell in the midst of Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the City of Truth, and the mountain of the LORD of hosts will be called the Holy Mountain.'" Beloved, when the Lord Jesus Christ returns the next time, no one will miss it. No one will be confused. And the planet as we know it will be radically changed, and all Israel will finally fulfill their destiny. According to Exodus 19, six, as a "kingdom of priests and a holy nation." And finally, the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, the final Adam, will fulfill and reclaim the first Adam's role of dominion over the whole earth. Moreover, at that point, when he returns, He will be coronated in his temple. Zechariah describes the glory of this future ceremony, this coronation ceremony, in Zechariah six, beginning of verse 12. "'Behold a man whose name is Branch.'" By the way that is a messianic title from Zechariah's earlier vision, it's referring to the Messiah. "'Behold, a man whose name is Branch, for He will branch out from where He is;’” In other words, to redeem sinners, to reconcile them to God, "'and He will build the temple of the Lord. Yes, it is He who will build the temple of the Lord, and He will bear the honor and sit and rule on His throne. Thus he will be a priest on His throne, and the counsel of peace will be between the two offices,'" referring to both Priest and King, which typically were in constant conflict with one another, but he will be both.

Please understand, the current dispensation of the church where Jews and Gentiles are equally integrated into one body under the law of Christ is going to be very different from the dispensation of the Messianic kingdom. In this present age the church is the custodian of divine truth and serves as a spiritual temple, Ephesians 2:20 and following. Today, we present our bodies as a living and holy sacrifice that is acceptable to God, according to Romans 12 and verse two. And today we have access, through Christ, into a heavenly temple, according to Hebrews four. Because of this, we can draw near with confidence to the throne of grace. But dear friends, this church age is going to end, we will be translated into heaven at the rapture. And then according to Romans 11, verse 26, "all Israel will be saved;" that is when Christ returns, "all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB, THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.'"

At that point, the spiritual temple will be replaced by a physical, millennial temple that is described in great detail in Ezekiel chapter 40 through 48. You might say that the church age right now is an eschatological interregnum existing between Israel's failure under the old covenant and her restoration under the new covenant. In our current church age, we are governed indirectly by Christ, the head of the church, through the Spirit. But in the millennium, the earthly kingdom, the theocracy of Israel, will be governed directly by God through the Messiah, who's reigning physically upon the earth; none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. The millennium will include Gentiles, but it will be distinctively Jewish. It will function under the theocratic laws of the new covenant, which will include animal sacrifices, it will include a physical temple in which Christ will physically dwell. The sacrifices will include burnt offerings, grain offerings, peace offerings, sin offerings, guilt offerings, drink offerings. And bear in mind that the sacrifices will not be efficacious any more than the Old Testament sacrifices were; they merely pointed to Christ, they never saved anybody. Instead, they will be tangible memorials of Christ's efficacious, once for all, sacrifice on the cross. And I might add that they will also be essential for outward corporate sanctification, or ceremonial purification, even as they were in the Levitical Old Testament system. In fact, Ezekiel states that these offerings are according to Ezekiel 45:17, "to make atonement for the house of Israel." "Atonement," "kippur" in Hebrew, it means, "to purify, to cleanse from sin, or from the defilement of sin."

And it's hard for us to fathom how radically different corporate worship will be when the ineffable glory of the Shekinah of God will dwell physically in his temple in the midst of the people. In fact, Ezekiel tells us that the millennial city of Jerusalem and the temple will together encompass about a 2500 square mile area. So obviously, topographical changes will occur when the Lord returns. In fact, the dimensions of just the temple courts alone are bigger than the entire ancient city of Jerusalem within its walls. Can you imagine coming to worship, being able to somehow get a glimpse of the Shekinah glory of the Lord that we have loved and served for so long? I think about the term "ichabod"-- it means "no glory." That's going to change to "kabod,"which means "the glory." However, at that point, there will be unglorified human beings in varying states of witting, as well as unwitting, ritual defilement. And therefore, they could pollute the sanctuary and violate the ceremonial standards. Even having young children come to the temple to worship, and therefore, the purification sacrifices will be necessary in order to sustain that corporate sanctity. Again, they have nothing to do with salvation or even inward sanctification. Instead, they will ensure corporate sanctification or ceremonial purification, if you will, to protect the holiness of the divine presence in his theocratic kingdom. This will be how God will bless his people.

It's interesting, as well, to know that there will be feasts in the millennial kingdom recorded in Ezekial 45. It will include the New Year feast, It will include a Passover Feast, unleavened bread, Feast of Booths. And you will recall, Jesus promised to his disciples, remember at the last Passover, and by the way, this is recorded in each of the Synoptic Gospels. Luke 22, verse 18, Jesus said this, "'I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes.'" Obviously, this is a reference to the millennial observance. As we read in a Ezekial 45:21, "In the first month, on the 14th day of the month, you shall have the Passover, a feast of seven days; unleavened bread shall be eaten." And folks to think, according to Second Timothy two and verse 12, that we will be there in glorified bodies reigning with Christ.

Well, may I challenge you, as you try to absorb so many of these great truths; that you maintain a proper worldview as you see the world kind of coming apart all around you, especially as you see all of the chaos and the wickedness as it relates to Israel. But know this as well, that far greater calamities than what they've experienced will come. Indeed, the great and terrible day of the Lord is coming. But also remember that God's plan is perfect, right? There is nothing that can thwart it, he will accomplish all that he has promised. It has said that there's about 2500 prophecies in the Bible, and about 2000 of them have been fulfilled to the letter: no errors, literally. So with that, we can have every reason to believe that what God has promised is going to come true.

And may I close by reminding you that death awaits each one of us, unless we know Christ and we're snatched away. But if you don't know Christ, death awaits you, and then judgment, for its appointed unto man once to die, and then the judgment. So I would plead with you that if you've never come to a place of genuine heart felt repentance and place your faith and the grace afforded to us through the shed blood of Christ, your only hope of salvation. I pray that you will do that today before it's too late. Devastating destruction can come upon us, even as it has upon the people in Israel and so many other places around the world down through history. I think especially today, with our borders open and who knows who or what lurks around the corner. So dear friends, please place your faith and trust in Christ. Relax in his sovereign grace. He will accomplish all that he is promised and he will take us home to glory. Amen? Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. May they bear much fruit in our lives to the praise of your glory. For it's in Christ's name that I pray. Amen.

We come now to a time when we have an opportunity to look into the Word of God and hear the truths there. This is the third part in a little series that I'm doing on understanding Israel in Bible prophecy. And if you've been with us thus far, you know that the primary goal here is to give you a biblical, historical, and certainly a prophetic perspective of all that we see happening in the world today. I do not want you to be ignorant of these things. And if you are, I hope it's not because I haven't taught you, but it's rather because you haven't been listening. And certainly, we want to understand, from a truly Christian perspective, the rise of anti-semitism, as well as Israel's war with Iran, through her mercenary forces of Hamas, and Hezbollah, and others. We've all seen the unprecedented number of protesters that are mainly Arab Muslims, along with Marxist revolutionaries. I've been to those places, there in London. It was amazing. I think they said roughly 500,000 people marching in favor of the Palestinians and Hamas. By the way, there's about 500,000, or I should say, I take that back, about 4 million Muslims now living in the United Kingdom, and about the same here in the United States. And of course, we see a lot of the deranged, social justice, woke people; they're always on the hunt for the next victim group, they have to have an oppressed group, so that they can attack the oppressors to fulfill their cultural Marxist agenda. And this results in what a lot of secularists call "mass formation." I've written on this in chapter four of my book, "Warrior Preachers" if you want to go into detail. But there I quote from an author by the name of Matthias Desmet; I believe he is Belgium, and his book, The Psychology of Totalitarianism. And there he defines mass formation, which again, is what we see with all of these protests. He defines it as, quote, "a kind of group hypnosis that destroys individual's ethical self-awareness and robs them of their ability to think critically. This process is insidious in nature. Populations fall prey to it unsuspectingly. The willingness of the individuals to blindly sacrifice their personal interests as a part of this," he went on to say, "they will blindly sacrifice their personal interests in favor of the collective, radical intolerance of dissident voices." He also describes it as, "the curious susceptibility to absurd, pseudo-scientific indoctrination and propaganda; the blind following of narrow logic that transcends all ethical boundaries." End quote.

And certainly that is a good description. But it misses the theological description, which I call "mass depravity." As I have written, "Mass depravity is a manifestation of the wrath of divine abandonment, where God has lifted his restraining grace on a mass of depraved human beings who reject Him; allowing them to collectively voice their deceptions in the echo chamber of their rage, and ultimately experience the damning consequences of their iniquities." Frankly, God calls these people and many like them "fools." A fool is one that has no fear of God. And therefore the Scriptures tell us that they despise wisdom and instruction. And again, this is the wrath of divine abandonment as we read in Romans one, where God gives people finally over to a depraved mind because of the rejection of him. And as a result of that people will believe things that are demonstrably false. They will believe things that are idiotic, irrational, immoral, and frankly, insane. And sadly, we have a lot of these people ruling over us in our government. But I might also add that to all of these people, God offers forgiveness. And he offers grace when people come to the Lord Jesus Christ in repentant faith, and trust in Him as their only hope of salvation.

By way of quick review, we've looked at number one, God's choice of Israel. Secondly, Satan's hatred of Israel. Third, God's judgment of Israel. And now today, God's protection of Israel, and Lord willing, the next time we're together, I will deal with God's salvation and restoration of Israel. So this morning, I would like to address God's protection of Israel; past, present and future but especially future.

Think about this, despite the numerous pogroms down through history designed to eradicate the Jewish people, they are still here. The Marxist mobs of anti Semites who are overwhelmingly liberal democrats get their news, we know, predominantly from the leftist media organizations, as well as Instagram and primarily Tik Tok. And if you've been on Tik Tok very long, you will quickly see that you will lose brain cells if you stay there. People don't want to hear the facts. For example, people marching today do not realize the fact that Israel was amenable to a second Palestinian state when they were founded in 1948. But the Palestinians would have nothing to do with that. On numerous occasions, Israel offered the olive branch to the Palestinians; peace to the Palestinians, but they would always reject it. And when Israel withdrew from Gaza, I remember it well in 2005, what did the Palestinians do? They elected Hamas to be the ones to lead them. And Hamas had a very clear "anti-Israel" platform and "eliminate the Jews" platform. And the first thing Hamas did was get rid of the Palestinian Authority in a military coup and start firing rockets on Israel and committing acts of terror on Israel. And they've been doing that for 20 years. And I assure you that the people that are foaming at the mouth in these protests have no understanding of any of that; not to mention the other biblical, theological issues pertaining to God's choice of Israel, their disobedience, God's judgment upon them and Satan's hatred of them.

Most of them don't know anything about the Hamas charter. In Article 13, they say quote, "Peace initiatives and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic resistance movement. Those conferences are no more than a means to appoint the infidels as arbitrators in the lands of Islam. There is no solution for the Palestinian problem, except by Jihad initiatives. Proposals and international conferences are but a waste of time and exercise in futility." It also says in Article Seven, "The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight Jews and kill them. Then the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees and the rocks, and the trees will cry out, oh, Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him." And people were protesting all over the world to allow these sociopathic demonic monsters the freedom to carry out their goal. May I remind you again, and I know I said this last week, but I think it bears repeating. Israel is about the size of the state of New Jersey. 9000 Square miles and has a population of 9.7 3 million people. 75% of them are Jewish. They are surrounded by 22 Arab countries, encompassing 5 million square miles. And those lands are populated by 600 million people; all aligned with the entire Muslim world, consisting of over 1.8 billion people, making up about 24% of the world's population. And virtually all of these Arab Muslim countries are committed to the destruction of Israel and the genocide of Jewish people. And yet Israel is the oppressor? Israel is such a threat to civilization, that they must be exterminated? I mean, friends, no rational person could believe anything so ridiculous.

But I also must add, God loves what is perceived to be, insurmountable odds. Well, I've gone to great lengths to explain in my two previous discourses these things. Again, the satanic nature of anti semitism; God's judgment on Israel, his beloved enemy, whom he will continue to preserve and protect, and one day transform and restore, so that eventually, they will be able to do what they're not able to do now--they will be able to fulfill the purpose in which they were chosen for which they were chosen, as God declared through his servant, Jeremiah in Jeremiah 13:11, "That they might be for me a people for renown and praise and for glory." And although today most Jewish people reject Jesus as their Messiah, and remain under divine judgment, one day that will change. He has promised never to violate his covenant promises; never abandon his people. You read about this, for example, in the new covenant promises in Jeremiah 31. And the Apostle Paul has said, in Romans chapter 11, and verse one, "God has not rejected His people has He? May it never be!" And in verse 25, and following, he says, "that a partial hardening has happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in." He goes on to say, then "all Israel will be saved, just as it is written, THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS." But dear friends, until that deliverer comes, as he has promised, until he comes from Zion, to remove the ungodliness from Jacob, he must continue to protect and preserve his people from the onslaught of their enemies.

Again, by way of quick review, last week, we talked about Revelation six, you will recall there, John is standing in the throne room of heaven. He's looking upon the word the Lamb, who has received the scroll containing the pre kingdom judgments from the hand of his Father, as we read about in chapter five. And then he has given this dramatic visual presentation of the contents of each one of those seals. And in Revelation six, we see the breaking of the first seal, which reveals the summoning of the first horse and horsemen of the apocalypse; a reference to the antichrist that is to come; the one who will come and make a peace covenant with Israel, bring a false sense of peace to the world, Daniel 9:27, "He will make a firm covenant with the many"-- referring to Israel, "for one week." The context there, one week is referring to a week of years. This is also referred to as Daniel 70th week--the final seven years of the tribulation. And in that covenant, even Israel will be deceived by a false sense of security that is offered to them by this diabolical ruler. And during this time with this treaty, undoubtedly, they will be allowed to rebuild their temples. Something that they currently cannot do, because of the Muslims. So something dramatic must take place. And the Jewish people are waiting for that even now. Something dramatic must take place to get this highly distrusting nation of Israel to be seduced by this pseudo peace. And I made the case that the battle of Gog and Magog, in Ezekiel 38 and 39 could be the event to set into motion this first seal. That battle that describes a Russian/Arab alliance of predominantly Muslim nations. We talked about that at length. They will come from the north and be supernaturally defeated. And I believe that a good case could be made that this will take place before the actual tribulation begins and set it all into motion. Russia could very well fulfill the role of Gog. Certainly it has six of its former Soviet republics, right to the north of Israel. They are now independent Islamic nations, and they're all calling for Israel's annihilation. Right now, today. Russia has suffered, I read, this week, 122,000 casualties in Ukraine. And almost 200,000 have been injured. They have been humiliated. Their economy is collapsing, crime is skyrocketing. Some of my brothers in Siberia where I have been on several occasions to teach them aren't even able to write to me via email anymore because of the government control. Population is just decreasing. The people are disillusioned, and now they're getting arms from North Korea, from Iran, from China. And they are forming alliances with them along with Turkey, Pakistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Sudan and Ethiopia. But whoever makes up these alliances, or this alliance of nations, that God causes to come upon Israel, they will be destroyed.

Let me remind you of that by reading a passage out of Ezekiel 38. I want to begin with verse 14. "'Therefore prophesy, son of man, and say to Gog, 'Thus says the Lord God, "On that day when My people Israel are living securely, will you not know it? You will come from your place out of the remote parts of the north, you and many peoples with you, all of them riding on horses, a great assembly and a mighty army; and you will come upon come up against My people Israel like a cloud to cover the land. It shall come about in the last days that I will bring you against My land, so that the nations may know Me when I am sanctified through you before their eyes, O Gog." Thus says the Lord God, "Are you the one of whom I spoke in former days through My servants the prophets of Israel, who prophesied in those days for many years that I would bring you against them? It will come about on that day when Gog comes against the Land of Israel," declares the Lord GOD, "that My fury will mount up in My anger. In My zeal, and in My blazing wrath, I declare that on that day, there will surely be a great earthquake in the land of Israe. The fish of the sea, the birds of the heavens, the beasts of the field, all the creeping things that creep on the earth, and all the men who are on the face of the earth will shake at My presence; the mountains also will be thrown down, the steep pathways will collapse, and every wall will fall to the ground. I will call for a sword against him on all My mountains," declares the Lord GOD. "Every man's sword will be against his brother. With pestilence and with blood, I will enter into the judgments with him; and I will rain on him and on his troops, and on the many peoples who are with him, a torrential rain with hailstones, fire and brimstone. I will Magnify myself, sanctify Myself, and make Myself known in the sight of many nations; and they will know that I am the Lord.'" Likewise, in Ezekiel 39, some of which, all of which I just read a few minutes ago. Let me take you to verse six through verse eight. "'And I will send fire upon Magog and those who inhabit the coastlands in safety; and they will know that I am the Lord. My holy name I will make known in the midst of My people, Israel; and I will not let My holy name be profaned anymore. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel. Behold, it is coming, and it shall be done,' declares the Lord GOD. 'That is the day of which I have spoken.'"

Certainly today the nations of the world mock the Lord God, the God of the Bible, the one true God, but that is going to radically change when this occurs. Obviously this will send a shock wave of fear throughout this God mocking world. And Israel will instantly become one of the most feared nations in the world. Sometime around this great battle, which will be either before, during or after, the church will be translated into heaven, adding even further chaos and confusion to the world.

And think what the rapture of the church would do. With the unprecedented carnage on the mountains of Israel, the bewildered Islamic world, and the sudden disappearance of millions of Christians around the world; the world will be instantly set into a tailspin of confusion. Economies will collapse, every government will be in a state of shock. Every leader that has nuclear power will have his finger on the trigger, prepared for further hostilities. And at that point, the world will be absolutely craving for peace. Confused, deceived--what a perfect storm for the first Seal Judgment of Revelation six to be unleashed upon the world. This would be the perfect time for the world to come together under a satanically inspired, charismatic leader, promising all that they ask. The prophet Daniel tells us in Daniel chapter seven, beginning in verse 23, that as the Antichrist arises, he will bring about a one world government. And by the way, isn't that what so many in the world are clamoring for today--a one world government, a one world economy. But according to Daniel's prophecy, this one world government will splinter into 10 governments. A new world alliance will come into being far more powerful than NATO or the even the UN. And this 10-nation confederacy will thrive under the leadership of the Antichrist until the middle of the tribulation.

Now, obviously, I'm leaving out enormous amounts of information. I'm giving you the highlights of eschatology from a biblical perspective. At first, the Antichrist will represent the nations and he will make concessions to Israel, given their astonishing defeat of the Russian Arab Alliance. And then he will unite the rest of the world, primarily the Europeans, in an alliance with Israel, a covenant of protection and commerce and peace. Shall we say the New World Order will finally come into being. But it will be nothing more than a ploy, in preparation for his fiendish, satanically inspired goal of Jewish genocide--as well as exalting himself as God.

Well, by this time, many of the secular Jews who are mostly atheists today, will believe in Yahweh, in some form or another, the God of their fathers. And many will even believe that the Messiah, the Lord Jesus, is doing this. But certainly, many will wrongly believe that the war of Gog and Magog will be the final battle for Jerusalem, as prophesied in Zechariah, chapters 12 through 14. In fact, if you look at Jewish eschatology, you will see that that is what they believe. For example, when respected rabbi, Rafael Eisenberg said this, "The miraculous defeat of Gog (Russia) and her satellites in Jerusalem will reveal that it is God who guides the universe punishing the wicked and upholding his promise to his servant Israel."

Now, to be sure, with the elimination of the Islamic political clout, the Orthodox Jews, as I say, could finally rebuild their third temple. Secular Jews will no longer resist it as they do now, because they're afraid of what the Muslims would do. They want peace at all costs. The nations of the world will even support this because they are now bowing to the wishes of this new global leader, the clear front runner of global leaders, namely the Antichrist. But remember this worldwide peace that the Antichrist is going to offer will be short lived according to the second seal that we read about in Revelation six, verses three through four. Violence will quickly arise and escalate into global conflicts--worldwide wars.

Now once again in the beginning of the Tribulation, many Jews will wrongly believe that the victory over Gog and Magog will be the beginning of the Messianic age, it is finally come. After all, the supernatural victory is consistent with the oral prophecies of the Jewish people. The oral Torah is called or the Talmud, which states quote, "Jews will not have to fight a war against the non-Jewish custodians of the Temple Mount in order to take possession of it from them." This is also consistent with the view of Orthodox Jews and the Temple Movement in general, as expressed by Gershon Solomon, the leader of Israel's temple, Mount Faithful. Let me read to you what he wrote in 1998. Quote, "The prophet Ezekiel prophesied that in the end times of the redemption of the people of Israel, a terrible war will break out of the land when Gog and Magog, with many other nations, come to the land of Israel and try to destroy the people and state of Israel (Ezekial 38 and 39)." He went on to ask "Why does the small David armed only with a small rock, again need to fight against giants? We only need to read Ezekiel and Zechariah carefully to gain understanding. The God of Israel will use this means to finally defeat all those many enemies of Israel, who have continually tried to destroy the state and people of Israel and push them into the Mediterranean." He went on to add, "The coming war will be the final war undertaken against Israel by her enemies. In it, God will terribly defeat them. After this war, the new godly era will start. The Third Temple will be the house of God, the only building on the Temple Mount. Moshiach ben David will be the king of Israel and all mankind. By the way, that is a reference to what they believe will be a future Jewish king that comes from the Davidic line, but it's not a reference to Jesus. He went on to say, " We can see how the black clouds are coming closer and closer to Jerusalem, and to the mountains of Israel. The march of Gog and Magog and all their allies has started." He says, "Finally, the time of judgment is close at hand, Israel will survive this war and become the nation which God and all the prophets dreamed about." Again, written in 1998.

So after the Gog and Magog defeat, and the rise of the Antichrist--again, this is a biblical perspective of these things, Israel will be able to build their third temple on the Temple Mount. I might also add that if you want to see the architectural plans for the third holy temple, you can go online and have a virtual reality tour of a mockup. It's put out by the Temple Institute in Jerusalem, and they believe that it could be put up in less than a year. I've been to the Temple Institute; I've seen many of the things that they've already prepared for the temple. But then in the midpoint of the Tribulation, we read from scripture that the Antichrist is going to overpower the temple. He's going to drive out the priests; he's going to stop the sacrifices, and he's going to seat himself in the Holy of Holies and demand that the world worship him. Like his forerunner, Antiochus Ephiphanes. We read about this in Daniel's prophecy in Daniel nine verse 27. "'And he,'" referring to the Antichrist, "'will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.'" I might also add that this is pictured as well in Revelation 13 verse one, as well as verse five, as "the beast coming up out of the sea." And he has given quote, "a mouth, speaking arrogant words and blasphemies and authority to act for 42 months was given to him." 42 months, let me pause. If you go to Revelation 11 and verse two, we also read that "they will tread underfoot the holy city for 42 months." That's the last half of the seven-year tribulation.

Back to Revelation 13, beginning in verse seven, "It was given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world, in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." Now, it's fair to ask the question, "What on earth will this guy do that is so heinous, that will be so abhorrent to God?" Well, as we read the prophetic literature, we get the answer. Once the Antichrist gains power over the temple precincts, he will erect a statue of himself. We read about this in Revelation 13, verses 14 and 15. And that is what is called "the abomination of desolation," which is the act of defiling the temple. And this will fulfill Daniel's prediction in Daniel 11:36. There we read that the antichrist quote, "'will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods; and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done.'" You get the idea that God is in charge of all this and allowing it to happen to accomplish His glorious purposes; and to put his glory on display, so that the world will know that he is the Lord the God of Israel. Paul speaks of this in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse three. He is described as "the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship." Paul goes on to say, "he takes his seat in the temple of God displaying himself as being God."

You know, Satan has always wanted to be worshipped. And this is why he is determined to deceive people through false messiahs and false prophets. Second, Thessalonians two again, beginning in verse nine, he is described as, "the one who's coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved." I might add that the Greek grammar in that text indicates that this detestable thing--standing in the holy place, will be some kind of a permanent image probably of the Antichrist, that's displayed in the temple. Once again, dear friends, Jerusalem will remain under Gentile domination. As Paul says the times of the Gentiles, or the fullness of the Gentiles, in Romans 11, has not yet been terminated forever. But I might add that this blasphemous desecration will be the final period of Gentile domination over Jerusalem. And we know according to the prophetic literature that the last half of the Tribulation will be unimaginably catastrophic. It's called the time of Jacob's trouble, or Jacob’s distress, as we read about in Jeremiah 30 and verse seven, "Alas, for that day is great, there is none like it, and it is the time of Jacob's distress, but he will be saved from it."

In the last half of the Tribulation, we know that God will unleash, not only his seal judgments in the first part, but in the last half, his trumpet judgments, and then his bowl judgments. And then we read of unprecedented, unimaginable, worldwide catastrophic destruction and death. And all the while this is going on, the Jews are going to be persecuted by the forces of the Antichrist, as these forces try to gain control of the city. Again, Zechariah, 12:13 and 14. In that section, it describes the Antichrist, along with his allied nations, coming against the forces, the Jewish forces. And what's fascinating is God, in that time, will greatly strengthen them. Zechariah 12 beginning in verse five, "'Then the clans of Judah will say in their hearts, 'A strong support for us are the inhabitants of Jerusalem through the Lord of the hosts, their God.' In that day, I will make the clans of Judah like a firepot among pieces of wood, and a flaming torch among sheaves, so they will consume on the right hand and on the left all the surrounding peoples, while the inhabitants of Jerusalem again, dwell on their own sites in Jerusalem. The Lord also will save the tents of Judah first, so that the glory of the house of David and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem will not be magnified above Judah. In that day the Lord will defend to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the one who is feeble among them in that day will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord before them. And in that day, I will set about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.'"

We can also go to Micah's prophecy that shifts from the impending judgment of that day with the Babylonians and foresees the pre kingdom judgments; the near and the far fulfillment of prophecy, Micah four and verse 10, we read, "And now many nations have been assembled against you, who say, 'Let her be polluted and let our eyes gloat over Zion.'" Again, this is referring now, not to the battle of Gog and Magog, but the battle of Armageddon when the Antichrist comes against the Jewish people. "'Let her be polluted and let her eyes gloat over Zion' But they do not know the thoughts of the Lord, and they do not understand His purpose; for He has gathered them like sheaves to the threshing floor. Arise and thresh, Daughter of Zion, for your horn I will make iron and your hoofs I will make bronze, that you may pulverize many peoples, that you may devote to the Lord their unjust gain and their wealth to the Lord of all the earth. Now muster yourself and troops, daughter of troops; they have laid siege against us; with a rod they will smite the judge of Israel on the cheek.'" Zechariah 14 beginning in verse three, "Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as when He fights on a day of battle. In that day," referring to the second coming now; the battle of Armageddon is going on; Christ and the redeemed saints we will be with Him; He will come down on that day it says, or "In that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east." By the way, just so you understand the geography, this is directly across from the Temple Mount, which implies that this may be where a Jewish remnant will be rescued in the moment of their greatest peril. "His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives will split." It will "split" the Hebrew term "baqa," it means "to divide." It was also used at another great divide--when God divided the Red Sea, and the exodus of Israel. Let me read you that Exodus 14:16. "As for you," talking to Moses, "lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide," there's the term--"and the sons of Israel shall go through the midst of the sea on dry land."

Beloved, even as God miraculously delivered his chosen people from the Egyptian charioteers--that were pursuing them under the command of Pharaoh, who was a type of the Antichrist--he will do it again when the armies of the Antichrist seek to destroy his chosen people. And they have no place to go. The Antichrist being the antitype of Pharaoh, the one foreshadowed by Pharaoh.

I hope you can see the amazing parallels here. God divided the Red Sea to allow his people safe passage in the Exodus, and then he destroyed Pharaoh's army pursuing them. And what we see is that at the end of the tribulation, that the second coming of Christ, all of the nations will be gathered against his remnant. But they too, will be trapped in the Kidron Valley, where they will be destroyed. But the Lord once again will provide a way of escape for his people.

Back to Zechariah 14, beginning of verse three, "Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as when he fights on a day of battle. In that day, His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east... in its middle, from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will move toward the north and the other half toward the south. You will flee by the valley of My mountains, for the valley of the mountains will reach to Azel; yes, you will flee just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Then the Lord, my God, will come, and all the holy ones with Him!" That will be us folks. When the Lord's feet touches the Mount of Olives--when he returns again in all of his glory--it will part like the Red Sea. And two things will be the result of that. It will provide an East/West escape route for his people through the eastern side of the city, across the Kidron Valley and through the Mount of Olives, going out into the Judean Desert. But it also will block their enemies from escaping to the north or the south. And they will be trapped in the valley of Jehoshaphat, which means "God will judge." And like the Egyptian charioteers, they will be utterly destroyed.

The Holy Spirit describes this through his servant Zechariah, Zechariah 14, beginning in verse 12, "Now this will be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the peoples who have gone to war against Jerusalem; their flesh will rot while they stand on their feet, and their eyes will rot in their sockets, and their tongue will rot in their mouth. It will come about in that day that a great panic from the Lord will fall on them; and they will seize one another's hand, and the hand of one will be lifted against the hand of another. Judah also will fight at Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the surrounding nations will be gathered, gold and silver and garments in great abundance." The prophet Joel describes this as well in Joel chapter three, beginning in verse 12, "Let the nations be aroused and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat, for there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine presses is full. The vats overflow for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. The sun and moon grow dark and the stars lose their brightness. The Lord roars from Zion and utters His voice from Jerusalem and the heavens and the earth tremble. But the Lord is a refuge for His people and a stronghold to the sons of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, dwelling in Zion, My holy mountain. So Jerusalem will be holy and strangers will pass through it no more." You can read the same account with other things that is added in Revelation 19, verses 11 and following.

You know, here I am reminded of the Lord's promise back in Matthew 23. His promise to the leaders of Jerusalem, that the temple is going to be left desolate and that they will not see him again until something happens. Until they say according to Matthew 23:39. "'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord.'" And folks, when this happens, they are going to say that. And that's when they will see him again. In fact, when the Messiah King returns to deliver Israel in the hour of their apparent extermination, the Lord will not only deliver them physically, but he will deliver them spiritually. He speaks of this in Zechariah 12, beginning in verse 10. He says, "I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication."

I want to pause there. In the Hebrew, the words for grace and supplication share the same root, indicating that those who asked for grace will receive it. And in the power of regeneration, they are going to ask for grace because they're going to see Christ for who he is, and he will save them. And so he's going to "'pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced.'" Remember Isaiah 53 and verse five, the Messiah was pierced for the sins of His people, they're gonna look on him, they're gonna know who he is. "'And they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only son. And they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn. In that day, there will be great morning in Jerusalem, like the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the plain of Megiddo." By the way that's reaching all the way back into Second Chronicles 35 when their beloved King--godly King Josiah was killed in battle. He goes on to say, "'The land will mourn, every family by itself; the family of the house of David by itself and their wives by themselves; the family of the house of Nathan by itself and their wives by themselves; the family of the house of Levi by itself and their wives by themselves; the family of the Shemeites by itself and their wives by themselves; all the families that remain, every family by itself and their wives by themselves.'" What he's saying is because of the miracle of regeneration, the whole of Israel will be utterly stricken with grief over their rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they will finally embrace him as the Messiah, the Savior of their sins. And at that time, the Lord Jesus Christ will enthrone himself in his millennial temple, Zechariah eight and verse three says, "'Thus says the Lord, 'I will return to Zion, and I will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the City of Truth, and the mountain of the LORD of hosts will be called the Holy Mountain.''"

In fact, what's really fascinating, in Isaiah chapter two and verse two, we read that, "The mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it." You see, we know according to Zechariah 14 and verse 10, that the topography of the ground around Jerusalem--that whole area--is going to be radically altered, so that the temple will be elevated above everything else. It will be located according to Ezekiel 48:21, "in the middle of a broad plain." Remember, when the Lord returns again, he is going to renovate the earth, then at the end of the millennial reign, he will recreate the Earth, the heavens and the earth. We also read in Ezekiel 48, verses 10 and following, about the details of the holy city and the allotment for the priests and the Levites, around the sanctuary, where the workers of the holy city are going to dwell and so forth. And it's incredible to imagine that the glory of that day, for both Jews and Gentiles, will be see; a result of his saving grace. Zechariah 14, verse 16, "Then it will come about that any who are left of all the nations that went up against Jerusalem, will go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to celebrate the Feast of Booths." You realize what that's saying? That many of the enemies of Jerusalem will be spared, and they will be saved, and they too will worship the Lord. Folks, this will be the greatest of all awakenings in the history of the world. Revelation seven and verse nine, "After these things I looked and behold a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes and palm branches were in their hands; and they cry out with a loud voice, saying, 'Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.'"

Some of these people today that are the enemies of Israel; perhaps some of these people that are in these protests will be among the redeemed one day. This will include we know of many, many of Israel's former enemies that we'll come to faith in Messiah. Isaiah 66:18 and 19 tells us this. There we read, "the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and see My glory. I will set a sign among them and will send survivors from them to the nations." And here he's going to speak of some of those who were a part of the nations that came against Israel with the battle of Gog and Magog, "I will set a sign among them and will send survivors from them to the nations: Tarshish, Put, Lud, Meshech, Tubal and Javan, to the distant coastlands that have neither heard My fame nor seen My glory. And they will declare My glory among the nations." Oh dear friends the power of the gospel. So there we see God's protection of Israel.

I want to close by just reminding you that God has ordained in eternity past, a plan of redemption whereby he would ultimately bring glory to himself. And because he is the sovereign God over all his creation, we worship Him--because we are part of that redemptive process, just a small part. Our salvation is only incidental to this whole glorious plan of redemption. But it is part of it and we celebrate that. And we can relax in his sovereign purposes, despite the chaos that we see all around us. And we can rejoice knowing that he will fulfill all that he has promised, amen? Let's bow our heads together.

Father, thank you, for the great truths of your word. While there's so many things we don't understand, you have given us enough that we can get at least the big picture, even some of the great details. And ultimately what we see is that you are God and there is no other. And so we celebrate all that you are. Thank you for all that you have done, are doing and will do in each of our lives. And for those that do not know you, who have never truly come to repentant faith, I plead with you as your servant this day, that you will overwhelm them with such great conviction that they will have no rest until they repent and place their trust in Christ, the only hope of salvation. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

Last week, we began a short series; I'm not sure how long it's going to last, but I know it'll at least go through today and next Sunday, and maybe yet another Sunday or two, but I have entitled this little series "Israel in Bible Prophecy." And I decided to do this because I wanted to bring clarity from a biblical, theological, historical, and prophetic perspective to all of the chaos that's going on, not just in the Middle East, but around the world. By way of review, last week, we looked at the importance of understanding God's choice of Israel. Deuteronomy seven and verse six, we read, "For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; the Lord, your God has chosen you to be people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth." And we know According to Exodus chapter 19, and verse six, that God's purpose for Israel is to be, quote, "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." We also examined God's unconditional, unilateral, irreversible, covenant promises to Abraham, and to David as well as the New Covenant. All of those covenants are important to understand if you're going to see why Satan and so many people around the world who are obedient to him, perhaps even unwittingly, hate the Jewish people and hate what's happening in Israel. Because those covenants, the Abrahamic, Davidic, and new covenants, are all the basis of the establishment of the millennial kingdom that is yet to come.

We also, secondly, looked at Satan's hatred of Israel, that he is the father of lies, he is the god of this world. We are told, he is the ruler of this world, Jesus said, temporarily. So nonetheless, he is, and people tend to underestimate his power to deceive. And certainly he has deceived many. We see it with the Islamic jihadist, we see it with the Marxist protesters here in our country and around the world, a parade of the deceived and the ignorant. And we know that God predicted the intransigent antisemitism that we see being revealed around the world. He predicted this, when he cursed Satan in Genesis 3:15, and he said, and "I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed, he shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel." And I won't get into it again, but unless you understand that passage right there, you will never understand what's going on in Israel.

Later we know, as we studied, God allowed Satan to begin to drive a wedge with the descendants of Abraham; a rivalry between Ishmael, from which came the Arabs and Isaac from which came the Jews. And that extends to this day. Moreover, we examined the reality that because salvation is from the Jews, as Jesus said, in John four in verse 22, the Jewish people have always and will always be one of Satan's primary targets. He must destroy God's covenant people. And he operates through deception, through violence, through intimidation, through godless political ideologies, like liberalism, whether it be political or theological liberalism; it's always a cancer that will destroy people. And he certainly does it through false religious systems, especially Islam. And we studied why Arab Islamic jihadists hate Jewish people; because they believe that God's covenant with Abraham was a promise between Abraham and Ishmael, not Abraham and Isaac. They believe it was Ishmael who was offered on Mount Moriah, not Isaac, and therefore, all of the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant should go to them, not to the Jewish people. Therefore, the land of Palestine belongs to them, not to Israel. And of course, the Marxist cult of wokeism, promoted primarily again through liberalism, especially in the Democratic Party, is all committed to hating Jewish people hating Israelis, because they see them as the privileged white class. It's all part of finding some group that they can call the oppressor. Of course, there's no condemnation for the Palestinians and the Hamas people that are committed to Jewish genocide. And these people, of course, want to eradicate all white, Judeo Christian ethics and influence. They hate Western civilization. They hate America, they hate the Constitution, and on and on, it goes down with colonialism, which is really their code word for deconstruction of the West. And it's this kind of indoctrination that we see in our public schools and in our colleges and universities. And sadly, in many apostate and naive churches.

We also examined, thirdly, God's judgment on Israel. And that's a lot of what we're seeing here today. You will recall that God made it abundantly clear in Deuteronomy 28, that he would bless them for their obedience and curse them for their disobedience. And I want to expand on that, just very briefly. We know that in the last seven chapters of Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy 28, through 34, God has given us frankly, a prophetic summary of Israel's future. There we see the conditions of blessing for obedience and curses for disobedience. It speaks of the prediction of coming apostasy, the affliction God would bring upon Israel while still in the land of promise, because of her apostasy. It speaks of Israel being taken captive, it speaks of the enemies of Israel will possess her land for a time, that the land itself will remain desolate, that Israel will be scattered among the nations, that Israel would become few in number, that Israel would not be destroyed if she repents, that Israel will repent in her tribulation and worship God as He intended. And finally, that Israel will be gathered from the nations; brought back to her divinely given land, and eventually he will prosper them abundantly. And we have witnessed in our lifetime, the beginning of this regathering, when the Jewish people have arisen out of the ashes of the Holocaust, to finally have a nation; we saw that in 1948. And this is really a testimony of God's promise that was even reaffirmed to the psalmist. And we read about this in Psalm 105, beginning in verse seven, "He is the Lord our God; His judgments are in all the earth. He has remembered His covenant forever, the word which He commanded to 1000 generations, the covenant which He had made with Abraham and His oath to Isaac. Then He confirmed it to Jacob for a statute to Israel as an everlasting covenant, saying to you, 'I will give the land of Canaan as the portion of your inheritance.'" And God will ultimately fulfill this promise when Christ returns and establishes his Messianic kingdom. And it's absolutely astounding to see the most persecuted ethnic religious group on the planet not only survive, but actually thrive. It's amazing to me; a testimony of God's protection, despite their disobedience, despite Satan's hatred of them, and the world's hatred of them.

I'm reminded of the promise in Amos chapter nine beginning in verse 14, where God says, "'I will restore the captivity of my people Israel, and they will rebuild the ruins cities and live in them, they will also plant vineyards and drink their wine and make gardens and eat their fruit, I will also plant them on their land. And they will not again be routed out from their land which I have given them,' says the LORD your God." And of course, this is in fulfillment of the promise that God made to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob 4000 years ago; a promise that was even reaffirmed to Moses. And to be sure, the Arab Muslims cannot stand this. And they are going to do everything they can to prevent this. But ultimately, we know that God will not allow them, or any other people, to have that land. But rather he has promised that land to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Now, that brings us to today and my fourth point in our little outline. And sometime in the near future, I'll get to the fifth point. The fourth point is God's protection of Israel. And then eventually, I'm not sure if it'll be next Sunday or the next, but we're going to look at God's salvation and restoration of Israel. Now with respect to God's protection of Israel, there are a myriad of examples of miraculous ways that God has protected his people. And it's amazing when you think about it, that despite the numerous pogroms that we have seen down through history, designed to eradicate the Jewish people from the face of the earth, the Jewish people still exist. Now, why is that? I mean, think about it. Over 4000 years ago, Abraham purchased burial property in Hebron to bury his wife, Sarah. Hebron, by the way, is about 19 miles or so southwest of Jerusalem. Today, it's a Palestinian city in the West Bank. And despite all of the barbaric attempts to cleanse these people from the face of the earth, they still exist. You don't hear anything about the Amalekites. You don't hear anything about the Hittites, or the Jebusites, or the Canaanites. But the Israelites dominate the news, tiny little Israel, about the size of the state of New Jersey; 9000 square miles. They have a population of approximately 9.73 million. About 75% of them are Jewish. And to think they are surrounded by 22 Arab countries, encompassing 5 million square miles, populated by approximately 600 million people who are all entirely aligned with the entire Muslim world that consists of 1.8 billion people, about 24% of the Earth's population. And virtually all of these Arab Muslim countries are committed to the destruction of Israel. And yet, they are the oppressors.

Well, today, I wish to focus on an event yet future. Another event that God has promised, whereby he will protect and preserve and even deliver Israel. And it's a promise that may be developing right before our eyes, as we look at this chaos in Israel. Chaos that really centers around Iran and her allies and proxies. And in a few minutes, I will take you to some of those passages in Ezekiel 38, and 39. But before we do, I want to take you to the book of Revelation in just a moment. Let me give you some background here. I fear this will be the most disjointed, confusing sermon you have ever heard. But I'm going to try to piece this together for you, so you have a grasp of what the Word of God has to say.

According to Ezekiel 38 and 39, we know that an alliance of nations will one day descend upon Israel from the north under the leadership of quote "Gog and Magog," and they will be supernaturally defeated on the mountains of northern Israel. And my goal this morning is to try to answer who, what, where, and why, even when, and bring some clarity and comfort and hopefully conviction to each of you that Christ might be exalted. Now, that's kind of where we're going. But in order to get there, we need to take just a short detour to get some understanding of what God has said, in the book of Revelation, the "Apokalypsis lesou Christo," the revealing of Jesus Christ, the last book in the Bible. Now, I'm going to have to assume some knowledge, on your part, of biblical eschatology. And so I'm not going to be able to get into all of the details, but I'm going to hit the highlights, and hopefully you will be able to fill in the blanks in days to come.

I want to remind you that the first five chapters of the apocalypse, or of the book of Revelation, are all introductory and then in Revelation six, we see the Worthy Lamb, the Lord Jesus Christ, opening six seals of divine wrath. And all of these are proceeding from the throne of God. And this is going to set into motion a purging that will ultimately kill most of the Earth's population and virtually every living thing and frankly, this is the whole climate cult environmentalist cults worst nightmare. And his purpose for this is to punish those who refuse to worship him. Moreover, according to Daniel nine, and verse 24, the purpose is to quote, "finish the transgression;" the transgression of Israel in the final 70th week of judgment that God revealed to Daniel, and then establish his earthly kingdom. Daniel 9:24 says," to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place."

Now we know that those four seals, the first four seals, are all represented by colored horses being written by four riders; sometimes you've heard people talk about the four horsemen of the apocalypse. The first seal describes, and this is very important, a pseudo peace, a false peace that will lull the world, including Israel into a false sense of utopia; a false sense of security. The second seal reveals a worldwide war; the third seal, worldwide famine; the fourth seal, death through the sword, and famine and pestilence and wild beasts. The fifth seal speaks of martyrdom of the newly converted saints--tribulation saints. The sixth seal speaks of unprecedented earthquakes and cosmic disturbances. And then the seventh seal includes kind of a silent contemplation of the staggering judgment that has transpired thus far. And then that will unleash the seventh trumpet judgments, followed by the seven bowl judgments.

Now, the catastrophic consequences of just the first four seals are inconceivable. They will ultimately kill 1/4 of the population of the earth, according to Revelation six and verse eight. And yet, those are only "the beginning of birth pangs," Jesus said, in Matthew 24, verse eight, and by the end, most of the human race will be exterminated. And what we see is that even as labor pains increase in severity and frequency for a mother about to give birth, so too, the seal, trumpet and bowl judgments will increase in severity and frequency, until finally a glorious kingdom will be birthed when the Lord Jesus returns in all of his glory.

Now, please understand just kind of basic chronology as I understand it from Scripture. The church will be caught up in the rapture, First Thessalonians 4:17. The Lord has promised to protect his church, to "keep" his church according to Revelation 310, "from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth." And sometime after the Lord snatches away his church and now begins to deal exclusively, once again, with Israel primarily in Daniel's 70th week, these seal judgments will begin to occur, and the first three and a half years of the tribulation. And of course, after the rapture of the church, according to Daniel 9:27, a character comes and his name is the "prince to come"; referring to the Antichrist. And we know that he is going to make a covenant with Israel, which really will begin the 70th week of God's judgment upon them. And at that time, the Jews will finally be able to build their temple on Mount Zion; which the Jewish people have been preparing for a long time; which the Antichrist, we know, will later desecrate in the middle of the week, or in the middle of the tribulation; three and a half years in.

And of course, this is all consistent with Jesus' chronology that he gave some 65 years earlier on the Tuesday before his crucifixion, at what is called the Olivet Discourse. You read about it in Matthew 24, and 25, Mark 13, and Luke 21; sometimes called "the little apocalypse," because it really parallels the events and the chronology of his unveiling here in the book of Revelation.

Now, another important kind of footnote to get your mind in the right place, very briefly, you must understand the profound significance of a third temple that needs to be built. Hasn't been built yet, but it's going to be remember the first temple was desecrated and destroyed in 586 BC with Nebuchadnezzar. And we know that there is a great restoration that is promised according to Malachi three and verse one, as well as the details of that temple are described in Ezekiel 40 through 48. And then the second temple desecration occurred in 186 BC, through Antiochus the fourth, and then it was utterly destroyed by the Romans and AD 70. And now we know that on that place, and I've been in this particular place, Satan has erected the Islamic Dome of the Rock, the Al-Aqsa Mosque, right there on Mount Zion, in which exists the former resting place of the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy of Holies. And currently, that sacred temple mount is under the militant control of the Islamic authority. And so the Orthodox Jews are passionate about restoring their temple; somehow getting rid of that temple, without the whole world exploding, right, and building their temple. And we know that that temple has to be built in order for the Antichrist to desecrate that temple in the middle of the tribulation.

Now, mind you, the secular Jews at this point, they couldn't care less about building the temple, all they want is peace. And they know that once you start tinkering with that particular piece of real estate, the whole world is going to blow up. But a third temple, we know, will be built according to Revelation 11, verses one and two, and then it's going to be desecrated in the middle of Daniel 70th week, the middle of the tribulation, according to Daniel 9:27, and Second Thessalonians, two, four.

Then, after the Lord returns, he will build the final millennial temple that is described in Ezekiel chapters 40 through 48; all of this is significant now for understanding the first seal. And you'll see why in a moment. Now we go to Revelation, Revelation chapter six. Again, John is standing in the throne room of heaven; he's looking upon the Worthy Lamb who has received the scroll of doom from the hand of the Father. That's all in chapter five. And then he has given a dramatic visual presentation of the contents of each seal.

And we see this first seal, beginning to be described in verse one of revelation six, let me read this to you. "Then I saw when the Lamb broke one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures saying as with a voice of thunder, 'Come.'" So he sees and he hears one of the magnificent angels around the throne summon the first horseman and his horse of judgment. And it's described as, quote, "a voice of thunder." And this is reminiscent, is it not, of the thunder that accompanied the theophany of God on Mount Sinai when God gave Moses the 10 commandments, as we read about in Exodus 20.

Verse two, "And I looked, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer." And we know that in Scripture, horses were used to symbolize conquest and power and majesty, and war. And certainly in Revelation they are associated with force, with power that brings great disaster upon the earth. And you will notice this is a white horse, which was a symbol of victory for the Romans and for the Persians; and also the symbol of righteousness and holiness in the book of Revelation. So what does this represent? Well, it's important, whenever we look at the prophetic literature, that we do so, especially as we look at symbolism, that we do so through the context of other prophetic passages. And we must interpret the symbolism here, of this white horse and rider, through the lens of many other prophetic passages that give us context as to what happens here in the initial phase of the tribulation, that we await; that the world awaits, I should say. Because again, I believe the church will not be in that particular season of God's wrath.

The beginning of the Tribulation will be characterized by a time of peace. The world's craving peace today, is it not? All over the world people don't know what to do. But according to Bible prophecy, the most diabolically wicked political leader in the history of the world will be the one who will come and offer that peace. And that person will be the Antichrist. And that world peace will center around tiny Israel. And it will happen, in Daniel 9:27, when quote, "he will make a firm covenant with the many," that is Israel, "for one week," that's weeks of years, in other words, seven years--that's why we call this Daniel 70th week; Israel is going to be deceived by a false sense of security provided by this ruler. And this peace will allow them to finally rebuild their temple; something they cannot do now because of the Muslims and their Dome of the Rock. And again, as I say, most Israelis really don't want it. All they want is peace, and they know that that will only bring further war.

According to Daniel 9:27, we read, "in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice is referring to the Antichrist, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes a desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate." And this of course, is consistent with what Jesus said in Matthew 24, in verse 15, referring to "the abomination of desolation." And we know according to Revelation 13, verses 14 and 15, that the antichrist at that point will set up an image of himself in the temple and demand to be worshipped. In First Thessalonians five and verse three, Paul also warned about this peaceful deception he said, "While they are saying, 'Peace and safety!' then destruction will come upon them suddenly like labor pains upon a woman with child, and they will not escape."

So given these facts, the first horse and horseman symbolizes a force of wickedness that will bring about a pseudo peace that's described in other passages as well. Now this person cannot be Christ; he is the one opening the seals. Moreover, this rider is given a "stephanos" crown, in the original language, a victor's wreath. And he carries a bow, whereas we see Christ is crowned with many diadems, that is royal crowns, in chapter 19. And he carries a sword. He doesn't carry a bow. And as we're gonna see, it's a bow without arrows. And he comes at the end of the tribulation, not at the beginning. So I would submit to you this is the White Horse of counterfeit righteousness, of feigned holiness; a person that the world is going to absolutely feign over. And I'm reminded of what the Apostle Paul said in Second Corinthians 11, begin in in first 14, this person will be like, quote, "Satan," who, "disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore, it's not surprising if his servants also disguised themselves as servants of righteousness, whose end shall be according to their deeds."

Now, I want you to notice as well, there's no indication that the rider is a specific person like the Antichrist, but rather he represents this impersonal force, this impetus--that of a counterfeit piece; even as the other riders, if you look into it, will represent war, and famine and death. And notice also this rider has a bow, but no arrows, perhaps symbolic of the capability to use force without the determination to do so. So here we see power, and the pretext of peace without malice. And we understand that better in the next phrase of verse two of Revelation six. We see also, "a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering, and to conquer." And this is not a reference to Christ, the eternal Sovereign King, he has no need for anyone to give him a crown. So this horse and rider, again, depicts this false peace that will be secured by the Antichrist, the one who will be given a winner's crown as he seduces the world.

And likewise here in this first seal, there is no hint of a military conquest that comes in the second seal. Yet we have one who goes out quote, "conquering and to conquer." So obviously, this must mean there is some kind of political maneuvering, not a conquering through military force. And this will probably be the force behind what we hear today called the New World Order. Paul describes the power of his deceptive capabilities in Second Thessalonians two, in verse eight, he's described as "the lawless one." So the Antichrist, the lawless one, also in verse nine, and following, "the one who's coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perished, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. And for this reason, God will send upon them a diluting influence so that they might believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth but took pleasure in wickedness."

And we know that the Antichrist will also have the help of many false teachers, many false messiahs. Jesus spoke about this in Matthew 24. At the end of verse four "'See to it that no one mislead you. For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will mislead many.'" He will also have as his accomplices, an army of false religions, of ear tickling false shepherds who multiply like fruit flies, in the midst of a crisis, as we see today, like the false shepherds in the days of Jeremiah, who kept preaching "Peace, peace, but there is no peace," Jeremiah six and verse 14. Now that's all introductory to where I want to go.

What kind of events in the prophetic sequence contribute to this kind of mass gullibility? What would cause the world including Israel to be so profoundly duped? Well, I would like to offer you a possible scenario, I can't be dogmatic, you know, when it comes to eschatology, everybody's bucket has holes in it. I just think mine has fewer than the others. I know that sounds hideously arrogant, but you know, you have to have convictions, right? I would like to offer you a possible scenario that emerges from the prophetic literature and I believe that the Prophet Ezekiel gives us much insight into the possible sequence of events that could cause the world to clamor for peace, like never before. There has to be something that will transpire to get the highly distrusting nation, and rightfully so; the highly distrusting nation of Israel to be seduced by this pseudo peace, represented by the first seal at the beginning of Daniel's 70th week. And I believe that a possible explanation for all of this can be found in the events of Ezekiel 38 and 39 and the prophecy of Gog and Magog. Let me give you a thirty second overview of the book of Ezekiel, okay. I don't know, I think I may have this on the overhead.

In Chapters one through 24, there's a description of Israel's removal from their land. Chapters 25 to 32, depicts God's historical judgments on other nations. Chapter 33, there's a historical call to repentance, the fall of Jerusalem. And of course, all of that happened literally, which tells you that the rest of it will all happen literally. And then in chapters 34 through 39, you have prophecies concerning Israel's literal future return to the very same land from which they were driven and dispersed across the globe. In chapters 38 and 39, you have a graphic description of a future invasion of Israel and its aftermath that will occur just prior to Messiah has returned to establish his earthly millennial kingdom. And then chapters 40 through 48, you have a detailed description of the millennial temple and conditions in the kingdom with respect to the boundaries and division of the land and the priests and the tribes and on and on it goes.

Now I want you to think carefully with me. In Ezekiel 37, you have that magnificent chapter of the vision of the valley of the dry bones depicting a national resurrection of Israel and regathering back into the land, where eventually at His second coming, the Lord promises according to verse 24, "I will put My Spirit within you and you will come to life, and I will place you on your land. And in verse 24, we read that was verse 14 in Ezekiel 37, and then verse 24, we read, "My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd." And in verse 26, he promises that, that this will all fulfill the Abrahamic and Davidic and New Covenants together as he establishes his kingdom. And he says there, verse 26, "'I will set my sanctuary in their midst forever. My dwelling place also will be with them; and I will be their God, and they will be My people. And the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, when My sanctuary is in their presence for forever." Now, obviously, that has not happened. But then in Ezekiel 38, he gives a detailed prophecy of a future invasion, before all of this happens, and then in chapter 39, he gives a description of him coming to the aid of Israel, destroying these enemies, and a description of the aftermath and ultimate restoration of Israel into their land during the millennial kingdom. And, of course, all of the detailed descriptions of the millennial temple.

But what's interesting, is sandwiched in between Israel's regathering and promised spiritual restoration in chapter 37 and the temple details in chapters 40 and 48. You have this invasion in chapters 38 and 39. And all of this tells us that this battle is somehow uniquely associated with the last days temple. But let me read you Ezekiel 38, verses two through six. "And the word of the Lord came to me saying, 'Son of man, set your face toward God of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him and say, 'Thus says the Lord God, "Behold, I am against you, O Gog, prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal, I will turn you about and put hooks into your jaws, and I will bring you out, and all your army horse, horses and horsemen, all of them splendidly attired, a great company with buckler and shield, all of them wielding swords; Persia, Ethiopia and Put with them, all of them with shield and helmet; Gomer with all its troops; Beth-togarmah from the remote parts of the north with all its troops--many peoples with you."'" Now, let me stop there. Just real briefly, the meaning of Gog is uncertain. I would estimate that I've spent at least 12 to 15 hours over the years, studying everybody that's ever written on this topic. And I can assure you that nobody really knows what Gog means. And the best we can do is see it as the personified head of the forces of evil which are intent on destroying Israel that we know. And we also know that this comes from the land of Magog and against that's uncertain; most likely a name describing the region that compromises the alliance of nations; the complex of nations that he goes on to mention. But he or it is called the "prince of Rosh," at least in the New American Standard, I think a better translation like you would see in the ESV, or even the Legacy Standard is "the chief prince," because Rosh is really an adjective in the Old Testament meaning chief, and so it's translated like in the ESV, "the chief Prince of Meshech, and Tubal." And of course, we know that these were provinces in Asia Minor in an area associated with the Scythians, kind of in the southern region of Siberia, if you would look at it today. And those people reigned from Central Asia--from China to the northern Black Sea, which is the region now of Turkey, and six Muslim Soviet Socialist Republics: Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan. An estimated 25 million Muslims live in Russia, and most are living in the immediate proximity. And certainly, these particular republics are in the immediate proximity of Turkey, and Syria, and Lebanon and Iraq, and Iran, and Afghanistan. And we see from the text that God's allies include Meshech and Tubal, we know that they were territories in Turkey. Persia, he mentions, is Iran. Kush and Ethiopia is Sudan and that part of Northern Africa. Put, likewise Libya. Gomer can be identified historically with the Gimmerai of the Assyrians, or the Cimmerians of Greek literature, who originally came from the north of the Black Sea. Beth-togarmah is Turkey, and it may also include Azerbaijan and Armenia. So basically, the geographical area Ezekiel describes would include parts of Iran and Turkey and the southern provinces of Russia. Gog's allies, although they offer no conclusive evidence as to God's identity, and today, all of these nations hate the United States, ultimately, and they certainly hate Israel. And they want to destroy Israel. And of course, the most powerful motivation of all is the Shia Muslim commitment to their goal of not just a regional caliphate, but a worldwide caliphate. I mean, they would ultimately destroy every one of us if they could. And worse yet, mainstream Shiites believe that the return of the Messiah like figure they call the 12 Imam, and his coming was going to be hastened by some kind of an apocalyptic chaos and violence that's perpetrated upon Christians and Jews. And so they love to see all of this chaos because they think it's going to bring in their redeemer, their messiah figure.

But God says that he's going to put hooks into their jaws and bring this alliance down on Israel, according to verse four. According to verse 13, to "plunder, to carry away silver and gold to take away cattle and goods to capture great spoil." Now, when will this happen? Some say, well, it's going to happen during the tribulation. Others say it's the battle of Armageddon. Others say it's really mainly speaking of the end of the millennium. And others will say, as I do, that, I believe this will happen before the tribulation. Even though I can't be dogmatic, I think it's very possible. And I want you to look closely at this. We know that they're going to swoop down on Israel from the north, quote, "the mountains of Israel," 38 in verse eight and other passages, even in chapter 39. It's also going to be a region of, quote, "unwalled villages," according to 38 and verse 11, which is currently true of Northern Israel, I've been there. And this security seems to refer to military confidence rather than their trust in the Lord. And these invaders, according to 38 and verse six and verse 15, are going to come out of "the remote parts of the north." And according to chapter 39, verse four, we know that God will miraculously defeat them, quote, "on the mountains of Israel."

Why is he going to do this? Chapter 39, in verse seven, "'My holy name I will make known in the midst of My people, Israel; and I will not let My holy name be profaned anymore. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel.'" And what's the outcome of the war? Well 39 verse 22, says, "'And the house of Israel will know that I am the LORD their God from that day onward.'"

Now, obviously, this war must take place prior to the millennium, because during the millennium, Israel is not going to be surrounded by murderous enemies. And they will not even enter the kingdom, unless they already know the Lord and are worshipping Him. Moreover, and this is really fascinating, according to Isaiah 66, verses 19 and 20, some of the attackers Ezekial mentions are actually going to come to saving faith in Christ and come and worship the Lord. So I think that, and another a number of other reasons, that would rule out the millennium. So will it take place during the tribulation or at Armageddon? Well, I think not. Let me tell you why. At Armageddon, according to Zechariah 12, verses two and three, it says, quote, "all the nations of the earth will be gathered" against Jerusalem. And they will be allied with the Antichrist to destroy Jerusalem while the people are in a state of imminent peril. In Joel three, verse two, "I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat." Jehoshaphat means "Yahweh judges." "Then I will enter into judgment with them on behalf of my people and my inheritance Israel." But with the battle of Gog and Magog in Ezekial 38, it's not all the nations, it's a specific alliance of nations that meet their fate on the mountains of Israel.

Moreover, at Armageddon, we read that the Antichrist will assemble his army in the northern part of Israel, round mountain Megiddo, according to Revelation 16, verses 14 and 16. But the actual battle is going to be in Jerusalem, Zechariah 12, 13, 14. But in the battle of Gog and Magog, there's no mention of the Antichrist, at least any anything that I can see; and the alliance of nations are going to be destroyed on the mountains of Israel, Ezekial 39 and verse four. And Armageddon occurring at the very end of the tribulation, it will occur at the very end of the tribulation, when the world including much of Israel, is going to be utterly destroyed by the seal trumpet in bowl judgments. It's devastating. In Revelation six, verse 16, we read that the people will say to the mountains into the rocks, "'Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of the wrath has come and who is able to stand?'" But in the battle of Gog and Magog, we see something very different. The context according to Ezekiel 38, and verse 11, is Israel living quote, "securely." "Betach,” securely; safely, free from anxiety and fear--a term which by the way can refer to peace through military might. And we also see that God will cause their enemies to come upon them and take spoil. Well, my goodness, if that's happening at the end of the end of the Armageddon, they're certainly not going to be living in peace and security. And there won't be any spoil to take.

Now, we know when Christ returns at Armageddon, amazing things are gonna happen to the topography of the earth. In Zechariah 14 beginning in verse three we read, "The Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as when He fights on a day of battle. In that day, His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives will be split in its middle from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will move toward the north and the other half toward the south." And in verse 10, we read, "All the land will be changed into a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem; but Jerusalem will rise and remain on its site from Benjamin's gate, as far as the place of the First Gate to the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hananel to the king's wine presses. People will live in it, and there will no longer be a curse, for Jerusalem will dwell in security." Now that describes radical changes to the earth's topography; there is a renovation of the earth that occurs when Jesus returns, returning the earth to a form of Edenic splendor. In fact, John MacArthur says quote, "All the land into a plain," what we just read, "the term plain pictures the Jordan Valley, extending from Mount Hermon, which is an elevation of 9100 feet to the Gulf of Akabah. Here the entire land from Geba, six miles to the north, to Rimmon, in the south, would be leveled to become like the well-watered and fertile lowlands of the Jordan Valley, causing Jerusalem to be exalted above, like a solitaire diamond on a ring. Jerusalem having been rebuilt according to these dimensions will be exalted in both place and purpose; the prominent royal city of Jesus Christ, Ezekiel 40 through 48."

Now, how can you reconcile this kind of supernatural glorious renovation and cleansing of the Earth with the cleanup after the battle of Gog and Magog? Because it says in Ezekiel 39, nine through 16, it will take Israel "seven months," verse 12, to bury the corpses. And the destruction of the weapons will take according to verse nine, "seven years." You see, if this battle were to occur during the tribulation, the Jews would be having to do this during the horrific sealed trumpet and bowl judgment, where they're experiencing unprecedented persecution and judgment and death. We know according to Revelation 12, six, many of them will flee into the wilderness. And we know according to Zechariah 12, verses seven through eight, chapter 13, verse one, chapter 14, verse two, that others are going to remain in Jerusalem. So if this is a battle of Armageddon, this means that in other words, that the battle of Gog and Magog happens at the battle of Armageddon. This means that exposed corpses and military equipment will litter the land that the Lord has just renovated. I cannot fathom that. It's going to happen seven years into the millennium? That makes no sense to me. So that's why I believe that this battle will take place prior to the tribulation. And this will give Israel time to bury the corpses and dispose of the weaponry that will take seven years. In fact, as I look at it, in Ezekiel 38 and 39, there is nothing in those texts that would rule out the conditions of the State of Israel prior to the Hamas attack on October 7.

Is it possible that that attack signals the beginning stages of the battle of Gog and Magog? Maybe not the final one, but certainly we see, I think, the stage being set for all that Ezekial has promised, certainly that shocked Israel. They thought they were secure because of their military might. And it has certainly triggered a second front in the north with Hezbollah, and it's galvanized the entire Islamic nations of the world against Israel. Yay, I would submit to you is galvanizing most of the world against Israel, including the alliance of nations described in Ezekiel 38 verses five and six. I mean, we all watched the Muslim mob storm the airport, in Dagestan. Did you see that in search of the Jews wanting to kill them when they came in on the plane? That Republic of Dagestan is on the southernmost tip of Russia. And it shares border with Azerbaijan and Georgia, northwest of Tehran, and east of Turkey.

Israel's devastating ground operations in Gaza has outraged the world, along with millions of Marxists in the US. We see this with all of the protests. And think about this, we see now Biden losing support from the radical left. Let me present some scenarios to you. And here, we're just we're just thinking out loud, okay? Can't be dogmatic with any of this. What if the US decided to withdraw support from Israel? What if the rapture were to suddenly take place? I mean, Israel would be absolutely vulnerable. Either one of those scenarios, would be an opportunity for the enemy to come down upon them. Could this be the way God fulfills his stated promise in Ezekiel 38 verse four, when he says, "I will turn you about put hooks into your jaws, and I will bring you out and all your army." The idea to destroy Israel.

Now, imagine the geopolitical implications of such a victory. All of these nations come down upon Israel, and God supernaturally destroys them. And we'll get into that, possibly next week to see what he's going to do. But I mean, he destroys them, not Israel. Suddenly, the Islamic world would lose all of its clout, and Israel would become the most feared nation on the planet. The world's economy would collapse. You add to that the rapture of the church, and the United States would become a toothless tiger. And that would create a global crisis, a leadership vacuum that would need to be filled. Israel would become a force to be reckoned with, requiring a peace treaty. This could pave the way; I believe for the first seal of Revelation six; the horse and the rider that depicts the force of false peace that will be secured by the Antichrist. Moreover, at that point, guess what? The Orthodox Jews would finally be able to rebuild the third temple. And the secular Jews would no longer resist it, for fear of Islamic reprisals because they are basically neutered. And there has to be a third temple in order for it to be defiled. By the way, that temple will ultimately be destroyed and the fourth temple, the final temple, is the one of Ezekiel 40 through 48.

Well, I'll expand upon this more the next time, we're out of time. But at least, maybe we can begin to see that what we're seeing today, possibly, could be the beginning of all of this. Certainly, it's going to include many of the nations and the satanic ideologies that are driving all of the wickedness in the world today. And we don't know exactly when, but we know that it will ultimately happen, because God has promised it and he cannot lie. And to that extent, dear friends, I would encourage you to rejoice in the Lord. Don't be afraid of all this stuff. I mean, the worst that could happen is we die and be with him. Right? Right. And so we can rejoice in this. And I, I'm just thrilled when I look at all of the prophecies that God has fulfilled absolutely literally. And even though we don't know, again, everybody's buckets has holes in them, right? And my bucket's got holes in it. Like I say, I just don't think it has as many as some of the others but, but the point is, I know that ultimately, my God reigns, your God reigns, Christ is coming again, and he's going to establish His Kingdom just as he's promised. And my friend, if you don't know Christ, as your Savior, if you have never trusted in him as the only hope of your eternal salvation, please, I plead with you, do that today before it's too late. Let's pray together.

Father, thank You for the glories of your grace, the promises of your word. And I pray that even as we've reflected upon some of the possibilities, and certainly many of the truths of your word, that we will once again be encouraged in who you are, and that we will contemplate even more deeply and celebrate more joyfully, the wonders of your grace; the perfections of your character, that we might serve you and love you. That many might see Christ in us and be saved. To this end we pray for the glory of Christ. Amen.

It is always an immense privilege to be able to stand before you, and minister the word of God to you. And I would invite you to take your Bibles and turn to Deuteronomy 29, where we just were. But I must say I have many passages that we will be going to. This is not going to be a typical exposition. In fact, I'm not sure exactly where I'm going with all of these things, but I have much to share with you with respect to what's going on in the world today. In fact, I'm moving away temporarily from our study of the gospel of Mark, to address the issue of Israel in Bible prophecy.

We are all stunned, at least the civilized world is stunned, with what has happened in Israel. I've been in many of those areas; I've never been to Gaza, but I've been to many of those areas. And the savagery that took place there is nothing short of satanic. And we're also stunned to see the massive protests here in the United States; people that are somehow sympathetic with things that they don't understand frankly, and some of them do understand. And many are asking the question, "Why such violent hatred of Jewish people?" "Why such antisemitism, pretty much worldwide?" "Why are the Jews and the Islamic Arabs in a perpetual state of war?" Is it because Israel is oppressing the Palestinians, as many will argue; that somehow they are an oppressive people group? And therefore, the solution to all of this is a political solution. Because ultimately, this is a land dispute. My goal over the next few weeks is to present a biblical, theological, prophetic explanation of what is happening. And I will say from the outset, that the things that I have to say that emerge from the Word of God will be utterly absurd to people who do not know Christ, and do not have a grasp of scripture. But for those of us who, by his grace, know and love him, the Spirit of God will use his word to illuminate our hearts, and bring comfort, and discernment and hope, and strengthen our faith.

Why such hatred of Jewish people? Why Hamas and Hezbollah? Why the violent protests? Well, God answers this very clearly in his word. And I'm going to present this to you very succinctly and then I'm going to spend several weeks elaborating on what I'm about to say. The reason for all of this can be summarized under two simple headings. The hatred of Jewish people and Hamas and all of these things, is number one, the result of Satan's hatred of God's chosen people. Secondly, it's because of God's judgment on his chosen people. Which I might add, will ultimately result in their spiritual salvation and national restoration.

When Christ returns and establishes His kingdom what we see happening in Israel today, dear friends, is nothing more than a manifestation of the ancient battle between the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light; between Satan and God. Satan is doing everything he can to thwart the purposes of God. And Israel is right at the heart of that, as we will see, Christian people. But also, what we see here is the fulfillment of God's promises to judge his people for their disobedience. God made it an abundantly clear, for example, in Deuteronomy 28, that he would bless them if they would obey his law, but also he would curse them if they did not. So frankly, he predicted the bewilderment that many people have today with antisemitism. In fact, as we read just a minute ago in Deuteronomy 29, beginning in verse 24, he predicted this, he said, "All of the nations will say, 'Why has the Lord done thus to this land? Why this great outburst of anger?'" Here's the answer, "Then men will say, 'Because they forsook the covenant of the Lord, the God of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went and served other gods and worshipped them, gods whom they have not known and whom He had not allotted to them. Therefore the anger of the LORD burned against the land, to bring upon it every curse, which is written in this book; and the Lord uprooted them from their land in anger and in fury and in great wrath, and cast them into another land, as it is this day.'" And I will elaborate much more on this in times to come. But what we see today is God allowing Satan, and his demonic and human servants, to persecute His chosen people, that he might eventually bring them to saving faith in Christ

May I remind you of Jesus' profound statement to the Samaritan woman recorded in John 4:22. And this helps under helps us understand the reason for Satan's hatred. Jesus said to her, "'You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.'" Dear friends, the implication of that last phrase is absolutely staggering and it is at the heart of what we see happening in Israel and around the world today. You see, because salvation is from the Jews, God's chosen people, they have always been and will remain, Satan's primary target. Satan and his minions are conducting to this very day, a campaign of deception and violence to prevent God's plan of redemption, by eliminating the very people from which the Savior arose once and will return. God predicted this intransigent Semitism, antisemitism that has dominated history, when he cursed Satan in the Garden of Eden, after Satan tempted Adam and Eve, you will recall in Genesis 3:15. And this is foundational to understanding all that has happened and all that is happening there. In Genesis 3:15, God said, "'And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed, he shall bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him on the heel.'" Friends, I would submit to you that you cannot understand the mystery, the problem of antisemitism and anti-Christianity unless you understand that passage of scripture and it's far-reaching implications recorded in Scripture. What we are watching today is the result of this ancient battle of two opposing spiritual kingdoms. The kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan, combined with God's judgment upon his chosen people for their disobedience. And even to the to this day, most of them remain his beloved enemy.

But I will add this, we also know that God will one day save and restore Israel, when the Messiah the Lord Jesus Christ returns and judges the nations and establishes his kingdom. In fact, in Deuteronomy, where we were earlier, beginning, in verse three of chapter 30, we read this, "Then the Lord your God will restore you from captivity, and have compassion on you, and will gather you again from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you. If your outcasts are at the ends of the earth, from there the LORD your God will gather you, and from there He will bring you back. The LORD your God will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed, and you shall possess it; and He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers."

We even read in Jeremiah chapter 30, in verse 24, "The fierce anger of the LORD will not turn back until He has performed and until He has accomplished the intent of His heart. In the latter days, you will understand this." In Jeremiah 32, beginning of verse 37, we also read "'Behold, I will gather them out of all of the lands to which I have driven them in My anger, in My wrath and in great indignation; and I will bring them back to this place and make them dwell in safety. They shall be My people, and I will be their God.'" Thus saith the Lord.

Well, I have an outline that I made up that I hope to follow, at least at some level, that may give you some categories to hang some of these great truths upon. And unless you're a bit OCD, I would encourage you not to even take notes, because I'm going to be going fast and furious. And all of this is going to be transcribed, and you will have them available to you, okay? But my outline is simply this. Number one, we're going to look at God's choice of Israel. Number two, we're going to look at Satan's hatred of Israel. Number three, God's judgment of Israel; and that's probably as far as we'll get today. And then, fourthly, we're going to look at God's protection of Israel, and finally, God's salvation, and restoration of Israel. And what you will see is there's much overlap in all of these categories.

So first of all, in order to understand what's going on, we need to start from the beginning. We need to understand, number one: God's choice of Israel. Let me give you the big picture overview. We know that God created the heavens and the earth, everything that is in the universe; that he allowed sin to enter into his perfect universe. And as a result of that, he cursed all that he had created with the intent of ultimately bringing blessing and restoration; to bring glory unto himself to an elect group of people. And when God made that curse, he also cursed Satan in the garden. And I read that a moment ago in Genesis 3:15. He predicted a great struggle between Satan's seed, referring to unbelievers, and Eve's offspring, referring to Christ, and all who are in him. And there we read that Satan would bruise Christ's heel, meaning that he would cause him to suffer, but Christ would bruise him on the head, meaning he would ultimately and utterly destroy him. And that happened at the cross. And the ultimate fruition of that will occur, yet future. The cancer of sin, we know from the biblical record and from history, continued to metastasize.

So God judged the entire Earth with a global flood. And after the days of Noah, God chose the descendants of Abraham to be his treasured possession. Deuteronomy seven beginning in verse six, God said, "'For you are a holy people to the LORD.'" In other words, you're separated unto me. "'You are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. The Lord did not set His love on you, nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples.'" Let me pause, and also in Deuteronomy nine and verse six, he adds, "'it is not because of your righteousness, that the LORD your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stubborn people.'" Back to Deuteronomy seven and verse eight and following. Here's why he set his love upon them. "Because the Lord loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers,'" referring to the Abrahamic covenant. "'The LORD brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Know therefore that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His loving kindnesses to a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments; but repays those who hate Him to their faces, to destroy them; He will not delay with him who hates Him, He will repay him to his face.'"

Now, very briefly, we know that in Genesis chapter 12, God introduced a covenant, a promise to Abraham. And then he actually made that in Genesis 15, beginning in verse 18. And then he reaffirmed it later on in Genesis chapter 17. And then we also know that he renewed it with Isaac in chapter 26, and also with Jacob in chapter 28. And this covenant contains essentially four elements; number one, that he would give him a seed-- referring to Christ that would come from his loins. And this was reaffirmed again in Second Samuel seven, that secondly, that he would give Abraham's descendants a land, a specific territory, that would be set apart by God for His people; a place where he would ultimately dwell with them in a holy and an intimate union. And we can see this reaffirmed in Leviticus 26, for example, as well as Deuteronomy 27 and 28. And thirdly, he promised that from Abraham would come a great nation, where Abraham's godly reputation, and his legacy would be displayed materially, spiritually and socially; that the glory of God's grace would be put on display. And then, fourthly, he promised divine blessing and protection upon them. And this is all reaffirmed in the new covenant blessings found in Jeremiah 31. In fact, the writer of Hebrews describes the certainty of God's promise to Abraham and his descendants in chapter six, beginning in verse 13. Here's what the writer says, "For when God made the promise to Abraham, since He had not one greater by whom to swear, He swore by Himself saying, 'SURELY I WILL BLESS AND MULTIPLY YOU.'" And then later in verse 17, we read when God desired to show more convincingly, "to the heirs of the promise, the unchangeable character of His purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath."

Now, God's promise to Abraham included blessings to his descendants that would come through his sons, Ishmael, and Isaac. And it is here, where Satan began to drive a great wedge in that family, in those people. And he did this by implementing a nefarious plan to thwart the purposes of God. So we move from God's choice of Israel; Secondly, to Satan's hatred of Israel. What we see in the biblical record is that here Satan caused a rivalry between Ishmael, whom most will say was the father of the Arabs, and Isaac, through whom came the Jews. And it's important for you to understand that God promised to make Ishmael a great nation, with many progenies and the father of 12 rulers. But God also said in Genesis chapter 16, and verse 12, that, "'He will be a wild donkey of a man, his hand will be against everyone and everyone's hand will be against him, and he will live to the east of all his brothers.'"

Later, in 2005 BC, Isaac's barren wife, conceived and gave birth to twin boys, by the name of Jacob and Esau. Esau being the father of the Edomites, the fierce enemies of Israel. And in Genesis 25, verse 23, we read that, "The LORD said to her, 'Two nations are in your womb; and two peoples will be separated from your body; and one people shall be stronger than the other; and the older shall serve the younger.'" Dear friends, we're seeing this played out today in Israel. Indeed, only Isaac's descendants would be the inheritors of the racial and the national promises made to Abraham. You read more about this, for example, in Romans chapter nine. And in Genesis 32 and verse 28, we read how God changed Jacob's name to "Israel." And through Jacob, the grandson of Abraham, came the 12 tribes of Israel.

Well Satan's attempt to destroy God's chosen people continued, and obviously I'm leaving out lots of history, I'm giving you the highlights. But we see this when the line of Abraham was almost eliminated by the plot against Jacob's son, Joseph, when God raised him up to be a great ruler in Egypt. And we know that God intervened. We know that he preserved many people, including his own family. We also see that Joseph is a type of Christ revealed in Scripture. And Joseph's own words reveal the glory of God's intervention and all of that. In Genesis chapter 45, verse eight, he said, "'Now therefore, it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh and lord of all his household, and ruler over all the land of Egypt.'"

Now we know that the Israelites in Egypt began to prosper greatly. The 12 tribes that came through the loins of Abraham and through Isaac, and finally Jacob, ultimately became a threat to Pharaoh. So he began to afflict them with bitter labor. But as we read in Scripture, the Israelites actually thrived and prospered, despite Satan's attempt to destroy them.

And in that day, God raised up Moses to deliver his people, Israel, from the Egyptians, and bring them into, according to Exodus 3:8, "'a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanite and the Hittites and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite.'" It's also interesting, in Genesis 15, verse 13, Abraham was told by God, that his descendants would be aliens, that would be mistreated in a foreign land for 400 years using a figure rounded to hundreds. And as promised, According to Exodus 12:41, quote, "at the end of 430 years, to the very day, all the hosts of the LORD went out from the land of Egypt." And we know that through the ordinates of that first Passover, that pointed to Christ's saving work, God miraculously delivered his chosen people from the Egyptians. And that happened we know in 1446 BC.

And as they wandered in the wilderness, making their way, ultimately to their promised land, we see how God made that family into a nation. And he gave that nation his law through his servant Moses, to demonstrate his righteous standard, and to help them understand their need for a Savior, that would one day come. He promised to bless them for their obedience, to curse them for their disobedience as we have read. And again, this is vividly and solidly described in Deuteronomy 28. And so we know that he brings them finally into the promised land. And it's interesting in Deuteronomy seven, beginning in verse one, we read that God commanded them to, quote, "utterly destroy" the people of Canaan, when they entered the land. Which meant they were to kill every man, every woman and every child. They were to do this as an act of divine retribution for their extreme wickedness, and also to protect Israel, not only from their violence, but to protect them from the corruption of their idolatry and immorality that would ultimately cause them to sin and bring judgment upon Israel. And sadly, they violated God's commands in many different ways. And they succumb to Satan's schemes. They began to intermarry with those people, they began to worship their idols. And they suffered greatly at the hands of their enemies, as God allowed that to happen as part of his judgment upon them.

And this moves us now to the third point in our little outline, and that's God's judgment upon Israel. Again, this is promised in Deuteronomy 28, as a consequence of their disobedience; and there's many examples of how his judgment was manifested. Let me give you a few more. We know that Satan almost eliminated the descendants of Abraham, the Israelites, in the potential genocide of the Jews that we read about in Esther chapter three and chapter four. He attempted to destroy the Messianic line itself, in the time of Joash. You read about that in Second Chronicles, 22, and 23. And what's interesting is always, even in the midst of all of those horrible judgments that were occurring, he would always remind them of his faithfulness to his covenant promises. And as God's plan unfolded in history, around 1000 BC, he made another promise to one of Abraham's descendants, to a man named David. The promise of an eternal kingdom, whereby David's throne would ultimately belong to a descendant of David, to a greater son of David, namely the Lord Jesus Christ. But we know that God's judgment continued as God allowed Satan to persecute his people.

In 722 the northern kingdom of Israel fell to the Assyrians. In 605 BC, Judah fell to the Babylonians. And during that time, God raised up a prophet by the name of Daniel. In the prophecies of Daniel chapter seven, which parallel Daniel chapter two, I might add. In that prophecy, Daniel sees four great beasts, according to Daniel seven, verse three. They're coming, "up from the sea, different from one another." And there he describes the empires of Babylon, of Medo-Persia, of Greece and of Rome, and also a future revived Roman Empire that would be ruled by the most hideous of all rulers that we know to be the Antichrist, that is coming. And there we read of a successive number of Gentile empires that would dominate Jerusalem and God's covenant people until the Messiah would come and establish his kingdom. And we see Satan's role in all of this.

You will also recall in Daniel chapter 10, as well as chapter 12, where Daniel speaks of the Archangel Michael, the great prince, who stands guard over the sons of Israel, Daniel 12, verse one. Remember how, according to chapter 10, and verse 13, that he fought against a demon called the Prince of Persia, whom Satan had dispatched to thwart the purposes of God by opposing Gabriel in heavenly warfare. You may remember that from our study of Daniel.

But once again, because of his great love, and his great faithfulness to his covenant promises, God gave Abraham's descendants, a fourth promise, a new covenant of redemption, that we read about in Jeremiah, chapter 31. A covenant whereby through Israel, God's very Son would purchase their redemption, and the redemption of all who had placed their faith in him; that he would restore them to their land. And this of course, was and is an eternal and unconditional covenant, based upon God's very character. That all who know him and love him would participate in the spiritual blessings of salvation. Promises to be fulfilled and individuals, and to Israel as a nation, when they are reestablished into their land in the millennial kingdom.

Moving ahead in history, we continue to see this battle take place between Satan and Yahweh. Remember when the infant Messiah was born, the Lord Jesus Christ, in Matthew two we read how Satan tried to kill him. He tempted Christ, to get him to abandon his mission in Matthew chapter four, and he incited the Jewish leaders and their followers to crucify the Messiah. He even went so far as to make sure that there were people that were guarding his tomb where he wouldn't rise again as he promised. Since the time of Christ, Satan has tried to exterminate God's chosen people. He has tried to thwart God's kingdom purposes; and God allows it, consistent with his promise to judge them for their disobedience.

In AD 70, the Romans came in and massacred them. And during the next six centuries, conflict grew between Jews and Gentiles. They were scattered all over the globe in the Diaspora. By the fourth century AD, we see how even the church was suddenly getting sucked into this antisemitism. We see it through the influence of Augustine, where the Christian community had become so thoroughly Gentilized, that they began to adopt, frankly, an antisemitic view. But yet they realized that the Old Testament said something different, and they couldn't accept the idea of a future national restoration of Israel, despite how clearly it says differently in the Old Testament. So they embraced the Grecianized hermeneutic of Plato and of Origin in order to expunge God's covenant people from God's plan for mankind; to get rid of them completely. And they created the hermeneutical device of allegorizing Scripture. And from that came, replacement theology, also known as supercessionism, or amillennialism, frankly, Roman Catholic eschatology.

And by the seventh century AD, we know that Satan dispatched a demon to give a series of visions to a man by the name of Muhammad, this demon's name was Gabriel, Muhammad said. And he recorded what the visions were. They are now found in the Islamic scriptures known as the Koran, the book of Islam. Islam means "surrender, or submission," "surrender to the will of Allah." And Islam would then grow to be one of the most violent haters of all people, but especially the Jews of any religion that has ever existed; more on that later.

Dave Harrell  

By AD 1096, you have the Crusades, and they attempted genocide of the Jews. In fact, if you read your history, you will see that the medieval church's vicious degradation of the Jews is one of the most heart wrenching periods in world history. The English Magna Carta of 1215 legalized persecution of the Jews. By 1492, when Columbus discovered America, prior to their expulsion by Ferdinand and Isabella, who were patrons of Columbus, the Jews in Spain endured horrible, horrible, hideous torture, even being burned alive during the Roman Catholic Spanish Inquisition. History records how at least 300,000 of them had to either convert to Roman Catholicism, or flee Spain or be killed. And we know that 1000s of them fled to Portugal, to Greece, to Turkey, to the Netherlands and so forth.

Between the years of 1346 and 1353, the Jews were blamed for the Black Death. Remember that? The bubonic plague that caused the deaths of they say anywhere from 78 to 200 million people. And many of the reformers were even vicious anti Semites like Martin Luther of the 15th century, who accused the Jews of poisoning wells and ritual murder. You ought to read his diatribes in his work entitled "The Jews and Their Lies." But by the 19th century, the volcano of antisemitism was erupting in Poland, and in Russia, resulting in many pogroms, that is by the way, "p" "o" "g" "r" "o" "m" "s." In Russian it means it means "massacre." Basically, the Russian Tsar Alexander the First used the infamous protocols of the "Learned Elders of Zion," to distract the Russian people from the political problems that he had caused, that was occurring in Russia. And according to the Shoah Resource Center of Yad Vashem; "shoah" by the way in Hebrew means "Holocaust." And this is referring to the world Holocaust Remembrance center in Jerusalem; I've been there on several occasions, if you've never been there, I hope you can go, you will never be the same when you see what the Nazis did to the Jews. But in the Shoah Resource Center, they speak about the protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion. And folks, this is just one example of many, of how Satan uses his lies to deceive millions. They say quote, "It was a forged document that claims to reveal a Jewish plot to take over the world. The protocols were based on a satire of the French regime by Maurice Joly, that had been published in Belgium in 1864. The adaptation was first distributed in Russia. Eventually, the protocols were used by the Nazis," as quote, "proof of the Jews wickedness and greed. Groups still publish the protocols today with the intention of hurting the Jews and denying the Holocaust." They went on to say, "the protocol state that the Jews will use weapons to achieve control over the world. It claims that the Jews brought about the French Revolution, liberalism, socialism, communism, and anarchy, in order to weaken European society." That Jews, "also control the price of gold and have the power to evoke economic crises, rule the media, create religious and tribal feuds and destroy cities if the need arises. Once they gain world power, they would demand total obedience to a Jewish king." Finally, they say, "the Freemasons would act as their collaborators in these conspiracies."

So again, you see Satan at the very core of these things. You see God allowing these things to happen, as he promised, as a judgment on their disobedience. And of course, what I just read led to Hitler's, quote, "final solution" of the Holocaust, where 6 million Jews were murdered; an evil that is without parallel, an evil that Satan orchestrated to destroy all Jews and Jewish civilization in Europe.

Now, I have just given you a mere sampling of biblical, theological, historical truths. And of course, after hearing that, you can see that the reason why there is a battle in Israel is because Israel is oppressing Hamas. I mean, folks, if that's what you think, I don't know what else I can say. I mean, that is a level of stupidity and naivety that begs language. And yet, that's what you're hearing by so many; that Israel is oppressing the Arab Muslim Palestinians, because they are occupying their land. And of course, the answer is a two-state solution. You just give them their land, give them what they want, and everybody's gonna get along fine. Staggering stupidity: people that live in a fool's paradise.

You know, Jesus said of Satan in John 8:44, that he is the "father of lies." And folks is a great example of that. He is the "ruler of this world," Jesus said in John 12:31. In Second Corinthians four, four, he describes him as "the god of this world," who "blinds the minds of the unbelieving, so that they won't see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ." And this is the blinding that we are seeing happening today in our world, in our country. And this is the blinding that's being perpetuated in our elementary schools, junior high schools, high schools and universities...and in the halls of Congress.

You see Satan causes people to believe things that appeal to their fleshly lusts, to their depraved nature; things that are idiotic; things that are irrational and inconceivably evil. All you have to look at this whole LGBTQ transgender insanity. And you can see that we've got military leaders today that are more concerned about personal pronouns, and soldiers more concerned about makeup kits than protecting our country. Absolute insanity. Beloved, what I have just said to you, what I'm just touching on here, are the great truths of history, and theology, and the Bible, that needs to be taught to our Ivy League students. And when they understand these things, they'll put down their banners and they'll stop foaming at the mouth with all of this hate that they do not understand. Please understand, the brainwashed world of Islamic Jihad and the Marxist revolutionaries of Black Lives Matter and Antifa, and university professors; all of this is a result of the father of lies. And that's why they are elated with what Hamas has done. I mean, folks, this is as predictable as a Hallmark movie. All right? Bear in mind liberal, woke, Marxists align themselves with radical jihadist because they all hate Jews. But they do so for different reasons.

Maybe I can explain this briefly. The woke social justice Marxist see them as privileged, white, that are oppressing brown people. And you know, when they look at the worldwide success of Jewish people in every field, and the enormous wealth that the Jewish people have worldwide, that causes them to see them as the oppressor group; the white privileged class. And therefore they must be scorned and censored and eliminated.

And then of course, there's the jealousy factor because of their towering intellect. They are a brilliant, a very highly successful people. You realize that they make up only 0.2% of the 8 billion people that inhabit this globe. And yet, from 1901 to 2023, 22% of all Nobel prizes have been awarded to Jews. My friend, David Larsen, who spoke here a number of years ago; he's now with the Lord, he's written, by the way, a book called "Jews, Gentiles and the Church." It's one of the best books I've ever read, you simply must have that, you must read it, you must learn it. But he said this, quote, "Jews are twice as likely to go to college than Gentiles, reflecting the religious obligation of study, and are five times more likely than Gentiles to be admitted to an Ivy League school." Let me pause for a second, he wrote this in 1995, so some of these figures may be a little bit different now. But he went on to say, "Jews are overrepresented in the field of science by 231%, in psychiatry by 47%, in law by 265%, and dentistry by 299%. And in mathematics by 283%. The very terms of their apartness have fostered scholarship and achievement in order to survive, but these have made them susceptible to jealous resentment, and the other prices," of quote, "otherness. Thus, some people have spoken of the Jews as the pariahs of privilege." And my how much greater that is today than it was in 1995.

Additionally, I might add that the appeal of Islam, among many in the black community, is rooted in their shared hatred of white Christianity. But with respect to the Arab Islamic jihadist, they also hate them because they believe God's covenant with Abraham was a promise between Abraham and Ishmael, not Abraham, and Isaac. In fact, the Islamic Eid al-Adha feast commemorates Abraham's offering of Ishmael. They believe it was Ishmael who was to be offered on Mount Moriah, not Isaac. And thus the blessings of the land and all of the promises that God gave to Abraham's descendants through Isaac, really is supposed to be theirs through Ishmael.

They also believe Moses was referring to Muhammad in Deuteronomy 18:15, where we read, "The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your countrymen, you shall listen to him." So you must also understand that the Arab Islamic jihadist also hate Israel because they believe that Jewish sovereignty in the Middle East contradicts the teachings of the Qur’an. Jewish presence in that region is perceived to be a wicked reality that undermines the validity of Islam. Because what it does in their minds is it elevates Yahweh over Allah, the supreme insult. You see, Muhammad hated both Jews and Christians because they refused to accept him as the only prophet. We read about this, for example, in the Qur’an in 586, "you will surely find that the most hostile to the believers are the Jews and the idolaters, while those who have the greatest affection to them are the ones who say 'we are Christians.'" Historically, we know that after Muhammad's death, and who supposedly ascended to heaven from on his horse, from the site known as the Dome of the Rock there in Jerusalem, at his death, the Muslims became a world power, and that spread from northern Spain to India. And during that time, their hatred of Jews and Christians increased, and much of that hatred was justified, in their mind, by the words of the Qur’an in chapter nine, in verse 29. It says, "fight against those who do not believe in God, or in the last day who do not forbid what God and his Prophet have forbidden or practiced the true religion."

Again, David Larsen says, quote, "The influence of the PLO among Arabs living in Israel and the occupied territory, seems to be receding and the influence of the Islamic movement, or Hamas, seems to be growing." Again, this is 1995, okay? "The radicalization of Islam in Israel bodes no good. A recent international conference to support the Islamic Revolution in Palestine held in Tehran included 400 delegates from 60 Islamic countries." The conference called for quote, "the elimination of the Zionist existence and total opposition to any peace process involving Israel." He went on to add, "escalation of the activities of Hezbollah, the Shiite extremist organization, demonstrates the implacable and irrational nature of this hatred for everything Jewish. The history of Islamic terrorism has involved the use of every vicious means and tactic conceivable."

I might also add that both the woke Marxists in our country, and the Islamic jihadist, despise Western civilization. The social justice Marxists like BLM and Antifa, etc. and all of the, you know, the hysterical feminazis that you see spewing out all of their vengeance with all of the protests and so forth and all of the diversity, equity and inclusion people, they all hate Western civilization, and they want to eradicate everything that is white, everything that smacks of Judeo Christian ethics and influence. Down with colonization, which by the way, is their code word for capitalism. The destruction of the West, that's what drives so many of these people. And the Islamic jihadist, which are really nothing more than religious Nazis agree with them, but they have a little different twist with all of the colonization resentment, because you must understand that these people are tribalists. They're from tribalism, not nationalism, they do not want a Jeffersonian democracy. They do not think and act in the best interest of a nation, but only in terms of their tribe. So again, these are some of the symptoms of what's really at the core of all of these problems, at its most fundamental level. I would submit to you that antisemitism is the result of those two things: number one, Satan's hatred of God's chosen people, and his attempt to thwart the kingdom purposes of God; as I have demonstrated. Satan is the temporary god of this world; he is bent on destroying God's covenantal people. And only then can he thwart the covenant promises of a messianic kingdom and retain his own coveted status. So that's what drives him and Satan's hatred of the Jewish people hatred of Israel, is because they were to be, according to Exodus 19, six, "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." And when Christ returns that will be fully realized. When according to Zechariah's prophecy and chapter eight and verse three, the Lord says, "'I will return to Zion, and I will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem, then Jerusalem will be called the City of Truth, and the mountain of the LORD of hosts will be called the Holy Mountain.'"

Folks, Satan is doing everything he can to prevent that. And that's why the Temple Mount is the most disputed piece of real estate on the planet. But also, this antisemitism is a result, as I say, of Israel's disobedience, God made that so clear in Deuteronomy 28. In fact, I would add that the last seven chapters of Deuteronomy, chapters 28, to 34, really provide a prophetic summary of God's dealing with Israel. It describes her afflictions; it describes God's judgments against them. It describes their salvation, their regathering, her restoration. And frankly, we have witnessed the beginning of this regathering to Israel in our lifetime. Do you realize what a miracle it is for Israel to have its own state, its own land, its own country, after the Holocaust? That which was established by the UN in 1948. Something that Hitler's "final solution" could not prevent. I'm reminded of Amos's prophecy and chapter three, verse two where the Lord says to Israel, "'You only have I chosen among all of the families of the earth.'" "Chosen" by the way is also the word "known." It carries the idea of an intimate, loving relationship. God predetermined that he would know Israel as the intimate object of his love, making them his chosen people. People whom he would never permanently cast away.

But today, God's hand of judgment is on his beloved enemy Israel, even though he continues to protect them. They have been temporarily put aside as we read in Romans 11, verse 25, "a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in." Then in verse 26, we go on to read, "all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB, THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.'"

Well, in conclusion this morning, I know some of you are asking, Okay, so, all right, a lot of history, I see some of this, but prophetically what's going to happen next? Well, a little preview of where we will ultimately be going; we know biblically that God's focus will once again return to Israel after the snatching away of the church in the rapture. And then God will pour out his final judgment on Israel as he promised and Daniel 9:27, Daniel's 70th week--judgment; we're waiting. The 69 weeks has already happened, we're waiting for one more week of years to occur. And that's a distinctly Jewish context pertaining to God's covenants with Israel. It will be the time when according to Jeremiah 30, and verse seven, when Israel enters quote, "the time of Jacob's trouble." And we see the details of that delineated in Revelation chapter six through chapter 19; a period of unprecedented oppression for Israel, but also, the context describes her future and final salvation and restoration, when the Messiah returns in power and great glory to establish His kingdom. And then the focus will remain upon Israel during the millennial reign of Christ when all God's remaining covenant promises will be fulfilled to them literally, including the promises of earthly blessings, and an earthly messianic kingdom that will last for 1000 years. And that millennial kingdom will be the consummating bridge between human history and the eternal state.

In the meantime, Satan is going to continue to do all he can to thwart the purposes of God. But both Jews and Gentiles can take comfort in what God has promised. Zechariah chapter 12, beginning in verse eight, "'In that day the LORD will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the one who is feeble among them in that day will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord before them. And in that day, I will set about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son. And they will weep bitterly over Him, like the bitter weeping over a firstborn."

And finally, I know some of you are saying, "well, what about this Hamas war? Where does all that fit in?" I don't have time to get into it, by any means today, I will next week. But I will simply say that I believe that what we are seeing right now is God establishing, orchestrating, what he promised in Ezekiel 38 and 39. In Ezekiel chapter 38, and 39, we read about a Russian Arab alliance of nations that will descend upon the northern mountains of Israel to try to destroy them, the great battle of Gog and Magog. We know that they will be supernaturally defeated on the mountains of Israel. I believe that that battle is going to occur before the tribulation. I believe that what we're seeing now is God, beginning to set the stage for when that will happen. Don't know when it will happen, but I can tell you this, it is going to happen. And when it does happen, Israel will know that Yahweh is indeed the Lord, the God of Israel. And it will set into motion the final pre kingdom judgments that will lead up to the second coming of our Savior and King.

And I also believe that before that happens, the church is going to be snatched away. So if you do not know and love Christ, I would plead with you as a minister of the gospel, do business with God today before it's too late. And for those of you who know and love Christ, let's celebrate the glory of his person, his faithfulness, and to know that we as Gentiles, have been grafted into the root of the Abrahamic Covenantal blessings. And so our hope is also in Christ, amen? Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the glorious truths of your word, for the power of your Spirit. Speak to every heart that cry Christ will be exalted, that your name will be praised. We commit it all to you, in Jesus name and for his sake. Amen..

We come to the 25th and final exposition of the book of Daniel. So if you'll take your Bibles and turn there, I'm glad no one applauded or said, Amen. Daniel chapter 12. The book, as you will recall now, is inspired by God and was written to encourage the exiled Jews of that day by revealing his sovereign plan to them, a plan that included what he is going to do throughout redemptive history, especially over the many years with respect to Gentile domination. Here we have learned of the successive stages of Gentile domination through the centuries, leading to the most vile and wicked ruler of all, the Antichrist, who will be praised by the vast majority of the world's population; people that are naive, people that are depraved, like those that make up the Neo pagan world of liberalism in our country and around the world today. But we've also seen how the greatest conqueror of all the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the Messiah, will defeat all those who stand against him; all those who stand against his covenant people Israel. We've seen how his righteous judgment against them will one day come to fruition. And he will according to Zechariah 12 and verse 10, "'pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only son. And they will weep bitterly over Him, like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.'" And over the course of this study, we have been immersed in grand truths with respect to the holiness of God, the majesty, the transcendence of God, the sovereignty of God, His faithfulness, and His love towards all of the redeemed. And what a comfort to know that our God is the unassailable sovereign over all of His creation. That his kingdom purposes cannot be thwarted by man or by devil. And as we have seen, a day of divine retribution is coming. A day of judgment is coming upon this earth. Now, while such a claim may cause liberals to hyperventilate on their yoga mats, and choke on their Starbucks, nevertheless, it is the truth. And we must proclaim that truth to them, that they might know the one true and living God through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, before we examine these final verses in Daniel, I wish to answer a criticism that occasionally comes my way from listeners outside the church. They are probably listening today. And that criticism is basically why do you interpret Bible prophecy literally, rather than figuratively, rather than spiritually. And indeed, I believe the prophetic Scriptures, and like all scripture, should be interpreted in a literal, in a normal, natural way, in a sense that is consistent with the original intent of the author, the Old Testament authors. Of course, taking into consideration figures of speech and symbols. Moreover, I believe that the New Testament continues the narrative of the Old Testament prophets. It does not redefine them or reinterpret them. And so as a result, real practically speaking, I believe that Israel is Israel and not the church. I do not believe Israel has replaced the church. I believe, for example, that Daniel's prophecies of Israel's judgment, and future restoration will occur both spiritually and physically. Jesus will actually reign on the earth in an intermediate Kingdom between the Second Coming in the final concentrations of all things in the eternal state. And this is a position known as pre millennialism, as most of you know. Now other very godly people, friends of mine, believe differently. They use a spiritual hermeneutics-- hermeneutics is the science and art of biblical interpretation--so they believe that the New Testament transforms or transcends the Old Testament, a storyline rather than continues it. This requires a spiritual interpretation. And so in varying ways, they will look for hidden meanings embedded in some of the Old Testament passages. And they look to New Testament revelation to help shape and inform them. They believe Jesus and the New Testament authors therefore reinterpret or redefine, or spiritualize, the kingdom message of the Old Testament. And as a result, they believe that Israel has been replaced permanently by the church, and the promised blessings to Israel are merely spiritual, and ultimately, they are to be interpreted in a spiritual way, not a literal way. And they understand, for example, Revelation to be a description of the current reign of Christ in this present age, a position known as amillennialism. And so they would believe that we are living in the kingdom now spiritually. Now, this is not a test of orthodoxy. Not at all. But I do want to defend just for a moment, why I interpret and we interpret as a church, the scriptures the way we do.

And in order to do that, I want you to turn for just a few minutes to Second Peter chapter one. We're going to look at verses 16 through 21, just for a moment, the context here, Peter is preparing for his crucifixion. He knew he was about to die a horrible death, as Jesus has promised. And we read about that in verse 14 of Second Peter one. But what's fascinating is what is foremost on his mind as he faces his imminent death is the absolute importance of fighting against false teachers, who he calls in chapter three and verse 16, "the untaught and unstable," who distort the scriptures "to their own destruction." And chapter two and verse one, he says, "there will be also false teachers among you." In other words, within the church, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies. In other words, they will smuggle them in; the original language helps us understand. They will smuggle them in under the guise of something else. And we see this for example, in the Neo pagan, Neo Marxist, woke social justice, social gospel movement that has invaded the church. So in chapter one of Second Peter, he, like the Apostle Paul, argues for the absolute supremacy of Scripture that has originated from God Himself, and therefore must never be added to, detracted from or in any way redefined by fallen man. He is passionate about a proper understanding of Scripture, which will lead to sanctification. If you don't know and understand the scriptures, you will not be able to apply them to your life by the power of the Spirit and grow into conformity to the Lord Jesus Christ. It's just not going to happen. So he is passionate about this.

So in Second Peter one, beginning of verse two, he says, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you and the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him, who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He is granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them that you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. Now for this very reason, also, applying all diligence in your faith, supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence knowledge." In other words, moral excellence and knowledge will promote sanctification. He goes on to say, "and in your knowledge, self-control and in your self-control perseverance and in your perseverance godliness, and in your godliness brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours, and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, for he who lacks these qualities, is blind or short sighted," In other words, like the false teachers, "having forgotten his purification from his former sins. Therefore rather than be all the more diligent to make certain about his calling and choosing you, for as long as you practice these things you will never stumble; for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you." So what he's saying is the key to salvation and sanctification is a high view of Scripture, and a total surrender to all that God has said, something the false teachers refuse to do, as he will go on to say. So in light of that, in chapter one and verse 16, he says this, "For we do not follow cleverly devised tails, when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty," referring to what they saw on the Mount of Transfiguration. "For when He received honor and glory from God the Father, such an utterance as this was made to him by the majestic glory, 'This is My beloved Son with whom I am well-pleased"--and we ourselves heard this utterance made from heaven, when we were with Him on the holy mountain." And then he says this, "So," or it could be translated, "and, we have the prophetic word, made more sure." Prophetic word refers to the declarations of the mind and the will of God in Scripture, "we have the prophetic word made more sure," which means more certain, more reliable, more reliable, more certain, more sure than what? The answer is our own perceptions, our own experience, what we saw with our own eyes, what we heard with our own ears. In other words, what he's saying is friends, Scripture is more reliable than anything you know, or anything you think you know, anything that you have ever experienced. And we all know that when we relay something that we've experienced, we always leave something out that we forgot, or we may distort something or whatever. Not scripture. It is absolutely pure. Scripture is breathed out by God. And so the omniscient one who cannot lie, is the one who speaks. And his infinite perfections in his character, his very honor is at stake in His Word. And that's why he goes on to say, "to which you do well to pay attention." "Pay attention" literally means to be consumed, to be controlled by as to a lamp shining in a dark place. If you've ever been in a pitch black cave, you know what it's like. You follow the light if you see one, and obviously the unregenerate they grow up in the darkness of their own depravity and in the world. And only a fixed focus on the Word of God on Scripture will give them the light to see Christ and to make their way to glory by faith in Him. So we are to pay attention to this light "until," he says "the day dawns," referring to the eschatological day of Christ, we read about that same phrase in Zechariah, 12, 8 through 14. "And the morning star arises in your hearts." In other words, we keep watching that light until the Lord returns in all of his glory and judgment. "And the morning star arises in our hearts," referring to the complete and perfect revelation of Christ when we are finally in his presence, and we see Him as He is; when we are made like him. So what Peter was saying is, Scripture is more sure, it's more certain, more reliable than anything you have ever experienced. Anything you have ever thought, anything you have ever conceived, anything you have ever imagined.

Back to Second Peter 1:20. He says, "But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's interpretation." Fascinating term "interpretation," it means to release or unloose or to unravel something. And here he is for referring to private unraveling. This doesn't speak so much of how we interpret Scripture, but the source of Scripture, the origin of Scripture. In other words, no part of God's revelation originated from or finds its source in human experience, or human wisdom, human cogitation, human ingenuity, whatever. Therefore, there is nothing subjective or secretive about scripture that requires my input or your input in order to make it relevant, to make it somehow understandable or authoritative or sufficient, so that God can somehow, with our help, accomplish his purposes through Scripture. No, it stands on its own. Its source is divine. All "scripture is breathed out by God," Second Timothy 3:16. It's not tainted by fallible human wisdom. It's not tainted by human ideas or experience. By the way, that same term "interpretation" is used in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, in Genesis 40, where it describes how Joseph received direct revelation from God in the form of a dream. And he was very careful not to in any way, taint what God said, with any of his own interpretations when he communicated it to others. And Peter goes on in verse 20. And he says, "For no prophecy was ever made." In other words, it never comes from, it never finds its origin, by an act of human will, human authorship. But men moved by, literally carried along, by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. So clearly, Peter wants us to know the source, the origin of Scripture, it is from God, it is not from man, therefore, and this is the passion of my heart, do not trifle with the truth. Do not tamper with the text. God said it, I believe it and I bow before it. That's it. You don't need me to say, well, I know that's what God said. But that's not what he meant. Let me tell you what he meant. Now, beloved, what you do is you move from interpretation to Revelation, and I am not inspired, neither of you. So that's why I'm very careful to stay with the text. Notice "men were moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." The term "move," "phero" in the original language. It's the same Greek verb that is translated "made" in verses 21 Verse 18, and verse 17. In other words, the word of God is the word of God. It's not the word of man. He not only inspired men to write it by the superintending work and guidance of the Holy Spirit, he's the one that made it. This is his word. This is why the Bible is authoritative. "Men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God."

Now I also find it interesting in verse 21, he says, "men spoke." In the miracle of inspiration, the Holy Spirit caused these men to speak like I'm speaking to you right now. Well, what do we do when we speak? Well, we use normal language to communicate what we are saying to other people, so they can understand us. There's no hidden meaning. There's no deeper meaning, there is no secret Bible codes, there is no secret symbolism that we need to discover. There is no, as I hear from time to time, fuller sense that must be discovered or redefined, or reinterpreted or spiritualized. Now, of course, there are rules of interpretation. There are rules of hermeneutics. Even when we speak, we understand that I mean, we have to look at the context, we have to look at vocabulary, metaphors, symbols, figures of speech, we all understand that. But we obey the normal rules of grammar, the syntax, the authorial intent, and all of those things. And so, it's for this reason, that I reject the allegorical, spiritualized method of interpretation, especially with respect to Bible prophecy. The Jews didn't understand it that way. They weren't looking for some secret hidden meaning they just knew this was what was promised to them.

And by the way, it's for this reason, if I can add something else, I want to say this kindly. I don't give two hoots for your word of knowledge, or your special prophecy, or your ecstatic gibberish or something that God told you when you had a quiver in your liver. Or somehow, you heard from somewhere, maybe your imagination or it could be a demon. I don't care anything about that. The canon of Scripture is closed. Jude three makes that very clear. It's for this reason, we contend earnestly in the Greek for the once for all delivered for the faith. The scriptures was handed down to the saints and that's what it says, "we contend earnestly for the faith, which was once for all delivered to the saints," and then when it comes to Bible prophecy, I have no confidence in those obscure secret kind of allegorical spiritualized interpretations. And while I respect those that differ, that is just not my position, I want to be very careful with that. In Revelation 21:18, we read, "I testify to everyone who hears the words is actually 22:18. "I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part, from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book." All I want to know is what God has said. And all I have to say to you, is what God has said. This is why Peter said in verse 19, "we have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay attention." And so this is why we use a literal, grammatical, historical hermeneutic when interpreting scripture. God moved, men spoke, and we can understand it; the normal meaning of language. And so when we look at any passage of Scripture, we look at it in a straightforward reading, and interpretation, like in the book of Daniel.

By the way, this is why Jesus said in Matthew 24:15, that we are to "understand" he says, the book of Daniel. Well enough of all of that I'm sure my critics are perfectly satisfied now. And we can rejoice and share heaven together. All right, now let's look at these final verses in Daniel 12.

You will recall now the first three verses of Daniel 12, reveals to us three precursors of the establishment of Christ's earthly millennial kingdom, you will recall that Israel is going to experience a time of unparalleled tribulation, then there will be supernatural deliverance, and finally, the kingdom citizens will be raised from the dead. And now the angelic messenger that is speaking to Daniel turns his attention to Daniel, in verse four, where we pick it up this morning. He says this, "'But as for you, Daniel, conceal these words and seal up the book until the end of time, many will go back and forth, and knowledge will increase. Then I, Daniel looked and behold, two others were standing, one on this bank of the river and the other on that bank of the river. And one said to the man dressed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, 'How long will it be, until the end of these wonders?' I heard the man dressed in linen, who was above the waters of the river as he raised his right hand and his left toward heaven, and swore by Him who lives forever, that it would be for a time, times, and half a time. And as soon as they finish shattering the power of the holy people, all these events will be completed. As for me, I heard, but could not understand; so I said, 'My Lord, what will be the outcome of these events?' He said, 'Go your way, Daniel, for these words are concealed, and sealed up until the end time. Many will be purged, purified and refined, but the wicked will act wickedly, and none of the wicked will understand but those who have insight will understand. From the time that the regular sacrifice is abolished, and the abomination of desolation is set up, there will be 1290 days. How blessed is he who keeps waiting and attains to the 1335 days! But as for you, go your way to the end; then you will enter into the rest, and rise again for your allotted portion at the end of the age.'"

Now, here, beloved, I believe we have a chronology of the Great Tribulation. Let's look at it more closely in verse four. "'But as for you, Daniel, conceal these words,'" It literally means I want you to preserve these words, I want you to protect them; they are prophetic, divine inspired revelation. Do this, he says, "until the end of time.'" "Seal up the book," he says, close up--that's what it means. Secure all of this material until the end of time, which is a reference to the tribulation period. That's the way it's used in chapter 11, verse 35, as well as verse 45. And then he says something fascinating. He says, "'Many will go back and forth and knowledge will increase.'" The concept of going back and forth is the idea that they're going to run about trying to find answers to explain all of the chaos and judgment that's coming upon the world during the trial time of Tribulation. And he says, as they do so, "knowledge will increase." In other words, they are going to read Daniel, what you have preserved to the end and their knowledge concerning what God has promised will become clear to them.

Verse five, "Then I, Daniel, looked and behold, two others were standing, one on this bank of the river and the other on that bank of the river." It's referring to two other angels. This is similar to the vision described in chapter eight, verses 13 through 16. And evidently, these two angels, who are lesser in status to the grand angel that's dressed in linen who was above the waters of the river, as we will read. Evidently, these two angels were talking about God's plan, as it relates to the affairs of men. And so they asked this question. "And one said to the man dressed in linen," one of these angels said to the more glorious Angel, "who was above the waters of the river, 'How long will it be until the end of these wonders?'" In the context here, "How long will it be till the end of Daniel's 70th week, the end of the tribulation?"

I want to pause for a moment because I'm always fascinated with angels, especially their curiosity. First, Peter 1:12, we read, "It was revealed to them," "it" referring to the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow in verse 11, "it was revealed to them," referring to the Old Testament prophets, "that they were not serving themselves, but you, in these things which now have been announced to you through those who preach the gospel to you, by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven." These things, catch this now, "into which angels long to look." I mean think of all the righteous men and women of the Old Testament who long to understand those things that were revealed, even those things that they had written. But now we have seen these things, we have heard these things, we understand who Christ is. Now, think about this, even the angels who are not recipients of redemption, even the angels long to look at what God has done, what he is doing, what he is going to do, through Christ Jesus, our Lord. And again, you think about it, I mean, they're, they're all around us, watching us. I can't wait to get to heaven. In fact, I can't wait to meet my guardian angels, and then apologize to them for what I put them through. But they're longing to look at these things, even the Old Testament prophets, even Daniel, as we see here, in this text. He didn't understand it all that he wanted to know more. But think how much more we know now, and how much more is yet to be revealed in glory one day.

And we get a flavor of this in Daniel 12 six, he says, "'How long will it be until the end of these wonders?'" In verse seven, "I heard the man dressed in linen who was above the waters of the river," which by the way is to suggest his supernatural authority and power, "as he raised his right hand and his left toward heaven and swore by Him who lives forever." And here we get a sense of the profound solemnity of the oath that he is taking here; that oath he is about to utter. And notice the phrase, he "swore by Him who lives forever." I love that phrase, "the one who lives forever." And who is this? Well, it's the Triune God. First Timothy six, Paul says in verse 15, "He who is the blessed and only sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone possesses immortality, and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen, or can see, to Him be honor and eternal dominion, amen." And to think someday we shall see Him as He is, and he will see us. We see a similar scene, by the way, in Revelation 10, beginning in verse five, "Then the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land, lifted up his right hand to heaven, and swore by Him who lives forever and ever, who created heaven, and the things in it, and the earth and the things in it, and the sea and the things in it, that there will be delay no longer," he says.

So, again, back to the question, how long will it be until the end of these things? And the angelic messenger swears "by Him who lives forever that it would be for a time, times and a half a time." Again, as we've studied, this is a reference to the last three and a half years of the tribulation of Daniel's 70th week. And then he adds this "and as soon as they finish shattering the power of the holy people, all these events will be completed." So God is going to allow the Antichrist to shatter his covenant people, those whom he chose to be holy, but who refuse to believe in their Messiah. And finally, at the end of the three and a half years of unprecedented persecution, what he calls here, "the end of these wonders," finally, the power of Jewish deception will be shattered, and their unbelief will be broken. Finally, in their state of brokenness and humiliation, they will believe, and they will be saved. You may recall how 17 years earlier; God revealed the same truth to Daniel. It's recorded in Daniel seven, and verse 25. There we read, "He will speak out," referring to the Antichrist, "against the Most High, and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law; and they will be given into his hand for a time, times and a half a time." And then he goes on in verse 26 and he says, "But the court will sit for judgment, and his dominion will be taken away, annihilated and destroyed forever. Then the sovereignty, the dominion and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven, will be given to the people of the saints of the Highest One; His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom, and all the dominions will serve and obey Him." My How I long for that day. And in that day, Israel will finally function according to its intended purpose that we read in Scripture, as a chosen nation. So many passages speak to this. I think of Isaiah 41, beginning in verse eight, "'But you Israel, My servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, Descendant of Abraham My friend, you whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called from its remotest parts and said to you, 'You are My servant, I have chosen you, and not rejected you.'" My what a promise. Exodus 19, verse six, "You shall be to Me, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." At this time, dear friends, Israel will finally enjoy world supremacy in the coming Kingdom, where it will fulfill its grand purpose of being a blessing to all of the nations of the world, as asserted in the original covenant that we read in Genesis 12 and verse three, where God says, "In you, all the families of the earth will be blessed."

Now, some will ask and appropriately so, what about the church age? What about us, the church, where we live right now? Well, this, this needs to be seen; the church age needs to be seen as an ongoing fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy that is going to culminate in the Messianic kingdom. We are not some disconnected parentheses, no, no, not at all. The church shares in the promises of Israel, but not in her unique identity as a chosen nation. There is a distinction here, you will recall in Romans 11, beginning in verse 16, Paul described Israel as the natural branches from a cultivated olive tree, some of which have been broken off for the present time due to quote, "a hardening of heart." And Paul also reminds the Gentile church that we are the wild olive branches. We are the ones that have been grafted into, quote, "the rich root," referring to the rich root of Abrahamic covenantal blessings and privileges that God promised to him. So indeed, the church shares these promises with Israel but never takes her place as a nation. And despite their rebellion, God has not abandoned his chosen people. Paul understood this. You will recall, in Romans nine he speaks of Israel's election. In Romans 10, he speaks of Israel's defection. And finally, in Romans 11, he speaks of Israel's salvation, when the Messiah returns. And what an amazing story it all is, right? This is his story, the story of Christ. With Israel being a magnificent object lesson of how God deals with all mankind. He saves some, he judges others, all to reveal His glory through the Lord Jesus Christ, who is both Lamb and Lion.

So again, back to the question in Daniel 12, six, "'How long will it be until the end of these wonders?'" Answer, "'For a time, times and a half the time. And as soon as they finish shattering the power of the holy people, all these events will be completed.'" Folks, it's important to remember that God revealed these events to Moses. We read about this in Leviticus 26, as well as Deuteronomy 28 and 38, or 30. And repeatedly, he speaks about it in Isaiah, for example, in chapter four of Isaiah, beginning in verse three, "It will come about that he who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be Jerusalem will be called holy--everyone who is recorded for life in Jerusalem. When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion and purged the bloodshed of Jerusalem from her midst, by the spirit of judgment and the spirit of burning." Another one in chapter six of Isaiah beginning in verse 11. "Then I said, 'Lord, how long?' And He answered, 'Until cities are devastated and without inhabitant, houses are without people and the land is utterly desolate, the Lord has removed men far away, and the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land. Yet,'" and here's the promise, "'there will be a 10th portion in it,'" there's always going to be a remnant. "'And it will again be subject to burning, like a terabinth or an oak who stump remains when it is felled. The holy seed is that stump.'" Likewise, Isaiah chapter 26, beginning in verse 20, we read, "Come, my people, enter into your rooms and close your doors behind you; hide for a little while until indignation runs its course. For behold, the Lord is about to come out from His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; and the earth will reveal her bloodshed and will no longer cover her slain."

We read the same types of promises in Jeremiah 30. We read about them in Zechariah 11, Zechariah 13, Zechariah 14, in Jesus' Olivet Discourse, and in Matthew 24, and 25, and Luke 21. And this will continue, as Jesus declared in Matthew 23:39, until Israel finally cries out, "'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!'" Only then will they enter into their millennial rest, according to Isaiah 40 verse two, "having received of the Lord's hand, double for all her sins." Oh, dear friends, what a picture of of God's judgment on sin and disobedience, as well as his blessings on faith and obedience.

And here I'm reminded of the promises found in Isaiah 59 and 60. In Isaiah 59, you might recall after describing the multiplied transgressions of Israel and his judgment upon them, that passage closes with a message, a certain message of redemption and restoration. We read of it in here in Isaiah 59, verse 20. Here's the promise, "'A Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,' declares the Lord. 'As for Me, this is My covenant with them,' says the Lord: My Spirit, which is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your offspring, nor from the mouth of your offspring's offspring,' says the Lord, 'from now and forever.'" And I would submit to you that that has not happened yet, but it will.

Then the dominating theme in the next chapter, Isaiah 60, is the restoration as well as the world supremacy of the nation of Israel. Beginning in verse one, "'Arise, shine; for your light has come, the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples; but the Lord will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising.'" Verses four through nine goes on to describe their return to their promised land after the worldwide dispersion and how the nations that once oppressed them will come and pay homage to them as God's chosen people, and how God will will contribute to their prosperity and the adornment of the sanctuary of their God; the days of apostasy are over. The days of idolatry and destruction and exile are over.

Now back to Daniel 12, verse eight. "As for me," Daniel said, "I heard but I could not understand; so I said, 'My Lord, what will be the outcome of these events?'" "Outcome" in Hebrew can be translated the final end. In other words, what will be the nature of these events that characterize this outcome? Obviously, he's thinking, you know, when will my people finally be delivered from all of this? And I'm sure he's going back to what he saw in Daniel seven, with respect to the little horn, the Antichrist, "from the time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time," chapter 12 and verse one. What's going to happen to my people during this time, and here's what the angel said to him. I've had professors say this to me before I remember. "'Go your way, Daniel.'" In other words, stop. That's enough. Literally, in the Hebrew, "go, Daniel." What it means is in the conversation, you're just trying to satisfy your own curiosity, be content with what I've given you here. "For these words, are concealed and sealed up until the end of time." So to be sure, all those who will experience these things during that day, will find comfort in what God has revealed.

I also find it interesting that 600 years later, do you realize, God answered Daniel's inquiry through the apostle John, on the Isle of Patmos, and the Apokalypsis lesou Christos," the revealing of Jesus Christ, the book of Revelation. He gives us many, many more details, not all, but many more details. By the way, there's a great lesson to be learned here, I believe. And that is this, God simply doesn't give us all of the details. He doesn't tell us everything. And you know, for good reason, we wouldn't understand it if he did. And we may not like it if he did. He didn't want to put up with all of that. He gives us however, all we need to know. And in that we need to be content. And this is true, not only with Bible prophecy, but with all the great doctrines of Scripture. I mean, I can't explain how in creation, He speaks things into existence. But I'd love to know how that works. Wouldn't you? He just doesn't tell me. I don't understand the doctrine of the Trinity, the doctrine of the Incarnation, I don't understand the doctrine of Providence--what a miracle that is. I don't understand why you save some and not all. I can't harmonize man's responsibility in salvation, and God's unconditional sovereign election. In fact, in Romans nine, he says, Hey, don't even ask that question. I mean, you're, you're like a pot, and you don't want to ask the potter why you made me that way. You know, you're just, frankly, a dumb pot. So let's don't even go there. And by the way, folks, as soon as you try to untie these Gordian knots that we see in Scripture, the ones that God has tied, you cease to be biblical. And you start making stuff up. As soon as you try to explain the unexplainable mysteries of God, as soon as you try to penetrate the unpalatable, you deify yourself. And you put yourself into a position where now I am going to explain what God has done. And then you end up twisting the scriptures to support your premises. And you play the fool like all false teachers. It's kind of like asking a kindergartener to explain the nature of black holes and wormholes in the universe. You know, what they say, may sound brilliant, but in the end, their insight is on par with that of a dung beetle trying to explain quantum theory, you know. And by the way, their contribution to theology is about as noble. And that's what false teachers tend to do. By the way, I didn't mean to insult dung beetles, but I think you get the point. Deuteronomy 29:29, "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law."

Now, the angel doesn't get into specifics pertaining to the outcome of these events as Daniel inquired, but he does say this, notice verse 10, "Many will be purged, purified and refined, but the wicked will act wickedly." So he's referring here to the Lord's chastening work on Israel. In fact, the same three words are used in Daniel 11:35 when he described his judgment upon Israel, by the Gentiles, following the rule of Antiochus Epiphanes. So again, verse 10, "Many will be purged, purified and refined, but the wicked will act wickedly." Then he says this, "and none of the wicked will understand, but those who have insight will understand." And of course, spiritual blindness is one of the chief characteristics of the unregenerate. They simply cannot see the light of the glory of Christ. Jesus said in John 9:39, speaking to the Pharisees, "'For judgment, I came into this world so that those who do not see may see, and," he has this, "that those who see may become blind.'" which is an ironic way of him saying, "Those who think they walk in the light, but in fact walk in the darkness, will be those that I will further harden." Because of their rebellion, he judicially hardens the hearts of those who hear the truth and reject the truth. It's for this reason, in Second Timothy four, four, Paul tells Timothy and all of us that, that the unregenerate "will turn away their ears from the truth and turn aside under myths." And the grammar there suggests that they will do this without an awareness of their desertion, and then they will become consumed by the lies that they embrace. By the way, how else can you explain the stuff that we see in our world today? Just absolutely amazing. I mean, now we got drag queens in so called churches, leading children in Bible studies. I've heard of sermons where they're trying to explain to the congregation how we need to be careful not to misgender some, you know, male buttercup who thinks he's a female. Or some controlling feminazis who thinks she's a man. You know, I mean, it's just beyond our ability to comprehend. These people need Christ dear friends, and only he can give them the light of truth. It's for this reason that Paul says in First Corinthians 2:14, "a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them because he is spiritually appraised." Scripture is not their spiritual authority, they are. As well as the culture in which they live, which denies and distorts the truth.

So back to the text as we wrap it up this morning, when the Antichrist seizes control, and these catastrophic judgments come upon the world in the tribulation, especially upon Israel, verse 10, says, "Many will be purged and purified and refined, but the wicked will act wickedly, and none of the wicked will understand but those who have insight will understand." In other words, the elect of God, by His grace, will turn to the truths of Scripture, they will be saved. They will turn to Daniel's prophecies; they will be able to embrace the truths that God has revealed. According to Zechariah 13, in verse eight, we know that 1/3 of the Jews will survive. That means two thirds will be killed. He says there, Zechariah 13 eight, "and I will bring the third part through the fire, refine them as silver is refined and test them as gold is tested. They will call on my name and I will answer them and I will say, 'They are My people.' And they will say, 'The Lord is my God.'" So I'm sure Daniel is comforted now with his this information, that those who have insight will understand that His people will be able to understand what God has said; they will be able to read these prophecies that he must now conceal. And then the angel adds this in verse 11, "From the time that the regular sacrifice is abolished, and the abomination of desolation is set up." Now we know that that's when the Antichrist establishes himself to be God and defiles the restored Jewish temple. You read about it in Daniel 9:27, Matthew 24:15. When that happens, he says there will be 1290 days. Now, what's interesting here is in other places, we know that the Great Tribulation is three and a half years, 1260 days. Time, times, two and a half of time--Daniel 7:25, for example, Revelation 11, three and 12:6, it is 1260 days. So what's the deal here? Is this a misprint? Why does it say 1290 days in this passage? Now, some expositors suggest that we need to take this symbolically that these numbers have no specific meaning. As I argued earlier in this exposition, I don't interpret Scripture that way. It would make no sense to me why in several passages, would it be 1260 and then here in verse 11, 1290. And as we're going to say, in verse 12, 1335. There's something going on here. All these numbers are too unique and too close to being the same length to justify a symbolic meaning. Moreover, in Daniel eight and verse 14, 2300 days are mentioned, and that was proven to be absolutely precise, according to history. So why the additional 30 days? Well, we can't say for sure, God doesn't tell us. But I think it is reasonable to say that given the unimaginable destruction, and carnage upon the earth that will exist when Christ returns and as a result of his return, this is probably a time period needed to do one of two things, maybe both. First of all, it may be a reference to a 30-day period, for cleansing or purifying the temple of God as did Judas Maccabeus and his army did after defeating Antiochus Epiphanes in 164 BCE after they defiled the temple. You read about that in first Maccabees four verses 36 through 51. We also know for example, in Second Chronicles 30, beginning of verse two, we read about something similar when King Hezekiah postponed the celebration of the Passover for one month, quote, "because the priests had not consecrated themselves in sufficient numbers, nor had the people been gathered to Jerusalem. Thus, this thing was right in the sight of the king, and all the assembly." It might also require another 30 days needed to complete the judgment of Christ; to determine who will be permitted to enter the kingdom and who will be not permitted. We read about that in Matthew 25:31, and so forth. Both of these are possibilities, we can't say for sure. But then he says this in verse 12, "How blessed is he who keeps waiting and attains to the 1335 days!

Now let's look at this closely just for a moment, "keeps waiting," it could be translated, one who keeps waiting earnestly, that’s the idea in the original language. And the term "attains to" comes from a root word that means to touch and hear; the imperfect form of this means "he will touch." In other words, he will gain with effort. So a paraphrase of what its saying here is this, how blessed it is he who keeps waiting earnestly, is finally able to touch the 1335th day. Huh? Why 1335? I mean, come on, that's 45 days longer than the 1290, 75 days longer than the 1260-day duration of Daniel, the end of Daniel's 70th week. So what's going on here? Well, once again, God doesn't tell us but I think it's safe to assume that this will be another 45 days that is necessary for God to establish the governmental aspects of Christ's reign, his rule and a time to place all of the kingdom citizens, all of us in our proper realm, and how we're going to function, place us in the regions of our inheritance and so forth. And we get a hint of this in verse 13, "But as for you, go your way to the end;" "Go your way to the end," technically, here, the imperfect word "go," "go" parallels the same term in verse nine, where he is told "go your way, Daniel," in this conversation and so forth. And so here he says, "then you will enter into rest and rise again for your allotted portion at the end of the age." And so I believe it's referring to that same type of thing; after the tribulation days are complete, Daniel, along with the Old Testament saints are going to be resurrected, they're going to be given their allotted portion in the millennial kingdom. You will recall in Colossians one and verse 12, Paul says "Giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light." The term "inheritance," "kleros" in the original language speaks of an allotment, especially according to the terms of a will. You realize the father has a will and a portion of it has your name on it; has my name on it, the saints in Light. And in that text Paul reaches back in the Old Testament by alluding to the specific land allotments that were given to the Israelites when they entered the land of Canaan. Read about it in Numbers 26 and 33. So inheritance can literally be translated portion of the lot. And the text says the father has qualified, literally it means authorized us, according to His grace, to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light. Which "saints in Light" is a synonym for the kingdom of God and heaven. And in this glorious kingdom, beloved, each believer will be given a specific portion of the total divine inheritance. That is what is willed to us. This will include specific privileges and possessions, spiritual blessings beyond our ability to comprehend. Colossians 3:24, We read "Know that from the Lord you will receive the reward of your inheritance." My I can't wait. Ephesians 1:11, "Because of our Father's great mercy, we have obtained an inheritance." Hebrews 9:15, "Those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance." And I especially rejoice in what Peter said that we "have hope to obtain an inheritance," First Peter one four, which denotes property, denotes possession. Oh, dear Christian, may we all dare to be a Daniel in these difficult days knowing what God has promised, what is coming? And without question, Daniel would echo the testimony of the apostle Paul, and say, "I am not ashamed. For I know whom I have believed in, I am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day," Second Timothy 1:12. And with the apostle John, we can all say, "Come, Lord Jesus." Let's pray together.

Father, truly your word is a lamp unto our feet and a light into our path. And as we contemplate the glories of your grace, and the power of your sovereign election, and all that you have planned not only for Israel, but for the church, for all of us who have been grafted into the rich root of Abrahamic blessing, Lord, how we celebrate these things. And may we all live lives that are pleasing to you that manifest the glory of Christ, that others might see him through us. We thank you, we rejoice in these great truths. And we pray that indeed, you will come quickly. Amen.

It is always such a great joy to be able to minister the word of God to you. And I would invite you to take your Bibles and turn once again to Daniel chapter 12. We are making our way through this book. We'll look at a couple more verses here this morning. Under the heading "Israel's Final Deliverance." Given the brutality of war that we are witnessing today, it should be of no surprise to any of us that there is one coming as God has prophesied through his word, called the Antichrist who will oppress and persecute people like never before. And his primary focus will be on Israel, as we have studied thus far, when last week we looked at Daniel chapter 12, and verse one. Furthermore, given the moral freefall in our country, it should be of no surprise that God is even currently judging America in the wrath of his abandonment, America has become a land of sodomites and drag queens and entitlement snowflakes, climate change wackos. I mean, it just goes on and on, doesn't it? It's just hard to believe that people are caught up in these things worse yet, even the evangelical churches got caught up in this whole woke cult running around telling people that they need to repent of their whiteness of repent of how their ancestors abused a certain group of people and aligning themselves with the Neo-pagan Marxist ideologies of critical race theory and all of these things. Of course, this is typical, by the way of liberalism, this is nothing new. Man's problem, for them, is not his inherent depravity, his sinfulness. No, no, no, no, that's not the problem. The real problem is societal oppression and political corruption. So the gospel needs to be all about social justice, rather than God's justice, reconciling sinful man to a holy God. And as we have been examining, God chose Israel, to be an example of how he pursues both individuals to be reconciled unto himself and how he judges and blesses nations as national entities. And through the nation of Israel, we know biblically that He will restore fallen humanity and bring salvation and being bring restoration to all of the nations eventually, in his millennial kingdom. When Jesus returns, we know that he will rule the nations from Israel. And through that rule, and through those people, and all of the redeemed, He will bless all of the nations as a microcosm of how God deals with individuals, and nations. He judged Israel because of her rebellion against Him. This is, by way of reminder, of what we have studied thus far. We know biblically that he deliberately determined 490 years to accomplish his purposes in delivering his people, Israel. Daniel 9:24 reveals to us the nine, I'm sorry, the six objectives to be accomplished in this regard. And this is really at the heart of the gospel, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, referring to Christ's sacrifice, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place. You see, God's kingdom plan is ultimately all about bringing glory to himself, and that can only be accomplished through the death, the sacrificial death, of the Lord Jesus Christ. So the gospel is all about reconciling sinful man to a holy God, not resolving social inequities, and ethnic injustices. That is not the gospel. For this reason, we as a church, I reject this whole evangelical wokeness movement and refuse to fellowship with those that embrace that. That is a distortion of the biblical, the true gospel. That is a gospel that will not save, it will only produce further division and damn people to an eternal hell. And Satan knows it very well. I'm reminded of Galatians one, verse eight, or Paul said, "But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he used to be accursed! For am I now seeking the favor of men or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bond servant of Christ." Now, to be sure, any student of Scripture will very quickly recognize that it is man's innate sinfulness, not what's happening in society, that is the real problem. Just ask the people in Ukraine. Moreover, when we examine Bible prophecy, the whole fool's paradise of liberalism quickly dissipates, its exposed for what it is. Because what we see biblically, in prophecy, is that the whole world is moving inexorably towards a day of divine judgment, a day of retribution. And God has a kingdom program, that he has ordained in eternity past and he is implementing precisely and perfectly, a kingdom program that cannot and will not be thwarted. And in that I find great relief and joy. Indeed, his kingdom, under the rule of the Messiah King, the Lord Jesus Christ, will eventually resolve all of the ills of society, of this fallen world. And as we examine Daniel's prophecy, we see that the progression of the Gentile nations that have oppressed Israel will one day be defeated forever. God's kingdom will be established, and that involves both spiritual as well as material elements. He has sovereignly chosen his covenant people Israel to be the vehicle to accomplish his plans. Both national Israel and her land are frankly, microcosms of what he will do with all people groups. As God blesses Israel, He will bless all of the nations of the world; His kingdom, will affect every aspect of life on Earth. When we re-examine these things, biblically, we see that his kingdom will affect people socially, geographically, agriculturally, even the animal kingdom and on and on it goes. The second Adam must accomplish what the first Adam did not do. And that is to rule and subdue the earth for the glory of God, that must be accomplished, and it will. But all of God's blessings are linked to Israel's acceptance of the Messiah, as well as the nations of the world. And then once the kingdom age is complete, the eternal state begins when Jesus hands his successful mediatorial Kingdom reign to God the Father, as we read in First Corinthians 15.

Now, what I have just rehearsed for you is obviously a radically different worldview for most in our culture, nevertheless, because it flows out of Scripture, it is true. Now, you will recall that the closing verses of Daniel 11 describe Antichrist's military and political career. And then in chapter 12, we discover three important precursors to the establishment of Christ's earthly millennial kingdom. And I think these three precursors will give us a bit of a framework to understand what is revealed here in the rest of Daniel. Let me give those three precursors to you as just a little outline. Here we will see that Israel will first experience a type of unparalleled tribulation. Secondly, Israel will experience a supernatural deliverance and then finally, kingdom citizens will be raised from the dead.

Now last week, we looked at the first part of this: Israel will experience unparalleled tribulation. Notice Daniel 12 one, "Now at that time, Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time." And as we studied last week, this intense suffering at the hands of the Gentiles will occur during Daniel's 70th week of judgment or the time of the Great Tribulation. Jeremiah 30, verse seven, speaks of this, as do many other passages. There we read, "Alas, for that day is great, there is none like it; and it is the time of Jacob's distress, but he will be saved from it." And as we examined last week, this includes Michael's victory over Satan, that will occur 12 0 days, or three and a half years, before the Messiah's Second Coming, according to Revelation 12, verses six and verses 14. And that brings us to where we are today.

The second precursor to the kingdom will be Israel will experience a supernatural deliverance. Notice at the end of verse one, "And at that time, your people, everyone who is found written in the book," which, as you know, is God's record of the righteous redeemed, all of those, "will be rescued." Don't you know this would have brought great comfort to Daniel, because remember, he's praying for his people. He's trying to understand when are they going to be rescued from Babylon. And of course, God is answering this way beyond that discreet period of time. All the Gentile nations that would dominate Israel, beginning with Babylon, and then Persia, then Greece, then Rome, and eventually the 10-nation confederacy of the Antichrist, the revived Roman Empire, all of those will eventually come to an end.

Now, I want to spend a little bit of time talking about how Christ will rescue his people, quote, "at that time." And, of course, all of this centers around the gospel. So let me take you to a few other passages of scripture for a few minutes this morning. The first way he will rescue his people is through the two witnesses whom Antichrist kills, and who will be resurrected, and will visibly ascend to heaven. We learn about this in Revelation 11, if you will turn there Revelation 11, beginning in verse three. "And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1260 days;" that's the last part of the Tribulation, "clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees and the two lamp stands that stand before the Lord of the earth." By the way, just a quick note here that the two olive trees and two lamp stands were symbolic of the oil of the Holy Spirit's power that would perpetually fuel the lamps of divine truth pertaining to saving grace. We saw them in the tabernacle, in the temple. That's what it's referring to here. He goes on to say, "And if anyone wants to harm them, fire flows out of their mouth and devours their enemies." Boy, sometimes I wish I had that power, don't you. "So if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this way. These have the power to shut up the sky so that rain will not fall during the days of their prophesying; and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood and to strike the earth with every plague, as often as they desire. When they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up out of the abyss," referring to the Antichrist, "will make war with them, and overcome them and kill them. And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city, which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt." That's referring to Jerusalem, it's so wicked it's being symbolized by Sodom and Egypt, "where also their Lord was crucified. Those from the peoples and tribes and tongues and nations will look at their dead bodies for three days and a half days, and will not permit their dead bodies to be laid in a tomb. And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and celebrate; and they will send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth." In other words, this will be a time where the unregenerate, those that hate Christ will rejoice that two of his good witnesses have finally been defeated, who wants to hear all of that stuff about the gospel. But it doesn't end there. "But after the three and a half days, the breath of life from God came into them. And they stood on their feet; and great fear fell upon those who were watching them." That has to be one of the greatest understatements in all of the Bible. "And they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, 'Come up here.' Then they went up into heaven in the cloud, and their enemies watched them. And in that hour, there was a great earthquake, and a 10th of the city fell; 7000 people were killed in the earthquake, and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven. The second woe is past; behold, the third one was coming quickly."

So many will see this, and indeed, they will be rescued; they will come to faith in Christ. Well, not only will God use his two witnesses to rescue his people, but secondly, his 144,000 sealed disciples. Revelation seven, verse four, we read, "And I heard the number of those who were sealed, 144,000 sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel." This will be the greatest missionary force in the history of the world that will be unleashed by God himself during the last half of the tribulation. Revelation 14 and verse three describes them as those "who had been purchased from the earth." Verse four, they're morally pure servants that "follow the Lamb wherever He goes." Verse five says, "And no lie was found in their mouth; they are blameless." So these will be preserved from the impending plagues, from the four winds as we read in this prophecy, that will fall upon the unbelieving world. They will be preserved, they will be sealed so that they can be instruments of God's saving grace and serve him in his elective purposes for Israel, and for all who would come to faith in Christ. In other words, they too will preach the gospel, and many will be rescued. The bulk of the nation will be nourished according to Revelation 12, six for 1260 days. And you will recall that will happen while the pursuing armies are swallowed up by the Earth, in verses 15 and 16.

And of course, finally, the most glorious of all aspects of God's rescue will occur when Christ returns as the Messiah King. I read a little bit of this earlier in our scripture reading. Look at Revelation 19, just beginning in verse 11. "And I saw heaven opened and behold a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges in wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him, which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood and his name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed and fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From His mouth comes a sharp sword so that with it, He may strike down the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty and on His robe, and on His thigh He has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.'" Beloved, that is my Jesus. I hope it's yours.

Zechariah 14 also describes Israel's rescue in magnificent detail. There we read beginning in verse one, "Behold, a day is coming for the Lord when the spoil taken from you will be divided among you. For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city will be captured, the houses plundered and women ravished and half of the city exiled, but the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city. Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as when He fights on a day of battle. In that day, His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives will be split in its middle from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will be moved toward the north and the other half toward the south. You will flee by the valley of My mountains for the valley of the mountains will reach to Azel; yes, you will flee just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah, king of Judah, then the Lord, my God will come and all the holy ones with Him!"

As a footnote, in Matthew 25, verses 31 through 40, Jesus describes how the few believers that survive the great tribulation will be honored. Those that were beheaded because of their faith in Christ will be resurrected from the dead to reign with Him. Revelation 20 verse four speaks of this as well. "Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who have been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus, and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image and had not received the mark on their forehead and on their hand; and they came to life and reigned with Christ for 1000 years."

And this beloved leads us to the third precursor of the establishment of Christ's earthly millennial kingdom. And that is, kingdom citizens will be raised from the dead. Oh, how I love to reflect upon this magnificent truth, because I have loved ones that have gone on, and they're going to be raised from the dead. And when I die and you die, we're going to be raised from the dead. Notice what it says, back to Daniel 12 and verse two, "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life." And of course, that will include those beheaded for the witness of Jesus during the Tribulation, "but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt."

Let me remind you of some of the great truths that are revealed in Scripture with respect to death and resurrection. At death, we know biblically that the soul vacates the body. In fact, for believers we read in First Corinthians five, "To be absent from the body is to be," what? "present with the Lord." We await that time, Paul tells us in Philippians 3:21, "when Christ will transform our lowly body." And as I age it gets lowelier and lowelier, "and conform it to his glorious body." And in Acts, chapter 24, verse 15, we read that there will be "a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust." There's no such thing as a mere mortal do realized that? Everyone will live forever. But you will live either as the just, one that has been justified by faith in Christ; you will live in glory with Christ, or you will live as the unjust and you will be raised to everlasting judgment and torment because you ignored the gospel, you laughed at it, you scoffed at it, you preferred your sin. You thought that your works were good enough to get you in Heaven, you bought all of the great lies that Satan has perpetrated upon the world. But for the just, oh, this resurrection is our promised hope. And it has been the promised hope of the redeemed down through redemptive history. A hope that is based upon the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You see, his resurrection guarantees our resurrection. Jesus said, "'Because I live, you shall live also,'" in John 14. Because of Jesus death, think of it dear friends, that tyrant of all tyrants will hold no fear on those who have been saved by His grace. We have been released from the grip of death. Yes, we will die, "but for me to live is Christ," Paul said, "and to die is gain." "Oh death, where is your victory? Oh, death, where is your sting?" First Corinthians 15.

Now, may I remind you, or maybe for some of you, teach you what the chronological order of resurrection really is? We see this described especially in First Corinthians 15. So if you'll go there for a moment, we'll look briefly at a few of these passages. In verse 20, of First Corinthians 15, we read, "But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep," referring to the righteous dead, whose spirits have gone on to be with the Lord but await their bodily remains being...awaiting recomposition and resurrection and so forth. So notice this, Christ's resurrection is the "first fruits." In other words, the first installment of the harvest of the elect to those who are asleep. They are to be considered the full harvest. And this is so exciting, please understand, Christ's resurrection didn't occur somehow in isolation. If it had, it would have no impact on the rest of the harvest. No, you see, he was, as we read here, "the first fruit" of the rest of the harvest that already existed. Think about that. You see you can't have a first fruit, if there is no other fruit, if there is no existing crop. And that existing crop was and is the elect of God that has existed in eternity past to this very day and for eternity. So although their souls are in heaven, enjoying the unfathomable riches of being in eternal glory, their bodies which were fatigued, and perhaps disabled and all used up, the bodies are in the grave, the soul is with the Lord. Or perhaps their bodies are scattered all over the earth, we don't know. But one day, the DNA of that decomposed body will be recomposed, and they will wake, they will rise in unimaginable power and in unimaginable glory and they will be united with their glorified soul. That Prince of preachers the 19th century in London, Charles Spurgeon, stated this in his own inimitable way and when he commented, quote, "The righteous are put into the graves, all weary and worn. But such they will not rise. They go there with the furrowed brow, the hollow cheek, the wrinkled skin. They should wake up in beauty and glory. The old man totters fither, leaning on his staff, the palsy comes there trembling all the way. The halt, the lame, the withered, the blind journey in doleful pilgrimage to the common dormitory. But they shall not rise decrepit, deformed, or diseased. But they shall rise strong, vigorous, active, glorious, immortal, the shriveled seeds so destitute of form and comeliness shall rise from the dust of beauteous flower. A green blade, all fresh and young shall spring up, where before there was the dried, decayed grain." I had a friend tell me the other day that his kid said, what they're going to say at his funeral is, "well the nut is gone, but the shell remains." And there's some measure of truth to that. But in Scripture, we see death in the symbolism of sowing, do we not? First Corinthians 15, verse 42, "So also is the resurrection of the dead," Paul tells us, "It is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body."

Oh dear Christians, the implication of the resurrection of Jesus Christ exceeds the importance and the power and the potential of all other events in history. Think about it. It is rivaled only by the actual creation of the universe. You see, within the resurrection body of the Lord Jesus Christ, existed the supernatural power source of eternal life and God's everlasting kingdom. Dormant within the resurrection body of Christ that appeared to Mary, is the seed of resurrection glory for all whom the Father had given him. Think about that. The infinite power source of the universe and God’s everlasting kingdom was and is, within him. If you are united to Christ, in saving faith, if you truly love him and submit to him, think about this now, you are like a nuclear warhead waiting to explode in unimaginable power and glory. And what a precious comfort this is to every child of God. And is for this reason Paul said in Second Corinthians four beginning in verse 16, "Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." So the power contained in the resurrection body of Jesus is infinitely power, for it houses the omnipotent power of our Creator God. And one day we will behold his body, we will see him as he is. And what's amazing is he will look like us in many ways. From his glorified body, will emanate the effulgence of his celestial glory, his majesty. The resplendent light of his glory will blaze from him more brilliant than the light of the sun. And to think Christ is "the first fruits." That means the rest of the fruits are going to have some resemblance to the first fruits, right? That's not very complicated. In other words, he has a precise sample of a coming harvest, which means our resurrection bodies will, in many ways, be like his. Minus the incommunicable attributes that are his alone.

Now, back to First Corinthians 15, notice the resurrection of those who belong to Christ in verse 22. At the end, he says, "In Christ, all will be made alive." Verse 23, "But each in his own order." Then he says, "Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ's at His coming." And Paul goes on to describe the rest of the harvest of which Christ was the first fruit. And he says, "each one in his order." The term "tagma" in Greek, it was a military term used to describe the arrangement of troops. And so we see even in the resurrection of all people, God has an order; he is an orderly God, he is purposeful in all that he does. So here we learn of the order of the resurrection harvest, which comes in three stages at Christ's coming. Again, notice that Christ the first fruits, and after that those who are Christ's at his coming. Now, the first stage of resurrection is for those who have come to saving faith from Pentecost, to the time of the rapture, and they will be joined with living saints at the rapture, First Corinthians 15:23, "those who are Christ's at His coming." This will include the resurrection of all of the church saints, both dead and alive at the rapture. According to First Thessalonians four beginning of verse 16, this will be when "the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words."

The second stage of the resurrection harvest is for those who come to faith during the tribulation. You see, most of the people will be martyred, but it will also include all of the Old Testament saints as well. They will all be raised to reign with him during the millennium, Revelation 20, beginning of verse four, "And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus, because of the word of God and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead, and on their hand and they came to life and reigned with Christ for 1000 years." So back to Daniel 12 two. This is what it's speaking of here, "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground, will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others,” referring to the rest of the unsaved, "to disgrace and everlasting contempt." You can read about this as well in Isaiah 26 and Romans two verses five through eight, where it explicitly states that there will be a resurrection of the righteous as well as of the wicked.

The third stage which Paul calls, quote, "The end." In first Corinthians 15:23, refers to those who die during the millennial kingdom, they will probably, we don't know for sure they will probably be instantly transformed at death into their eternal bodies and spirits. And so this only leaves those who are the ungodly, those who have rejected Christ. And that occurs, they will be raised at the end of the millennial kingdom, at the Great White Throne Judgment of God, Revelation 20. And they will then be sent to Hell. Acts 24:15, "there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust." And John describes a, quote, "resurrection of life and the resurrection of judgment,” in John 5:29. But oh, dear Christian, once again, the implications of the resurrection for all who belong to him, are utterly inconceivable. And I feel so sorry for those that do not know Christ, because to the natural man or woman, the things of the Spirit are foolishness, and they cannot understand them. So they hear all of this and they think, I can't believe that anybody would believe this stuff. Well, obviously, they can't, not because of a lack of intellect, but because they're spiritually dead. And until they come to faith in Christ, none of these things will make any sense and none of this will be their hope, or their joy. But all the resurrection implications for us are absolutely astounding. Romans eight verse 23, "we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly," catch this now, "for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. For in hope we have been saved." You see, our redemption includes more than just our soul and our spirit. Our redemption also includes our bodies. And this will occur when Jesus returns and raises our bodies from the dead. Glorification is the stage, one of the stages, the final stage, in the whole process of redemption, when he fashions for those that he has redeemed and those that is he has inhabited, into a glorified body and reunite that with their soul. It's astounding. Again, think about this. The seed of our DNA will one day blossom forth in the eternal perfection of divine holiness, divine glory, the majesty of Christ. Why? Because we are united to him. Christ is the first fruits of this resurrection harvest and his resurrection guarantees ours. Likewise, we will be given a glorified body like his; you might say he was the prototype.

Again, back to First Corinthians 15, verse 49. And "just as we have borne the image of the earthly." We shall also bear the image of the heavenly. John says in First John three two, "when He appears, we shall be like Him." Paul stated in Philippians 3:21 that Jesus will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body. So this is referring to a supernatural metamorphosis and instantaneous re-creation. Well this makes all of the suffering of life just kind of pale into insignificance doesn't it? Don't you long for that day? Paul said in First Corinthians 15:19, "If for this life only, we have hoped in Christ, we are of all men most to be pitied." Aren't you thankful that we have a hope beyond this life?

Beloved, never forget the fact that as believers we are forever united with Christ in every aspect of His work of redemption, which includes his resurrection. We have died, we have been buried and we are resurrected with him. Paul said, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ that lives in me." You have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Amazing theological concepts. And while we await for our glorified bodies, our true essence as glorified saints is concealed in this world. We can't even see it ourselves. Other people look at us, we look just as ugly as everybody else, right? But because our life is hidden with Christ in God--I know this is corny, but it's kind of like Superman, you know, he just looked like Clark Kent until he got in the phone booth or whatever it was, and all of a sudden, there he is. I told you it was corny, but I think it gets the point across, doesn't it? I mean, that's who we really are. Peter says that we have been born anew to a living hope, how? Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. First Peter, one three. Jesus resurrection, you see, is explicitly connected with our regeneration, our new birth, that supernatural instantaneous impartation of spiritual life to the spiritually dead, that spiritual resurrection that happened within our nature within our soul. And you see, when Jesus rose from the dead, he had a new quality of life, he had a resurrection life, in a human body and human spirit, they were perfectly united for fellowship and obedience to God forever. And in Christ's resurrection, you see, he earned for us a new life just like his. And when we are born again, we receive all of the new resurrection life in our spirit. At that moment of the new birth, we are made alive with new resurrection power, waiting for that to happen in one day, our resurrected bodies will follow suit. Hallelujah. This resurrection power of Christ is the supernatural power of God, dear friends, that is at work within us right now. Right now. Paul prayed for the Ephesians that they would know, quote, "what is the immeasurable greatness of His power in us who believe, according to the working of his great might, which he accomplished in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead and made Him sit at His right hand in the heavenly places." You see this resurrection power includes everything we need to live a life that is honoring to Christ; a life that can have victory over remaining sin in our life. In fact, Romans 6:14 says that sin will no longer have dominion over you. It includes our power for ministry, to work for the sake of the kingdom.

Now back to Daniel 12. As we wrap this up here this morning, this third precursor of the kingdom, you first have Israel's rescue, followed by the resurrection, which will then lead to the kingdom and blessings in God's kingdom. Verse three, "Those who have insight will shine brightly, like the brightness in the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever." He speaks of "those who have insight," it can be translated those who are wise, or those who have spiritual discernment. It's the same expression by the way that was used in chapter 11, verse 33, and verse 35, where it referred to those who lived in the days of Antiochus Epiphanes who were willing to die for their convictions, and who were willing to make it a priority to help others become wise, with respect to knowing who God was, and being obedient to Him, even as they battled the lies of Antiochus Epiphanes. So they will have insight. "Insight", it carries the idea of having the ability to see something with mental clarity, to see something for what it is, to have spiritual discernment. That's what it means. And in this context, it refers to spiritually discerning Christians during the time of the tribulation, who will, as he says here "lead the many to righteousness." And oh, dear friends, this is what we need today, isn't it? This is what we need in the church today. Most evangelical Christians today have the theological acumen of a second grader and the spiritual discernment of a transgendered seventh grader. They just don't understand what Scripture says. They don't know what it says. And when they hear it, they mock it. Think of all the Christians who support these political leaders that hold the things that are an absolute abomination to God. Think about that. Our kids are being exposed and poisoned by the urban culture. All of the vulgar music and Hollywood idols and sports figures that hate God and our kids are expected to embrace the Neo paganism and Marxist ideologies of critical race theory and Black Lives Matter and all of the other garbage that is out there today. Instead of celebrating and rejoicing in the blood bought unity found in the multiethnic household of God. That's what our kids need to understand. Oh, how we need believers within sight, those with spiritual discernment willing to help others.

So again, notice here in closing, "Those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever." We know that when Jesus returns, he will remove the ungodly and only his redeemed will enter the kingdom. As Jesus said in Matthew 13:43, "Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." My, what motivating truths for evangelism and discipleship. Let me ask you, dear friends, are you a witness for Christ in your sphere of influence? Are you actively engaged in presenting the gospel? Persuading others to see the horror of their sin and the glory of the cross? Is that how people would describe you? Or are you a chameleon Christian that is able to change your color depending upon the situation you're in. So that nobody will know that you stand for something that they might be opposed to. Because after all, you don't want to get canceled. Oh, dear friend, if that is you, please repent of that. Please repent of that.

Well, we'll stop here this morning. Three important precursors to the establishment of the Kingdom. Though the days in which we live are getting darker and darker, know this, that the darkest hour is just before the dawn, right? Judgment is coming. But so too, is our Messiah King. And one day he has promised that the earth will be filled with the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word, may they bear much fruit in our lives, to the praise of your glory. And I pray if there be one here today that knows nothing of what it is to truly see their sin to acknowledge it, to long for forgiveness, Lord, we know that they're not going to see that unless you do a mighty work within them. And so we would plead with you by the power of your spirit; to so overwhelmed them with conviction that they will literally run to the cross and plead for the mercy that you will so quickly give. We thank you. We give you praise for all things in Jesus name. Amen.

Oh my what a wonderful time of singing we've just had. Isn't it great to be able to give expression to the doxologies of our heart because of God's grace, that which he has wrought within us by the power of his Spirit through the gospel? Will you take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter 12s , as we continue to make our way through this amazing book. This morning, we are going to be looking at verse one. But I'm going to also take you into Revelation Chapter 12, for much of our time, because they are linked together. This is the first part of a series entitled Israel's final deliverance. And may I remind you as we open up the Word of God that the Lord fixes his gaze and lavishes his blessing in a very special way upon those who are aware of the profound impact their sin has had on themselves, and certainly in violation of God's law. Those who know that they are unable to stand in the presence of his holiness on their own. Therefore those who have an all-consuming heartfelt desire to worship the Lord their God, he looks especially at those people, we're reminded of this in Isaiah 66 and verse two, he says, "'But to this one I will look.'" In other words, this is the one that gets my attention. "'To him who is humble,'" a term that literally means willing to take the lowliest position before God. "'To him who is humble and contrite of spirit.'" "Contrite" in the original means to be lame, to be disabled. And also "'who trembles at My word.'" "Trembles" carries the idea of being stricken to the absolute core of your being because of your sin, and because the glory of His Word. So I trust this is the state of your heart and your mind this morning, as we come before the word of God. Anything less is a mockery of God. And it is certain proof that you are not right with Him.

Now today, we return to Daniel's prophecy. We're going to see much of where the world is heading. And I want to remind you that this is Daniel's fourth, and his final vision; a magnificent, prophetic panorama that is first introduced in chapter 10. And chapter 12 is really a continuation of the angelic response to Daniel's prayer of confession and of intercession on behalf of His people Israel; that they might be delivered from Babylonian captivity and restored to their land. And as you will recall, God sent an angel--l we believe it was probably Gabriel, to answer his prayers. But his answer encompassed far more than just delivery from Babylon, but rather, it moves to a magnificent plan to deliver his people from their sin, a remedy that can only be accomplished through the death of Christ and will ultimately come to fruition when he returns.

Moreover, his answer looked beyond the present the current Gentile oppressors of Babylon, to a final day when they will be delivered from all earthly oppressors, and enjoy the triumph that will be accomplished when Christ returns in power, and in great glory. So again, here in Daniel 12, we have a continuation of Gabriel's response that began all the way back in chapter 10, about verse 20. And goes through, actually verse four of chapter 12, where we're at and then as we will see, in coming weeks in verses six through eight, Daniel has some questions. Gabriel responds again in verse seven, and then beginning in verse nine through the end, he continues his response.

Now, again, bear in mind that the theme of the previous chapter, chapter 11, is the focus of the rule of the Antichrist. But now in chapter 12, the attention shifts to those who are going to be ruled by the Antichrist, which will include the whole world. But ultimately the focus is upon Israel, those who must endure his rule during the Great Tribulation, the pre kingdom judgments, as I like to call them. Daniel 70th week, all of those terms are synonymous. So let's examine the word of the Lord through his angelic messenger, recorded by his prophet Daniel. Daniel 12, verse one. "'Now at that time, Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of distress, such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time, your people, everyone who's found written in the book will be rescued.'" Now let's look closely at what the Spirit of God has revealed to us here. Notice the phrase "now at that time," again, a reference to the Great Tribulation, under the rule of the Antichrist, the subject of the previous chapter, the one who, according to Daniel 11:46, will "pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain." In other words, between the Mediterranean Sea and the Dead Sea, there on Mount Zion. "Yet he will come to his end and no one will help him." Now, may I remind you that Jesus also elaborated upon this future day in Matthew 24, in his Olivet Discourse, beginning in verse 21, he says, "'For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'"

Now back to verse one of Daniel 12. "'Now at that time, Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise.'" Alright, let's think about who is Michael? Well, you may recall earlier in chapter 10, Michael was the angel that God dispatched to assist the angel Gabriel, who was, according to verse 13, battling the prince of the kingdom of Persia, a powerful demon, perhaps even Satan himself, "'who was withstanding me for 21 days; then behold, Michael, one of the chief princes came to help me.'" The term Michael, the name Michael means who is like God, and we know biblically that he is one of the most powerful, perhaps the most powerful of all of the angels. He is the one that leads and protects the people of Israel, according to chapter 10 and verse 21. In Jude nine, we read how that Michael is the "archaggelos," the Ark Angel, which means the chief angel or first angel, so we have a little sense of who he is.

Again, "'Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people will arise.'" Now, prophetically, this includes the final victory of Michael over Satan. That will occur 1260 days or three and a half years, according to Revelation 12, verse six and verse 14, right before the Messiah returns, as we will see in a moment. Look again at the end of verse one there, “'And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was the nation until that time.'" Again, the intense suffering at the hands of the Gentiles will occur during this, this time of tribulation, Daniel's 70th week. In fact, Jeremiah spoke of this in Jeremiah 30. In verse seven, he said, "'Alas! for that day is great, there is none like it, and it is the time of Jacob's distress. But he will be saved from it,'" referring to Israel.

So again, Daniel 12 one at the end, it says" there will be a time of distress, such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time, your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be rescued.'" So here we see that the Messiah King, the Lord Jesus Christ, will rescue Israel. We know later on in verse two, he is going to resurrect the dead. And also in verse three, he is going to reward the righteous. Now what about this book of life? What is that all about? Well, that is God's record of the righteous redeemed his record of the elect. We read about that, for example, in in Psalm 69, verse 68, those who have been elected by his grace, those who have been justified in his sight. Jesus said in Luke 10 and verse 20, "'rejoice that your names are recorded in heaven.'" Aren't you thankful that we serve a sovereign God that has accomplished our redemption, and is made certain that it will stand throughout eternity? If it were left up to us, it would never happen. These are those according to Acts 13:48, who were quote, "appointed to eternal life and who will believe." At the the Great White Throne Judgment, we read in Revelation 20 and verse 12, John says, "And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books according to their deeds."

So given this, let's look at this first verse of Daniel 12, as a whole. "'Now, at that time, Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people will arise. There will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who was found written in the book will be rescued.'" Now, this is obviously a season of unparalleled suffering for Israel, that is being described here. And it was also described in Daniel's first vision, you may recall, in Daniel chapter seven, beginning in verse 21, we read, "'I kept looking, and that horn was waging war with the saints in overpowering them until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was passed in favor of the saints of the Highest One. And the time arrived when the saints took possession of the kingdom.'" That horn, by the way, referring to the Antichrist, verse 25, of Daniel seven, he goes on, and says, "'He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law; and they will be given into his hand for a time, times, and half a time.'" In other words, three and a half years, the last three and a half years of the tribulation. This is also described in Daniel's third vision, Daniel 9:27, "'And he,'" referring to the Antichrist, '"will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week,'" in other words, in the middle of the seven years, '"he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering, and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate.'" Beloved, I believe that it is during this time of unparallel suffering for Israel, during the Tribulation, that Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the people of Israel, will arise.

Now, let's back up for a moment and look at the big picture, because I get a lot of questions along this line. And this may help to give you a sense of where these things probably fit in a little summary here of events, as I understand them from Scripture, the next event on the prophetic timetable, the prophetic calendar, is probably the rapture of the church, the snatching away of the church. He will remove the church and once again focus on Israel. And it also could be a time when the battle of Gog and Magog takes place Ezekiel 38 and 39. With the rapture maybe occurring sometime thereafter, we're not sure. But eventually the Antichrist will sign a peace agreement with Israel to be their protector and to be their ally and so forth. But it will be a phony piece, but that signing of that covenant will be the trigger of Daniel's 70th week. The trigger of the tribulation, and that will set into motion the seal and then the trumpet. And finally, the bowl judgments that are described in Revelation six through 19. And in the middle of that tribulation, the Antichrist is going to desecrate the temple. He's going to set him up, set himself up to be God. He's going to demand to be worshipped at that point, the Jews will know they have been taken, and the persecution will begin to mount upon them. And many new Christians at this point now, many Jews are going to come to saving faith in Christ. Revelation seven, we know that God will raise up at that time, he will raise up and seal 144,000, Jewish evangelists, 12,000 Jewish men from each tribe. In Revelation 11, God is also going to raise up what is called two witnesses, two prophets, to preach a message of judgment to the world that is enduring these amazing events. And they are going to do that, according to Scripture, 1260 days or 42 months, or three and a half years. During that time, many will be saved. In Revelation 13, God is also going to dispatch three angels, who according to the text says, will fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to those who dwell on the earth. So you can imagine what is going to happen during that day. And with so many coming to faith in Christ, and giving their full allegiance to him, the Antichrist is going to be apoplectic, he will be infuriated with all that is going on and seek to destroy the remnant of Israel and all Christians. In fact, we know that only a third will survive. We read about this, for example, in Zechariah, 13, beginning in verse eight, "It will come about and all the land that declares the Lord, that two parts in it will be cut off and perish, but the third will be left in it. And I will bring the third part through the fire, refine them as silver is refined and test them as gold is tested. They will call on my name, and I will answer them; I will say 'They are my people.' And they will say, 'The Lord is my God.'" At the end of all of that, then you have the battle of Armageddon. And you have the King of kings and Lord of lords descending in power and great glory to judge the nations, win that battle and so forth, and establish His glorious kingdom.

Now, let's back up. Where does Daniel 12 one fit into all of this? Well, Revelation chapter 12, if you'd like to turn there, Revelation, chapter 12, verses six through 17, helps us understand the chronology here. And basically, the answer is Michael is going to arise sometime around the midpoint of the Tribulation, when he casts Satan, the dragon out of heaven. This is a fascinating promise, a fascinating passage of scripture. Let me set this up a little bit--after suffering his defeat at the hands of Michael as we're going to see, Satan is going to vent his spleen against Israel, knowing his time is short, he is going to want to eradicate the pernicious and perfidious Jewish people once and for all, removing any possibility of them or anyone else inheriting the Messianic Kingdom with the coming of Christ. Satan's ultimate doom, however, will follow the events of the end of the seventh trumpet and bowl judgments that are described in Revelation 15 through 18. So let's take a little excursus here, let's go into Revelation Chapter 12, for a moment. Again, background is everything. So let me give you a little bit of background and we're just jumping right into the middle here of Revelation. So I want you to know where you're at, in this text, Revelation 12 through 14 those chapters is basically as a parenthetical section in the book that provides a chronicle of Satan's career. And it actually recapitulates what had been said earlier in Revelation chapter six through 11. So we have a little parenthesis here that chronicles Satan's career. And the first six verses of chapter 12 provide a sweeping overview of Satan's ancient rebellion and war with God as well as his covenant people Israel, and they are symbolized, by the way, as the woman. That's a reference to Israel and her son, reference to the Son of God the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, the scene in Revelation 12 describes Israel during this last first half of the Tribulation, notice verse six, "Then the woman fled into the wilderness where she had a place prepared by God, so that there she would be nourished for 1260 days." So here we see that during the Tribulation, Satan will increase his efforts of Jewish genocide through the reign of the Antichrist, and thereby try to prevent anyone from populating the millennial kingdom. But God arises again as the defender of his people, to hide them and to nourish them for 1260 days, or in other words, three and a half years. Again, Jeremiah 30, verse seven, this is the time of Jacob's trouble or Jacob's distress, and God's going to protect them in some undisclosed place there in the wilderness. And frankly, it's reminiscent, is it no,t of the 40 year wandering in the wilderness where God provided for his people? We know prophetically that many of the Jews are going to remain in Jerusalem, they're going to remain close to the temple, they're going to try to survive, many will be saved through the testimony of the two witnesses, and so forth, yet many are going to be slaughtered.

And then next, in verses seven through 12, John records this amazing battle in heaven. And probably like most men, I love battles, especially when my guys win. Right? I love it. So this is a battle in heaven, where Michael is used to permanently expel Satan from the presence of God; he's going to cast him to the earth. And soon thereafter, we know he's going to be cast into the, into the abyss, the Lake of Fire, which will be his eternal dungeon. I also want to add a little footnote here. All of this is future, though grammatically, you will notice that it is presented in the past tense. This is a literary device that is commonly used to describe a future event in such a way as to indicate that it is already an accomplished fact. It's to emphasize the certainty of an event. grammarians call it a proleptic aorist. Indeed, much of John's vision here is proleptic, where future events are so certain, they can be described in the past tense, as if they have already occurred, the very important concept that you need to understand in order to have the proper hermeneutic to interpret Bible prophecy.

Now let's notice closely this war in heaven, verse seven of Revelation 12. "And there was a war in heaven, Michael and his angels waging with the dragon." Now, you know that throughout history, Satan has waged war against God and his holy angels. We know that beyond the veil of our senses, is a war that's going on--a vast spiritual war. Untold conflicts happening all the time, even at this very moment. I am always aware that when I come into this pulpit, and we meet here, in this place, that there are angelic beings that are unseen that are protecting us. Remember, again, as well, Satan has a highly organized army of demons that he commands. Ephesians 6:12 speaks of this, including those that are in charge of nations, in charge of empires, like the prince of the kingdom of Persia in Daniel 10. In fact, without question, we could say that most of our political leaders here in the United States are Satan's puppets; highly influenced by demons and all of the false teaching and false philosophies that have been building up down through the centuries. So this is not the first time Michael and his forces have encountered this enemy. Now, I wondered in my own mind, many, many years ago, I wonder how they fight you know, what does that look like? You know, do they have these Star Wars sabers? I mean, you know, what do they do? Well, guess what? The Bible doesn't tell us. You know, it just doesn't say. Scripture is silent regarding how they wage war. So the actual tactics and the kinds of casualties, all of that remains a mystery to us. But here we see God dispatching Michael once again, and along with undoubtedly, a celestial army that he leads to wage war with the dragon. And this is what we believe is going on here in Daniel 12 one. Now grammatically, if we look at Revelation 12, seven, the phrase "Michael and his angels waging with the dragon," that reveals to us grammatically in the original language that it is Satan, that is the instigator of this conflict. In fact, the phrase could be translated, "Michael and his angels had to fight the dragon." Now, we want to ask the question, What triggered this attack? It's a good question for any student of the Bible. Well, we can't be sure. But when we put all of the things together, it might be, I mean, we know that it's happening in the middle of the week after Israel has fled into the wilderness for the final three and a half years, according to Revelation 12, six. But the trigger may well be a combination of these supernatural victories that are occurring at the hands of the two witnesses on earth that God has dispatched, along with the sealed 144,000 that are that are protected and proclaiming the gospel, many people coming to saving faith in Christ. Also the three angels of chapter 14, verses six through 11, are flying in mid heaven, making various warnings to those on the earth during that tribulation period. And so all these things combined could be what energizes Satan's attack, because he does have a diabolical plan to destroy God's people and prevent the establishment of the millennial kingdom. He has done this throughout redemptive history in various ways.

But notice, again, in verse seven, at the end, it says, "The dragon and his angels waged war, and they were not strong enough, and there was no longer a place found for them in heaven." So here, beloved, we see how the cleansing of heaven is now complete, right? They're no longer in heaven. But they're really remains a purification on Earth, so now they're on Earth. And we begin to understand in verse nine, what happens with respect to Daniel's defeat. Notice verse nine, "And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him." "Thrown down," he says it three times. I want you to notice as well here, the Lord describes the enemy of our souls, this wicked fiend in five ways he's called the great dragon, underscoring the vicious cruelty of this monster. He's also called the serpent of old, identifying him as the serpent in the garden that tempted Eve and brought sin into the world. He's also called the devil, the slanderer, or the maligner, the one who roams the earth collecting evidence to accuse saints before God's holy bar of justice, as Scripture reveals to us. He's also called Satan, transliteration of the Hebrew word Satan, referring to our superhuman adversary, and he's also described as the one who deceives or misleads the whole world. Indeed, he is a genius in seducing people to believe that which is false. And then when he causes them to fall, he accuses them before God. Can there be anything more evil than that? What a, what an exceedingly dangerous and vile creature.

Notice again in verse nine, the Lord uses the phrase "thrown down." It literally means to cast down or to forcibly remove or expel. In this context, it carries the idea of being manhandled. Are you familiar with that? He's manhandled here. This is a supernatural body slam. That's what's going on here. I love it. When he’s slammed from Heaven down to earth. I mean, that's a that's a big slam. Right? This underscores the humiliating ignominious defeat, and the method of his expulsion. He's going to be overwhelmed by a vastly superior force and physically hurled from heaven to earth. You know, I was thinking about this. I've been thrown out of places before. I know what that's like, maybe you have been to, but I've never had anybody pick me up and throw me. Especially that far, right? I mean, it's an amazing thought that that's what's going to happen and I confess I, I find great satisfaction when I contemplate this theme. You know, I can imagine Michael saying, come on, make my day. So here we learn of the dragon's inevitable defeat.

But notice the reaction. Oh, how I love this verse 10. "Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, 'Now the salvation, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, he who accuses them before our God, day and night.'" So here the glorified saints in heaven erupt in song. And undoubtedly, this will be us dear friends. A glimpse of our future. The accuser of the brethren has been thrown down. And obviously his relentless and slanderous accusations fell on deaf ears. Because we have a great mediator at God's bar of justice. Because we have a faithful high priest. Because we have been declared righteous; Romans five verse two, "having been justified by faith," we have what? We have "peace with God." Despite all of the accusations, despite all of our sin, we have peace with God because we have been declared righteous on the basis of the imputed righteousness of Christ. That's justification. "Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exalt in hope of the glory of God." And beloved, this heavenly celebration erupts because faith has become sight.

Now, let me give you an overview, once again, a possible progression of events. As we look at Scripture, from a literal grammatical perspective, probably soon after the rapture of the church. A Russian-Arab coalition will launch a massive attack against Israel. That could happen before, but we can't say for sure, that is the battle of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38 and 39. Israel being a key ally of NATO, and the United States will be under attack. And that group of European nations will probably be this Revived Roman Empire that the Antichrist will lead; an alliance of nations that will most likely feel threatened as well, from this north/south coalition of Russia, and the Arab nations coming against Israel. And although God is going to destroy this coalition, utterly defeat them on the mountains of Israel, which by the way, you should keep in mind as you watch the Russian army coming into, into Ukraine, know that eventually that army is going to be destroyed, which by the way is heartbreaking. I've got a number of dear friends in Russia, a lot of believers, a lot of them were out of the KGB, were saved from that and were saved from the Russian military and they're pastors. Lord willing, I don't know, we may see some of them at the shepherd's conference; we usually do every year. But believe me, many of the men fighting for Russia don't want to be there. It is a wicked, barbaric army. But anyway, they will be defeated on the mountains of Israel. The entire world at that point will be amazed. The Islamic world will be stunned and they will be forced to admit what they have denied for centuries. And that is that the God of Israel is the one true God; there is no other and Allah is a figment of their imagination of satanic deception.

At that point, according to Ezekiel 39 and verse nine, it will give them seven years to burn the weaponry, seven months to bury the dead in order to cleanse the land. Then all of the nations of the world will suddenly view Israel in a way that they never have before, a power to be reckoned with. And after describing the supernatural defeat of the Russian-Arab Alliance, we know that God spoke through the prophet of Ezekiel, and says this, in Ezekiel 38:23, "'I will magnify Myself, sanctify Myself, and make Myself known in the sight of many nations, and they will know that I am the Lord.'" Right now, that is an absolute joke to the majority of the people in the world. Verse seven of chapter 39 of Ezekiel, "'My holy name I will make known in the midst of My people, Israel, and I will not let My holy name be profaned anymore, and the nations will know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel.'" Indeed, many will know, not all will bow. In fact, people in hell will blaspheme him forever, knowing full well who he is.

So after this defeat, the Arab-Muslim world will be powerless to prevent Israel from destroying their sacred Dome of the Rock, there in Jerusalem building their own temple. Israel's newfound power, combined with the political and economic upheavals in the world, would be the perfect storm for the Antichrist, for a world ruler to come to the forefront and provide peace, for everyone. Satan's aid, the Antichrist, representing a European confederacy--which is rapidly by the way, becoming a Muslim confederacy, I hope you understand that in Europe--he will see the need to ally himself with Israel. He will negotiate a covenant of peace with her. I think about this day and it's fascinating. Israel typically comes to a peace table with everyone discriminating against her. But for the first time in modern history, she will actually come away with an international blessing, so to speak, something that they have never, never seen. But the signing of this covenant will be the trigger that will set into motion the, the time of Daniel's 70th week and the first half of the Tribulation. Israel will experience peace. The world will experience some peace. But it will be a false peace; a calm before the storm. And during that time, God will begin to set into motion wrath that will be poured out upon the nation's-- the seal and then eventually the trumpet, and finally, the bowl judgments of Revelation six through 19, resulting in millions of casualties both of unrepentant Jews and Gentiles. And many people that will come to saving faith in Christ. But by the middle of the tribulation, we believe it is there, where Satan will be cast out of heaven. This again is where Michael comes on the scene. Enraged by his humiliating defeat, and knowing whose time is short, to prevent the establishment of the Kingdom, upon the earth that he now rules, he will begin again to vent his fury against the 144,000, the indestructible two witnesses, and all of this will cause Satan to influence the Antichrist to invade Jerusalem. Daniel spoke of this, again back in Daniel 11, beginning of verse 44, "He will go forth with great wrath to destroy and annihilate many. He will pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain." This is as Daniel prophesied again in Daniel 9:27. This is consistent with what the Lord Jesus prophesied in Matthew 24:15, and the apostle Paul, in Second Thessalonians two four. The Antichrist is going to invade the Temple Mount, put an end to all of their worship, and he is going to seat himself in the Holy of Holies, displaying himself as being God. The Scripture says, that is "the abomination of desolation." The temple in the land at that point, will be ritually defiled and many Jews will flee into the wilderness where God will protect them, where God will nourish them. And all of this will set into motion when Satan is thrown down out of heaven to earth.

Now let's go back to Revelation 12 verse 13. Notice the dragons pursuit of the woman. "And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman referring to Israel, who gave birth to the male child." "Persecuted" here, in the original language literally means to chase, or to hunt, to pursue with the intent, to do violence. And here Satan is depicted as this dragon monster, chasing a woman, Israel who gave birth to the male child, the Lord Jesus. And this is consistent with other Old Testament prophecies, especially Daniel's prophecy, of which the Lord referred to in his Olivet Discourse regarding this time, remember what Jesus said in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 15. "'Therefore, when you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken up through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place, (let the reader understand), then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'" This, by the way, is the region to the east of Jerusalem, the wilderness mountain regions. Daniel 11:41, again speaks of this, "But these will be rescued out of his hand: Edom, Moab and the foremost of the sons of Ammon." Goes on to say "'Whoever is on the housetop must not go down to get the things out that are in his house. Whoever is in the field must not run back to get his cloak. But woe to those who are pregnant. And to those who are nursing babies in those days! But pray that your flight will not be in the winter, or on a Sabbath.'" You must understand that travel on Shabbat, on the Sabbath day, is a violation of the law and legalistic Jews would be furious and would try to impede travel. Jesus goes on to say in Matthew 24:15, as I've read earlier, "'For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'" The scene, we know, is one of a surprise attack. Israel is not going to expect her ally, the Antichrist, and all that he commands, to suddenly come against them. After all, they've been promised peace and safety. And unlike any other city in the world, Jerusalem has already been besieged 27 times. And unless they're besieged again prior to this time, that will make 28. And this will be the final season of judgment upon the stubborn and stiff-necked people. And during the siege of Israel, of I should say of Jerusalem, we read that the Lord of hosts will strengthen Jewish soldiers Zechariah 12, verses five through nine, Micah 4:11 through chapter five and verse one. And according to Zechariah 14 and verse two, the Antichrist will be able to only recapture half of the city. That will probably be the eastern half of the city since later when the Lord returns according to Zechariah 14 four, the Mount of Olives will split into each side of the mountain moving north and south. And this will allow an East/West escape route for his remnant. They will cross the Kidron Valley directly through the Mount of Olives; an amazing thought, allowing them to join many others in the Judean wilderness who had been protected there since the mid tribulation flight.

I want you to notice the word "split," which translates the Hebrew word, "baqa." It's the same verb used in another magnificent split that allowed God's covenant people to flee to safety from another army pursuing them. When God "split" the Red Sea. In Exodus 14, we read it in verse 16, as well as 21. So some future day the Jews will read these texts I believe, and they will immediately understand the connection. It's interesting you think back to Egypt; Pharaoh was a type of the Antichrist, the Antichrist being the antitype. And even as God blocked the pursuit of Pharaoh's Egyptian charioteers at the Red Sea, once again, he's going to block the armies of the Antichrist in this great split. In fact, his armies will be prevented from fleeing north and south leaving them utterly vulnerable. In the Kidron Valley, which is also known as the Valley of Jehoshaphat, "Jehoshaphat," meaning "God will judge" and there they will be utterly destroyed.

So here in verse 13, we see Satan pursuing Israel through the Antichrist. Verse 14, "But the two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman, so that she could fly into the wilderness to her place, where she was nourished for a time and times and half the time, from the presence of the serpent." In other words, the last three and a half years of the tribulation. Notice the woman's flight here, Israel's flight, he uses the phrase, "the two wings of the great eagle." Now that was a familiar concept to the Jewish people. It would have been a familiar concept to John, it certainly has nothing to do with an airplane as some people want to assert. In fact, the Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv is 30 miles west of Jerusalem. That's going to be where the forces of the Antichrist are going to be kept; it has nothing to do with that. This phrase is in keeping with other terms and concepts of Israel's former deliverance from Egypt. Exodus 19, verse four, we read "You yourselves, have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagle's wings, and brought you to Myself." So once again, the Lord is going to miraculously deliver his people in ways that we are not told. And the imagery here also of wings, is emblematic of speed, and of great strength. We read this in other Old Testament passages. But it's ultimately a picture of divine protection. In fact, Moses' great song of deliverance speaks of this describing what happened to the Egyptian charioteers. Deuteronomy 32, verse nine, "'For the Lord's portion is His people; Jacob is the allotment of His inheritance. He found him in a desert land, and in the howling waste of a wilderness; He encircled him, He cared for him. He guarded him as the pupil of His eye, like an eagle that stirs up its nest, that hovers over its young, He spread His wings and caught them, He carried them on His pinions.'" Again, Revelation 12:14 doesn't tell us how he does all of this, but it clearly will be through some miraculous intervention. And he will somehow recapitulate something similar to what he did in the splitting of the Red Sea. And this may well be another example of Daniel 12 one, when Michael, the great prince who stands over the people of Israel will arise, God will dispatch a division of his angelic forces, under the leadership of Michael.

But notice verse 14, again, "the two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman so that she could fly into the wilderness to her place, where she was nourished for a time and times and half a time from the presence of the serpent." So many of the Israeli remnant will be supernaturally transported into some region of the wilderness mountain area east of Jerusalem. And there, the Lord will once again care for his covenant people, nourishing them, feeding them perhaps manna, once again, as he did 3400 years earlier, in their desert wandering; assuming that this will happen in the near future, which we do not know.

And finally, the dragon redirects his animosity here in verse 15. "And the serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman, so that he might cause her to be swept away with the flood." This symbolizes this invading force that will just sweep upon the vulnerable. But notice the Lord's glorious protection, verse 16, "But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and drank up the river which the dragon poured out of his mouth." Now, we can't be sure, but when we look at the context and the symbolism of the Earth, swallowing up this approaching hoard, it seems to indicate that God is going to use a massive earthquake to accomplish this eradication of the enemy, just as he used the waters of the Red Sea to destroy the Egyptian charioteers. In fact, in Exodus 15:12, Moses said, "'You stretched out your right hand, the earth swallowed them.'"

So here we learn that Satan's forces, under the rule of the Antichrist, are going to meet a similar fate. And because he is once again prevented from carrying out his nefarious scheme, he redirects his animosity towards another group, verse 17. "So the dragon was enraged with the woman and went off to make war with the rest of her children, who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus." Here we see that who he goes after now are believers out of Israel. The rest of the children, literally the seed. This will include Jews who will remain under siege in Jerusalem, but also the 144,000 Jewish evangelists that continue to fearlessly preach the gospel, as well as all believers who, I love this "keep the commandments of God, and hold to the testimony of Jesus." By the way, grammatically, the two phrases "the commandments of God" and "the testimony of Jesus," are both what we call "subjective." Meaning they can be translated "the commandments which God gave," and "the testimony which Jesus bore, the truth that he taught." So this is more than just a testimony about Jesus dear friends. What is being described here are the divine truths that were revealed and taught in the New Testament. So Satan will go after those who preach and teach the New Testament. And this will include what I'm teaching today, from the "Apokalypsis lesou Christos," the revealing of Jesus Christ, the book of Revelation, that reveals Satan's defeat and Messiah's triumph. If you think this is politically incorrect, now, just think what it will be like in those days. And I believe with all my heart that there will be people in those days, who will turn and hear what I have said today and other preachers have said today, or who've taught on these things, and will understand more clearly what the Word of God has revealed, and what a comfort that will be to them.

Dear friends, I hope as you read these things and study these things, your heart will be filled with praise and adoration for our sovereign God. Isn't it great, especially given all of the insanity that's all around us, isn't it great to know that we serve a holy and a sovereign God that has redeemed us by the blood of the Lamb and His promise to deliver us, ultimately, from all of these things, and that one day, one day, people will bow before my Savior and my king? And they will do that, either in terror or in triumph. And I pray that it will be triumph for each of you. If you don't know Christ, dear friends, you need to get serious about the tragedy of your own sin and come to God in saving faith and ask him to save you. And for the rest of us, let's just pray that Jesus will come soon. Right? Amen.

Father, thank you for these eternal truths. While there are many things we don't fully understand, and, and we can't be dogmatic about a lot of things, nevertheless, we have your word. And then when we look at the normal meaning of language, we can begin to piece together some sense of what you're up to, and what will happen. But Lord, it's not all of the details that matters. It's the big picture that matters and the big picture is that you are the Holy God Of Israel, The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and that we as Gentiles have been grafted into the root of Abrahamic blessing, that covenantal blessing, in such a way as to make us part of the family of the redeemed the church. Lord, we celebrate all of this. And we thank you that we can find such comfort from your Word, especially in these dark and chaotic days, knowing that you have a plan and you are working it perfectly, to the praise of your glory, as well as for our eternal good. So we thank you and we give you praise in Jesus name. Amen.

We return this morning to our study of Daniel. So if you will take your Bible and turn there to Daniel chapter 11, the amazing book in the Bible, and even this chapter, which is filled with some 135 prophecies that have already been fulfilled literally, which naturally leads us to believe the rest will as well. And this morning, we're going to look at the last verses of this chapter, verses 36 through 45. Now to prepare your hearts, let me just remind you, folks, even as invasive briars grow naturally upon the face of the earth, the insidious thorns and weeds of sin grow naturally in our hearts. And the flowers and fruits of righteousness, therefore, need to be cultivated, they need to be nurtured if we are to enjoy them. And the divine gardener gives us all of the resources, we need to do just that. And he uses primarily his Word and his Spirit. So I trust you're willing to allow the Word to do its work in your heart today, and nourish you with its living water. And how sad to see fruitless trees withering in a church, or people that claim to be Christians bearing bad fruit, which is a certain indication that they were never planted by God. In fact, Jesus said in Matthew seven, "'A good tree cannot produce bad fruit. Nor can a bad tree produce good fruit, every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then you will know them by their fruits.'" Fruits, referring to the fruits of genuine repentance that manifests Christ-like obedience and holy living. So with this, we focus our attention on the Word of God, which is also likened to mother's milk, right? Remember what Peter said, we are to be like "newborn babies and long for the pure milk of the word," First, Peter two two. Why, why should we do that? "So that by it you may grow and respect to salvation, if you have tasted of the kindness of the Lord," if you have truly been born again. And if you haven't, then you're going to be terribly bored here today, you will have no appetite for the Word of God. And unless you repent, you will perish in your sins. So will you humble yourself, and trust in Christ and those of us who know and love him, let's open up our hearts to his words.

So we returned to Daniel 11. Remember, this is where Daniel once again presents the Antichrist in this fourth and final revelation, prophetic revelation, which he has also done in the three preceding revelations that he received. And may I remind you that what we are examining here has nothing to do with Antiochus Epiphanes, he was the type that pointed to the antitype, who is the antichrist that is to come. And you may recall our little outline that we began several weeks ago when I was with you the last time. We first of all looked at the final willful king, the Antichrist in verse 36. And then secondly, the final world religion, verses 37 through nine and then today we will look at the final military conquests of the Antichrist. Let me give you a little review, in terms of the final willful king in verse 36. Remember, there we read, "Then the king," the Antichrist, "will do as he pleases and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods; and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." And of course, in chapter 12, verse one, we have some helpful insights into when this will occur, namely, a time it says "of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be rescued." So this is pointing to the time of the Great Tribulation, the prekingdom judgments before Christ returns. And as we see there in verse one of chapter 12, the rule of the Antichrist will encompass the most severe persecution in the history of Israel, and ultimately the world. Again, verse 36, "and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." And what is it that was decreed? Well, Daniel 9:24, we read "70 weeks" literally 70 sevens, or 70 times 70 years; 490 years "have been decreed," which means they have been decided, they have been determined "for your people and your holy city." So God has deliberately set aside 490 years in redemptive history to accomplish his purposes in delivering his covenant people Israel, their capital, city, Jerusalem, all of which is consistent with Daniel's prayer. Obviously, these things did not happen at His first coming.

And this brings us to the second division of that prophecy, which is in verse 25, where God's angelic messenger gives us the historical context. He says in verse 25, "So you are to know and discern from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks; it will be built again with plaza and moat, even in times of distress." Remember, there are two divisions there. Let me remind you of them so that you get the context of all that's happening here. The first division is seven weeks or seven times 7;49 years. And then the second division 62 weeks; 62 sevens is 434 years. And that means that something special occurred 49 years after the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. And what is it that occurred at that time? Well, that was the period of Ezra and Nehemiah, when they combined their efforts to establish a working capital city of Judah, it took almost a whole generation. And then the 62 weeks or the 434 years later, Messiah the Prince comes on the scene. And we know that that happened in the triumphal entry on nine of Nissan in AD 30. So 49 plus 434 equals 483. 483 years have been completed. But the final seven years have not. The starting point or the terminus a quo of this 490 years of Gentile domination and judgment upon Israel was 445 BC, when Artexerxes gave the decree to Nehemiah to return and rebuild the city. We read about that in Nehemiah chapter two. Now remember, there is an extensive time gap here between the first 69 weeks, in other words, the first 483 years and the final 70th week. And that's not at all uncommon in Bible prophecy. It's also important to remember that ultimately over the course of these 490 years of judgment, Daniel 9:24 reveals six objectives that God will accomplish during that time. First of all, he says to "finish the transgression." In other words, the violation of his law they revolted against his authority. And specifically, this refers to Israel's unrelenting and unrestrained rebellions against God. And then secondly, "to make an end of sin," which is a more general term of just dealing with all of the wrongs, to seal it up so it will be concealed to judge it with finality. And then thirdly, "to make atonement for iniquity." "Kaphar" in Hebrew, it carries the idea of a covering by means of an expiatory sacrifice. "To make a covering" is what it means, in other words, to provide a moral or a legal repayment for a fault or injury. And that's what happened when Christ went to the cross on our behalf. And also he says, "to bring in everlasting righteousness," also "to seal up vision and prophecy," which literally means to hide from view and demonstrate that its functions are over. In other words, visions, revelation, they're over. Prophecy, the message of the prophets, it's over. And finally "to anoint the most holy place," to anoint means to officially inaugurate into public ministry the most holy place, literally the Holy of Holies, the millennial temple.

And then in Daniel 9:27, he goes on to describe what will happen during that final week of years, that 70th week that we are anticipating. "And he," referring to the Antichrist, "will make a firm covenant with the many for one week." So in other words, a great deceiver will lure Israel into a protective agreement called "a firm covenant." "But in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until the destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate." So in the middle of the week, in other words, three and a half years in, this satanically, empowered and possessed antichrist will seize the temple. He will betray the Jews, demand to be worshipped, even as his four runner, Antiochus Epiphanes. This is the one pictured in Revelation 13 verses one and verse five, "the beast coming up out of the sea," given quote, "a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies and authority to act for 42 months was given to him," referring to the last half of the seven years of Daniel's 70th week.

Now back again to Daniel 11:36, the end of the verse it says, "he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." And of course, what was decreed, was the 490 years of judgment upon Israel, leading up to the return of the Messiah in the establishment of his long-awaited kingdom. So this vile blasphemous ruler will prosper until that time, as long as a sovereign God has decreed. I hope you find that as comforting as I do. To know that ultimately, he is the one in control. And then secondly, by way of review, very briefly, the final world religion beginning in verse 37, which is ultimately going to be the worship of the Antichrist, says "he will show no regard for the gods of his fathers or for the desire of women, nor will he show regard for any other god; for he will magnify himself above them all. But instead, he will honor a god of fortresses, a god whom his fathers did not know; he will honor him with gold, silver, and costly stones and treasures. He will take action against the strongest of fortresses with the help of a foreign god, he will give great honor to those who acknowledge him, he will cause them to rule over the many, and will parcel out land for a price." I will not go over all that we learned the last time, but if you want to know the details of that, you can go back and listen.

This brings us to our text today. The final point, referring to the final military conquests, and this is truly, truly fascinating. Let me read the text beginning of verse 40. "At the end time, the king of the South will collide with him, and the king of the North will storm against him with chariots, with horsemen, and with many ships." Now, to understand this, what we need to do is remember the designations of the south and the north in earlier passages, and of course, that referred to the Ptolemaic and the Seleucid rulers respectively. So it's fair to assume that these regions in the future will bear some similarity. You will recall that the South went to Ptolemy, General Ptolemy. And so the Ptolemaic power of Egypt is probably in view here. Ptolemy was one of the generals of Alexander the Great. And I might add that today, Egypt's military power is ranked number 12 out of 140 nations in the world. So it is a very formidable power. It is the most powerful country in the League of Arab States, a regional organization, which consists of 22 Arab nations in the Middle East. Which, by the way, includes Syria and Lebanon, that we see in the news all the time, and also includes nation states in Northern Africa, on the Horn of Africa. So I think it's fair to see Egypt as representative of the Arab nations that will, according to this prophecy, collide with the Antichrist. This quote, "king who will do as he pleases," according to 11:36, the one "who will do as he pleases and exalt and magnify himself above every god," which by the way, would include Allah. And "will speak monstrous things against the God of gods." So he will one day mock the god of Islam, the god of Judaism and the God of Christianity. You can imagine how people will react to that. Notice also in verse 40, the king of the South will apparently form a coalition against the expansionist campaign of the Antichrist, with it says, the king of the North, who "will storm against him with chariots, horsemen, many ships." That, by the way, is just representative of have their counterparts in modern warfare, which would have been unheard of in Daniel's day.

Now, what about the king of the North? Well, in earlier passages, we know that this referred to Syria, especially as it related to Antiochus Epiphanes, who ruled the Seleucid Empire at that time. And remember, Syria and Babylon originally went to general Seleucus. However, Syria today doesn't even remotely qualify as some kind of military powerhouse comparable to the ancient Seleucid dynasty. And it is certainly not a realistic threat that could come against the revived Roman Empire, ruled by the Antichrist. So given all of this, and given other passages of Scripture, I think the most reasonable designation of this future king of the North is Russia. Moscow being directly north of Jerusalem. Now, while I cannot be certain, I will also argue at some level that this prophecy pertains to the battles associated with Ezekiel chapter 38, and 39, the prophecy of Gog and Magog and the future invasion of Israel, that I think may well occur prior to the tribulation. Now, some of these things that I'm going to say are going to be speculative on my part. Some of my argumentation has holes in the bucket. But I think my bucket has less holes than some of the other buckets. And I'm not going to explain all of the buckets, I'm just going to show you my bucket, okay? And we're not starting a new denomination, I can't be dogmatic on these things. But I think I will give you an exegetically defensible, tentative hypothesis of what this battle may be all about. No one can be dogmatic about any of this, including the timing. By the way, the Lord knows this and he's deliberately vague about many of these things. You know, if we knew exactly who and when these things were going to happen, you know, that we would all react in ways that would make fools out of ourselves. And so what's important is not who and when these things take place, but the certainty that they will take place, and that God is in charge, and he will judge as he has promised.

Now, concerning Ezekiel 38, and 39, and I read chapter 39, few minutes ago, there are reasonable arguments that those battles are referring, or that that battle refers to the time the Battle of Armageddon in Revelation 16. Others say that it will happen at the end of the millennium. And you can read about that, for example, in Revelation 20, verses seven through nine, but we can't be certain. And I believe that there are just too many disparities in the description of these events to justify those positions. And again, as I say, all positions have holes in the bucket, as does mine. But let me give you why I think this may happen before the tribulation. One of the main reasons is that this will provide the necessary time for Israel to bury the dead and burn the weapons according to Ezekiel 39, nine. Something they would not have time to do, or the ability to do, during the future prekingdom judgments of the tribulation that are going to be horrific. And I believe you will agree that the world stage is set for these things to happen; we're seeing this right before our eyes today. I mean, think about it. It's not at all difficult to imagine a 10 member, NATO Confederacy, European Confederacy, a revived Roman Empire being led by some maniacal fiend that would be a threat to Russia and to the Arab nations. Remember, while Israel is not a member of NATO today, it is one of his staunchest allies in the Middle East. Russia's fear of NATO is what's driving Putin's military buildup on the border of Ukraine right now as we speak. So it's not at all difficult to imagine a coalition of southern and northern forces coming against the forces of a NATO Alliance ruled by some megalomaniac. And right now, we know that Russia and China and Iran and North Korea are testing the resolve of a pathetically weak and incompetent president and administration. And an ultra woke administration, even an ultra woke military, that are more concerned about LGBTQ inclusion and critical race theory than keeping us safe.

Now, hold your finger on Daniel nine, I mean, Daniel 11, for just a moment, I want to take you to Ezekiel for just a few minutes. Think carefully with me. Let me give you a little, little context here. In Ezekiel, chapter 37 you have the vision of the valley of the dry bones depicting a national resurrection of Israel regathering back into the land, where eventually at His second coming, the Lord promises in verse 14, "I will put my Spirit within you and you will come to life and I will place you on your land." Verse 24, "My servant David will be king over them and they will have one shepherd;" my servant David, referring to the Messiah, David's descendant, it could not be the David of the Bible, he's been dead by now 400 years. In verse 26, he promises to ultimately fulfil the Abrahamic and Davidic and new covenants. As together, he will establish his millennial kingdom. In verse 26, we read, "'I will set My sanctuary in their midst forever, My dwelling place also will be with them, and I will be their God, and they will be My people. And the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, when My sanctuary is in their midst forever.'" Obviously, this hasn't happened, but it will. So that's Ezekiel 37. Go to Ezekiel 38. He gives the detailed prophecy of a future invasion before all this happens. And I believe that this may well be what is being described here in Daniel 11:40, but I can't be dogmatic. And then in Ezekiel 39 that we read a little bit ago, we are given a description of Gods coming to the aid of Israel, destroying all of her enemies, and a description of the aftermath and ultimate restoration into their land during the millennium. Then in chapters 40 through 48. You have a detailed description of the millennial temple and so forth. So sandwiched in between, catch this now, sandwiched in between Israel's regathering and promised spiritual resurrection in chapter 37, and the millennial temple in chapters 40 through 48 is this invasion that will occur that’s detailed in chapters 38 and 39, telling us that this battle is somehow linked to the last day's temple. I will not take you to Ezekiel 38-- let me just review a few things. In verses two through six there's a prophecy of Maygog ruled by God the prince of Rosh, which is reference to the ancient land of the Scythians easily identified as the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Tajikistan. And GOG, there we read, allies with his allies, including Meshech and Tubal, which are territories of Turkey. And Persia, which is Iran. Kush and Ethiopia, which is Sudan. Put, which is Libya. Gomer, Germany. Beth-togarmah which is Turkey, and may also include Azerbaijan and Armenia. And all of these nations today have various military and economic alliances with Russia, who has historically supplied them with arms. And of these nations today are Islamic nations. Including six of the former Soviet republics to the north of Israel. And we all know that these people have a violent hatred of the nation of Israel. Furthermore, it is no secret that all of these nations want to defeat the United States, Israel's greatest ally and protector.

And Ezekial specifically tells us that one day they are going to form this Confederacy and invade Israel. You might say, well, what's the big deal with Israel? Why would they want to invade Israel? Well, first of all, let me just give you a few thoughts here. First of all, Satan is ultimately the god of Islam. And he has always been opposed to God's covenant people, the Jews. He wants to prevent the Messiah from returning and so forth. Secondly, the Muslims and other non Muslim Arabs have been, and continue to be, utterly humiliated by Israel stunning military victories over them. It makes Allah look pretty weak and pathetic. It even calls into question his existence. They also believe that the land of Israel belongs to them because they are the descendants of Abraham through Ishmael. But thirdly, the Muslims in the Arab world are insanely jealous of how Israel is one of the most prosperous nations in the world. Despite its tiny size, it's considered the Silicon Valley of the Middle East. And militarily, it is considered to have one of the most powerful militaries in the world. I checked; right now it has the third most powerful air force in the world, United States, number one, Russia, number two; Israel, number three. It's fascinating. There are 1.3 billion Muslims in the world and only about 15 million Jews. In fact, there are more people in the state of Florida than there are Jews in the whole world. Jews constitute 2.5% or 2.5 tenths of 1% of the world's population, all right? Yet the Muslims insist that the Jews are trying to dominate and take over the world. But a fourth reason why they would want to come upon Israel and I think the most powerful motivation for the Islamic world is that, and even the non Muslim countries, is their ambition for global dominance. They believe that they are to follow the steps of Mohammed and conquer the world for Allah. He alone is to be the authority. And everyone that does not obey him is to be put to death. They must obey his law. And the primary tool for this religious expansionism is jihad, a holy war, that purges and converts by the edge of the sword. Worse yet, we know that mainstream Shiite Muslims believe in the return of a messiah-like figure called the 12th Imam. And his coming can be hastened through apocalyptic chaos and violence perpetrated upon Christians and Jews. So when you have this kind of a mindset, you can begin to see why they would want to come down upon Israel.

Now Russia's motivation is very different. Russia is also a very proud nation right now. She is a wounded bear that looks upon Israel with envy. Her motivation is not theological, but political. And they need the help of the Muslim world to defeat the United States and NATO and Israel. Again, we're all kind of a part of the same group, therefore, they must align themselves with the Muslims and Arabs of the world. And this also would allow them to have access to the vast oil reserves their Arab allies currently have. But it would also help them if they had Israel, to tap into the magnificent resources in the land of Israel; natural resources crucial for their survival and prosperity, including water and chemicals in the Dead Sea, and also gain access to Israel's cutting edge technology and their advances, their military advances, and their vast arsenal of nuclear weapons. No doubt these factors pertaining to the Arab Islamic world and Russia, help explain Ezekial's prophecy where God says that He will, quote, "put hooks into their jaws," chapter 38 verse four, and bring them down upon Israel. Verse 13, "to plunder, to carry away silver and gold, and to take away cattle and goods to capture great spoil." I might add that right now a preemptive airstrike by Israel on Iran's nuclear program could set all of this into motion very, very quickly. So Ezekial's prophecy describes this alliance of nations that will swoop down on Israel from the North. Chapter 38 and verse eight, and several other passages, says you're going to sweep down to the "mountains of Israel," also a region of "unwalled villages," chapter 38, verse 11. Which is currently true of Northern Israel, I've been there on multiple occasions. And these invaders will according to chapter 38, verse six and verse 15, come out of the "remote parts of the North." But according to 39 Chapter, verse four, God will defeat them on the "mountains of Israel." And I believe it's possible for these things to occur before the tribulation actually begins with all of the elements describing Israel in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39, already in place.

I might add another note. And I've talked with some of the Jewish people in Jerusalem about this. Orthodox Jews in the current temple movement, in Israel, interpret as equal in this very way. They are convinced that the war of Gog and Magog will be the next great war that Israel will fight. And it will ultimately be fought over control of Jerusalem, and the Temple Mount, primarily. But all of the rest of the resources of Israel as well. And ultimately think this, they think, that this will be the final battle described in Zechariah 12 through 14. But I might add, just parenthetically, before Israel receives the restoration temple, promised in Ezekiel 37, it must go through the final purging of Daniel's 70th week. Now, let's just speculate here for a moment. Imagine the clout Israel wouldn't suddenly have if all of these things actually happen. If these armies are destroyed, on the mountains of Israel, the whole world would stand in absolute amazement at what was obviously supernatural. And when you read how God destroys them with earthquakes, and pestilences, and then fighting amongst themselves, you see that obviously God did this. No nation would dare to go against them. And Israel at that point, as the text says, at least the vast majority of them, will know that it was YAWEH that did this. Imagine how the seven month burial of the dead and the seven year burning of the weapons of the defeated armies would be a witness to all of the nations. This burning could begin three and a half years before the Antichrist signs the covenant with the Jews, which by the way, will technically trigger the tribulation, the Daniel's 70th week. And they would then burn into the middle of the tribulation, that time when the Antichrist would then take over and want to be called God. Imagine how even the secular Jews in Israel today, who really couldn't care less right now about the building of the temple and all of those things, and infuriating the Muslim world, imagine how they would be, they would suddenly realize, "let's join in with Orthodox Jews because God did this." And with most of the Muslim world defeated and in shock, there would be no one to stop Israel. Israel would become an oasis in the world, an oasis of peace in the world that will gradually begin to disintegrate into wars and famines and natural disasters that are described in the seal judgments in Revelation six. And then add to all of this suddenly the church being snatched away. The Rapture of the Church, sometime around this great battle, either before or during or after, the church is going to be translated into heaven. Imagine the further chaos and confusion that would occur in the world. And think what this would do.

With the unprecedented carnage on the mountains of Israel. With a bewildered and defeated Islamic world, with a Russia that is utterly neutered. And then with the sudden disappearance of millions of Christians, the world would be sent into a tailspin of confusion. The world's economy would immediately fail. Every government would be in a state of shock. Every leader with nuclear capability would have his finger on the trigger, prepared for further hostilities in the world, would be craving, craving, for security, for peace. What a perfect storm for the first seal of judgment in Revelation six to be unleashed upon the world, and what's that first seal? What is the first thing that's going to happen?

Let me read it to you, Revelation six, beginning in verse one. "Then I saw when the Lamb broke one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures saying, as with the voice of thunder, 'Come.' I looked, and behold, a white horse and he who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer." This first seal describes the pseudo peace that will lull the world, including Israel, into a false sense of security, and a vision of utopia; the calm before the storm, that will be offered to them by the Antichrist. This would be the perfect time for this world leader to come onto the scene and for people to follow Him. To do all that he asks, wanting all that he will promise. I mean, we've seen people do that. I remember, in the days of Barack Obama. I mean people just thought that, my, this is, you know, this is the kingdom, you know. Daniel 7:23, through 24 describes this time when it it will be at the age of a one world government, it will eventually splinter into 10 governments, a new world. Alliances will occur. At that time, it would be probably far more powerful than NATO and the UN combined. And this 10 nation confederacy will then thrive under the leadership of the Antichrist, until the middle of the tribulation.

At first, the Antichrist, we know according to prophecy, will represent the nations. He will make concessions to Israel. I mean, after all, look what God has done for them, this astonishing defeat of the Russian Arab Alliance and then he will unite the rest of the world, primarily the Europeans and an alliance with Israel. Give them a covenant of protection, a covenant of commerce and peace. And oh, here's the new world order. But it will be nothing more than a ploy, and preparation for his fiendish, satanically inspired plan; his goal of Jewish genocide in establishing himself as God. Daniel 9:27.

So back to verse 40. "At the end time, the king of the south will collide with him and the King of the North will storm against him, with chariots, with horsemen, and with many ships. And he," referring to the Antichrist, who is the subject of this passage, "will enter countries, overflow them and pass through." The original language carries the idea of an overflowing river, like a flooding river. He will pass through this defeated North/South alliance in that realm in Israel. And again, remember today Israel is one of the key allies of NATO, the United States and an alliance of nations that will most likely be part of that Roman Revived Roman Empire ruled by the Antichrist. And although God will do the destruction of this North/South coalition that will come against Israel, that attack would have been considered, or probably will be considered an affront to the Antichrist who will claim the victory.

Verse 41, "He will also enter the Beautiful Land," referring to the land of Israel, that land that he will ultimately want for himself, "and many countries will fall; but these will be rescued out of his hand: Edom, Moab and the foremost of the sons of Ammon. By the way, the counterparts of these ancient lands in the southeast of Palestine today is Jordan.

Verse 42, "Then he will stretch out his hand against other countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape." So Egypt and her Arab allies will be easy targets because they basically have no more military. They're defeated on the mountains of northern Israel. So he will head south to occupy these countries. Verse 43, "But he will gain control over the hidden treasures of gold and silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt; and Libyans and Ethiopians will follow at his heels." That's a reference to the idea of them readily and eagerly capitulating to all of his demands, and his authority and becoming part of his vast and growing empire. "But rumors from the East and from the North will disturb him, and he will go forth with great wrath to destroy and annihilate many." This is likely a reference to a new alliance that will come out of the North and may even include some of the Jews. We don't know, but probably out of the East. This is a reference to the Chinese who will see his growing domination in the world as a threat to their power. So this satanically empowered Antichrist it says "will go forth with great wrath to destroy and annihilate many." Remember Satan is the one that is empowering him and he will not be defeated until the Lord defeats him.

Verse 45, "He will pitch his tents and his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain." The ancients would have understood this. Whenever a conquering general would come into a land he would put up his main tent in the middle of a place and then his attendants would have their tents around them and it would be a way of symbolizing his utter domination of that region. And that's what is going to happen one day. He will pitch the tents of his royal pavilion, which could be translated, he shall plant the tents of his palace, between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain. The Holy Mountain is Mount Zion, where the temple will be erected, and the seas would be the Mediterranean Sea and the Dead Sea. So in other words, they're in the region of Jerusalem.

So verse 46, again, "He will pitch his tents and his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain," Mount Zion, where the new newly erected temple will stand. But notice this last phrase, "yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him." Indeed, dear friends, this satanically empowered, counterfeit ruler, a counterfeit of the Lord Jesus, along with his religious helper, the false prophet, and all of his forces are going to be defeated in the Battle of Armageddon. We know that Revelation 19, that will happen in the valley of Jehoshaphat. Let me read to you what Joel has to say in his prophecy. Chapter Three, beginning of verse two, he says, "I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat." Jehoshaphat, by the way, means "Yahweh judges." Yahweh judges. "I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. Then I will enter into judgment with them there on behalf of My people, and My inheritance, Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations; and they have divided up My land." Drop down to verse 12, "Let the nations be aroused and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat. For there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine press is full. The vats overflow, for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. The sun and moon grow dark and the stars lose their brightness. The Lord roars from Zion and utters His voice from Jerusalem, and the heavens and the earth tremble. But the Lord is a refuge for his people, and a stronghold to the sons of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, dwelling in Zion, My Holy Mountain. So Jerusalem will be holy, and strangers will pass through it no more."

Dear friends, we don't know the time of these things. But we do know the results. Our God reigns, he rules. And he is coming to judge the nations of the world and all those who reject his command to repent and believe and place their faith in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I hope and I pray that you are among the ranks of the redeemed. Because if you're not, one day you will meet the Lord Jesus Christ in the fullness of his wrath. Most today, scoff and mock at God's prophetic word, but a day is coming when all of the scoffing and all of the mocking will cease. The day is coming when according to Philippians, two beginning of verse 10, "at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth." He goes on to say that "every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Oh, how I pray, that that will be your experience one day. Let's pray together.

Father, thank You for the eternal truths of your word. While we cannot understand in any way, the fullness of all that you have said, what we can grasp is that you are a sovereign God, a holy God that will indeed judge sin. And we thank you that despite the horrors of your judgment, and the unrelenting terror, of an eternal hell, we thank you that you have given us grace in the Gospel. That you have provided a way for us to be delivered from the wrath to come through faith in Christ. And I plead with you that there will be a great outpouring of your spirit among sinners today. Let it begin here at Calvary Bible Church and in our community. But Lord may have spread throughout the world that many might be saved to the praise of your glory. For its in Christ's name that I pray. Amen.

We returned this morning to our study of the book of Daniel. And it is not only the passion of my heart, but my most solemn responsibility to make sure that I teach this so that you understand it. This is the Word of God to us. And it is very important that we know what he has to say. So if you will turn to Daniel chapter 11, we will be looking at several of the verses between verses 36 and 45, under the heading "The Willful King, the Antichrist." And as you will see, this will just be part one. Now, today, we move beyond the 135 fulfilled prophecies in Daniel 11, verses two through 35. We're moving beyond that, to events that have never been fulfilled historically; descriptions where there is no specific correspondence in history. So this morning, we examine this, and we will see that it has great relevance even for us today, because it is pointing to things beyond where we live now. But where we are headed? Many asked me, Pastor, where do you think all of this chaos in the world is headed? All of the insanity and ungodliness in our country? Where is all of this going? The false narrative of critical race theory and the militant aggression of the woke cult that has now invaded evangelicalism, the LGBTQ mafia, and the transgender insanity? Where is all of this going? The COVID fear mongering and the experimental vaccine mandate, and the passports that now, I don't know how many 1000s of truckers and people are in Canada, I noticed that, in my old stomping grounds over in British Columbia, there's a huge group of people, even there in Victoria, where is all of this going? Of course, it's moving towards a social credit score, I hope you realize that. That's ultimately what the elites want, just like China, so that they can control us. We've got runaway inflation, open borders, the slaughter of the unborn, totalitarian politicians that are not only incompetent and immoral, but in many ways they're delusional. And half of the country votes for these people. Where is all of this going? Well, according to Scripture, the short answer is God is allowing Satan to prepare the world for the rule of the Antichrist, where there will be a one world government a one world ruler, a one world economy, and a one world religion. The dream of every social warrior, social justice warrior--globalism, a socialistic utopia, but by the way, one that cannot coexist with biblical Christianity. False Christianity, yes, that'll be part of it, but not biblical Christianity. As I stated in my book, "Why America hates Biblical Christianity," the vast majority of Americans in both political parties live for this world. Christians live for heaven. Their priority is the pursuit of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Ours is the glory of God. They live for this life only, we live for eternity. They set their affections on the things of the earth, we set our affections on the things above. They lay up treasures on earth, we lay up treasures in heaven. They consider this world their home, we consider ourselves strangers in it. They obsess over preserving the planet, we believe God will destroy it and recreate it. They obey the ever changing morality of a sin cursed culture, we obey the never changing laws of an infinitely Holy God. They believe man can achieve utopia on Earth, we believe God alone can bring in everlasting righteousness, peace and prosperity. Can there be any greater disparities and worldviews than these few examples? I think not. Dear friends, our hope is in Christ, the King of kings and the Lord of lords who will one day rule over a new heaven and a new earth. The one who is coming for us. One day the curse will be lifted and sin, Satan and death, that was defeated at the cross, will be removed forever. And everyone who has been washed in the blood of the Lamb will see his face and we will reign with him forever. That is the hope of the believer. These eschatological promises shape everything we do, at least they should. And if they don't for you, there's something terribly wrong with your faith. Something terribly wrong with your understanding of Scripture. We live in light of eternity, not for this life only; the certainties of our salvation, and heavenly destinies cause us to say with the Apostle John, "Come, Lord Jesus." Now, remember, the book of Daniel is to the Old Testament, what the book of the Revelation is, to the New Testament. In fact, Daniel is the key to interpreting the Olivet Discourse that Jesus gave us, for example, in Matthew 24. Remember, there he said, in verse 15, "'When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place, let the reader understand then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'" Later on in verse 21, "'For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved, but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'" There are obvious parallels between Daniel's prophecies and many New Testament prophecies. When John says in First John two 18, "You heard that the Antichrist is coming?" Indeed, they had heard that but the ultimate and final antichrist, the man of lawlessness, will one day be allowed to reign just before Christ returns. Paul speaks of this in Second Thessalonians two beginning of verse three, he says, "Let no one in any way deceive you for it will not come," referring to the day of the Lord, the final period of divine judgment, "unless the apostasy comes first and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called God or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God displaying himself as being God." This is referring to the abomination of desolation recorded in Daniel nine. Paul goes on to say, "Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things, and you know what he restrains him now so that in his time he will be revealed? For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. Then that lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth, and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming." And there Paul is merely rehearsing what Daniel says that no human agency will destroy the AntiChrist, but the Lord Jesus Christ will bring it into his life "by the appearance of His coming." Paul went on to say, "that is the one who's coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason, God will send upon them a diluting influence, so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness."

So throughout Scripture we see Daniel's influence. In fact, Daniel's prophecies provide the foundation for the chronological structure, and much of the symbolism of Revelation chapter six through nine. Through Daniel's prophecy, we see God revealing the successive stages of Gentile domination throughout the ages. And that will continue until Messiah returns in power and great glory as King of kings and Lord of lords. When he judges the nations, when he defeats them, when he establishes His glorious Millennial Kingdom is universal reign upon this earth, that day, in which he will fulfill all of the physical as well as spiritual covenant promises to a regenerated Israel, that day, in which we too shall reign with Him. Now, it's important for me to remind you from time to time of the big picture of Daniel, sometimes, especially when you're in Bible prophecy, it can feel like you're an aborigine and you have never seen a car and some guys up there telling you all about a transmission. All right? So we need to come back and say, "let me tell you what a car is." In Chapters one through seven, the inspired Prophet reveals God's sovereign rule over history over all of the nations and those who lead them. In fact, in Daniel chapter two, and Daniel seven, he reveals how God will unexpectedly and astonishingly establish his kingdom, after the utter ruin of four literal, successive Gentile Empires, that being Babel in middle Persia, Greece, and Rome, and then a revived Roman Empire, at the end of the age ruled by the Antichrist. And just as those four ancient kingdoms were literal kingdoms, so too the revived Roman kingdom will be real; a real geographical and political kingdom, as well as the Messiah messianic kingdom that will come and destroy it and replace it. Then in chapters eight through 12, God reveals His sovereign rule over Israel's future. And that, of course, is where we've been over the last several months. There, he unveils his kingdom promises both during and after Gentile domination in the world, what is called the times of the Gentiles. And I also want to remind you that the last seven chapters of Deuteronomy, chapters 28, through 34, provide, as David Larson says, quote, "The Matrix out of which the great prophecies of the Old Testament regarding Israel emerge." In other words, if you want to get a blueprint of what God sees overall, for his covenant people, this would be it. I have given you a handout on this before I'll not repeat all of it. But suffice it to say that in chapters 26, and 28 of Deuteronomy, we see the conditions of blessing that would follow obedience. And then chapter 31 speaks of the coming apostasy. Again, in chapter 28, we read about the affliction that God will bring upon Israel while still in the land because of her apostasy. In chapter 28, we read about how Israel will be taken captive. In chapters 27 and 32, we read how the enemies of Israel will possess her land for a time. Also, in Deuteronomy 28 and 29, we read how the land itself will remain desolate. Deuteronomy 28 and 32 we read how Israel will be scattered among the nations and then in chapter 28, though punished, Israel will not be destroyed if she repents. And also in chapter 28, as well as chapter 30, we read how Israel will repent one day in her tribulation. And finally in chapter 30, verses three through 10, we read how Israel will be gathered from the nations and brought back to her divinely given land. And we see all of this unveiled in Bible prophecy. Much of it has been fulfilled literally to date. But the rest will follow. And we must also remember that the Spirit of God inspired Daniel to write this magnificent book to encourage God's people, his kinsmen, those that were in exile in Babylonian exile, to encourage them throughout their weary sojourn even beyond the days of Babylon. And here we also witnessed the miracle of divine providence that's orchestrating all of the events of world history to accomplish his ultimate purposes. And that is to exalt our Savior and King and to redeem all whom the Father has given him. According to Revelation seven beginning in verse nine, this will include, "a great multitude which no one could count from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; and they cry out with a loud voice saying, 'Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.'"

Now, a few technical things, but this is very important, otherwise, I wouldn't waste your time with them. All right? So bear with me. Before we examine the text, you must understand that there is a stark contrast between the prophecies pertaining to Antiochus Epiphanes in verses 21 through 35 and that of the king who according to verse 36, will do as he pleases, and who will exalt and magnify himself above every god. You see, neither Antiochus Epiphanes, or even Herod the Great, ever sought to exalt and magnify himself above every god. In fact, despite the 135 stunning and precise prophetic fulfillments concerning the Persian and Grecian empires, revealed in chapter 11, two through 35, the events and the descriptions that are being revealed in verses 36 through 45, have no specific correspondence to history, despite many tortured attempts to prove otherwise. And we see two phrases in verse 35 that really serve as markers of this transition from that which has been fulfilled, to that which is yet future and unfulfilled.

Notice verse 35. We read, "Some of those who have insight will fall, in order to refine, purge and make them pure, until the end time." In other words, the persecution of the saints will continue until Christ returns and that's referred to as the end time. Now, to be sure, this would include the era of Antiochus Epiphanes, but his tyrannical rule of horror could not be called the end time. There was no climactic end time or an age of his of persecution against Israel, that ceased with the death of Antiochus Epiphanes. It's just simply not there. His reign merely prefigured such a time, the age detailed in Daniel 70th week, the time of the tribulation, the great judgments, the pre kingdom judgments. The next phrase in verse 35, only strengthens this transition when the Prophet states "because it is still to come at the appointed time," referring to the events pertaining to the person and the work of the Antichrist that's going to be described now in verses 36 through 45. The coming willful king, of whom, now catch this, Antiocus Epiphanes was merely a type. He just foreshadowed the Antichrist. And as we will see, these descriptions will parallel other descriptions of the Antichrist given elsewhere in Scripture.

Moreover, to say as some do that verses 36 through 45, is a further historic and prophetic account, fulfilled in Antiochus Epiphanes makes this whole section of scripture beg for relevance. Here's what I mean. Why would the policies of this person be introduced for the first time and reviewed in detail? If this were a reference to Antiochus? Whose person and policies and detailed life history have already been given, that would be a non sequitur. As far as the Jews were concerned, no further treatment of Antiochus is necessary because he's dead and gone. Furthermore, Antiochus was never introduced in the preceding verses as, quote, "The king," the form that we see in verse 36, using the definite article, "the king." Not even his predecessors were ever referred to as "the king." They were always designated as a mighty king, or the king of the south, the king of the north. Antiochus, who was only called a king one time, and that was jointly with Ptolemy, in verse 27. But as we will see, beloved, in verse 36, using the definite article, "the king" is a reference to what Daniel has been discussing in the past and previous revelations. You will recall in Daniel seven, verse eight, "he" referring to the Antichrist, is called the "little horn that starts out small" Do you remember that? And he gradually appears among the other horns, but by verses 24 and following he overpowers the other 10 horns. Let me read that to you, Daniel seven, beginning in verse 24. "As for the 10 horns out of this kingdom, 10 kings will arise." Again now, this is yet future. "And another will arise after them and he will be different from the previous ones, and will subdue three kings. He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law; and they will be given into his hand for a time, times and a half a time. But the court will sit for judgment, and his dominion will be taken away, annihilated and destroyed forever." Now that's certainly no reference to Antiochus Epiphanes. In Daniel 8:23, the Antichrist is called a king, "insolate and skilled in intrigue." In Daniel 9:26, he's called "the prince that shall come." You see, all of these passages are revealed to us in the context of the coming tribulation, Daniel's 70th week.

And finally, I must add, that it is only fitting that Daniel would speak here of the Antichrist in his fourth and final revelation, since he has already set him forth in the three preceding ones. So what we are about to examine, I would humbly argue against brothers that I love who would say differently, that this has nothing to do with Antiochus Epiphanes, but everything to do with the antitype, of which Antiochus Epiphanes was merely the type. This is speaking of the coming Antichrist. This is speaking of a time of distress. Chapter 12, here in verse one speaks of this "time of distress." In other words, he's going to rule during a time of history where we have the most severe persecution of Israel, which corresponds to what Jesus said in Matthew 24:21. And also what Jeremiah the prophet prophesied, in Jeremiah chapter 30, beginning in verse seven, we read "'Alas! For that day is great, there is none like it, and it is the time of Jacob's distress. But he will be saved from it. It shall come about on that day,' declares the LORD of hosts, 'that I will break his yoke from off their neck, and will tear off their bonds and strangers will no longer make them their slaves, but they shall serve the Lord their God and David their king, whom I will raise up for them. Fear not, O Jacob My servant, declares the Lord, 'and do not be dismayed, O Israel; for behold, I will save you from afar, and your offspring from the land of their captivity, and Jacob will return and will be quiet and at ease. And no one will make him afraid for I am with you,' declares the Lord, 'to save you, for I will destroy completely all the nations where I've scattered you. Only I will not destroy you completely, but I will chase you justly. And will bone by no means leave you on punished.'"

So with that introduction, let's read the text here in Daniel 11, beginning in verse 36. "Then the king," referring to the Antichrist, "will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods and he will prosper until the indignation is finished. For that which is decreed will be done. He will show no regard for the gods of his father's or for the desire of women, nor will he show regard for any other god for he will magnify himself above them all. But instead, he will honor a god of fortresses, a god whom his fathers did not know; he will honor him with gold, silver, costly stones and treasures. He will take action against the strongest of fortresses with the help of a foreign god, he will give great honor to those who acknowledge him, and will cause them to rule over the many and will parcel out land for a price. At the end time, the king of the South will collide with him, the king of the North will storm against him with chariots, with horsemen, and with many ships, and he will enter countries overflow them and pass through. He will also enter the Beautiful Land and many countries will fall; but these will be rescued out of his hand, Edom, Moab and the foremost of the sons of Ammon. Then he will stretch out his hand against other countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape. But he will gain control over the hidden treasures of gold and silver and over all the precious things of Egypt; and Libyans and Ethiopians will follow at his heels. But rumors from the East and from the North will disturb him and he will go forth with great wrath to destroy and annihilate many. He will pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain; yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him."

Now I've given you a little outline here, very simple. We're going to look first of all at the final willful king, the Antichrist in verse 36, and then secondly, we'll look at the final world religion, that's verses 37 through 39. And then the next time when I am with you, we will look at the final military conquests in verses 40 through 45. Let's look closely at what the Spirit of God has for us in his word, under the heading the final willful king, the Antichrist. Verse 36, "Then the king will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods." Now, as I said earlier, in chapter 12, verse one, we are given some helpful context for when this will occur, namely, "a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time and at that time your people, everyone who is found in the book, will be rescued." So this fits in the context now of the Great Tribulation, Daniel 70th week, the pre kingdom judgments. And it will be at that time, once again, verse 36, that this "king will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods." Now, I would add that no world ruler has ever done this in the context of Roman power over the Israelis in the land of Israel, including the Hellenistic Antiochus Epiphanes who worshipped the pantheon of Grecian gods and demanded that the Jews do the same thing. But this does fit the descriptions that we find elsewhere in scripture of the Antichrist.

Daniel spoke of this and Daniel 7:25, "He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One." Daniel 8:24, "'His power will be mighty, but not by his own power, and he will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will. He will destroy mighty men and the holy people.'" Paul speaks of this and Second Thessalonians two, four, as "the man of lawlessness who will be revealed the son of destruction who opposes and exalts himself above every so called God or object of worship, so that he takes the seed in the temple of God displaying himself as being God." And again, as I mentioned before, Matthew 24 The Antichrist will desecrate the temple, Jesus tells us, committing the "abomination of desolation" deifying himself, he will be the greatest enemy of Israel in all of history. And this act of apostasy will be the most blasphemous act in the history of the world. We could go to the book of Revelation in chapter 13. Looking at verses six through eight, there, we learned how God has ordained 42 months, a 42 month season of blasphemy against himself. And this will include the Antichrist blaspheming him against three things There we read, "And he opened his mouth in blasphemies against God, first of all, to blaspheme His name," and of course, the name of God expresses the consummate perfections, the sum of all of his attributes. He will blaspheme his name. Secondly, and his temple. The temple is where God exists and transcendent glory, the glories of heaven from which Satan by now has been expelled. And then also against those "who dwell in heaven." This is a reference to the saints and the holy angels, whom Satan hates. The text goes on to say, "It was also given to him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him." Now we see further evidence of this megalomaniac, who will do as he pleases in Revelation 17, beginning of verse 12, and "The 10 horns which you saw are 10 kings, who have not yet received the kingdom, but they receive authority as kings with the beast," that's him the Antichrist, "for one hour." One hour is a figure of speech denoting a very brief period of time, one that is shorter than the reign of the beast himself. In that context, we read how there will be 10 subordinate rulers of 10 lesser kingdoms that will join a confederacy with the Antichrist and become a part of his empire. We read about this again back in Daniel chapter seven, verse seven, as well as verse 24. Back to Revelation 17, verse 13, "These have one purpose, and they give their power and authority to the beast." So they will be united in their allegiance with the beast as together they oppose the Lamb of God, and all who belong to him.

So again, back to verse 36. I know you're thinking, we'll never get out of verse 36, we will. "Then the king will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god, and will speak monstrous," it could be translated astonishing things, "against the God of gods." Now, I would submit to you that this isn't a stretch at all for us. I mean, we see politicians blaspheming God, constantly, routinely. They're constantly passing laws that are an insult to the one true God and imagine what it will be like when all power is consolidated in one man. Imagine what that will be like. The text goes on to say, "and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." Interesting term, indignation. Daniel uses the same phrase, "the indignation" in chapter eight, verse 19. When speaking of the tribulation period, There we read, "Behold, I am coming to let you know what will occur at the final period of the indignation for it pertains to the appointed time of the end." Again, referring to the final seven years before Christ returns, Daniel's 70th week. You read about it in Daniel nine, verse 27. So again, verse 36 at the end, "he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." Well, what was decreed? What's he talking about here? Well go back to Daniel nine in verse 24. There we read of the "70 weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city." Literally 70 sevens, 7 heptads, units of 7. 70 times seven, 490 years have been decreed. The text is telling us that God deliberately decreed or determined these 490 years to be cut off from all of the rest of history to accomplish his purposes, with Israel, his people Israel and their capital city Jerusalem, which was consistent with what Daniel was praying for to understand.

Obviously, by the way, this didn't happen at his first coming, but it will happen in his Second Coming. Notice in Daniel 9:24, there are six objectives to be accomplished in this decree. First of all, to finish the transgression, referring to the violation of God's law, they revolted against God's authority, especially their unrelenting and unrestrained rebellion against God. He is going to finish that, he's going to deal with that. Secondly, to make an end of sin, which is a more general term of all wrongs, to seal it up, that it might be concealed. In other words, to judge it with finality. Thirdly, to make atonement for iniquity, "kaphar" in Hebrew, to cover by means of an expiatory sacrifice. It's the idea of making a covering. It's the idea of atonement to provide a moral or legal repayment for a fault or an injury. And also it it was decreed, number four, to bring in everlasting righteousness. Number five to seal up vision and prophecy. This speaks of hiding from view and demonstrating that these functions are over. Vision being revelation prophecy, being the message of the prophets. And then six, to anoint the most holy place. In other words, to officially inaugurate into public ministry, the Most Holy Place. Literally, the holy of holies in the millennial temple. All of these things have been decreed. Daniel 9:27 goes on to describe what's going to happen during this final week of years. "And he will make a firm covenant," "He" being the Antichrist, "with the many for one week." In other words, this great deceiver is going to lower Israel into a protective agreement called a covenant. "But in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering, and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate." So in other words, in the middle of the week, after three and a half years, this satanically possessed antichrist will seize the temple, he will betray the Jews and he will demand to be worshipped like his forerunner, Antiochus Epiphanes. And this is the one pictured as well in Revelation 13 verse one, and verse five, as the "beast that comes up out of the sea...given a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies and authority to act for 42 months was given to him," referring to the last half of the seven years.

Back again to Daniel 11:36, "he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." Yes, what was decreed the 490 years before the Messiah would finally do all of these things and establish his long awaited and promised millennial kingdom. So this vile, blasphemous ruler will prosper. But only as long as a sovereign God allows him to prosper.

So we've seen the final, willful king, the Antichrist in verse 36. What about the final world religion? And this just touches on it, there are other passages, especially in Revelation that reveal more of this, but we see this in verses 37 through 39. Notice verse 37, "He will show no regard," actually, for three things, first of all, "no regard for the gods of his fathers." Now, the King James Version is misleading. Here it says, "The God of his fathers," capital G. And so many people will read that and say, well, this means the Antichrist must be a Jew. Because the God of his fathers would be the Messiah, he's going to reject the Messiah. But the word translated God is Elohim, not Yahweh. And this is a name for God in general, applying to all gods and had the writer, I believe, intended to refer to the one true God of Israel, he would have used the term Yahweh not Elohim. So the proper translation is he "He will show no regard for the gods of his fathers", which would include the full pantheon of pagan deities worshipped by the Romans and all peoples, since we know the Antichrist is going to come out of this revived kind of European Roman Empire. But it would also include having no regard for the one true god worshipped by the saints. So the point is simply this, when the end comes, this theme will not only be the Antichrist, the pseudo Christ, but he will be an utterly godless person rejecting any and all gods of his ancestors. But the verse goes on to say "he will show no regard for the desire of women." Now, what does this mean? Perhaps it means he will be a homosexual, perhaps a misogynist of some sort, or perhaps he is prefigured by Antiochus Epiphanes. Maybe he will just who by the way, was a notorious womanizer. It may mean that he will just not share the normal graces of a woman, that he will not have any tenderness some people say, or graciousness or kindness. Another view says since the Messiah is often said to be the natural desire of Jewish women who longed to be the mother of the Messiah. Some will say that he disregards the one beloved by women referring to the Lord Jesus Christ. John Walvoord, says this, quote, "pious Jewish women in premessianic times had one great desire, they wanted to be mothers, with a view to him, who is the promise seed of the woman." He's referring there to the promised seed and in the protevangelium of Genesis 3:15. He went on to say "his birth was beloved by these godly mothers of Israel, this king then hates God and hates his blessings, Son, the Lord Jesus Christ."

So I'm giving you various views, we can't say with certainty. All right, and I know what you're going to say. So I'm just going to handle it right now. Rather than have you line up at the end of the service, which one do I think it is? Well, I believe that he's probably referring to the Antichrist as a homosexual. Since homosexuality is an assault against the image and the glory of God revealed in creation; homosexuality defies God's moral order and it is an inversion of God's physical order. And as a result, we know from Romans one, that those who live in that world are eventually given over to a reprobate, depraved mind, that is utterly worthless and irrational. So I would think that that would probably fit. But I don't know, you don't know, we don't know.

Verse 37, again, he will show no regard for the gods of his father's, or for the desire of women. And then thirdly, nor will he show regard for any other god; for he will magnify himself above them all." So not only will he reject all other gods, he will claim deity for himself. As I said earlier, Second Thessalonians two verse four, Paul describes him as the one "who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called God or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God." And then in Daniel 11:38, we go on and we see what is revealed to us. But instead, he will honor a god of fortresses." "mauzzim;" fortresses means a strong place, namely, in this context, his unprecedented satanically empowered military might and power. "A god," he goes on to say "whom his fathers did not know." Now, mind you, ancient Rome believed their military conquests were done in accordance to their pantheon of gods and they even deified their emperor, but not so the coming Antichrist. He rejects all gods, save himself and his confidence, his faith, you might say, the object of his worship will be his military power. And here that is personified in the phrase the "god of fortresses." Now we all know that military readiness and military conquests are very expensive. And so the text goes on to say "he will honor him," referring to his god of fortresses, military might and power, "with gold, silver, costly stones and treasures," literally everything that is valuable. Young asserts, quote "For religion, he will substitute war, and war he will support with all that he has."

Verse 39, "He will take action against the strongest of fortresses with the help of a foreign god." In other words, his overwhelming, seemingly invincible, military power, this is the foreign god. "And he will give great honor to those who acknowledge him and will cause them to rule over the many, and will parcel out land for a price." In other words, he is going to reward those he conquers with honor and land and positions of authority as long as they obey him and serve him and worship him; those who pay homage to their king. Beloved, can you see a counterfeit here? The more the obedience, the more the reward. And so as Satan's pawn he will know how to appeal to the sinful heart of men who will sell their soul for the fleeting pleasures of this life. We see it all the time. They will be men who fear man rather than God. Beloved, this will be the final world religion, the worship of the Antichrist. John MacArthur said something interesting along this line, quote, "Through all the ages, there has been a Cain for every Abel there has been a Jambres for every Moses, there has been a Babylon for every Jerusalem, and a Herod for every John the Baptist and a Judas for every Peter. And ultimately, there will be another and final antichrist, for the true Christ."

O Child of God, this is where the world is heading. And aren't you thankful that we have been saved by his grace and that our God reigns. But he will use the wicked to accomplish his purposes, to bring glory to himself and to fulfill all of his covenant promises. Well, this is a good stopping point. Let me let me encourage you for a moment as your pastor, you know, although we see the world heading in these directions and moving inexorably towards a day of judgment and although we resent and we fear the despots that rule over us--may I remind you that these are mere men, right? These are mere men. We worship Almighty God right? Scripture describes them as those who pursue vanity, they chase the wind, they're spiritually dead, at enmity with God, enemies of God, they're mere worms, clay, dying grass, fading flowers. And you're going to be afraid of them?

All of our lives in Scripture are likened to a vapor, to a bubble, to a shadow and we're going to be afraid of them? Really. Jeremiah Burroughs was a 17th century Puritan clergyman who endured great persecution at the hands of the apostate church of England and the king, along with many other clergyman who refuse to obey the superstitions, and the unbiblical ceremonies of the Church of England. And yet he reasoned from scripture, about their fragile state, the fragile state of the wicked that persecuted him. These people in power, he compared them in Scripture, I should say scripture compares them and he saw this as dross dust, a rotten root, straw trodden down from the dung hill. The froth and foam of the sea and threads in the fires. He said, quote, "The greater men are in their power, the sooner they perish." And he went on to add, "Wicked men are going to their destruction as a thing rolling by the wind." Just think of it dear friends, the wicked that are in power over us today blaspheme God, in the midst of all of their pleasures. And yet, one day very soon, they will be in hell, where they will blaspheme God forever in their pain. Don't be afraid of them. Pity them, pray for them. Give them the gospel. Be of good cheer for your God, not man. What did Jesus say? Do not fear those who will kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Therefore, like Paul, we need to be able to say I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. And in his excellent book, "The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment," that I would encourage you all to read, Jeremiah Burroughs defined Christian contentment this way, "Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God's wise and fatherly disposal in every condition." End quote, and I might add, including the wickedness that's being forced upon us in our day. So may we all joyfully submit to Christ's tutelage during these difficult days, and rejoice in every circumstance, knowing that God is in it, and he is accomplishing great things for our good and for His glory. Let's pray together.

Father, we thank you for the magnificent truths of your word. And pray that by the power of your Spirit, we will be able to not only understand them, but apply them in such a way as to bear much fruit for your glory. And for those that may be within the sound of my voice, that need to be in a right relationship with you through faith in Christ, they know nothing of what it mean for Christ and enjoy the fullness of His presence in their life. Lord, I pray that you will so overwhelm them with conviction today. That they will be absolutely stunned, horrified at the reality of their sin and what it deserves. And therefore be amazed at the grace that can be theirs if they bet placed their faith in the giver of grace, our precious Savior, the Lord Jesus, Lord, we plead with you to accomplish this great work. And we do this in Jesus name. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to the book of Daniel, We return again to Daniel chapter 11. We're going to be looking at verses 21 through basically 35 this morning.

I might say to preface our time together, as you know, last week you weren't here because of the snowstorm. I was here. Actually, I was here on Saturday, and it was recorded. And so I was pretending like I was speaking to you trying to look in the silly little camera. But I was joining in with, I guess, about 5000, plus pastors all around the United States, who were preaching on sexual morality, joining together with our brothers in Canada, to protest the law that they have implemented, that forbids you from basically proclaiming the truths of scripture regarding homosexuality and transgenderism, and all of those types of things. And I just want to say, folks, never underestimate the privilege we have to come together and hear the truth. Because this time, I believe is short. Nancy and I were reading from John 15, this morning, where, you know, Jesus reminds us that the world is going to hate you because it hated me and because you're not of this world. And certainly we see that, in fact, my friend John MacArthur, who also spoke on this issue, had his sermon removed from YouTube, perhaps you heard, because he violated their hate speech policy. And it's because of primarily the following statement. John said, quote, simply stated, "There is no such thing as transgender. You are either xx x or x, y. That's it. God made man male and female, that is determined genetically that is physiology, that is science, that is reality. This notion that you are something other than your biology is a cultural construct, intended as an assault on God." Indeed, amen. That is the truth. But people don't want to hear the truth, do they? And unfortunately, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. And sadly, we live in a world that is basically ruled by fools. They need the gospel, they need Christ, because to the natural man, the things of the Spirit are foolishness, we are told, and they cannot understand them. And so the only way they are going to understand the truth is to be saved by the truth. And it is our responsibility to do all we can to present the truth and to preach the truth, which we will continue to do this morning by looking into Daniel.

So we return to Daniel's fourth and final vision, revealed in chapters 11 and 12, where probably the angel Gabriel, the angelic messenger, comes to Daniel and proceeds to give him predictive revelation pertaining to Israel's future, especially as it relates to Gentile dominance over Israel and the return of the Messiah King, the Lord Jesus Christ. And in Daniel 11, verses two through 35. We have approximately 135 detailed prophecies that were fulfilled accurately and literally, which I believe gives evidence that prophecy yet unfilled, will also be fulfilled in the same literal manner. I've given you an outline, I think maybe you even have it in your hands today. Last week, we looked at the kings of Persia, the kings of Greece, the kings of the south and north, referring to Egypt and Syria. And now we come to verse 21. And we will look at Antiochus IV Epiphanes. And as I put in my notes for you, his intense persecution of the Jews fueled the Maccabean revolt, resulting in heavy Jewish casualties and the temple defiled and this became the precursor to the final Gentile ruler, the Antichrist.

An so Antiochus IV Epiphanes typifies the coming Antichrist, as we will see this morning. Now by way of quick review, because I realize this is a bit complicated. Most of us, most of you are probably not up on your ancient history in the Near East, and especially what it has to say in this passage in Daniel 11. So if we go back to verse 17, we read that he referring to Antiochus, will "set his face to come with the power of his whole kingdom, bringing with him a proposal of peace, which he will put into effect; he will also give him the daughter of women to ruin it." And this speaks of Antiochus now, who was the father of Antiochus that we're looking at today, but he wanted to gain control over Egypt, but not through military invasion. And he was planning on attacking Rome. And the last thing he needed was for the Egyptians to cause him any trouble. So he sends his daughter Cleopatra I to marry Ptolemy V. This happened in 197 BC. This was part of a peace treaty that he did with the Egyptians, but he also wanted her to spy on them, and help him promote Syrian interest in the Ptolemaic family.

Verse 17, again, "But she will not take a stand for him, or to be on his side." And indeed, this is what happened. She did not go along with his plan, and she actually simulated in with the Egyptian family and assisted them. In fact, she even helped the Egyptians assist the Romans, when Antiochus fought against them. Verse 18, "Then he will turn his face to the coastlands and capture many." And this happened--Antiochus launched a very successful campaign along the Aegean region, the country surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, especially the islands that were their portions of Asia Minor and Greece. Again, verse 18, "But a commander will put a stop to his scorn against him' moreover, he will repay him for his scorn." And we know historically, this is exactly what happened. The commander was a Roman general Lucius Cornelius Scipio. And he was commissioned by Rome to stop Antiochus, which he did. So in 188 BC, in utter humiliation, Antiochus was forced into a peace treaty with Rome, and he had to relinquish all of his holdings in Asia Minor to the Romans. Verse 19, "So he will turn his face toward the fortresses of his own land, but he will stumble and fall and be found no more." This is what happened. He returns to his own land, having lost all that he gained even though he still ruled over Syria and Palestine and the Mesopotamian region, Babylonia, Iran, which is was Medo-Persia. But as prophesied, he stumbled and fell and was found no more and he was killed. We know while seeking to rob the Temple of Bel in Elam, Persia.

Verse 20, "Then in his place, one will arise who will send an oppressor," referring to one who forces others to pay taxes, "through the Jewel of his kingdom," referring to Palestine, "yet within a few days, he will be shattered, though not in anger nor in battle." This is a reference to Seleucus IV Philopater, who ruled from 187 to 176 BC. He was the son and the successor of Antiochus the Great and because his father had drained all of the Treasury and in all of his warring to try to conquer other places and because they owed Rome 1000 talents, he, annually, had to get money. So, he sent a guy named Heliodorus to seize the funds of the temple treasury in Jerusalem. And as we read the last time, we were together, according to Second Maccabees three this attempt was thwarted by an appearance at the temple of a divine apparition. So Heliodorus returned home empty handed and later he assassinated Seleucus IV Philopater as prophesied consistent with the end of verse 20. Yet within a few days he, referring to Seleucus IV Philopater, will be slaughtered, though not in anger nor in battle. So after just a short 11-year reign Seleucus died mysteriously, they believe through poisoning. And then we come to verse 21, where we're going to start today.

"In his place," in other words in the place of Seleucus IV Philopater, "a despicable person will arise, on whom the honor of kingship has not been conferred, but he will come in a time of tranquility and seize the kingdom by intrigue." And this brings us to the fourth point in our little outline, Antiochus IV Epiphanes Now, mind you, these things are occurring some 300 years after Daniel has them revealed to him through the angelic messenger.

Dave Harrell

Now, a little history here, following the death of, Seleucus IV, his brother, Antiochus IV, seized the throne illegally from the son of his murdered brother, Demetrius Soter, who was held hostage by Rome. And so the new king adopted the name Antiochus IV Epiphanes, and he's going to rule just from 175 to 164 BC. By the way, "Epiphanes" means glorious. He liked that name. I'm Antiochus IV, the glorious one. By the way, the Jews hated that name so much that they nicknamed him Antiochus Epimanes-- "Epimanes" meant "madman." Now he was previously alluded to as the "little horn" in Daniel eight, nine through 14 and 23 through 25, as we will see. So indeed, as prophesied, "a despicable person will arise on whom the honor of kingship has not been conferred, but he will come in a time of tranquility and seize the kingdom by intrigue." An interesting term in the original language-- "intrigue" can literally be translated "slippery places." In this context, it refers to slippery actions, he was a slippery character, a person who is cunning and deceptive and evasive and untrustworthy, who equivocates with words and deals. Remember, we had a president who was nicknamed Slick Willy, this is the concept, this is who this guy was. And history reveals how he would do this with intrigue. He flattered Eumenes, King of Pergamum, along with other key leaders in Syria, promising them prominent positions if they helped him gain the throne. And Rome even fell for his flattery and all of his promises. And they backed him for a while. They wanted him to help them maintain peace in the east. This is the age-old political strategy of quid pro quo, right? You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. This is the grease that basically makes the machinery of power run smoothly and wickedly.

I might add. It's important to remember that God has always been true to his promise in judging wicked nations, and don't you see this constantly, all through all of these prophecies and even to this day? And I might add that throughout the Old Testament, one of the things that we see is that that he destroys these wicked nations because they practice idolatry and immorality, especially homosexuality and bestiality and all manner of abominations. And we see this, again, happening throughout the history of all these things that we're reading. But one of the key components, one of the key methods of God's destruction in these nations is the removal of qualified men from leadership. By the way, he does the same thing today in the church. He removes qualified leaders. In Isaiah three he described for example, his judgment on Judah and Jerusalem. Verse four, he says, "and I will make mere lads, their princes. And capricious children will rule over them, and the people will be oppressed each one by another, and each one by his neighbor. The youth will storm against the elder and the inferior against the honorable." In other words, the young who are typically ruled by their emotions rather than by integrity, rather than by truth, will be the ones in charge. Verse 11, of Isaiah three, "Woe to the wicked, it will go badly with him for what he deserves will be done to him. O my people. Their are oppressors are children and women rule over them. O my people, those who guide you lead you astray and confuse the direction of your paths." This is exactly what we see when we examine the fall of these ancient empires. And I might add, this is exactly what we see in the United States of America today. Exactly. Immoral, ungodly, undiscerning, incompetent leaders that are ill suited to be in authority over anyone. And the results are always catastrophic, because that's exactly God's intention. This is one of the ways that he judges the wicked. And it's not an exaggeration to say that many of our leaders today are not only intellectually challenged, challenged to the point of just being downright stupid, but they are delusional. They believe things that have no basis in reality. The whole transgender thing is one example of that. So dear friends when you see and you feel this incredulity in your heart, these, these babbling fools in leadership over us, know that this is an evidence of God's judgment upon those who mock him, who mock his word. Those who literally criminalize those things that he deems holy, those that legalize those things that he deems an abomination.

So Antiochus Epiphanes was just another pagan fool ruled by his depraved heart, evil to the core with no regard whatsoever for the one true God that would eternally damn him, as well as damn all those who follow Him. And this will also be the fate of those who follow the satanic deceivers who rule our country. So indeed, a despicable or a slippery person arose and seize the kingdom by intrigue. But the angel also made another prediction in verse 22, "The overflowing forces will be flooded away before him and shattered." That phrase, "overflowing forces will be flooded away before him," could literally be translated "arms of the overflow shall be overflowed." And this is what happened. The invading forces that sought to conquer Syria, were themselves conquered. This was true historically, especially with respect to the Egyptians described later on in verse 25.

Dave Harrell

Now, let me give you a little background here. Antiochus' father, Antiochus the Great promised to give Coele-Syria, "coele" in Greek meant meant hollow. And Coele-Syria was basically the Beqaa Valley that was kind of a hollow area, you might say, in between Mount Lebanon and what was called Anti-Lebanon. Those mountains in that region. Well anyway, his father had promised to give Coele-Syria, as well as Palestine the Land of Israel today, to Egypt as a dowry with his daughter Cleopatra, upon her marriage to Ptolemy Epiphanes. So when Antiochus Epiphanes comes to the throne, comes to power and takes his father's place, he is going to pretend like he is going to go along with his promise, but in his heart, he's thinking, no, no, no, I want all that for myself. And so, in order to keep peace between the two empires, he decides he'll go along with this. But surprise, surprise, in 170 BC, five years after he ascends the throne, he leads a military campaign down through Coele-Syria, down through Palestine, and comes up against Egypt, as we'll see in verse 25. He's determined to claim all of these areas for himself, and later since Ptolemy VI Philometor of Egypt, when he sees that Antiochus is going to do this, and he's not going to make good on the promised land, he decides he's going to attack him. So that's a little bit of the history here. And when Antiochus Epiphanes catches wind of this coming invasion in 170 BC, he goes out to meet him and utterly defeats them on the southeast sea coast of the Mediterranean halfway between Gaza and the Nile delta.

Dave Harrell

So, verse 22, fulfilled precisely, "The overflowing forces will be flooded away before him and shattered and also the prince of the covenant." I believe here that the prince of the covenant is probably referring to Ptolemy VI Philometor because he agreed to be an ally with Antiochus if the Syrians would help him gain the throne to Egypt, which had been taken away from him by his younger brother Ptolemy VII Euergetes, whose nickname was Physcon. In Greek, it means fatty, or fat. So it literally means potbelly. Okay. So this is his fat little brother. All right, that might be easier than saying Ptolemy VII Euergetes, all right? So I'm gonna call him fatso here's that we kind of keep all this in mind. So Ptolemy VI Philometor is fatso's older brother, all right? You with me? It's his older brother. Their mother was Cleopatra. All right? And she is also the sister now of Antiochus Epiphanes. So both Ptolemy VI Philometor and Ptolemy VII Euergetes, or fatso, are his nephews. Alright, so you got one big happy family here. We got one big happy family; quality leaders are there brimming with integrity. We've had families like this lead us in our country as well. Now remember earlier, and 169 BC, Ptolemy VI Philometor had launched an attack against Antiochus Epiphanes' forces, as I mentioned a minute ago to regain those territories of Palestine lost to the Syrians. But he was defeated. Not only was he defeated, but he was captured by his uncle and held hostage. And that's when the people of Alexandria and Egypt put fatso on the throne. Okay, so this is what you got going on here.

Dave Harrell

Verse 23, "After an alliance is made with him," referring to Ptolemy VI Philometor, who I believe is the "prince of the covenant," he will practice deception. So here's what happened. Good ol uncle Antiochus professed friendship with his hostage nephew to gain assistance against the new ruler of Egypt, which would have been Ptolemy's chubby little brother, Ptolemy VII. And he's basically saying, Look, you help me against your brother, I will help you. I'll see to it that you get your throne.

Verse 23, again, "and he will go up and gain power with a small force of people." And indeed, at this stage in Antiochus' reign, his nation of Syria was small in comparison to what he had before; he had to give so much back to Rome, with their rise to power. So as predicted, as the angel has said here, he "practiced deception," and he went up against Egypt and gained power. Verse 24, he did this, "In a time of tranquility," it could be translated "without warning." "In a time of tranquility, he will enter the richest parts of the realm." And this is what he did, he seized the finest products of the most fertile and prosperous areas of his domain. These areas included, of course, Egypt and Judea and other provinces, where Syrian forces were successful. 24, in the middle of the verse, it reads, "and he will accomplish what his fathers never did, nor his ancestors, he will distribute plunder booty and possessions among them and he will devise his schemes against strongholds, but only for a time." And this is what he did. He was kind of a Robin Hood type of a guy. He would rob from various areas and give to other areas to make them all unite behind him. And by doing this, he also kept some of the areas that he ruled over a bit weak, he didn't want them to rise and have too much power, otherwise he would have to deal with them. But as the text says, he would only do this quote "for a time," which means for as long as God will allow it, which wasn't long because again, he only ruled 12 years. He died in 164 BC.

Verse 25, "He will stir up his strength and courage against the king of the South with a large army; so the king of the South will mobilize an extremely large an mighty army for war; but he will not stand, for schemes will be devised against him." This is what happened. Antiochus amassed a great army to invade Egypt. In fact, in first Maccabees 1:17, we read that Antiochus, quote, "entered Egypt with an overwhelming multitude with chariots, elephants and cavalry." So indeed, the king of the south now mobilized an extremely large army. And although Antiochus' army was smaller, and even though they marched all the way from Syria, all the way down to the borders of Egypt, nevertheless, they defeated Ptolemy Philometor. And how did they do this? Verse 25. It says that "he will not stand, for schemes will be devised against him." Interesting schemes devised against him. Verse 26 clarifies this, "Those who eat his choice food will destroy him, and his army will overflow but many will fall down slain." And this is what happened. Historically, the king had treacherous advisors at court, trusted counselors who convinced him to attack knowing that he probably would not be successful. In fact, the Hebrew literally reads, quote, "his army shall be overflowing in size, but still, many of its numbers shall fall in death." And this is what happened, as I say, Ptolemy attacked, he was defeated and he was taken captive by Antiochus.

Verse 27, "As for both kings, their hearts will be intent on evil, and they will speak lies to each other at the same table; but it will not succeed for the end is still to come at the appointed time." You see Antiochus, as well as Ptolemy, were both very selfish. And both kings were in, you might say a chess match, to try to manipulate the other one to their own advantage. And both are making promises they had no intention on keeping. And they did this it says "at the same table." In other words, at the table where there should be the table of hospitality, where there should be honesty and integrity, that should have been the highest priority, but it wasn't. So they both dealt treacherously with one another, both speaking lies in place of the truth in order to gain ground.

Verse 27, goes on to say, "But it will not succeed, for the end, or literally it can be translated "the goal," the goal "is still to come at the appointed time." In other words, God's predetermined appointed time to accomplish his goals during the end of the age. And although Antiochus pitted brother against brother in the end, it's interesting, none of them are able to control all of Egypt. It is important to note that when Antiochus went into Egypt, he was able to conquer the region of Memphis, kind of in the center of Egypt, upon which he did put Ptolemy Philometor on the throne, thinking that eventually he would dethrone him, but he needed his help there for a time. So that did happen, but his younger brother, his chubby younger brother was able to repel Antiochus, and he was able to maintain rule over the region of Alexandria. So Ptolemy Philometor's little brother still ruled Alexandria.

However, here dear friends, the plot thickens, as they say, shortly after Antiochus returned from Syria, the Ptolemy brothers decided that they would come together and form an alliance to rule jointly. And Ptolemy accomplished this by marrying their common sister, who now is Cleopatra II named after her mother, and she became queen. Eventually, by the way, she would marry the other brother, but that's a story for another time, okay, lots of incest that went on during those days. Then verse 28, "he," referring to Antiochus, "will return to his land with much plunder." Again, the word of God is always accurate. That's precisely what happened. We read in the histories, found in first Maccabees 1:19, "Thus they got the strong cities in the land of Egypt, and he took the spoils thereof." But in Daniel's prophecy, in verse 28, it goes on to say, "but his ,heart will be set against the holy covenant the holy covenant referring to all things religious in Judaism, the whole system of the Mosaic Law and so forth, "and he will take action," the text says, "and then return to his own land." So fueled by wounded pride, he decided to vent his anger on the Jews that he despised. And so, on his way back north to Syria, he stops in Palestine, he plunders the temple, destroys some of the religious personnel and he puts a stop to the ceremonial and sacrificial systems of Judaism. Now, by the way, Satan is already helping to accomplish all of this, under the authority of God's sovereignty. One historian tells us that "the occasion of the action," referring to Antiochus now coming into Jerusalem, "involve the Jewish reaction against the high priests, Menalaus, who has catered to the favor of Antiochus in the past days. Antiochus now sought to assist Menalaus and put down a minor revolt." So you've got an apostate here, that's the high priest, the Jews are rebelling against him, but he's with Antiochus. So Antiochus comes up, Menalaus says, hey, I need a little help here, I've got some problems with these guys. And so they decide to put them down. So this was all the excuse, that Antiochus needed to unleash his fury upon God's covenant people. We read about this historical event in first Maccabees, chapter one, beginning in verse 20. "And after that entire cause had smitten Egypt, he returned again in the 140 and third year, and went up against Israel in Jerusalem with a great multitude, and entered proudly into the sanctuary, and took away the golden altar and the candlestick of light, and all the vessels thereof, and the table of the shobread and the pouring vessels and the vials, and the sensors of gold, and the veil and the crown and the golden ornaments that were before the temple, all which he pulled off. He took also the silver and the gold and the precious vessels. Also, he took the hidden treasures, which he found, and when he had taken all away, he went into his own land, having made a great massacre, and spoken very proudly. Therefore, there was a great mourning in Israel in every place where they were, so that the princes and elders mourned the virgins and young men were made feeble, and the beauty of women was changed. Every bridegroom took up lamentation. And she that sat in the marriage chamber was in heaviness. The land also was moved from the inhabitants thereof, and all the house of Jacob was covered with confusion."

Now, let's go back to Daniel 11, in verse 29. "At the appointed time" referring to God's appointed time, "he will return and come into the South." Another amazing prophecy and that's what Antiochus did. Two years after his moderately successful campaign in Egypt, he decides to go back, because he learns about this coalition between his two nephews and their sister. And so he decides to go back down there with his armies to punish them and gain the land. But Daniel 11:29 says, "this last time, it will not turn out the way it did before." Remember, his first conquest into Egypt was moderately successful. But the prophecy here is that the next one will not be and here's why. For ships of Kittim will come against him." Kittim is a reference to to the Cyprians, the islands and coastal regions off the Northeast Mediterranean Sea area. And this included the regions west of Palestine, all of the the northern coast of the Mediterranean. And this is where the Romans had come with their ships. And what Antiochus didn't realize is the Romans had formed an alliance with the Egyptians and their ships were harbored off of these coasts. So what happens historically is Antiochus is going to come down now, he thinks he's going to take over Egypt, but the Romans, now working with the Egyptians, sent an emissary out to meet him. His name was Popillius Laenas and he was sent from the Roman Senate, and he had a letter that basically told Antiochus to go home and leave Egypt alone. Well Antiochus didn't like that. And history records how he paused and he was furious. Here, he's got his armies come all the way down here and now, here's the Romans. And he wasn't wanting to give an answer, so the emissary of Rome takes a stick, and he draws a circle in the sand around Antiochus and says that you must give me an answer before you step out of the circle. And basically, he knew that he didn't have a choice. So in utter humiliation, he had to agree and go back home.

Verse 30, "Therefore, he will be disheartened and will return and become enraged at the holy covenant" again, Judaism and its religious system. This you might say, the Jews, you might say, we're the most available dog to kick, right? He's got to go through that region again, and he's just furious. So "he will be disheartened will return to become enraged at the holy covenant and take action; so he will come back and show regard for those whose forsake the holy covenant." Again, now remember, this guy is Satan's man. Satan hates the Jewish people. He hates the God of Israel, our God; he hates all that God has promised with respect to the return of the King of kings. And so he's going to do all he can to thwart the purposes of God. And this has been true down through history. So what happened? Well, on his return trip home, he stops in Palestine, Vents his fury on the Jews and he was especially mad because there was a rumor going around that he had been killed. But he wanted to let them know that I am not dead. So he came to Jerusalem. And as the text says, "He will come back and show regard for those who forsake the holy covenant." So what does he do? He finds some of the Jewish apostates who were willing to side with him and help him eradicate every vestige of Judaism and all of the observances of the mosaic ceremonies and so forth. And of course, the leader of that group was that same apostate high priest, Menalaus, who fully cooperated with Antiochus.

If I can pause for a moment. Dear friends, the greatest threat to the church today, has been and always will be, apostates within the church, apostates within the church. I fear professing woke believers far more than I fear godless pagans. You know, Paul tells us in Acts 20, speaking to the elders there in Ephesus that "savage wolves will come in among you not sparing the flock. And from among your own selves, men will arise speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them, therefore be on the alert." This is why we are told for example, in Second Corinthians six to come out and be separate. We have no fellowship with these kinds of people. This is why judgment is to begin with the household of God, as we read in first Peter 4:17. And there is a purging dear friends, it's going on in the church today. A purging. And the fires of persecution are always purifying fires for the church. For God chastens those that he loves. And this was the same type of dynamic that went on when Antiochus now comes to Jerusalem.

Back to verse 31, "Forces from him will arise." "Forces" could also be translated "arms." Arms "will arise, desecrate the sanctuary fortress, and do away with the regular sacrifice." Now bear in mind Antiochus wanted to force Grecian customs on the Jews. Remember, he had spent a great deal of time in Athens before becoming king of Syria. So he fully embraced all of the mythological gods and goddesses. And so what does he do? He does away with the regular sacrifice. In other words, he outlaws all of the mosaic ceremonies, and then it says "and they will set up the abomination of desolation." The prophecy was true, Antiochus sets up a statue of the Olympian Zeus. They believe even with the features of Antiochus--sets that up in the Holy of Holies.

Verse 32, the prophecy says "By smooth words, he will turn to godlessness, those who act wickedly toward the covenant." In other words, he's going to use flattery as he has before; he's slick, he's going to make promises he knows he could never keep, but you're going to promise them wealth and power, if you will join me. So "by smooth words he will turn to godlessness, those who act wickedly toward the covenant, but the people who know their God will display strength and take action." Folks, there will always be a remnant of the faithful who will stand firm. Come what may. And that's what you had back then. In fact, in first Maccabees one, verse 61, we read, "How be it many in Israel were fully resolved and confirmed in themselves not to eat any unclean thing. Wherefore they chose rather to die, that they might not be defied with meats, and that they might not profane the holy covenant." And indeed, many of them did die. It's estimated that some 80,000 were killed or enslaved at this time.

Let me take just a few minutes here and give you the history of what the ancients describe with respect to what happened then first Maccabees one beginning in verse 29. "And after two years fully expired the kings in his chief collector of tribute into the cities of Judah, who came unto Jerusalem with a great multitude, and spake peaceably words unto them, but all was deceit. For when they had given him credence, he fell suddenly upon the city and smote it very sore, and destroyed much people of Israel. And when he had taken the spoils of the city, he set it on fire and pulled down the houses and walls thereof on every side, but the women and children took the captive and possess the cattle. Then builded they the city of David with a great strong wall and with mighty towers and made it a stronghold for them. And they put therein a sinful nation, wicked men and fortified themselves therein. They started also with armor and victuals. And when they had gathered together the spoils of Jerusalem, they laid them up there and so they became a sore snare. For it was a place to lie and weighed against the sanctuary, and an evil adversary to Israel. Thus, they shed innocent blood on every side of the sanctuary and defiled it, insomuch that the inhabitants of Jerusalem fled because of them. Whereupon the city was made and habitation of strangers and became strange to those that were born in her and her own children left her. Her sanctuary was laid waste like a wilderness, her feast were turned into mourning, her Sabbath into reproach her honor into contempt. As had been her glory, so was her dishonor increased, and Her Excellency was turned into mourning. Moreover, King Antiochus wrote to his whole kingdom, that all should be one people, and everyone should leave his laws. So all the heathen agreed according to the commandment of the king, yay, many also the Israelites consented to his religion, and sacrificed on the idols and profaned the Sabbath. For the king had sent letters by messengers unto Jerusalem in the cities of Judah, that they should follow the strange laws of the land, and forbid burnt offerings and sacrifice and drink offerings in the temple, and that they should profane the Sabbaths and festival days and pollute the sanctuary and holy people, set up altars and groves, and chapels of idols, and sacrifice swine’s flesh and unclean beasts, that they should also leave their children uncircumcised, and make their souls abominable, with all manner of uncleanness and profanation. To the end, they might forget the law and change all the ordinances. And whosoever would not do according to the commandment of the king, he said, he should die. In the self-same manner, wrote he to his whole kingdom and appointed overseers over all the people commanding the cities of Judah to sacrifice city by city. Then many of the people were gathered unto them, to wit, everyone that first took the law and so they committed evil to the land, and drove the Israelites into secret places, even wheresoever they could flee for Sucher. Now, the 15th day of the month, Kiselev live in the 100 and 40th and fifth year, they set up the abomination of desolation upon the altar, and builded idols throughout the cities of Judah on every side, and burnt incense at the doors of their houses and in the streets. And when they had wrent in pieces, the books of the law which they found; they burnt them with fire. And whosoever was found with any of the book of the testament, or if any committed to the law, the king's commandments was that they should put him to death. Thus did they by their authority unto the Israelites every month to as many as were found in the cities. Now the five and 20th day of the month, they did sacrifice upon the idol altar, which was upon the altar of God. At which time according to the commandment, they put to death, certain women that had caused their children to be circumcised, and they hanged the infants about their necks and rifled their houses and slew them that had circumcised them. How be it, many in Israel were fully resolved and confirmed in themselves not to eat any unclean thing. Wherefore they would rather die, that they might not be defiled with meat that they might not profane the holy covenant. So then they died in there was a very great wrath upon Israel." So there you have the history. Beloved, this demonstrates Satan's absolute contempt for the Most High God, and his covenant people, and all of the promises that God has given to all of his people down through the ages. And again, bear in mind that this guy is merely the type of the coming antitype, the Antichrist. So what I've just read is a harbinger of that which is to come, which will be far worse.

Back to our text, and Daniel 11:33. "Those who have insight among the people will give understanding to the many." In other words, during this time, there will be godly people with discernment, who will instruct the naive and instruct the ignorant. Yet it goes on to say "they will fall by sword and by flame, by captivity and by plunder for many days, that when they fall, they will be granted a little help and many of them will join them in hypocrisy." This is a reference to the Maccabees, you may remember that Mattathias Maccabeus, who had five sons refused to offer sacrifice to the Greek gods. And so he killed the king's representative, rather than to do this. And he along with his sons fled to the mountains, and they began to gather their own army and they enlisted others to join the revolt. And they were successful for a time but at the end, they were defeated. It says, "and many will join them in hypocrisy." It can be translated, "joined them by intrigue." And that's what happened. Out of fear of reprisal from some of the Jewish rebels, a lot of the Jewish people decided to join the uprising, but there were others that joined just to sabotage the efforts, because they were, they were still loyal to Antiochus and feared him. You may recall when we studied Daniel eight, that vision there, I give a lot of exposition on this whole period, because it speaks of this as well. In fact, in Daniel eight, verse 12, we read "on account of transgression the host will be given over to the horn along with the regular sacrifice, and it will fling truth to the ground and perform its will and prosper. Then I heard a holy one speaking and another holy one and said to that particular one who was speaking, 'How long will the vision about the regular sacrifice apply, while the transgression causes horror, so as to allow both the holy place and the host to be trampled?' And he said to me, 'For 2300 evenings and mornings, then the holy place will be properly restored.'" Now while we can't be dogmatic about the precise dates, we can go to first Maccabees four beginning in verse 52, through 59. There we read that "The Holy Place was properly restored on the 25th day of the ninth month of the year, 164 BC." And if you work backwards, 2300 days from that date, you come to the fall of 170 BC, which again, is absolutely astounding. And this is why so many historians say there's no way that this could be prophetic. This has to be some forgery written by some phony guy in the second century, who is basically recording history and saying it was prophecy. In chapter eight and verse 25, it says, "And through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence; and he will magnify himself in his heart, and he will destroy many while they are at ease. He will even oppose the Prince of princess, but he will be broken without human agency." That is he will be destroyed without human intervention. And that's exactly what happened.

Let me give you the history. Again, according to the second book of Maccabees, he was horrifically injured in the following manner which eventually led to his death. We read, "But they all sing, Lord, the God of Israel struck him with an incurable and invisible blow. As soon as he stopped speaking, he was seized with a pain in his bowels, for which there was no relief, and with sharp internal tortures. And that very justly, for he had tortured the bowels of others with many and strange inflictions. Yet he did not in any way stop his insolence, but was even more filled with arrogance, breathing fire in his rage against the Jews, and giving orders to drive even faster. And so it came about that he fell out of his chariot as it was rushing along, and the fall was so hard as to torture every limb of his body, as he who only a little while before, had thought in his superhuman arrogance, that he could command the waves of the sea, and it imagined that he could weigh the high mountains in a balance, was brought down to earth and carried in a litter, making the power of God manifest to all. So the ungodly man's body swarmed with worms. And while he was living in anguish and pain, his flesh rotted away. And because of the stench, the whole army felt revulsion at his decay."

Later on, on his deathbed, he learned that the armies of Israel had gone into the land of Judah and that he had been routed. And again, according to first Maccabee six, beginning in verse 18, "When the king heard this news, he was astonished and very much shaken, sick with grief because his designs had failed. He took to his bed, there he remained many days assailed by waves of grief where he thought he was going to die. So he called in all his friends and said to them, 'Sleep has departed from my eyes and my heart sinks with anxiety. I said to myself into what tribulation have I come, and into what floods of sorrow am I now, and I was kindly and beloved in my rule. But I now recall the evils I did in Jerusalem when I carried away all the vessels of silver and gold that were in it, and for no cause gave orders that the inhabitants of Judah be destroyed. I know that this is why these evils have overtaken me. And now I am dying in bitter grief in a foreign land.'" And according to what is called the "Scroll of Antiochus," we read that he drowned himself in the sea. Dear friends, in all of this, God was at work. And as we close this morning, we see in verse 35, that he was refining, he was cleansing, he was purifying his people through the fires of suffering. There we read, "Some of those who have insight will fall in order to refine, purge and make them pure until the end time; because it is still to come at the appointed time." And indeed, the persecution of Israel will continue until Christ returns, referred to here as the end time, a time of Daniel's 70th week, the time of the Great Tribulation, the pre kingdom judgments prior to our Lord's return. And this phrase, "until the end time," really serves as a transition to the events that are, as it says, still to come at the appointed time. And these are events pertaining to the person and the work of the Antichrist that's described in verses 36 through 45. The coming willful king of whom Antiochus Epiphanes was merely a type. Verse 36 describes him, "Then the king will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods; and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done."

Although American forces were warned about the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor, they ignored the warning. And you know what happened? And dear friends, even with what you have heard today, you are being warned that a Day of Judgment is coming, Jesus is coming again. And when you see him, he will either be your Savior and Lord, or your judge and your executioner. And right now there is an ark of safety available to you in the gospel of Jesus Christ. I plead with you to come to Christ in repentant faith. Enter into that ark before the deluge of judgment encompasses this earth. For those of us who know and love Christ, let's celebrate the fact that our Savior and our King reigns supreme; that he has ordained the end from the beginning and that he is coming again in power and great glory. Amen? Amen.

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the truths of your word that are so profound. But Lord, they are meaningless to those who are dead in their sins. So I pray that you will breathe life into those that are lost and dying, that they might be raised from the dead spiritually speaking, that they might repent and come to faith in Christ. And for those of us who know and love Christ, who are debtors to his grace, I pray that what we've heard this morning will just encourage our hearts knowing that yes, difficult times are coming. But we serve the King of kings and eventually, all of this will be over as promised. We thank you, we give you praise, in Jesus name and for his sake. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter 11. As we continue to make our way through this amazing Old Testament book, we're going to be looking at verses two through 35. Quite a large chunk, lots of ancient Near East history--I have given you a handout with the outline that will help you perhaps navigate that a little bit. There's lots of hard to pronounce names and lots of things you probably maybe have never even been aware of. And so I thought, rather than you burning up ink and trying to frantically write all these things, I'd give you at least a general outline. So I hope you will have that. But here in these verses, there are 135, approximately, detailed prophecies that were fulfilled, absolutely astounding. Dear Christian, never underestimate the treasure that we have in the Word of God.

Now, let me give you a little background, you will recall in Chapter 10, we had an introduction here, an introduction to Daniel's fourth and final vision that's going to be revealed now in chapters 11 and 12. And there we witnessed not only the preincarnate glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, and thus his sovereign rule over his created universe, but also God's plan for the ages, especially with respect to his covenant people Israel. Chapter 10 provides great insight into Yahweh's permissive will to allow Satan to rule this world temporarily, the systems of this world. We saw examples of how he ruled nations back then. And certainly he continues to do the same thing today, as he, in many ways, rules our nation, which explains the moral freefall, and just the mass deceptions that we are experiencing from our government, from the media, from educators, from churches, from culture in general.

Now, beginning in chapter 11, through chapter 12, the angelic messenger sent to Daniel, who we believe is probably Gabriel, proceeds with predictive revelation pertaining to Israel's future, especially as it relates to the Gentiles dominance over Israel until the return of the Messiah. And I might say that the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 was a mild preview of what is going to happen in the future with Israel and in the world, in what's called Daniel's 70th week; the pre kingdom judgments just before Christ returns. In fact, Jesus spoke of this in Luke 21 and verse, verse 24, where he said, "they will fall by the edge of the sword and will be led captive unto all the nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled." And certainly that happened in AD 70. And it will continue to happen, especially, as I say, during Daniel's 70th week, and from the era of Israel's captivity and 586 BC to Babylon, until her restoration in the Messianic Kingdom that you can read about, for example, in Revelation 20, the first six verses--God has allowed Gentiles to dominate and to threaten Jerusalem, and Israel. And all through the book of Daniel, we have seen how this has played out. We've seen how this has been fulfilled already, historically, and are waiting to be fulfilled prophetically.

And here in Daniel 11, God has revealed to us some astounding, detailed prophecies. In fact, this is one of the most astounding passages in all of Scripture. It is so historically accurate, that the third century AD pagan philosopher, Porphyry, considered it forgery. He argued that some other author wrote these events that occurred some time previously, a guy that wrote it sometime in the second century, and many liberal scholars believe that to this day that this is so historically accurate, that there is no way that this could have been predicted. So some clown wrote it in the second century and just recorded history and pretended like it was prophecy. By the way, that attack was refuted by one of the early church fathers. Jerome, who lived in the fourth century. He defended Daniel's authorship in a commentary based upon the original Hebrew text.

So I must say that in a world that is filled with lies, don't you get tired of it? I mean you will see one thing on television, you can see it with your own eyes, and you hear somebody telling you that that's not what you see. I just get so tired of it. But isn't it great to be able to come together and to look at truth? The truth of the Word of God. And these prophecies demonstrate that indeed, God is omniscient about the future, because he is sovereign over the future. It is his future. And with respect to Christ, it is history, his story. Furthermore, the book of Daniel demonstrates the divine inspiration of Scripture. This is an unequaled treasure that we have in our hands.

Now, before we embark upon this journey here in Daniel 11, this morning, and look at these prophecies, let's take a moment and ask, I think, a very appropriate question. Why would God reveal these things to Daniel? I mean why such detailed precision regarding the Gentile domination of the covenant people? Daniel would never live to see these things. He's receiving these prophecies at about 85 years old, right? So why give all of this to him? Many of those who read his prophecies would never live to see them come to fulfillment either. What possible benefit could that have been to him? To them? Or to us today? Well, I would submit to you that there are six reasons. And when I thought these through and wrote them down, I realized that this is a whole sermon in and of itself, but I'm just going to give you the points and move on. All right, six reasons.

First of all, these prophecies were given to demonstrate number one, the sovereignty of God, that indeed, God is in charge of his creation. He has ordained the end from the beginning. Secondly, to demonstrate the veracity or the truthfulness of Scripture, there is no other religious book ever in the history of the world that contains prophecies, especially fulfilled prophecies. Thirdly, to demonstrate the horrors of sin, because, dear friends, if you do not see the horror of sin, you will never see the glory of the cross and you will never seek forgiveness. And also to demonstrate the rule of Satan in the affairs of men, and how he is constantly doing everything he can with his minions, to thwart the purposes of God. Number five, to demonstrate God's faithfulness to his covenant promises; even as I have just read recently, just a few minutes ago, in Romans 11, God is faithful to his covenant promises with respect to Israel, with respect to even we Gentiles, who are the wild olive branches grafted in to the root of Abrahamic blessing. And then, finally, and this is the real censure, isn't it, to anticipate the glory of Christ's avenging justice. To anticipate the glory of Christ's avenging justice. The Father has given him all authority to execute judgment. Someday every knee will bow, every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. And it's great to know where the story is moving.

So let's look closely at Daniel's prophetic vision. And please understand while the details are accurate, they are also selective. And this is true of all Bible prophecy. In other words, it's not going to include every king, every battle, everything that happened. And I might also add, what I address will be a selective as well. There's literally hundreds of other events and stories that could be included in this discussion. Not all of the rulers, not all of the events of this era were discussed or recorded. However, I will also add that later on, there will be great detail given to Antiochus Epiphanes more than any other ruler. And the reason for that is the specific impact his wickedness had on Israel and the similarities of his actions with the coming Antichrist who he typifies. So you have an outline and again, I've added notes, due to the complexity of ancient Near East history. It's funny, as I was thinking this through again, this week, some of the ancient ways of remembering these things, when I was in seminary, began to come back to me just a little bit. You know how you come up with silly little sentences and things to remember people's names and everything. And some, I was laughing about that, some of it was coming back, but not enough for me to remember all of it. So I have to write it down as well. I'm not going to read all of these-- let me give you the four main points. We're going to look at, first of all, the kings of Persia in verse two, and then the kings of Greece in verses three and four. And then the prophecy will move to the kings of the south and the north, the south being a reference to Egypt, the North to Syria, that will be in verses five through 20. And then, fourthly, look at Antiochus, the fourth, Epiphanes in verses 21 through 36. And actually, we won't get to that today we'll look at the first three, primarily.

So let's look at the kings of Persia. Remember now, Daniel has asked, Gabriel has come, God has sent him. He wants to know what's going to happen. He's burdened for his people. And here's what the angelic messenger tells him beginning in verse two of Daniel 11. "'And now I will tell you the truth, behold, three more kings are going to arise in Persia. Then a fourth will gain far more riches than all of them; as soon as he becomes strong through his riches, he will arouse the whole empire against the realm of Greece." Now, since the fourth king mentioned is obviously Xerxes, the other three had to have been his predecessors who would have been Cambyses, Pseudo-Smerdis, Darius and then of course, Xerxes. And that reign of Xerxes would have included--some of you are familiar with the 300 Spartans that held off the Persians in the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC--hat's kind of when all of that happened. So he's telling him here, here's what's going to happen. Now, there were other kings who ruled in Persia, but these three kings ruled immediately prior to Xerxes, who indeed, attacked Greece and set up a counter attack by Alexander the Great, as we will see.

Now, let me give you a little background. Xerxes father, Darius Hystaspes, tried to conquer Greece in 490 BC, but he was soundly defeated. So when Xerxes comes to the throne, he wants revenge. He doesn't like his father being humiliated. And as stated in verse two, Xerxes was fabulously wealthy, he had conquered Lydia, all of Babylonia and Egypt and like his predecessors, he taxed the people heavily to gain his power, his influence, and to fulfill all of his pressures, which politicians love to do at our expense. So nothing has ever changed, right? In fact, his 180-day feast, described in Esther chapter one attests to his wealth. And that, by the way, was done at the culmination of a four-year period of preparation to go in and conquer Greece. He had many 1000s of troops. It is believed that he had amassed the largest army in the history of the ancient world. So Xerxes and his massive army, as well as navy, set out to avenge his father's humiliating defeat at the hands of the Greeks.

And this moves us to point two: the kings of Greece beginning of verse three. Look what the messenger tells Daniel, "'And the mighty king will arise, and he will rule with great authority and do as he pleases.'" This is a reference to Alexander the Great. Let tell you what happened in the story. Xerxes attacks Greece, and he was not only defeated, but the Greeks seized his entire Persian kingdom, a region far greater than the Persians ever ruled. In fact, with around 40,000 men, Alexander the Great, annihilated the Persians. He took all of Asia Minor, he took all of Northern Syria. He took the island fortress of Tyre down to Egypt, Mesopotamia, all the way over to what is modern Afghanistan, to the very borders of India. You may recall, his final victory was with King Porus and his war elephants in the Battle of Jhelum, in 326 BC. So Alexander the Great beats Xerxes, and he carves out a vast kingdom for himself of about 1.5 million square miles. And he did this in 10 years. By the way, I detail a lot of the brilliant strategies and weaponry of Alexander the Great and his forces in my exposition of Daniel two if you want to go back and look at that.

Verse four, "But as soon as he has arisen, his kingdom will be broken up and parceled out toward the four points of the compass, though not to his own descendants, nor according to his authority which he wielded, for his sovereignty will be uprooted and given to others be besides them." And this is exactly what happened. Alexander the Great died at the young age of 32. And his vast kingdom, as the prophecy says, was broken up and parceled out to four of his generals. Macedon and Greece went to Cassander. Thrace and Asia Minor went to Lysimachus. Syria and Babylon went to Seleucus and Judah and Egypt went to Ptolemy.

Gabriel continues now in his predictive revelation, point number three: the kings of the south, referring to Egypt, and north, referring to Syria. Notice verse five, "'Then the king of the South will grow strong." This is a reference now to Ptolemy the first Sotar of Judah and Egypt, he reigned from 304 to 283 BCE. "'The king of the south will grow strong, along with one of his princes.'" And this historically refers to Seleucus I of Nicator, "'who gain ascendancy over him and obtain dominion; his dominion will be a great dominion indeed.'" So in other words, Seleucus would become stronger than Ptolemy with respect to the extent of his dominion. And that's exactly what happened, as prophesied. Seleucus I Nicator, ruled over Syria and Babylonia in 321 BC until another general Antigonus Babylon and forced him to flee. But later Antigonus was defeated at Gaza in 312 BC, allowing Seleucus to regain his territory, plus the entire region of Midia, thus fulfilling verse five. Astounding.

Verse six, "'After some years, they will form an alliance, and the daughter of the king of the south will come to the king of the North to carry out a peaceful arrangement.'" And history affirms that this did happen. Egypt and Syria did make an alliance with one another in 250 BCE, some 50 years after both Ptolemy, and Seleucus proclaimed themselves to be king. Let me give you a little background here. It's really interesting. Ptolemy and Seleucus both died soon thereafter. And the son of Ptolemy, whose name was Ptolemy II Philadelphus, assumed the throne in Egypt. And the grandson of Seleucus whose name was Antiochus II Theos assumed the throne in Syria. By the way, aren't you glad you've got these notes so you don't have to write all this down?

Now, the plot thickens, as they say. In order to form an alliance, as the prophecy says must happen. Ptolemy II Philadelphus of the South sent his daughter Berenice to marry Antiochus II Theos. Who, by the way, was forced to divorce his wife Laodice. It was a forced marriage with Berenice. And he had to divorce his wife Laodice. Look at verse six again, "'But she will not retain her position of power, nor will he remain with his power, but she will be given up along with those who brought her in, and the one who sired her as well as he who supported her in those times.'" It's exactly what happened. History tells us that two years after the forced marriage between Antiochus and Berenice, her father, Berenice's father, Ptolemy II died. At that point, Antiochus decided he's going to take back his previous wife, Laodice. All right? Having been forced to divorce her. But Laodice wasn't too happy with what he had done so she had him poisoned. I hate that when that happens, right? Moreover, she developed a plot to kill her rival, Berenice, and all her attendants and her one infant son, by Antiochus, upon their arrival. Exactly what verse six tells us. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned right? Or as we would say, down here, mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. And so this is what happened.

Verse seven, "'But one of the descendants of her line will arise in his place, and he will come against their army and enter the fortress of the king of the North, and he will deal with them and display great strength. Also their gods with their metal images and their precious vessels of silver and gold, he will take into captivity to Egypt.'" This is what happened. Berenice's brother, Ptolemy III Euergetes reigned from 246 to 221 BC, defeated Seleucus II Callinicus, and returned to Egypt with all of the spoil. And according to Jerome, the ancient church father, Ptolemy confiscated quote, "40,000 talents of silver," now let me stop there. A talent is 75 pounds, take 40,000 time, 75 pounds, you get 3 million pounds of silver. Get an idea? That's 1500 tons, according to my calculations. I mean, that's over a trillion dollars. I mean, that's the type of stuff our government would love to get a hold of, right? Jerome said that, "Ptolemy confiscated 40,000 talents of silver, and 2500 precious vessels and images of the gods among them, those which candidacies had taken to Persia when he conquered Egypt." By the way, this would have required massive caravans, several years just to move all of this.

Back to verse eight at the end, "'and he on his part, will refrain from attacking the king of the north for some years.'" And indeed, from 241 to 223 BC, the two nations remained at peace with one another. So everything that was prophesied in verses seven and eight, were fulfilled precisely. By the way, what we're talking about here happened 300 years after Daniel died.

Verse nine, "'Then the latter will enter the realm of the king of the South, but will return to his own land.'" And indeed, Seleucus Callinicus, succeeded in regaining his position in Syria. After Ptolemy's victory over his realm, but in 240 BC, he unsuccessfully attacked Ptolemy and Egypt and as the text says, "returned to his own land" in defeat.

Verse 10, "'His sons will mobilize and assemble a multitude of great forces; and one of them will keep on coming and overflow and pass through, that he may again wage war up to his very fortress.'" It's interesting verse 10 here, "his sons," The younger son was Seleucus III Seronis and the older son was Antiochus III the Great. I love it when they put the great on there, you know, Jake Hutchison the Great, you know, whatever. That's what these guys used to do back then. And the younger was killed on a campaign in Asia Minor and just like the prophet prophesied Antiochus the Great became the king at the young age of 18.

Verse 10 again, "'His sons will mobilize and assemble a multitude of great forces; and one of them will keep on coming and overflow and pass through that he may again wage war up to his very fortress.'" And as predicted, Antiochus III, the Great, recaptured territory in Phoenicia from Ptolemy IV Philopater. And his forces, like the prophet says, "overflowed and passed through" all of the Egyptian territory that included the land of Palestine. But it goes on. Verse 11, "'The king of the South,'" who is Ptolemy okay? "will be enraged and go forth and fight with the king of the North,'" who is Antiochus, "'Then the latter will raise a great multitude.'" All right, and according to Polybius, who was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic period, he lived to, like 200 BC, up to about 100 BC or so. Polybius says this, quote "Ptolemy had amassed 70,000 infantry, 5000 cavalry and 73 elephants." Quite an army. And he says, "Antiochus had," quote "a multitude consisting of 62,000 infantry, 6000 cavalry, and 102 elephants." But Antiochus, we know, was given into Ptolemy's hand, exactly as it says at the end of verse 11, "'But that multitude will be given into the hand of the former.'" Amazing, isn't it? You can see why the liberals say there's just no way that anybody could predict this type of detail of history.

Verse 12, "'When the multitude is carried away, his heart will be lifted up, and he will cause 10s of 1000s to fall, and yet he will not prevail.'" So Ptolemy IV defeated Antiochus forces at the Battle of Raphia in 217 BC. And according to Polybius, the historian, Antiochus lost nearly 10,000 footmen and another 4000 were captured. But notice the end of verse 12. "'Yet he,' Ptolemy IV, "will not prevail.'"

Verse 13, "'For the king of the North will,’” again Antiochus the Great, "'will again raise a greater multitude than the former, and after an interval of some years, he will press on with a great army and much equipment.'" We know that's exactly what happened in 203 BC. Ptolemy Philopater and his wife died in Egypt, and their four-year-old son ascended the throne. His name was Ptolemy V Epiphanes. Well, this was the perfect opportunity for Antiochus the Great to launch a second invasion into the coastal region of Syria, which he did. And as prophesied, he had, quote, "a great army and much equipment." And he had acquired this from his other campaigns that he had been doing in the intervening years in the eastern regions of his domain as far as the Caspian Sea, even to the border of India. So now with an even greater army, and even more equipment than before he launches his attack.

Verse 14, "'Now in those times, many will rise up against the king of the South,'" referring to Ptolemy. And he says, "'The violent ones among your people,'" speaking to Daniel now, I mean, the violent ones among the Jews "'will also lift themselves up in order to fulfill the vision, but they will fall down.'" And we know historically that some of the pro Seleucid Jews who were tired of being subjugated by Egypt by the Ptolemies, join forces with Antiochus, to fight against Egypt. Plus, they were tired of being in this No Man's Land in Israel. That's where all these battles are fought, right? They're tired of everybody from the north and the south, they come along, and where did they fight? Right there in their land. They were tired of all that. So they decided to throw in with Antiochus. But it says in verse 14, "they will fall," down literally, in the Hebrew, but they shall stumble, probably a reference to the Jews who were not able to rid themselves of these warring kingdoms, or free themselves from their tyranny, because all of this just continued to go on. And interestingly enough, in many ways, it's still happening today.

Verse 15, "'Then the king of the North,'" who was Antiochus, "'will come, cast up a siege ramp will capture a well-fortified city; and the forces of the South will not stand their ground, not even their choicest troops.'" Now bear in mind, siege warfare was common in those days, you can go to the Near East today, in Israel, for example, and you can see remnants of siege warfare, the enemy would come in, they would build rather large wall around the whole perimeter of the city, while everybody's watching, in a way to communicate to the people that there is no escape. And they would do this with rocks. And then they would find the best place to begin to build a mound, little by little to go up until they could finally breach the walls. And this might take a couple of years. But when you have 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of troops, like little ants, they keep doing that until finally they conquer the city. That's what happened. Now, he speaks here of capturing this "well-fortified city and the forces of the South will not stand their ground, not even their choicest troops.'" And this is interesting. This is a reference to three prominent Egyptian generals, Eropus, Menocles, and Damoxenus,who were sent by Egypt to relieve Sidon and hopefully free them from this siege that was about to destroy them. But it says "'for they will be no strength to make a stand.'" And as predicted Antiochus soundly defeated Ptolemy V at the Battle of Panium near Mount Hermon and captured the city of Sidon.

So now with Syria in his control, this put an end to the Ptolemaic rule in Palestine. Verse 16, "'But he who comes against him will do as he pleases.'" Again, Antiochus was able to do anything he wanted to impose his will upon the Egyptians and their territories, including Palestine. And it says, "'and no one will be able to withstand him, he will also stay for a time in the Beautiful Land,'" referring to the promised land, the land of of Israel, "'with destruction in his hand.'" And indeed in 198, BC, Antiochus ruled over the promised land. But notice what the angelic messenger goes on to predict.

Verse 17, "'He,'" Antiochus, "'will set his face to come with the power of his whole kingdom, bringing with him a proposal of peace which he will put into effect, he will also give him the daughter of women to ruin it.'" You see Antiochus, we know historically, wanted to control all of Egypt, but not through a military invasion, and through military force. And now that he had all the control of Palestine and other eastern territories, he was in a great position to negotiate from a position of strength with Egypt. Furthermore, Antiochus, we know, was planning at that time on attacking Rome. And the last thing he needed is to have the Egyptians rise up and cause trouble. So he's got to do something to kind of calm things down and make sure that his rule was being affected there. So he sent his daughter, Cleopatra I, to marry Ptolemy V in 197 BC, as part of this peace treaty with Egypt. Now there was a bit of a problem here in 197 BC, Ptolemy was only 10 years old. So the marriage did not take place until 193 BC. I mean, let's wait till he's 14 right? And then then you can get married. However, Antiochus had another motive for sending his daughter and that was to get her in the family so that she could spy and help promote Syrian interests in the Ptolemaic family. But notice verse 17, there at the end, "'but she will not take a stand for him or be on his side.'" Indeed, she did not go along with the plan, she actually assimilated very well into the family even assisted them. In fact, Egypt even ended up assisting the Romans when Antiochus fought against them.

Verse 18, "'Then he will turn his face to the coastlands and capture many.'" And we know that happened, Antiochus launched a successful campaign in the Aegean region, which would have been the countries on the Mediterranean Sea, including the islands there. He conquered all of them, a substantial portion of Asia Minor, and Greece. "'But a commander will put a stop to his scorn against him.'" Moreover, "'he will repay him for his scorn.'" And this commander was the Roman General Lucius Cornelius Scipio. He was commissioned by Rome to stop Antiochus, which he did. Antiochus had bragged about how he was going to conquer all of Greece. But in 191 BC, he was driven from his stronghold in Thermopylae, and the next year, he was defeated at Magnesia and Lydia of Asia Minor. And finally in 188 BC, in utter humiliation, he was forced into a peace treaty with Rome. And he had to relinquish all of his territory in Asia Minor and give it to the Romans.

Verse 19, "'So he will turn his face toward the fortresses of his own land, but he will stumble and fall and be found no more.'" That's exactly what happened. He returned to his own land having lost all that he had gained. However, his own land included all of Syria, all of Palestine, all of Mesopotamia, all of Babylon, all of what is around the middle Persian realm, and we know that he was killed while seeking to rob the Temple of Bel in Elam, Persia. So much for Antiochus III the Great.

Verse 20, "'Then in his place one will arise who will send an oppressor.'" The Hebrew concept of that word oppressor, refers to one who forces others to do something, especially pay taxes. "'Than in his place one will arise who will send an oppressor through the Jewel of his kingdom,'" referring to Palestine, "'yet within a few days, he will be shattered, though not in anger nor in battle.'" Now, this is a reference to Seleucus IV Philopater, son and successor of Antiochus the Great. Here's what went on then, because his father had drained all of the treasury to do all of these wars and because he owed Rome annual payment of 1000 talents, he had to get money from somewhere. So he sends a guy named Heliodorus, to seize the funds of the temple in Jerusalem. That's a great place to go get money. And according to Second Maccabees three, Maccabees or non-canonical Jewish writings detailing Jewish history. According to the Second Maccabees three, this attempt was thwarted by the appearance at the temple of a divine apparition. Let me read you some of that old ancient history to give you a sense of what happened according to the historians. "When he had arrived at Jerusalem and had been kindly welcomed by the high priest of the city, he told about the disclosure that had been made and stated why he had come, and he inquired whether this really was the situation. The high priest explained that there were some deposits belonging to widows and orphans, and also some money of Heranicus, a son of Tobias, a man of very prominent position, and that it totaled in all 400 talents of silver and 200 of gold. To such an extent the pious Simon had misrepresented the facts. And he said that it was utterly impossible that wrong should be done to those people who had trusted in the holiness of the place, and in the sanctity and inviolability of the temple that is honored throughout the whole world. But Heliodorus, because of the orders he had from the king said that this money must in any case be confiscated for the king's treasury. So he set a day and went in to direct the inspection of these funds. There was no little distress throughout the whole city. The priests prostrated themselves before the altar in their priestly vestments and called toward heaven upon him who had given the law about deposits, that he should keep them safe for those who had deposited them. To see the appearance of the high priest was to be wounded at heart for his face and the change in his color, disclosed the anguish of his soul, for terror and bodily trembling had come over the man which plainly showed to those who looked at him, the pain lodged in his heart. People also hurried out of their houses in crowds to make a general supplication because the Holy Place was about to be brought into dishonor. Women girded with sackcloth, under their breasts thronged the streets, some of the young men who were kept indoors ran together to the gates and some to the walls, while others peered out of windows, and holding up their hands to heaven, they all made supplication. There was something pitiable in the prostration of the whole populace and the anxiety of the high priest in his great anguish. While they were calling upon the Almighty Lord, that he would keep what he what had been entrusted safe and secure, for those who had entrusted it, Heliodorus went on with what had been decided. But when he arrived at the Treasury with his bodyguard, then and there, the sovereign of spirits, and of all authority, caused so great a manifestation that all who had been so bold as to accompany him, were astounded by the power of God and became faint with terror. For there appeared to them a magnificently caparisoned horse." Caparisoned is an old word, it means equipped, it means decked out with rich ornamentation and decoration and that type of thing. "With a rider of frightening mean, and it rushed furiously at Heliodorus and struck him with its fernet hooves. Its rider was seen to have armor and weapons of gold. Two young men also appeared to him remarkably strong, glorious, beautiful and splendidly dressed, who stood on either side of him and flogged him continuously, inflicting many blows on him. When he suddenly fell to the ground and deep darkness came over him, his men took him up, put him on a stretcher, and carried him away. This man who had just entered the aforesaid treasury, with a great retinue, and all his bodyguard was now unable to help himself, they recognize clearly the sovereign power of God." End quote. Now, it's all that true? We're not sure, this is what the historians tell us. But something happened and we know that Heliodorus returned home empty handed, and later on, we know that he assassinated Seleucus Philopater, as prophesied.

Notice verse 20. "Yet within a few days, he,'" Seleucus Philopater, "'will be shattered, though not in anger nor in battle.'" So after a short 11 year reign, Seleucus died mysteriously, apparently through poisoning. Another historian tells us that his son, Demetrius Sotar, had been taken hostage to Rome, when Heliodorus, his Prime Minister, evidently sought the throne for himself and committed this act.

But notice verse 21, "In his place,'" referring to Seleucus Philopater, "'a despicable person will arise, on whom the honor of kingship has not been conferred, but he will come at a time of tranquility and seize the kingdom by intrigue.'" And folks, this leads us to our fourth point in the little outline that referring to Antiochus IV Epiphanes.

Let me just introduce this briefly in closing this morning. Following the death of Seleucus IV, his brother, Antiochus IV seizes the throne illegally, from the son of his murdered brother, this Demetrius Soter, who was still held hostage by the Romans and the new king adopted the name Antiochus IV Epiphanes in 175 BC. Epiphanes means glorious. He had to have his own name. Though he was a relatively obscure monarch in the ancient Near East, who, by the way, only ruled for nine years in the days and the decline of the Syrian power and the rise of Rome in the West. He was certainly Satan's emissary. Commissioned to inflict enormous casualties on God's covenant people. And his bitter persecution of the Jews ended up fueling the Maccabean Revolt resulting in heavy Jewish casualties, resulting in the defilement of the temple and the altar. And he therefore typifies the coming Antichrist whose diabolical reign and ruin are described later on in verses 36 and following. In fact, folks and Daniel 11:31, as well as 12:11, Daniel mentions the, quote, "abomination of desolation." Persecution of Israel committed by Antiochus Epiphanes. And we'll get into that the next time we get together on this. But likewise, Jesus referred to this important event. First spoken of in Daniel, Jesus speaks of this in his Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 15, we read, "'Therefore, when you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place, let the reader understand, that those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains.'" Later on in verses 21 through 22, he warns of this coming period, as "Great Tribulation upon Israel upon the world." This is what's coming. It is a time of tribulation without parallel in human history. He went on there to say, "'For then, there will be great tribulation, such has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved, but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'" Hope you understand Jesus expects a literal fulfillment of this prophecy, consistent with the literal fulfillment of Daniel's prophecies, concerning the abomination of desolation committed by Antiochus Epiphanes.

I might add that I believe with all my heart, Jesus expects a literal fulfillment of all Old Testament prophecies. So because of the unique parallels, beginning in verse 21, the rise of Antiochus IV Epiphanes occupies a lot of space in this chapter. In fact, it is a major section in this entire prophetic revelation which we will examine in our next exposition of this passage.

Well, friends, I hope you are awestruck by the accuracy of God's word. I hope that if nothing else, you will be further committed to study the Word, to see its absolute power, that a sovereign God has given this to us. Again, 135 detailed prophetic statements that were fulfilled literally. And why would he give all of this to Daniel, and ultimately to us? To demonstrate the sovereignty of God, the veracity of Scripture, the horrors of sin, the rule of Satan; to demonstrate God's faithfulness to his covenant promises and to help us anticipate the glory of Christ's avenging justice. So given all this, dear friends, may I ask you, what is your attitude towards God? Towards his word, towards his Son, our Savior and King, the Lord Jesus Christ? What is your attitude? Is he the sovereign creator? Sustainer, Redeemer concentrator of all things? Or is he just a myth? Is he some smiley face Santa Claus that is kind of stingy, but you can learn how to manipulate him so he will hand out the goodies? Is that who he is? Friends, I hope you can see from the Word of God that he is indeed our Creator, our sovereign God. And that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible, authoritative, all sufficient Word of the living God. It is not a book of myths. I hope it's your spiritual authority because if it's not, what is? Is it culture, is it your own ideas? Is it the foolishness of man or the wisdom of God? Well, I hope it's the latter and not the former. Because someday, all of us will see him face to face. And as I say, you will either see him in terror or in triumph. Remember that. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for your Word that speaks so powerfully to all of us who have been given the ears to hear. And we know, as always, that your Word will either harden or soften hearts. Lord, I beg you that it will be the latter and not the former. You've told us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. And certainly we've been given much of that here today. I pray that you will help us to grab hold of the great truths that you have given us with respect to your sovereignty, your holiness, and to your ultimate plan of redemption. That we might live consistently with these truths, and that others might see Christ in us, the hope of glory. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

This morning, we returned once again to our verse by verse study of the book of Daniel. So if you will take your Bibles turn to Daniel chapter 10. And I've entitled my discourse to you this morning, "A Glorious Preparation for Revelation." This is another astounding text that is often overlooked. But it is a text that has much practical application and instruction for our everyday lives. Because as we will see, Satan's efforts to thwart the purposes of God and to destroy his people, continues to exist to this day, as it did in the days of Daniel. And what we know biblically, as we will see from the prophecies, forthcoming from chapters 11, and 12, These things will worsen prior to the Lord's return as demons prepare the world for the rule of the Antichrist, by influencing wicked people, we see this already with the wickedness in the whole liberal, progressive movement, global elitist, and so forth. And in this chapter, we are going to gain great insights into the role of demons, and how they influence rulers and nations, and how world events are often shaped because of the things that they are up to. And we will also understand their unique commission to destroy the people of God and thwart God's sovereign purposes and plans. Just to get you thinking, I want you to understand, dear friends, that Satan is alive and well and he has a demonic horde that is actively and aggressively at work today. It is no coincidence that an unqualified career politician in a state of cognitive decline, with virtually no accomplishments and 40 years of politics, was elected President of these United States. It is no coincidence that this President and his top military advisors would humiliate United States of America in the withdrawal from Afghanistan. It's no coincidence that there is over 100 cargo tanker sitting off the coast of California, waiting to be unloaded. It is no coincidence that we have a supply chain crisis. It is no coincidence that the economic policies of the Democratic Party are not only destroying the economy in the United States, but also weakening the dollar all around the world. It's no coincidence that there is no end to the new COVID variants requiring unconstitutional experimental vaccine mandates, unending boosters, vaccine passports, destructive lock downs. And now they're coming after our children who are at virtually no risk. It's no coincidence that globalists continue to use fear to condition the masses to obey the government authorities. It is not happenstance that they are now pushing for embedded biometrics so that they can somehow have a digital vaccine passport. It's not just random reality that progressive corporate and tech billionaires censor those who reject their political ideologies. It is not just happenstance that progressive politicians have shut down the oil pipelines in our country, that they push this global warming hoax that they burden businesses with ridiculous environmental restrictions that sabotage our economy. And it's not just random reality that our government promotes subsidized unemployment. All of these things are going someplace. It's not coincidence that liberal politicians and religious phonies continue to promote the woke, critical race theory, LGBTQ insanity. Not only promote it, but try to impose those values on everyone. It's not coincidence that hundreds of 1000s of illegal aliens are flooding our porous borders and being released into our population without proper vetting. It's not just coincidence that the godless political left now rule our country through activist judges, through unelected bureaucrats, through public school teachers and academia and mainstream media and social media, and Hollywood. These things aren't just happening. They are all part of Satan's plan as he continues to rule this world temporarily. It's not coincidence that the two institutions that God has ordained and promised to bless--the two institutions of which Christ is to be the head--marriage and the church, are both under attack in our country. It's not by accident that we see an escalation of military conflicts around the world, especially the resurgence of anti semitism. It's not just by accident that Russia is now aligning itself with Turkey and Iran is being aided by Russia and by China. It's not just a coincidence that the European Union and NATO are beefing up their military might. It's not just something random, some happenstance that there is an increased demand for a central bank, digital currency. Beloved, all of these things are a result of Satan's plan and demonic activity. And through his minions, Satan is paving the way for global governance under the rule of the Antichrist, absolute totalitarianism, as we see in the prophetic Scriptures, a one world ruler, a one world economy, and a one world government. And what we are witnessing today is not only the systematic destruction of life as we know it in America, but hear this, we are witnessing God's sovereign plan being enacted, even through the use of his ape, Satan and his minions, and in that we can find comfort, can we not? What you're about to hear today, and over the next few weeks is a detailed explanation of the truths God has revealed to us through His Word. And sadly, many of these things most professing Christians know nothing about.

Well, let me give you a little background here of where we're going in the last three chapters of the book of Daniel, beginning here in Daniel 10. God is revealing prophetic truths concerning the future world events, beginning with the reign of Cyrus in 536 BC, all the way through the future reign of the Lord Jesus Christ, when he establishes his kingdom. So as there's this vast, historical, prophetic panorama that is being unfolded, this covers the same period here in chapter 10 and following that was set forth in Chapter Eight of Daniel, the reign of the Medo-Persian Empire, and later the Grecian empires. But what we're going to see is much more detail regarding the rule of Alexander the Great as well as the pre kingdom judgments, also known as the Great Tribulation.

Now, you will recall in Daniel nine, because it's been a number of weeks over the Christmas vacation, we moved away from Daniel and now we're back in it, but you will remember in Daniel nine, especially verses 24 and 27, that God revealed some amazing truths to Daniel. The background there--Daniel had offered heartfelt confession of sin, he was praying for his Israeli kinsmen, and he offered intercession on their behalf that they might be delivered from Babylonian captivity restored to their land and so forth. And God sent his angel Gabriel to answer his prayers. But in his answer, we see that what Daniel prayed for was not enough. That God's answer encompassed a far greater deliverance than merely the deliverance from the Babylonian captivity, he disclosed his plan to deliver his people from their sin, a remedy that could only be accomplished by Christ's death on the cross, at the end of his first coming, but his answer also looked beyond their Gentile oppressors in Babylon, to a final day, when they will be forever delivered from all earthly oppressors. And that will be accomplished by the triumph of Christ at His Second Coming. All of this will require 490 years, that is 70 weeks, as is revealed in that text, 70 weeks of years, literally seven sevens. And that was divided into two seasons of deliverance, the first requiring 69 weeks of years, or 483 years leading up to the death of Christ. And then, after an indefinite period of time, the final week, often called Daniel's 70th week, would ensue, culminating in the second coming of the Messiah, who will defeat the enemies of the Antichrist bent on exterminating all of ethnic Israel, and all who refuse to worship him. The details of that victory are given to us in chapter seven. And this brings us now to where we're at today. This is Daniel's fourth and final vision. And as I say, it is a magnificent prophetic panorama that is first introduced in chapter 10, through the first verse of chapter 11. That's what we will look at here today. And then we're going to see beginning in 11, to 35, there's the prediction concerning the immediate future from Daniel's perspective regarding Darius all the way to Antiochus. And then in verses 36 through verse four of chapter 12, you will see another division where he leaps into the far future, giving us great insights into what's going to happen just prior to our Lord's Second Coming. And then in chapter 12, verses five through 13, he gives a final message, and revelation to Daniel. So let's examine now, this introduction of Daniel's final vision recorded for us in chapter 10.

Again, I've been titled this "A Glorious Preparation for Revelation." We're going to look at it under three headings very simple, Daniel's mournful prayer to understand Israel's future. And then secondly, Daniel's terrifying vision of the glory of Christ. And then thirdly, Daniel's angelic strengthening, necessary to proceed. Now he begins in verse one by giving us the setting. In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia, a message was revealed to Daniel, who was named Belteshazzar." You will recall this was the name that was assigned to Daniel when he first arrived as a young teenage boy in Babylon. So this now is about 536 BC. This is given to Daniel when he's about 84 or 85 years old. And this is about two years after Gabriel's appearance to Daniel in chapter nine, and also about two years after the Jews were allowed to return back to Judea, to rebuild Jerusalem and the temple. Daniel was praying and he goes on to say, "And the message was true and one of great conflict." In other words, the message that he is about to receive, the message that we now have, under the inspiration of this prophet, speaks of great conflicts between nations in the future. And then he says, "But he understood the message and had an understanding of the vision."

So first, let's look under the heading of Daniel's mournful prayer to understand Israel's future and see what the Spirit of God has for us. Verse two, "In those days, I Daniel, had been mourning for three entire weeks. Have you ever mourned for something for three entire weeks." Have you ever had that level of burden, he was burdened for his people. He saw the troubles they had encountered when they returned back to Judea. It's been about two years now. The physical difficulties, the enemies in the land, their spiritual difficulties. He knew the horrors as well of the divine judgment that awaited them in years to come. He could look back and recall the 400 years of oppressive bondage in Egypt, despite the promises God made in his covenant to Abram in Genesis 15. He was burdened for these things. He was very aware of the captivity and banishment in its several stages, with the invasions of Nebuchadnezzar in the past. But, dear friends, the predictive revelations he had received made him aware that the sufferings of his people were just beginning. He wanted to understand these things. The subjugation under the Romans, the eventual destruction of Jerusalem, was absolutely unimaginable. And persecution has continued down through history, to this very day. But the revived Roman Empire under the rule of the Antichrist, in Daniel's 70th week, would be the worst of all, oh, dear friends the ravages of sin. Do you mourn over it in your life and in the lives of others in the lives of the people of the world? Jesus said, “Blessed are those who mourn for they will” be what? Comforted. Seldom do we really come to grips with sins, deadly consequences, especially in our culture of ease. In fact, most professing Christians have never really suffered for their faith. Because most professing Christians are just professing Christians. They're Christian in name only, they're chameleons. They have a dead faith that cannot save. They're pretend Christians so they blend in with the culture, so they're not going to be persecuted. But of course, friendship with the world is enmity with God, and God will judge all who rebel against Him. But Daniel now is mourning over the future of his people. He's longing for understanding, to be sure he loved the Lord and he loved his people. He was truly a godly man, something that is rare in his day, and in our day, in fact, later, the angel described him in verse 11, as "a man of high esteem," verse 12, a man who set his "heart on understanding," humbling himself before his God. And we see the depth of his passion in verse three, "I did not eat any tasty food, nor did meat or wine into my mouth." Of course, being in the king's court, he had the advantage of all of these luxuries, but he limited himself to a meager diet, so that he could focus on what was really at hand. And plus, he was distressed over all of this, so he had very little appetite. He said, "nor did I use any ointment at all until the entire three weeks were completed." You see, it was customary for them in those days to anoint exposed flesh with oil to protect it from the sun's rays. But all of that also was a symbol of joy, which would be discontinued in times of mourning. And these acts of self-denial were not intended to somehow really get God's attention; that's not why he was doing this. But rather, the intention was to help him concentrate on the matters at hand and to help him maintain the proper priority of his heart. And sadly, self-discipline and self-denial are foreign virtues in our culture, of self-indulgence and gluttony and sloth, all you have to do is go to Walmart and you will see that.

Dave Harrell

Verse four, "On the 24th day of the first month, while I was by the bank of the great river, that is, the Tigris." Let me pause there for a moment. This is important. This would have been the month of Nissan. So he prayed through the Passover season that was celebrated on the 14th of that month immediately followed by the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which lasted for seven days. So this was a fitting time for his petition to the Lord, because it was the time that commemorated Israel's original exodus from the bondage of Egypt, going into the promised land. But now he's witnessing another exodus, his people going back to their land after the Babylonian captivity, and he wants to understand more what's going to happen to them.

So we moved from Daniel's mournful prayer to understand Israel's future to secondly, Daniel's terrifying vision of the glory of Christ. Verse five, "I lifted my eyes and looked and behold, there was a certain man dressed in linen." All through Scripture, dear friends, linen is white. And white linen is a symbol of purity, it was worn by the priests, and I can't help but think of Isaiah one and verse 18, "Though your sins be as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. Though they are red, like crimson, they will be like wool." In fact, the Saints in glory are described in Revelation three, five as being "clothed in white garments. He goes on to describe what he sees. This being had a waist, that was "girded with a belt of pure gold of Uphaz." We don't know where that is, it's an unidentified place in Scripture. So he sees this heavenly being appearing as a human. But obviously, it has all the trappings of deity. It is indescribable, terrifying glory. Imagine what it would be like to be on the bank of a river, and to look out across the river and all of a sudden you see this elevated in front of you. It produced paralyzing fear. I believe, dear friends that this was a theophany, a visible manifestation of the pre–Incarnate Christ, the Lord of Glory who reigned supreme over all of his creation, in the purity of his holiness. And the reason why I, and many other conservative scholars would believe this, is because Daniels description has undeniable parallels with other descriptions of the glorified Christ in Ezekiel and Revelation. In fact, John the Apostle had the same reaction when he saw the glorified Christ in Revelation 1:17. It says, "I fell at his feet like a dead man." It goes on to say in Revelation one beginning in verse 13, "In the middle of the lampstand I saw one like a Son of Man, clothed in a robe reaching to the feet and girded across his chest with a golden sash. His head and his hair were white, like white wool, like snow, and his eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like burnished bronze when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of many waters. In his right hand, he held seven stars and out of his mouth came a sharp two edged sword and his face was like the sun shining in its strength." We can go to Ezekiel chapter one and see a very similar description and a similar reaction.

Now notice the similarities back to Daniel 10, beginning in verse six. His body that he says, also "was like beryl." Beryl was, I should say is, a magnificent gem having a yellow and gold luster to it, kind of quartz like in structure. He goes on to say, "his face had the appearance of lightning, his eyes were like flaming torches." Imagine looking into the face, the glowing face of deity, and seeing the penetrating eyes of divine omniscience, looking back at you. Absolutely terrifying. This is what he sees. "His arms and feet were like the gleam of polished bronze and the sound of his words, like the sound of a tumult." We're not sure what he said, but his voice sounded like a thunderous crowd of people speaking in unison. Verse seven, "Now I, Daniel, alone saw the vision, while the men who were with me did not see the vision; nevertheless, a great dread fell on them and they ran away to hide themselves." They couldn't see what was going on, but they knew Daniel, and they saw what was going on with his face, the color of his skin, and they could tell something supernatural was occurring. And they rent ran and hid themselves.

So verse eight, "I was left alone and saw this great vision; yet no strength was left in me, for my natural color turned to a deathly pallor, and I retained no strength." Beloved, this is always the reaction in Scripture, when someone is given a glimpse of the glory of God, it is one of sheer terror, and overwhelming sense of utter unworthiness and helplessness. At that moment, all sense of self sufficiency and self-aggrandizement evaporates like a fog when the Son comes out, and beams its rays upon it. Verse nine, "But I heard the sound of his words; and as soon as I heard the sound of his words, I fell into a deep sleep on my face, with my face to the ground." He was in a state of shock, he just passed out. It was just overwhelming. Now, I think it's fair to ask the question, why would the Lord appear in this way, and terrify his humble servant to the point of death? Well, Scripture doesn't necessarily say, but when we look at this context, and we look at other passages of Scripture, I think it's fair to assume that what God wanted to do is to remind Daniel of his ineffable glory and his sovereign might. Behold, Daniel, look at me, the one to whom you were praying. I want you to see the preexistent, self-existent, uncreated Creator of the universe. I want you to look upon the one who is omnipotent, the great I Am that is omnipresent, that is omniscient, that is sovereign over all of his creation. I am the invincible ruler of the universe, be comforted with that, be strengthened by that. I am the one according to Isaiah 46:10, "declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times, things which have not been done, saying, 'My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish my good pleasure.'" O, dear Christian, when the storms of life, toss your little boat to and fro and you feel like you're going to be drowned in the depths of the sea. You must look up and behold the glory of God and be comforted by his great strength and care. Be confident in his purposes in your life come what may. If you're drowning in sorrow, perhaps here today, if you're collapsing under the weight of some great burden, if you're confused about the direction of your life, dear friends, please hear me. You need a soul destroying, I should say sin destroying, soul invigorating, so captivating vision of the glory of God. This is what Daniel needed. And it was something I'm sure he never forgot. You say Well, yes, pastor, but but how I how can we see such a vision? We cannot see what he saw. Well, that's true. In fact, the apostle Paul tells us that for now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face someday we will see Him face to face. Now I know in part he says, but then I will know fully just as I have also been fully known. But we can, dear friends, see the glory of Christ in the gospel. We can through the eyes of faith see him revealed on every page of Scripture. We can see him in his true church. Indeed, he abides in each one of us, Christ in you the hope of what? The hope of glory.

The apostle Paul made it clear in his epistles, that all that God is and all that God does speaks of his intrinsic glory, especially his invasion to the material universe through the incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ, which the apostle John described in these words, "and the Word became flesh," John 1:14, "and dwelt among us. And we saw his glory; glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth." Sadly, we live in an evangelical culture today that has little concern, to see the glory of Christ. His word is not that big of a deal, his person is not that big of a deal. People really don't want to know him intimately. They don't care to commune with him to nourish their souls upon his word. They just live for themselves. And certainly, this is true of the unregenerate. In fact, those without Christ, and if that is you, you're probably sitting here right now and you're absolutely bored stiff. And the reason for that is you are alienated from God, and you are darkened in your understanding, and you are without Christ, and therefore you are without hope. And I would challenge you to do business with God this day, repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved. But many professing Christians leave their first love, right? And as a result, they have no zeal for the glory of God or a passion to live in such a way that others will see the glory of Christ in them. They are just caught up in the world. And they don't see the Lord's glory, because frankly, they care nothing for it. The Titans game on Sunday is much more important. So their lives are powerless. And they serve what David Wells calls "a weightless God."

Let me give you a little background here because it's very important. The Old Testament Hebrew term for glory is "kavod." And it comes from a root word that means heavy or weighty. It carried the idea of the heaviness of something and was therefore used even as a measure of worth or a measure of value. For example, we might say that something is worth its weight in gold. So you see the value there. Therefore, the term is often used in a figurative sense in Scripture, to suggest the remarkable worthiness or intrinsic value of a person and when applied to the Lord Jesus Christ, as Daniel sees him, as he beholds him, he is absolutely astonished by the weight of his glory, which produces an ever increasing zeal for his glory. Beloved, bear in mind, because we are united to Christ, he dwells within us, and we not only reflect His glory, but it actually radiates from within us. But many today in evangelicalism know nothing of any of this. They know nothing of the glory of God, in his holiness, for example, which is the all-encompassing attribute of his infinite perfection, and purity and power. But oh, dear friends, to see the effulgence of the celestial majesty of God, the resplendent light of his glory glowing off of him. I long for that day, I hope you do as well. Even though I can't see it, as Daniel did, I can see it in my mind's eye and through the eyes of faith, through his word, I can see it clearly. But oh, how much more clearly, when we see him face to face. Child of God it is our zeal for God's glory that unleashes the power of the Holy Spirit of God within us, causing our lives to redound to the glory of God and our souls to be flooded with the inexpressible joy of his presence and his power. This is what God wanted to reinforce in Daniel. But sadly, as I say, many serve what David Wells calls "a weightless God." Here's what he said, "It is one of the defining marks of our time that God is now weightless." In other words, this is the opposite of "kavod." "I do not mean by this, that he is ethereal, but rather that he has become unimportant. He rests upon the world so in consequentially as not to be noticeable. He has lost his saliency for human life. Those who assure the pollster of their belief in God's existence may nonetheless consider him less interesting than television. His commands less authoritative than their appetites for affluence, and influence his judgment, no more awe inspiring than the evening news and his truth less compelling than the advertisers sweet fog of flattery and lies that," he says, "is weightlessness."

Contrast this dear friend to the Lord's command given to us in Psalm 96, beginning in verse two, "Sing to the Lord, bless His name, proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day. Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples, for great is the Lord and greatly to be praised; He is to be feared above all gods." Oh, dear Christian, the pre incarnate glory of Christ, mind you, dwells within you, in some mysterious way that we cannot fathom. Remember that he has redeemed us that he might inhabit us, and one day glorify us in ways similar to his glory. And let this be the driving force of your life. Let this animate your heart to perpetual praise and confidence in his sovereign plan. Much of which is delineated in His Word. This is why I believe he appeared to Daniel has such an amazing, unforgettable way. I mean stop and think about it. If you saw for just one second what Daniel saw, what would happen? I'll tell you what would happen. Every priority in your life would suddenly be different, right? Everything would change, and your confidence in his plan and purposes would be unshakable.

Now, back to the text. We've seen Daniel's mournful prayer to understand Israel's future in his terrifying vision of the glory of Christ. And now thirdly, we're going to see Daniel's angelic strengthening, necessary to proceed. Verse 10, "Then behold, a hand touched me." Now this is probably the hand of Gabriel. As we will see, Gabriel had done this before, for example, in Daniel nine. And he says he "set me trembling on my hands and knees." So get the scene now, Daniel is at the riverbank here he has seen this. He's now raised up from his face in the ground, but he still tottering to and fro on his hands and knees, he can hardly even remain in that posture. Verse 11, "He said to me, 'O Daniel, man of high esteem, understand the words that I am about to tell you and stand upright, for I have now been sent to you.' And when he had spoken this word to me, I stood up, trembling. Then he said to me, 'Do not be afraid, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart on understanding this and on humbling yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to your words.'" Oh, dear Christian, what a powerful reminder that God hears and he answers prayer. But remember, he hears and answers the prayers of those who fear Him, who humble themselves before him, who seek understanding. And what a testimony to see how God dispatches his angels, to do his bidding to minister to us. Remember Hebrews 1:14, they are "ministering spirits," the writer tells us "sent out to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation."

Now, what follows is evidence of how demonic forces are exceedingly active in thwarting the purposes and plans of God, exerting their influence on the rulers of nations. Verse 13, "'But the prince of the kingdom of Persia,'" This is now a reference to some powerful demon, perhaps, even Satan himself, "'The prince of the kingdom of Persia, was withstanding me for 21 days; then behold, Michael, one of the chief princes came to help me, for I had been left there with the kings of Persia.'" This is really fascinating. Michael, whose name means "who is like God" is one of the most powerful of the holy angels. He is the one who leads and protects Israel as we see, for example, later on in verse 21. In fact, in Jude nine, he's called Michael, the archangel, "archaggelos" in the original language, meaning the first angel. He is the one that goes on to say, who disputed with the devil, and argued about the body of Moses. That's another story for another time. And the phrase here in this text, "for I had been left there" is really interesting. In Hebrew, it helps us see in the passive voice, it's referring to being left over or remaining in a position of preeminence. As if to say he was the only one left on the field of battle. That's the idea. And so the point here is with the help of Michael, Daniel's visitor, who I believe is probably Gabriel, gained the victory, and was thus left beside the kings of Persia. In other words, he replaced Satan's demonic envoy and now assume the position of influence with the Persian ruler. Notice "kings" is plural. So the godly influence extended now to Persian kings for actually a period of two centuries, until Alexander the Great would come along and conquer them, and become the new ruler of the world. And these angelic battles, dear friends, have continued down through the millennia of redemptive history. Now, bear in mind, this conflict even continued even after the message was given to Daniel. So because Daniel was receiving the message isn't the reason for the conflict. Rather, it was probably, we can't say for sure, but probably related to Cyrus's decree to allow the Jews to return to Judea and rebuild the temple. Oh my, from Satan's perspective, that's one of the worst things that could ever happen. Because if Jerusalem is intact, and the people are in the land and the temple is rebuilt, what might happen? The Messiah might return, can't have that. This, dear friends, is why the Temple Mount in Jerusalem remains to this day the most disputed piece of real estate in all of the world. It is the epicenter of the battle between Satan and God. So God used his holy angels here, Michael and Gabriel to influence the Persian monarch to release the Jews against the will of Satan and the battle ensues, a battle that continued even with the demonic forces over Alexander the Great and his Grecian empire that would follow.

Verse 20, will speak of that. God's people would be under their jurisdiction, following the Persian dominance. And as I say, this warfare continues to rage to this very day, as the holy angels may battle Satan's minions that endeavor to rule this world system. And you know, Satan is the ingenious and diabolical general of a demonic army that's waging this invisible war against God and all who belong to Him; Ephesians six speaks of this in particular. He is according to Second Corinthians four four, "The god of this world; who has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ." But he is also an enemy that God will one day defeat. We read about that in Revelation 12, for example. You know, Hitler was one of Satan's great stooges. In Mein Kampf, he posited the lie that there was a Jewish conspiracy to gain world leadership. Do you realize that it's still going around to this day? Staggering. This became the heart of the Nazi propaganda that led to World War Two. And as a result, 85 million people were killed in a span of about five years. 55 million of them innocent civilians. Joe Biden and his administration are Satan stooges today, as have been other administrations that we've had. Their policies are not only destroying America, but they are absolutely antithetical to the will of God in Scripture. Their obsession with the brutal dismemberment of unborn and unwanted babies is just one example of this. They scoff, they censor Christians. And frankly, those who support these rulers are deceived, and they are damned because they do not know God. I can't imagine a person calling themselves a Christian voting for these people. It's incomprehensible. Like the godless Pharisees, of whom Jesus said, "'You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I speak the truth, you do not believe.'" Jesus went on to say "'He who is of God hears the words of God. For this reason, you do not hear them because you are not of God.'" For generations, the American people have been lied to by demonically empowered, elected politicians. Teachers in our public schools that tell them that there is no God. There is no creator, that all the magnificent things in this world, all of the living systems, in this physical universe, are really the exalt of some big explosion 13 to 15 billion years ago. We continue to be lied to by psychologists and philosophers who tell people that they are basically good. And if given the proper environment, their true nature will show. And oh boy their true natures do show. All you have to do is look at what happens in these so-called protests. Look what happens in the crime of so many of these cities. They tell people that man is basically deprived, not depraved. Oh, you can't say that. So they scoff at man's need for the saving, transforming power of the gospel. We've been lied to by college and university, professionals, professors, by progressive liberals who fanned the flames of identity politics. With the unbiblical concepts of critical race theory and intersectionality, the found the national tenets of the Black Lives Matter movement and so forth. We've been lied to by generations of false religions, false teachers, even within the ranks of evangelicalism to the point where so many evangelical churches today are populated by people that do not know Christ. They do not understand the gospel. They want nothing to do with the truth. And even many people who do know Christ are so superficial. They have no biblical discernment. And when you look at their lives, it's hard to distinguish them from the lives of the unregenerate today. We can't trust the media. We can't trust politicians. We can't trust the FBI, the DOJ, on and on it goes right. Why? Because "the whole world lies in the power of the evil one," First John 5:19. Ephesians six, Paul says in verse 12, "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." Who knows to what extent UFOs are tied to all of that? I don't know and I don't care. But we see this so clearly in our text this morning.

Back to the text, verse 14, Gabriel says, "'Now I have come to give you an understanding of what will happen to your people in the latter days, for the vision pertains to the day's yet future.'" In other words, what I'm about to tell you is the future far beyond what you've been praying about with respect to Israel.

Verse 15, "When he had spoken to me according to these words, I turned my face toward the ground and became speechless. And behold, one who resembled a human being was touching my lips; then I opened my mouth and spoke and said to him, who was standing before me, 'O my Lord, as a result of the vision anguish has come upon me, and I have retained no strength. For how can such a servant of my lord talk with such as my lord? As for me, there remains just now no strength in me, nor has any breath been left in me.'" In other words, he's saying here that I can't even hardly breathe, I'm so terrified. "Then this one with human appearance touched me again and strengthened me. He said, 'O man of high esteem, do not be afraid. Peace be with you; take courage and be courageous!' Now, as soon as he spoke to me, I received strength and said, 'May my lord, speak for you have strengthened me.' Then he said, 'Do you understand why I came to you?'" In other words, he's reminding him here that, that I've come to answer more than just what you were asking about pertaining to the immediate future of your people, but to show you also the spiritual warfare that is occurring in the world today. He goes on to say, "'But I shall now return to fight against the prince of Persia; so I am going forth, and behold, the prince of Greece is about to come.'" So this Prince of Greece now is going to be another emissary of Satan, to influence Alexander the Great and his people, and on and on, it goes down through history. So he obviously wanted Daniel, and all of us to be fully aware of the kind of spiritual warfare that's going on behind the veil of human awareness. And dear friends, were it not for God's omnipotence, which includes his use of the holy angels to accomplish his purposes, and fighting back the angelic, the demonic forces of this world, were it not for all of that, the people of this world would kill every single Christian and burn every single Bible.

Verse 21, "'However, I will tell you what is inscribed in the writing of truth.'" In other words, what I'm about to tell you is reliable, it's infallible, it's inspired. It's come from directly from God himself. Then he says something interesting, "'Yet there is no one who stands firmly with me against these forces except Michael your prince.'" In other words, Michael and I have this covered. We have this covered.

Then verse one of chapter 11 really goes with this, "In the first year of Darius the Mede, I arose to be an encouragement and a protection for him." In other words, two years earlier, Gabriel says, I went to assist Michael in a time of need. So relax, we've got this covered. By the way, that would have evidently been the time when the Jews returned to Judah under Sheshbazzar in Ezra one. And there was that return we know from Ezra, was fraught with all kinds of demonic resistance. And probably resistance may be coming from Darius and Cyrus, requiring both Michael and Gabriel to somehow intervene to gain the victory.

So, beloved, this is the introduction to what is to come in chapter 11, and chapter 12, a glorious preparation for revelation. And may I challenge you in closing this morning--dear friend, if you do not know Christ, today is the day that you need to place your faith in him because he is coming again. And for those of us who know him, oh, dear Christian, may we all get serious about our walk with Christ, about living lies for the glory of Christ and not for ourselves? I think of what Paul said in Philippians, three, beginning of verse seven, "Whatever things were gained to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ." More than that, he says, "I count all things to be loss." And here's why. "In view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them, but rubbish, so that I may gain Christ." No, this dear friends, God's plans cannot be thwarted by man or by demon. His kingdom will come and his will will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And let us all rejoice with great confidence in those realities and live consistently with them. Amen.

Father, thank You for the truths of your word that speaks so directly to our hearts. I pray that because of them even this day, you will save sinners and you will edify and encourage saints that we may live for your glory until you come again to take us unto yourself. We thank you, we give you praise. In Jesus name. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter nine. Once again, we are going to be looking at verses 24 through 27. As we continue to make our way through this amazing book, this will actually be part two of what I've entitled 70 sevens. Before we look at the text. I'd like to remind you of a few things that will, I think, help us set our mind where it needs to be, given what we have before us in this passage of Scripture. We understand from scripture that Satan is the father of lies, he was a murderer from the beginning, there is no truth in him. Paul tells us that he is, "the god of this world that blinds the minds of the unbelievers that they might not see the light of the glory of Christ." We know from First John five and verse 19, that "the whole world lies in the lap of the evil one." Temporarily, he is the god of this world. And his primary purpose is to thwart the purposes of God, and to do that at every level, in every way he possibly can. And he does this primarily through deceptions, false ideologies, false philosophies, using false teachers, using political movements that are rooted in false presuppositions. And we see this all the time in our culture today. In fact, we see this most blatantly, in political and theological liberalism, twin evils that destroy nations, and deceive people, damn men souls. We live in an age of mass delusion. Millions are ruled by impressions and beliefs that are contradicted by reason and rationality. We look at things like critical race theory. And millions of people actually believe that that is based in facts rather than leftist propaganda. Millions of people believe that there's nothing nefarious going on with all of this vaccine and vaccine mandates and all of these types of things. Millions of people believe that biological males can be females if they want to be, and vice versa. Millions believe there are more than two genders. In fact, there can be well over 100 according to some. They believe that you can choose to be whatever you want. I was reading just this last week, maybe you saw it in the news, the governor of New York has now made it illegal to misgender a transgender or transsexual person who identifies with the opposite sex. In other words, Misgender means to use the wrong pronoun that that person wants you to use. Millions believe that a 17-year-old boy is a white supremacist and vigilante when he was protecting himself from the physical attacks of three white males, criminals, that that who were trying to kill him, and all of this is on video. But that doesn't matter. Facts don't matter to people that are delusional. Dyjuan Tatro, senior adviser to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee said this in regard to this written house trial that we've seen unfold this week. Quote, "The American legal system is rooted in racism and functions to uphold white supremacy." That's like saying two plus two is five. Folks, this is the work of Satan in the heart and the mind of people that have no fear of God. What the Bible calls fools, and those people will despise wisdom and instruction and as a result, we know biblically that God punishes those who reject him by giving them over to a depraved mind, literally a worthless mind. And they become delusional. We read about this, for example, in Romans one beginning of verse 28, "And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, there, gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving and merciful. And although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them." This is what happens according to what Paul said in Second Timothy four and verse four, I believe it is, "when people turn away their ears from the truth, they will turn aside unto myths." In other words, whenever there is the deliberate rejection of truth, that will result in the delusional acceptance of lies. And that's where we're at in the world today in our culture today. That, by the way, is a form of divine judgment. But Jesus promises that those who believe in Him, according to John 8:31, "'If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine, and you will know the truth. You will know the truth and the truth will make you free.'" Therefore, as we come together today, I think of what Paul said in Second Corinthians 10, verse five, we are "destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ." So dear friends in an age where virtually everything we hear from our corrupt political leaders and corrupt health care experts, knowing that most everything is a distortion of the truth, and when most everything we hear or read from the news media is merely parroting their propaganda, it is truly a blessing--and I hope you understand where I'm coming from with this--It is truly a blessing to open up the truths of the Word of God and immerse ourselves in them. What would we do without His Word? We would walk in darkness. But his word is a lamp into our feet and a light into our path. Jesus said in John 17:17, praying to the Father, "'Sanctify them in the truth, thy word is truth.'" And Paul tells us in First Timothy 3:15, that the "church of the living God is to be the pillar and the support of the truth." And of course, the greatest of all truth is that of the Lord Jesus Christ, who said, "'I am the way and the truth and the life no one comes to the Father, but through Me.'T that's the truth of the gospel. We have much to be thankful for here in the United States of America. But dear friends, the greatest object of our praise has to be God's mercy and grace that he has given us through the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the power of his Word.

Let me remind you of the context here in Daniel. Because once again, we have an opportunity to immerse ourselves in some truth okay? After a heartfelt confession of sin for his Israeli countrymen, and praying as well for himself, he interceded on their behalf that God would somehow deliver them from exile from Babylonian captivity, restore them to their land. So God sends his angel Gabriel to answer his prayers. But his answer encompasses a far greater deliverance beyond that of the Babylonian captivity. He discloses his plan to deliver them from a far greater enemy, and that is the enemy of their sin itself. A remedy that can only be accomplished through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross at His first coming, and so his answer is going to include that. But it's also going to include something more than just deliverance from their Gentile oppressors there in Babylon. But he's going to also speak to a final day when they will be delivered forever, from Gentile oppressors, all earthly oppressors. And that will occur at the triumph of the Lord Jesus Christ, when he returns as King of kings and Lord of lords. And as we've already learned, all of this is going to basically require 490 years, 70 weeks, literally 70 sevens, divided into two seasons of deliverance, the first season requires 69 weeks, or in other words, 483 years that will lead up to the death of Christ. And then after an indefinite indefinite period of time, there will be the final 70th week, and that will culminate in the second coming of Christ, the Messiah, who will defeat the the armies of the Antichrist, who is bent on exterminating all of ethnic Israel and all who worship Him. So that's the context here.

So let's return to the text. Let me read it to you, beginning of verse 24, of Daniel 9. "'Seventy weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy place. So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, until Messiah the Prince, there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks; it will be built again with plaza and mote, even in times of distress. Then after the 62 weeks, the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing and the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. And its end will come with a flood; even to the end there will be war; desolations are determined. And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week. But in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate.'"

So in verse 24, remember, he begins with 70 weeks, literally 70 sevens, 70 heptads, in other words, units of seven. So in other words, 490 years have been decreed. Remember that is from a Hebrew root that means to cut out, or to divide, to cut off, to determine. This has been determined for your people and your holy city. So God has deliberately determined a 490 year period of time, he's cut this out from the rest of history to accomplish his purposes in delivering his covenant people Israel from their sins, and deliver them once again, to their capital city, Jerusalem, and so forth. This is all consistent with Daniel's prayer. And I might add, as we're going to see, these things did not happen at Christ's first coming as some want us to believe. And then he lists six magnificent objectives that will be accomplished during this period of time. He goes on in verse 24, to say, "to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place." And you will recall last week we went into this in detail. So here God reveals the future--future realities way beyond that which occurred within Antiochus Epiphanes, far beyond the events surrounding the life and ministry of Christ, far beyond anything that has ever happened in history. 490 years of judgment must occur in order for these six glorious objectives pertaining to your people, Israel, and your holy city, Jerusalem could be realized, verse 19. All of which looks to the Messianic Kingdom of Christ here on Earth. So this brings us to our text this morning, to the second division of the prophecy where God's Messenger, the angel, Gabriel, reveals the historical context in which these six objectives will be accomplished.

So let's look at the text closely, beginning in verse 25. "'So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks; it will be built again with plaza and moat, even in times of distress.'" Now notice the two divisions of time here. First, you have seven weeks, in other words, seven sevens or 49 years. And then after that, another 62 weeks, or 62 sevens, which equals 434 years. This means that something special occurred 49 years after the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. And then as we will see, 62 weeks later, or 434 years later, Messiah the Prince comes on the scene. Now the question is, what is the starting point? The "terminus a quo?" When did this begin? This first 69 weeks, this 483-year period, that will also include a final seven years or a 70th week? Now there are various calculations to give us the answer to this. And I will not bore you with all the technical aspects of those calculations, but I will give you what I believe is the most compelling of all, and there's only minor variations in them.

The first division of seven weeks, or 49 years began in 445 BC, when Artaxerxes gave the decree to Nehemiah to rebuild the city of Jerusalem, Nehemiah two. And we know that he completed his work around the 15th year of the Persian ruler, Darius Ochus, that would have been around 409/408 BC, according to historians like Prudeo as well as Josephus. But we have to admit that history is sketchy on all this. Furthermore, the full 49 years of that first division probably included that work of Ezra and Nehemiah combined, as they were trying to establish a working capital city of Judah. We know for example, if we studied Nehemiah, that the debris in Jerusalem was so great that it was impassable in places. And so it took almost a whole generation just to clean out the city before they could rebuild it. Nehemiah's work included the construction, as the prophecy said, of "the plaza and moat." Plaza could be translated wide place or street and moat is the fortification ditch filled with water and so forth. It's also clear from Nehemiah's account as you will recall that all of this work was done "in times of distress," as the prophecy says. And that also includes the great difficulties that Ezra had, during that time, in which he tried to restore the spiritual foundation of the people in order for Jerusalem, and the people of Israel, to function as they should. That's the first division of 49 weeks.

The second division of 62 weeks, or 434 years, until Messiah the Prince can also be calculated by using the same terminus a quo or the starting point of 445 BC. And the terminus ad quim, if you want to use the Latin or the ending point would be AD 32, the date of the triumphal entry of Christ into Jerusalem. So what you have is 49 plus 434. That equals 483. The exact number of years according to the biblical chronology. Now there was a man by the name of Sir Robert Anderson, who was a good theologian, but he was also a great investigator. In fact, in the 19th century he was the chief investigator for Scotland Yard. This man did a masterful job of mathematical calculations where he demonstrates most compellingly, that between the dates of March 14 445 BC--that's Nissan the 20th year of Artaxerxes, as we read in Nehemiah two one--between that date and April 6 AD 32, which was the date of the triumphal entry, there are exactly 173,880 days, or 483 prophetic years of 360 days, which fulfills the prophecy to the very day. As Leon Woods states, "The idea of considering prophetic years, that's lunar years of 30 days to the month, rather than solar, in this context, finds support in that the scriptures elsewhere, in prophetic passages speak of 42 months as equaling 1260 days." Like we read in Revelation 11 two, verse three as well, Revelation 12, six and 13 five. So this is based on the calculation that they would use 360 days in the year.

So back to verse 25, "'So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem,'" 445 BC, '"until Messiah the Prince,'" 32 AD, '"there will be seven weeks.'" In other words, 49 years, which was that period of restoration for Nehemiah, and Ezra, '"And 62 weeks,'" or in other words, 62, sevens, another 434 years, you add the 49 and the 434. Together, you get 483 years, forgive me for having to be so technical. But if you want to know the truth, you have to study it. All right? And I don't think you need your calculators for this. But it is fascinating to see the precision in the Word of God.

Now we come to verse 26. '"Then after the 62 weeks.'" In other words, there's been the seven weeks, and now you've got 62 more weeks. '"After the 62 weeks the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing.'" This is a reference to Christ's crucifixion. "Cut off,” “karath" in Hebrew means to put an end to, or to destroy, or to kill-- Genesis 9:11, Deuteronomy 20:20, Jeremiah 11:19. And sometimes in the Old Testament, it is a term that's even used to describe an execution. We read, for example, in Psalm 37, nine "evildoers will be." here it is "cut off." Proverbs 2:22, "The wicked will be cut off from the land." So, "After the 62 weeks that Messiah will be cut off," and he goes on to say, "have nothing." "Ayin" in Hebrew, it means nothingness, no one, nothing he deserved was awarded to him. I mean, think about it, Israel rejected him, his disciples abandoned him, his father forsook him as he bore the wrath that we deserve in his body on the cross. Indeed, in his humiliation, he had nothing, not even a grave. And so all of this came to pass.

So once again, verse 26, "'After the 62 weeks, the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing.'" Obviously this has happened. We know that Jesus entered into Jerusalem on Monday, the 10th of Nissan--that's April. The precise day by the way, when, according to Mosaic Law, sacrificial lambs for the Passover were to be selected. You read about this in Exodus 12. And he was cut off, he was crucified then, on Friday, the 14th. Bottom line, dear friends, Christ's death occurred shortly after the endpoint of the 69 sevens, that 483 years as Daniel prophesied, the 69 weeks were then fulfilled in total.

But notice what else he reveals in verse 26. "'And the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. And its end will come with a flood.'" Then he adds this "'even to the end there will be war; desolations are determined.'" Well, we know that this is exactly what happened. 43 years later, after Christ, "the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary." That's a clear reference to the Roman invasion and AD 70. We know historically that General Titus Vespasian, along with 50,000 elite Roman troops came to Jerusalem, and they ended up leveling Jerusalem, the city, including the temple. And by the way, the temple was destroyed on the very anniversary of the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE. My what a coincidence. Immediately 500 Jewish leaders were executed. And according to Josephus, there was about 2.7 million persons that occupied the city at that time. Many pilgrims had come for the Passover, and the Romans massacred 1.1 million Jews, about 100,000 were taken into slavery. People were scattered all over the world.

So as prophesied, "its end will come with a flood even to the end, there will be war desolations are determined." A more literal rendering in the Hebrew is "and the end of it will be in the overflowing, and unto the end, there will be war, a strict determination of desolations," or the "determined amount of desolations." So this seems to indicate not only what happened in AD 70, but also indicate that there this will be the ongoing experience of Israel until the end of the times of the Gentiles. The end, which we see in verse 27, is decreed. And of course, this is reality that's corroborated by many other prophecies. Now, bear in mind, all of this occurred before the final 70th week is revealed in verse 27.

So let's look at verse 27. "And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week but in the middle of the week, he will put us stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate." So verse 27, "and he," who is this? This is a very important question. A very controversial passage of scripture. Who is this referring to? The Messiah, or the prince who is to come? Our amillennial brethren would argue for the former, the premillennial position would argue for the latter, the latter is my position, the position of this church. And this is a key understanding Bible prophecy. I do not believe it could possibly be a reference to the Messiah in the previous verse, although there are many who will argue that that's what it's referring to, because they deny the future fulfillment of this text and see this last unit of Daniel's prophecy following immediately after the 69th week, and ultimately finding its fulfillment in the ministry of Christ. I do not agree with that position. And I want you to understand why. Primarily, it's because there's nothing in the context of Daniel's 70th week that corresponds to anything in Christ's earthly ministry, despite the most labored forms of interpretation. More specifically, let me give you a few thoughts so that we have this on the record. Rather than me just telling you what I think, I want you to know why I think what I think-- why we teach what we teach--why we believe what we believe.

First of all, the 70th week is depicted as a period of time that is distinct, it is separate from the first 69 weeks, and those first 69 weeks are clearly treated as one unit or one period of time. Secondly, the text goes on to describe how this person makes a quote, "a firm covenant" with the people. Well, that's something that Christ never did in his earthly ministry. The only way you can come up with that is come up with some fanciful, spiritual interpretation. Thirdly, even if he had made some kind of a covenant, it makes no sense to mention that here after the statements concerning his death and the destruction of Jerusalem. And fourth, in what way did Christ put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering? Now, some will say, well, that's a reference to his death on the cross. But I would humbly argue that that just doesn't fit the context of this prophecy. And how would these ancient people possibly make even a remote connection to something like that. Moreover, the sacrifices did not cease until AD 70, some 40 years later. That was stopped by the Romans, not by Christ. Fifthly, Hebrew grammar, and this is very important for an exegesis, Hebrew grammar requires that the subject of the verb be linked to the last eligible antecedent. Namely, in this case, verse 26, "the prince who is to come" who "will destroy the city and the sanctuary," that is the Roman prince, not going all the way back to 25, "Messiah the Prince." And it's also obvious here that something further needs to be said about this destructive prince who is to come. And then sixthly, in Matthew 24:15, in Jesus' Olivet Discourse, he refers to quote, "the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet." And when he speaks of that, he describes that as a future event beyond his earthly life and ministry. So the pronoun here in verse 27, and "he will make a firm covenant" refers to the "prince who is to come" in verse 26, not the Messiah. However, go a little bit further, because the events described at the end of verse 26, and those described in verse 27, and other parallel passages, as we will see, I do not believe that this refers to the Roman ruler of AD 70, but rather to another ruler of a Roman Empire, a future Roman Empire, that Daniel has already described, in his previous visions, represented by the figures of quote, "the fourth beast," and the 10-horned beast of chapter two, and the little horn in chapter seven. Who is this? The Antichrist, ruling a revived Roman Empire. So this means that there must be an extensive time gap between the 69th week and the 70th week, which is not at all unusual in Bible prophecy.

I might also add in Daniel 7:24, Antichrist is described as the one who will rule a massive kingdom that basically comprises the old Roman Empire, but it will be one of a western confederacy of a united Europe that Daniel describes as a 10-nation empire.

So one more unit of seven needs to take place. And in this text, in Daniel 9:27, that Jesus refers to as the prophetic template that we are to use to determine the chronological sequence of the birth pains, the beginning of birth pains. Remember in Matthew 24, and Mark 13, all of these things point to something yet future. And I might also add, as we will see in a moment, all of this correlates with Revelation six.

So again, back to the text, bear with me here, "and he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week." In other words, there is going to be a great deceiver that will lure Israel into a protective agreement called a firm covenant. "But in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering, and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate." Again, referring to a future Antichrist during Daniel's 70th week, a time also known as the Great Tribulation.

If we go to Revelation chapter six, we see the description of the seal judgments. The first one in verse two and this will be the first Seal Judgment that will come upon the earth is an era of unparalleled world peace. Isn't that what everybody wants today? World peace? Oh, yes, but it will be a great hoax. It will be a calm before the storm. There we read about "a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went off went out conquering and to conquer." He had a bow, no arrows just a bow, implying a diplomatic rather than a military victory, a peace sealed by a covenant, not by a war. And a crown was given to him he went out conquering and to conquer. The certainly fits the Antichrist, the one who will conquer the world in a bloodless triumph one day. So the first seal with its white horse and rider symbolizes a force of counterfeit righteousness that will come upon the earth that will bring the world into a pseudo peace, a deceptive world peace, a false peace, whose architect will be the Antichrist. He will seduce the world as a great political leader, with his political savvy and his personal charisma. And he will put forth a compelling plan to the world that will bring everybody together. It will be the greatest kumbaya in the history of mankind. He will form a strategic alliance with European nations and with Israel, and even Israel will be seduced by his sham, and finally he will rebuild the third temple. But three and a half years later, in the middle of the week, they will learn of his charade, when he desecrates the temple as we read here in verse 27. So "he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week," in other words, three and a half years in "he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering." Now I might add, dear friends, that this obviously means that a new temple has been built by this time. And I would encourage you to go online, and you can see the architectural plans for the third holy temple. All of that is in place today. Go to the Temple Institute. I've been there in the Old City in Jerusalem. I've seen many of these things with my own eyes, but they have everything all set up ready to go. They said they could build it within a year. You can go online and see a virtual reality tour of a mockup of their temple. But we read here that the Antichrist is going to demand that they stop their worship and worship Him. Now I know it's hard for us to fathom a political leader that wants to be worshipped, right? Ha. But this is what is prophesied.

So back to verse 27, "'And on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even one until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.'" So in the middle of the week, three and a half years, this satanically possessed antichrist will seize the temple, he will betray the Jews, demand that they worship him, just like his forerunner, Antiochus Epiphanes, and he will do this for 42 months, according to Revelation 13 and verse five. The last half of the seven years, this is part of the pre- kingdom judgments just before Christ returns. This is the one pictured in Revelation 13 in verse one and five as the beast that comes up out of the sea. Let me read this to you. He "was given a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies, and authority to act for 42 months was given to him." We dropped down to verse seven, "It was given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. And all who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world, in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." Now, what will he do that is so abhorrent to God? Well, the answer can be found as well in Second Thessalonians two beginning in verse three. He is described as "the son of destruction who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship." And then Paul goes on to say, "he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself and as being God." Of course, this has always been Satan's modus operandi. This is always how he has functioned. He has always wanted to be the one to be worshipped. This is why he is so determined to deceive people, even to this day, through false Messiahs and false prophets. Again, he is the father of lies. Second Thessalonians two in verse nine, we read more about him about the Antichrist, he is "the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved." Grammatically, this passage of Scripture in the original language indicates that this detestable thing, standing in the holy place will be some kind of permanent image probably of the Antichrist that's going to be displayed in the temple. This, dear friends, is the abomination of desolation that Jesus referred to in Matthew 24:15, where he quotes the passage that we're looking at right here in Daniel 9:27. This is what Paul was referring to, in Second Thessalonians two, three, as, quote, "the apostasy," which is associated with "the man of lawlessness" that must come first, just prior to the final day of the Lord. So God makes it abundantly clear to his people through Daniel, that a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is going to be poured out on the one who makes desolate and indeed, we know according to Second Thessalonians, two, eight, "the Lord will slay" this lawless one, "with the breath of His mouth by the appearance of His coming." Oh, I love those passages. They're so exciting. I love it when the bad guy gets it, right? Then he, along with the False Prophet, we read and other passages will be "thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone," Revelation 19:20. And this will bring to completion the prophecies of Daniel's 70th week.

Dr. David Larsen, in his excellent book, "Jews, Gentiles, and the Church," said this, "The stage for the beast and his religious cohort, the False Prophet, is the tribulation period, quote, 'the hour of trial that is going to come upon the whole world,' Revelation three one, or the time of quote, 'messianic woes,' as the Jews have spoken of them. In this timeframe, certain gigantic collectivism will arise to form the driving wedge of Satan's massive effort to frustrate God's purpose. Problems on earth seem insurmountable. No human leadership seems competent to address the complexity of the issues. A demographic explosion with moral social, economic, ecological and political ramifications baffles the think tanks of the world. Humankind's vaunted self-sufficiency evaporates in the face of insoluble questions. The church notwithstanding her frequent impotence and perennial failure is now gone, and the salt and light she has afforded are missing. Hom sapiens are adrift, rudderless." Larson goes on to say, "Nature abhors a vacuum, the old adage has it. The scriptures depict a brilliant charismatic personality, a demagogue of the first order, striding dramatically onto the stage of human history. It is George Orwell's '1984' and Aldous Huxley's 'Brave New World.' So desperate is the human race for solutions and answers that freedom easily becomes a casualty in the panic for security." As the late Paul Henri Spaak, prominent Belgian diplomat and astute European strategist, put it so boldly, quote, "We do not want another committee, we have too many already. What we want is a man of sufficient stature to hold the allegiance of all the people and to lift us out of the economic morass into which we are sinking. Send us such a man, be he god or devil and we will receive him." End quote.

Now, there is much speculation about who this man will be, where he will come from. But I would argue that it's all speculation. However, we do know much about his character, as well as his diabolical plans. I'll get into it just a little bit here in closing this morning. According to Daniel's description of the Antichrist, we learn that he will have no normal desire for or interest in women, Daniel 11:37, which will probably mean that he will be homosexual, or at least will be heterosexual, be celibate. And because of this, combined with his unprecedented religious ecumenical power, and setting himself up to be the object of worship, some believe that he will be the Roman Catholic Pope. We don't know, it's speculation; it’s possible. But what is fascinating to me is that the biblical descriptions of the person and the work of the Antichrist are precisely how the Muslims describe their redeemer in the Quran. And the Sunnah, sometimes called the Hadith, which is the words and the practices spoken by Muhammad, their oral traditions. And for them, the Christian Jesus is the Antichrist. The Satanic counterfeit. Yes, Muslims believe in Jesus, dear friends, but it's not the Jesus of the Bible. The Muslim Jesus plays a crucial role in their eschatology.

Let me review this for you briefly. They teach that Jesus was not the second person of the triune godhead, not the Son of God, but merely a man and a man that did not die. They teach rather that he went to heaven like Elijah. And this is very important for their theology. This means that in no way did he provide an atonement for sin. He did not die and be buried and raised from the dead. And they believe that he is in heaven right now alongside Allah, waiting for Allah to send him back. Why? If you read what they write, it's to correct all of the Christians and the Jews who have misunderstood who he is. And he will get married when he comes back, he'll have children, he'll die and he will be buried next to Muhammad. That's what they teach. Islamic eschatology is very revealing. There's three great signs in the form of man at the end of history, let me give them to you. First of all, they believe in the "Mahdi." He is the redeemer of Islam. He's also called the 12th Imam. He's coming to slaughter all those who refuse to worship Allah, and to establish an everlasting world dominating kingdom of Islam. This will be, for them, the final caliphate. He will have an army, he will carry black flags and on the black flags in Arabic is the word punishment and you've seen these black flags that Iran has and ISIL and all of that stuff. Today, they use this flag of jihad. And they claim that the Mahdi's ascendancy to power will be preceded by an army from the east. They'll be carrying black flags and banners of war. And the Hadith indicates that these black flags will come from the area of Corizon and they will signify that the appearance of the Mahdi is nigh. Corizon is in today's Iran. Surprise, surprise. And some scholars have said that this hadith means that when the flag, black flags appear from Central Asia, in the direction of Corizon, then the appearance of the Mahdi is imminent. If you study their eschatology, they say that he will make a peace agreement with Israel and the West for seven years. His reign will last for seven years, he will come riding a white horse, as it says in Revelation six one through two, according to their sources and he will be loved by the people who will massacre the Jews. He will establish his rule on the Temple Mount. He will discover hidden scriptures and Torah to show that they were wrong. You have to say is this the Antichrist? Well, all of the details in Scripture certainly point to this. The biblical Antichrist may well be the Islamic Mahdi, can't say for sure. They also believe that Jesus is going to return as a prophet. But by the way, the Mahdi is greater than Jesus. He returns as a radical Muslim, he arrives at Minaret near Damascus. He's going to come to help prove, help the Madhi prove that Christians and Jews were wrong. He will worship and serve the Mahdi. He will establish a real law, he will quote "shatter crosses," meaning destroy Christianity, he's going to refute all the truths of the gospel, deny that Jesus was the Son of God and died for sinners, rose again and so forth. And he will kill the Islamic Antichrist, who, from our perspective is the true Jesus that we worship, and then he will die and be buried with Muhammad. So dear friends, all that the Muslim Jesus is and does parallels the person and the work of the false prophet in Revelation 13, as well as chapter 16 and 19, "the beast coming out of the earth." By the way, bear in mind, dear friends that Satan is the master counterfeiter. He offers you things that looks like the real thing, looks like the truth, but it's not. And in Scripture, we see how he counterfeits the triune Godhead. Satan is the father, the Antichrist is the Son, and the False Prophet is the Holy Spirit.

A third thing that you need to understand about Islamic eschatology is that the true Jesus, the Son of God, our Savior and Lord, they call the Dajjal. Dajjal, the Great Deceiver, their antichrist. They say that he is blind in one eye, he returns on a mule, that he's an infidel, a false miracle worker. And he claims to be Jesus the Son of God. He will attempt to stop the Mahdi and Islamic Jesus who will slaughter him. I know some might say, Do you mean that the United States could someday be under the authority of the black flag of Islam? I can't say. But certainly it's a tenable hypothesis. Given everything that we see, even now, our current administration is sympathetic to Islam. I mean, we just gave Afghanistan, we just surrendered Afghanistan to these people.

It's inconceivable, yet this has happened. Europe is gradually being taken over by them. And I believe we're next given the delusional policies of the left here in America. Just before the pre kingdom judgments of the Tribulation, I believe that the true church is going to be snatched away according to First Thessalonians 4:16 16th through 18th, First Corinthians 15:51, through 52, and Israel will once again become the focus of God's attention. And when the snatching away, the rapture of the church happens, the United States will be utterly devastated. Imagine the sudden departure of Christians all over the world. God has warned us that just before Christ returns, Israel will be surrounded according to Zechariah 12 three, by all of the nations of the earth, "all of the nations of the earth will be gathered against Jerusalem." All includes the United States. Dear Christian, I would just encourage you to wake up and look and see how the world is being prepared for the Antichrist. We see this in Daniel's prophecies, we see it all through Scripture. He will be the most deceptive, demonic power and violent dictator in the world that beyond anything that we've ever seen; we see this all through Scripture.

And then there will be his false prophet, who will be his great religious enforcer and chief supporter. The Bible prophecies tell us that there will be a one world government, a one world religion, a one world economy. The stage is set for all of that right now. Had we talked about these things even 50 years ago, it would be hard for anyone to comprehend how these things could come to pass.

Well, in summary, I believe that the next thing to happen on the prophetic calendar is the snatching away of the church and the rapture. The Antichrist will appear on the scene to somehow bring the world into an understanding of what has happened. He will offer a peace plan to the world protection of Israel. Then after three and a half years, he is going to betray them, demand to be worship. And the abomination that brings desolation will occur, resulting in unprecedented desolation throughout the last half of the Tribulation, where Satan tries to destroy Israel through the Antichrist and his vast armies a time. Jeremiah 30, verse four and following calls, "the times of Jacob's trouble." Then Jesus will return as promised, in power and great glory as the King of kings, the Messiah of Israel. He will crush Satan, Israel will repent, be reconciled to Jehovah, be finally restored to their land, he will establish his millennial kingdom on earth, all at the end of Daniel's 70th week. And again, I would argue that God is not finished with Israel, even to this day, they are his beloved enemy. Isaiah 62, beginning of verse 11, says, "Behold, the Lord has proclaimed to the end of the earth, 'Say to the daughter of Zion, Lo, your salvation comes. Behold, His reward is with Him, and His recompense before Him. And they will call them, the holy people, the redeemed of the Lord, and you will be called, sought out, a city not forsaken.'" Today, the people of the world, especially our political leaders, have absolutely no understanding why the Temple Mount in Jerusalem is the most disputed piece of real estate in all of the world. And there is a reason for that. According to Scripture, a Jewish Temple is going to be built there next to Islam's Dome of the Rock. And that temple is the epicenter of two opposing kingdoms, kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan. And we see this all through Bible prophecy, including what we've just studied here in Daniel nine. O, dear friends, what an unfathomable blessing it is to be a part of the Kingdom of God, amen? And to know that God is sovereign over all things, he is working his plan, and he's given us somewhat of a template to let us see where things are going. I mean, we can't be precise with a lot of these things, but what we can be precise about is Jesus is coming again, he is going to make the crooked straight, he is going to take us unto himself, and we are going to enjoy him forever. And during this Thanksgiving season, I pray that you will contemplate these things, this time when his kingdom will come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And I pray that all of you are ready to see Jesus. Because dear friend, one day every knee is going to bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord. We're promised that and you will see him one day. And when you do, you will see him either in terror or in triumph. You will see him either as your judge and executioner or your Savior and Lord. I just pray that all of you who love Him and long for his return will express your gratitude. Not just this Thanksgiving season, but every day of your life, because that will be the theme of our song throughout eternity. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for your Word. And even though there are always things within it, especially in the context of eschatology that we can't be certain of, but certainly, we can be certain that you are in control. You have a plan to ultimately bring glory to yourself and to think that we are somehow part of that plan, what an amazing truth. And so we give you thanks, we give you praise. And for those that may not know you as Savior and Lord, even though they may have some religious ideas and do some religious things, Lord, I pray that if they're not truly born again, will you be merciful to them? Bring conviction to their heart and save them by your grace? And may we be instruments of your righteousness to that end. We thank you. We give you praise. Even so, Lord Jesus come quickly. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to the book of Daniel in the Old Testament? If you have not been with us, we go verse by verse through whatever book is before us. And we come now to Daniel chapter nine. We're going to be looking at verses 20 through 24 today, under the heading "Seventy sevens," Seventy sevens, and you will understand that more as we get into the text. I was thinking this week that there's probably never been a more sobering era in human history to study Bible prophecy than in the days in which we live right now. We live in an age of idolatry and sexual deviancy, fear, insanity, government corruption, and authoritarianism. We continue to witness the power of fear as these corrupt pharmaceutical companies with their own regulators, with the fox guarding the hen house, as you might say, continue to push their experimental vaccines on people; now even on our children, to protect us from a virus that has just a fraction of a fraction of a percent of killing you. The deception and the corruption, even within the CDC, the NIH, the FDA, is routinely censored. I've been looking into this a lot, here of late, because so many of you are asking me about this. And certainly I'm not here to give you the pros and cons of the vaccine. But I can tell you that much of the adverse reactions to this vaccine are being censored. Only onset treatment is being censored. We see big pharma has collaborative efforts with world governments big tech, with media; national and international public health organizations all working together to control the money, control the power, controlling economies, that control governments around the world, even our own children, our families, our careers, all under the guise of promoting and preserving health. And out of all of this, we see authoritarianism rising in the United States of America. like never before. Neo Marxist democrats will tell us we know best, so we will tell you what to do, what to think, how to teach your children. And so we experienced today censorship, lock downs, mandates, job loss, slander of those who dare say anything contrary to the agenda, the officials of the CDC and WHO. All of this is commonplace. Perhaps you just heard on the news, and I read the letter from the CDC, that after a formal demand, the CDC now concedes, it has no proof of a single instance of a naturally immune individual spreading the virus. And yet the deceptions go on, the pressure goes on. Folks, totalitarian regimes have always used fear to control people. One of the first things to go will be free speech. That's what we're seeing like never before.

Another reason why I believe this is prime time to study Bible prophecy is because of the rise of apostate Christianity. I would argue that the vast majority of evangelicalism today is thoroughly apostate, consistent with what Jesus said in Matthew seven and many other passages. Luke 18 verse eight, Jesus said, When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?'" The idea being that, not much. Remember when judgment came before was no oh, there were how many faithful ones? Eight. And Jesus tells us that when he comes again it will be like in the days of Noah. His return will be marked by persecution, apostasy and unbelief even among those who named the name of Christ. Today we look around in the so-called evangelical church, and we see sodomites, lesbians, transgender deceivers filling pulpits. Apostasy in the form of this wake, woke cult is overtaking the ranks of evangelicalism at an alarming rate. Class warfare, heretics preach their Marxist oppressor/oppressed ideology under the banner of redemptive social justice. I hear this stuff and I just shake my head. That somehow the redemptive work of Christ, to reconcile sinners unto himself is equal to the redemptive work of social redeemers of leftists, to reconcile sinful white people, to oppressed minorities. And then to have the audacity to claim that their definitions of justice and righteousness and the Gospel, bear the same weight of authority as that which is in the Word of God. Folks is not only ludicrous, it's blasphemous. And I just wonder, how much longer will God tolerate this escalation of evil, before the nostrils of God begin to flare and he rises from his throne, and he says, This is it. And he sets into motion the great day of his wrath, a day that is repeated throughout the Old Testament and even into the new. The Old Testament prophets called it the day of the Lord. Folks, this is coming. The Lord Jesus Christ warned of this as well in his Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, where he described the unparallel sufferings that will come upon the earth just prior to his returns, also described in the book of Revelation as the time when, quote, "the wrath of the Lamb, will be poured out upon," quote, "the inhabitants of the earth." And that will happen through a succession of dreadful cataclysms known as the seal and the trumpet, and the bowl judgments. And I might add that by comparison, the horrors associated with the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, pale in comparison. The Holocaust pales in comparison to what is coming upon this earth. These final judgments will culminate in the greatest of all eschatological conflicts known as the Battle of Armageddon. You read about it in Revelation 16. This is also known as, quote "the day of vengeance." according to Deuteronomy 32, verse 14 and Isaiah 63 and verse four.

I want to read you a passage of Scripture before we get to Daniel, actually, I want to read several to help you get the context here. In Isaiah 13, the Lord speaks through his prophet, and he looks beyond in this prophecy; beyond the immediate conquest of the Medo-Persians against Babel into a greater and final destruction of Babel, and that will occur by the Messiah when he returns. In Isaiah 13 beginning of verse six, we read this, "Wail for the day of the Lord is near! It will come as destruction from the Almighty. Therefore, all hands will fall limp, and every man's heart will melt. They will be terrified, pains and anguish will take hold of them; they will writhe like a woman in labor, they will look at one another in astonishment, their faces of flame. Behold, the day of the Lord is coming, cruel with fury and burning anger, to make the land a desolation; and He will exterminate its sinners from it. For the stars of heaven in their constellations will not flash forth their light; the sun will be dark when it rises, and the moon will not shed its light. Thus, I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity; I will also put an end to the arrogance of the proud and abase the haughtiness of the ruthless. I will make mortal man scarcer than pure gold and mankind than the gold of Ophir. Therefore, I will make the heavens tremble and the earth will be shaking in its place at the fury of the LORD of hosts, in the day of His burning anger."

Beloved, the world in which we live is marching inexorably towards this Day of Judgment. Jesus' ominous words in Matthew 24:15 and verse 21. And following, describe this period, known as the Great Tribulation and when you read about it, it just sends shivers up your spine. There Jesus says, "'Therefore, when you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place, (let the reader understand) then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains....For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.'" Jesus tells us that this will catch people unawares. They've ignored the warnings. He goes on to say in verse 36, "But of that day, and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be.'" They were preoccupied with all of the commonplace, mundane matters of life, life as usual--don't pay any attention to what that Bible says, or those crazy preachers tell you.

By the way, Jesus also gave some good news in that prophesy, Matthew 24, beginning in verse 29. First he says, "'But immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.'" And then here's the good news, "The sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds from one end of the sky to the other.'" Since the church will have been translated to heaven in the rapture, the elect refers to Jews and Gentiles that are saved during the time of the tribulation. That's the way the term is used throughout the Olivet Discourse. And dear friends this will put an end to the times of the Gentiles that we've been looking at in the book of Daniel. The book of Daniel confirms these prophetic realities. My dear and departed friend Dr. David Larsen offers an excellent summary of this as we read in Daniel, he says this, "The times of the Gentiles, culminate in judgment as portrayed by the prophet Daniel's metallic colossus in Daniel two. The structured Gentile world power persist to the end of the age and ultimate ruination when struck by the rock cut out of a mountain but not made by human hands, a rock that broke the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold to pieces, Daniel 2:45. The metals, while decreasing in value, increase in shear strength, until we come to the mixed iron and clay and the feet and the 10 toes, corresponding to the great image of the four beasts of Daniel seven. Out of the last of which creatures come 10 horns, Daniel seven, seven and following." He goes on to say, "Among these 10 horns arises a little horn of a particularly devious sword, who wages war against the saints, Jews who are saved in the tribulation period, and indeed inflicts great duress upon them," quote, "until the Ancient of days came and pronounced judgment in favor of the saints of the Most High and the time came when they possessed the kingdom. This time of suffering for the saints, the Jewish messianic woes is the trauma preparatory to the establishment of the Messianic kingdom." And he adds, "The little horn should be seen as the Antichrist."

Well with this now, we return to Daniel nine. And in the first 19 verses, you will recall that Daniel offers a heartfelt confession of sin, both his as well as his Israeli kinsmen. And he also intercedes on their behalf, pleading for not only forgiveness, but also restoration for a regathering of Israel to her land. A restoration that would also be spiritual--that the glory of God might be put on display in them before the world. He understood from his study of the Word of God, especially as he was looking at what Jeremiah said, that God was going to impose 70 years of judgment upon Israel because of their idolatry, and for their deliberate neglect of his sabbatical years. We see these warnings in Leviticus 26. And Daniel, of course, as you might remember, was wondering, hmm, how and when this captivity, when is this exile going to end. But as we are going to see, God's answer encompasses a far greater deliverance than what he was talking about; deliverance from their captivity. His plan included the deliverance from a more formidable enemy, the enemy of sin, the culprit that caused all of the problems to begin with. A remedy that could only be accomplished by Christ's death on the cross at his first coming. Moreover, God is going to look beyond their Gentile oppressors in Babylon, and the others, to a final day when they will be forever delivered from all earthly oppressors. And all of this will be accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ, at his second coming.

Well all of this is going to require 490 years, 70 weeks of years, or 70, sevens, and we're going to see that these are divided into two seasons of deliverance. I'm giving you a little summary of what we're going to study at great length. The first season will require 69 weeks of years. In other words, 483 years, and that will lead up to the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then after an indefinite period of time, that final 70th week would ensue a time yet future, culminating in the second coming of the Messiah King with his armies from heaven, who will destroy the Antichrist, who is bent on exterminating all of ethnic Israel, and all Christians who lived during that time, even Gentiles, all who refuse to worship him. Daniel gives the details of this in Daniel seven.

And so let's look at God's answer now, to Daniel's prayer beginning in verse 20, of Daniel nine. "Now, while I was speaking and praying and confessing my sin, and the sin of my people Israel and presenting my supplication before the Lord, my God, in behalf of the holy mountain of my god." Let's pause here, I want you to look at this. "The mountain of my God," in other words, on the basis of the city of Jerusalem, and the restoration of your temple where your people worship. That's what he's looking at here. And I might add, this is an important distinction. He's not praying for the church. He's not praying for the body of Christ or for all of the elect down through redemptive history. This present, church economy or the stewardship of God's grace was hidden to Daniel, it was hidden to the Old Testament prophets, we read about this in Ephesians three, two through 10, Romans 16:25, through 26. The focus of his prayer to God, and the answers that God gives him, has to do with the restoration of quote "your desolate sanctuary," as we saw in verse 17, and verse 18. "Oh my God," he says, "incline Your ear and hear! Open your eyes and see our desolations of the city which is called by Your name." So God's answer will address his dealings with Israel on the bases of his covenant promises to them that he will indeed fulfill all that He has promised to them. That's what Daniel, that's what all of them were looking for. This is one of many reasons why I believe the church will not go through the tribulation. That's another whole study. The church will not be a part of Daniel's 70th week there, God is focusing on his promises to Israel. There's many other exegetical reasons why I would argue that, but throughout scripture, and especially here and Daniel nine, we see, God's plan for Israel is distinct from his plan for the church. The church will later on become the temporary custodians of God's truth. And I might add that I do not believe that the church has permanently replaced Israel in God's plan of redemption. Many people teach that and believe, some of my very best friends believe that. I do not see that in Scripture. This is certainly not a test of orthodoxy but it's an important distinction. If you're going to understand what we believe here at Calvary Bible Church with respect to premillennialism, this is an important distinction.

And I might add, it's worthy of a bit of a digression here, if you will bear with me, I do not believe that ethnic, national, territorial Israel are all permanently absorbed into the universal Christian Church, thereby permanently eliminating their national identity. This is often known as Augustinian or Roman Catholic eschatology. Sometimes it's called supercessionism, amillennialism, replacement theology and so forth. I do not believe that all of the promises given to Israel in the Old Testament were forfeited by their unbelief. I don't see that in Scripture. I don't believe that all of those promises are now given to the church in some spiritual sense, as God's chosen people to be his witness, his witnesses Israel failed miserably. Indeed they did. But is there a level of sin that surpasses grace? I think not. Psalm 130 and verse three, "If thou Lord, oh Lord should mark iniquities, Who could stand"? However, as we look at Scripture, because they quote, "rejected the chief cornerstone," Matthew 21:42, Jesus said in verse 43, "'Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you, and be given to a nation producing the fruit of it.'" Now, the supercessionism will argue that here, Jesus permanently rejects the nation of Israel, and the nation to whom the kingdom would be given is now the church. I think that is highly unlikely for several reasons. Just briefly, if we look at this text, we see that Jesus is addressing the chief priests and the Pharisees. He's addressing these wicked, hypocritical leaders of Israel that were determined to kill him. He was not addressing Israel as a nation as a whole. In fact, three verses later in verse 45, Matthew tells us that the religious leaders quote, "understood that he Jesus was speaking about them". Although Jesus antipathy towards the Jewish leaders continued to increase throughout his earthly ministry, he never shows any contempt for the multitudes. In fact, on the previous day, we see how he wept over Jerusalem, and they constantly acclaimed him as the messianic Son of David. Furthermore, other passages in Matthew's gospel reaffirms the idea that Jesus fully anticipated Israel's future restoration. In chapter 19, verse 28, he offers much needed reassurance to the disciples and He says, "'Truly I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel.'" "You who have followed me in the regeneration," "palingenesia" in the original language, it literally means rebirth, regeneration. It's referring to the Messianic age, clearly a reference to the earthly kingdom described in Revelation 20 verses one through five. It'll be when he says the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne and you also shall sit upon 12 thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. I might add that Peter also understood Jesus words. In Matthew 19:28. He understood that he was referring to a messianic kingdom, he wasn't referring to the church. Later, when Peter called the men of Israel to repentance and Acts three, in verses 20 through 21, he spoke of, quote, "The Christ appointed for you "whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from ancient time." You see, none of the prophets had spoken about the church, none of them had spoken about the inclusion of both believing Jews and Gentiles in a new spiritual community, the body of Christ, that was a mystery not disclosed in the Old Testament. Romans 16, verse 25, we read that it's a "mystery which has been kept secret for long ages past." We see the same thing in Ephesians, three, two through six.

So back to Matthew 21:43, "'Therefore, I say to you,'" referring to the wicked leaders of Israel, "'the kingdom of God will be taken away from you, and given to a nation.'" An "ethnos," a new nation spiritually, but also the same nation historically; a restored future Israel, we read about it in Romans 11:11, through 15. A nation that will experience a new birth. Isaiah 66, five through 13. A nation producing the fruit of it and so forth. Another passage affirming the restoration of Israel, and why I see a distinction between Israel and the church, and I believe that's what Daniel is seeing and what God is speaking about, in Daniel nine--in Acts chapter one and verse three, we learn that Jesus met with his disciples for a period of 40 days after His resurrection. 40 days. And what was the main topic that Jesus spoke about? He was speaking it says of the things concerning the kingdom of God. Then in verses six through seven, Luke records Jesus final interchange with his apostles before his ascension, when he once again affirmed the idea of restoration of national Israel. There we read, "When they had come together, they were asking Him saying, 'Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to to Israel?' And He said to them, 'It is not for you to know times are epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority.'" Now, I would humbly submit to you that if God was finished with his covenant people, Israel, and the church had therefore permanently replaced her as a new spiritual Israel, this would have been a perfect place for Jesus to have made that abundantly clear. If that were true, why wouldn't he have corrected them? Why wouldn't he have said, no, no, no, no, wait a minute. I've been with you for 40 days speaking to you concerning the kingdom of God. Don't you understand that ethnic, national, and territorial Israel is now absorbed into the universal Christian church, thereby eliminating their national identity? Don't you understand that the physical Messianic Kingdom once promised, Israel has now been changed to a spiritual kingdom, and you're living in it right now? Don't you guys get that? Well, obviously, he didn't say that because I don't believe any of that's true.

Romans 11 and verse one, Paul said "God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be!" The apostles understood this. And like Paul, they long to see the spiritual salvation and the physical restoration of their nation Israel. So it was appropriate for them to ask, "Lord, is it at this time you are restoring the kingdom to Israel?" We can go to the book of Romans in Romans chapter nine. The focus is on Israel's election, he assures them that God has not forgotten, he has not rejected his chosen people. Quite the contrary. In chapter 10, the focus is on Israel's defection. There, the apostle Paul explains why Jews rejected their Messiah and remain in ignorance and unbelief. Why salvation is now extended to the Gentiles, all of which is part of God's plan, even for Israel. And then in chapter 11, the focus is on Israel's salvation. God made it very clear that the specific promises that He had made, to his chosen nation, would come to fruition. Now some of those were conditional dependent upon their obedience, but his greatest promises were unconditional based upon God's character. And to this day, because of their unbelief, God is disciplining them as a nation. They have been temporarily put aside, as Paul says in verse 25, "until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in," and then in verse 26, eventually he says, "all Israel will be saved just as it is written, THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. And this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins." So I'm convinced that Israel was God's unique focus of redemption in one dispensation in the Old Testament, while the church, consisting of both Jews and Gentiles, has been his focus since their rejection of Jesus. However, I believe Scripture teaches that God will eventually focus once again, on Israel during the millennial reign of Christ on earth when all of the covenant promises that he has made to Israel will be fulfilled literally, including the the earthly blessings and the earthly Messianic kingdom. Prophetic literature is filled with the pivotal role Israel plays during that time. So I believe that the church shares in the promises of Israel, but not in their unique identity. (Audio not able to be transcribed)....And in that he says, quote, "The prophecies concerning Israel are the key to all the rest, true principles of interpretation in regard to them will aid us in disentangling and illustrating all prophecy together. False principles, as to them will most thoroughly perplexed and overcloud the whole word of God," end quote. And speaking on Ezekiel 37 that we read earlier in our scripture reading--in 1864, at the Metropolitan tabernacle, Charles Spurgeon was soliciting funding for the British Society for the Propagation of the gospel amongst the Jews. And Spurgeon declared this, quote, "The meaning of our text," referring to Ezekiel 37, the dry bones that come to life and so forth, "The meaning of our text as opened up by the context is most evidently, if words mean anything, first, there shall be a political restoration of the Jews to their own land, and to their own nationality. And then secondly, there is in the text, and in the context of most plain declaration, that there shall be a spiritual restoration, a conversion, in fact of the tribes of Israel." He went on to say, "Her sons, though they can never forget the sacred dust of Palestine yet die at a hopeless distance from her consecrated shores. But it shall not be so forever. They shall again walk upon her mountains, shall once more sit under her vines and rejoice under her fig trees. And they are also to be reunited. They shall not be two, nor 10, nor 12, but one, one Israel praising one god, serving one king, and that one king, the son of David, the descended Messiah. They are to have a national prosperity which will make them famous. They, so glorious shall they be that Egypt and Tyre and Greece and Rome shall all forget their glory and the greater splendor of the throne of David." And then Spurgeon said this, "If there be meaning and words, this must be the meaning of this chapter. I wish never to learn the art of tearing God's meaning out of his own words, if there'll be anything clear and plain, the literal sense and meaning of this passage; a meaning not to be spirited or spiritualized away, must be evident that both the two and the 10 tribes of Israel are to be restored to their own land, and that a king is to rule over them."

Now, after a long and weighty digression that I felt was important for me to get out, back to Daniel nine, verse 21, "While I was speaking in prayer, then the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision previously, came to me in my extreme weariness about the time of the evening offering." That's a reference to the meal and drink offering would have been between three and 4pm. I find it intriguing here, he speaks with his extreme weariness, any of us who have labored long hours and prayer; for that which is burdening our hearts, we know that it is difficult, even physically. But isn't it interesting, it had been 70 years since Daniel had offered the sacrifices in Jerusalem. Now the temple is destroyed, but notice he continues to worship the Lord, as if he was right there in the temple as if nothing had ever changed. Would that we all be so faithful in honoring the Lord. Verse 22, "He gave me instruction and talked with me and said, 'Oh, Daniel, I have now come forth to give you insight with understanding. At the beginning of your supplications the command was issued, and I have come to tell you, for you are highly esteemed." It could be translated, "counted precious." So God hears his prayer, dispatches Gabriel to answer it. And then Gabriel says, "so give heed to the message and gain understanding of the vision."

And here he begins, "70 weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city." Now 70 weeks, literally 70 sevens, or 70 heptad units of seven. So 70 times 70, 490 years have been decreed. The term "decreed" comes from a Hebrew word, "chathak," it means "to divide, to determine, to to cut off, to decide something to determine something." So the 70 weeks has been divided, has been cut off, "for your people and your holy city." And so in other words, God has deliberately determined that these 490 years would be cut off from all the rest of history to accomplish his purposes in delivering the people of Israel and their capital city, Jerusalem. And that's all consistent with Daniel's prayer. Which by the way, did not happen. All of those things did not happen when Jesus came the first time.

Now I want to focus on the six magnificent objectives that are to be accomplished in this regard. Notice what he says, again, "70 weeks had been decreed for your people in your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy place." So here, beloved, God reveals the future events I might add, that are far beyond that which occurred with Antiochus Epiphanes, far beyond the events surrounding the first coming of Christ, far beyond anything that has ever happened in history. So in other words, 490 years of judgment must occur before the six glorious objectives can be realized. All of which look to the Messianic Kingdom on earth, all consistent with Old Testament prophecy, even New Testament prophecy.

For example, in Acts three, verse 19, we read, "Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; and that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you, whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time." Again, go to Romans 11, beginning in verse 12. Paul says, "Now if their transgression is riches for the world, and their failure is riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fulfillment be!" Referring to the unbelieving Jewish people. Verse 15, "For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be, but life from the dead?" And in verse 25, "For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery--so that you will not be wise in your own estimation--that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved just as it is written, THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. This is my covenant with them, when I take away their sins. From the standpoint of the gospel, their enemies for your sake," you Gentiles, "but from the standpoint of God's choice, they are beloved, for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable."

So again, six magnificent objectives are to be accomplished during this 490 years. The first three are all negative realities that must be a eradicated. Namely, man's global rebellion against the Most High God. So the goal first here is to deal with sin and Satan, both of which are defeated at the cross. The first three are to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity. Now, it's important that we look at these closely because if you're like most people, you come to a passage like this, you read through it, have no real idea what it said, but you kind of move on to something else that will kind of speak to your heart-- when you're missing out on a whole lot. So let's don't do that.

Notice what the Spirit of God says, through Gabriel. First of all, "to finish" where it could be translated and "restrain the transgression." Transgression here is a term used to describe the violation of God's law, those that revolt against God's authority, specifically, Israel's unrelenting and unrestrained rebellion against God. If we were to go to Ezekiel, Chapter 20, beginning in verse 34, you will see how the prophet describes the elimination of all the apostates from the land of Israel during the Millennium. And Jesus described the same thing is going to happen among the Gentile nations in his Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24 and Matthew 25. In fact, during Christ's earthly reign, Isaiah 11 and verse 10, tells us that "the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." Can you imagine that? Sin will not be completely eliminated because unregenerate children will be born to those who enter into the millennial reign of Christ. And many of those unregenerate children will continue to reject Christ. So there will be occasional situations of rebellion, requiring the Lord to rule over them with a rod of iron as we're told. But that's going to be the exception, not the rule. Christ himself during that time is going to restrain sin during his reign, but it will be utterly non existent in the eternal state. You must bear in mind that the millennial reign of Christ is the consummating bridge between human history and the eternal state where sin will be eradicated completely.

He then uses, Gabriel now uses, nuances of terms and repetition in these parallel clauses he says, not only to "finish the transgression," but also "to make an end of sin." This is something else that's got to happen during this 490 year period, to make an end of sin. Here the term for sin is a more general term for all wrongs. And it carries the idea here when he says to make an end of, it's to seal it up, that it might be concealed, to even the idea of judging it with finality. And again, these are nuances. They're almost synonyms of all that God is going to do with respect to sin. Hebrews nine in verse 26, we read, "But now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." So all of that was set into motion at the cross.

But then there's this magnificent climax, he says also, "to make atonement for iniquity." Atonement, a Hebrew term "kaphar," it means to cover by means of an expiatory sacrifice, or literally to make a covering. To provide a moral repayment for a fault or an injury. In fact, if we look at Scripture, we see progressive revelation, and how the death of Christ was foreshadowed by many Old Testament types and symbols. Remember the coats of skin that God made for Adam and Eve in the garden? That was a picture of a coming Redeemer. The animal offering of Abel in Genesis four, the offering of Isaac by Abraham in Genesis 22. It goes on with the Old Testament sacrificial system that we read about, especially in Leviticus 17, the brazen serpent, erected by Moses in Numbers 21. The Passover lamb in Exodus 12. All of these things point towards an atonement. Atonement, by the way always involves two things satisfaction and substitution, satisfaction of the offended holiness of God accomplished only by an acceptable substitution. An innocent life must be given for the guilty, one who has offended the holiness of God. And this is why Jesus had to taste death for everyone, right? This is how salvation is made possible. This is the only way God can forgive sin and still remain holy. And what this accomplished, the way is paid for the second, three positive objectives in this 490 years. And that is, number one, to bring in everlasting righteousness.

I'm reminded of Isaiah's prophecy to Judah in Isaiah five, verse seven, he says, he speaks of Israel as the vineyard of the Lord of hosts, "The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His delightful plant." So given the idea here is, given all that God has done for them, he's expecting them to do better than what they've done. And he goes on to say, Thus He looked for justice, but behold, bloodshed for righteousness, but behold, a cry of distress." In Hebrew, it's a play on words. He looked for justice, which is "mispat", but behold, bloodshed "mispah." I looked for "mispat" and I got "mispah". And the same thing he goes on to say, I look for righteousness, which is "sedaqa', I look for "sedaqa," and I got "seaqa" So where's the righteousness going to come from? It has to come from the one who would make atonement for sin, the only one who can bring in everlasting righteousness. Only the Lord Himself can do this. It's fascinating. The removal of sin that he accomplished on the cross will be appropriated by Israel as a nation when Christ returns. It's an amazing thought. Many passages that speak to this, I'll give you but one, Jeremiah 23, beginning of verse five, "And behold, the days are coming." I love it when the prophets say that, "Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch; and He will reign as king and act wisely and do justice and righteousness in the land. In His days, Judah will be saved and Israel will dwell securely. And this is His name by which He will be called the Lord, our righteousness."

Well not only is he going to bring in everlasting righteousness, we read that there'll be a time when he will "seal up vision and prophecy." Seal up, the term that carries the idea of hiding from view and demonstrating that its functions are over. What would that would be, well vision, to seal up vision, the functions of the vision, what's vision? Revelation, not only revelation, but prophecy, the message of the prophets. My dear professor, Dr. Whitcomb said this, quote, "Similarly, in the post apostolic phase of church history, we have no further need of such ministries, possessing as we do the completed revelation of God and Holy Scripture." He's referring here to vision that is special revelation, and prophecies and so forth. He went on to say, "during the first half of the 70th week of Daniel, two witnesses will prophesy to Israel."

I need to backup, we have no further need of such ministries, possessing as we do the completed revelation of God and Holy Scripture. You know, we've got the closed canon here. We don't need somebody to come along and say, God told me this, God told me that; we don't need that. Don't pay any attention to that. But he says, "During the first half of the 70th, week of Daniel two witnesses will prophesy to Israel in order to launch the 144,000, and others into global witness for Christ after the rapture of the church, you read about that in Revelation 11." But he says, "All such prophetic ministries will end forever at our Lord's return to Earth.

So it's during this time, it's going to bring in everlasting righteousness, seal up vision and prophecy, and then finally, "to anoint the most holy place." The term anoint means to officially inaugurate something into public ministry. And what is the most holy place it could be translated literally, the Holy of Holies. This underscores the profound importance of the millennial temple that is described in Joel three in verse 18, Isaiah 60 verse seven, Jeremiah 33 verses 20 through 22, Ezekiel 37:26 through 28. And then Ezekiel chapter 40, all the way to chapter 48. Prior to this, during the Great Tribulation, the Antichrist we know will desecrate a newly constructed temple. We read about that and our Lord's Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24. Also in Second Thessalonians two verse four, Revelation 13:15. But when the Messiah returns, that will be done away with and a magnificent new temple will be built, And Ezekiel tells us this, "and the glory," remember the glory of the Lord, the Shekinah, that left, all right? And didn't return until Jesus returned and it was veiled in his body. Now it says, "The glory of the Lord will come into the house by the way of the gate, facing toward the east," Ezekiel 43 and verse four. So the Lord will come into His temple. And of course, during the eternal state, there will be no temple, because the Lord himself will be the temple.

So these six objectives, Gabriel tells Daniel will be accomplished in these 77s, 490 years that God has carved out of history to accomplish his purposes in delivering the people of Israel, their capital city, Jerusalem, consistent with all of his covenant promises. 490 years before Messiah would finally established the long awaited kingdom, for which Daniel prayed. Now, the next verse tells him when the clock is going to start ticking. And we'll look at that beginning the next time. Oh, dear friends, what a glorious future awaits the redeemed. Amen? And what a glorious God to not only make this possible, but to make it certain. I get so excited when I think about it. All of this stuff we deal with is one day going to be over. And the Lord is going to reign, every knee will bow every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord, let's pray together.

Father, thank You for these eternal truths. We pray as always that by the power of your Spirit, you will ignite our hearts and prays to the one who gave Himself for us our Redeemer and our coming King. And Lord, for those that may not know you, that may have some religion, but they have really never been broken over their sin. They've never cried out to you for the mercy that you will give. As a result of repentant faith, I pray that you will break their hearts, give them no sleep upon their pillow until they do business with you. We commit this to you by your grace, and for your glory. Amen.

It is my great joy and privilege to be able to minister the word of God to you this morning. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter nine, we continue to make our way verse by verse through this great Old Testament prophetic book. And we are looking at part two of Daniel's prayer of confession and intercession, as we just read a few minutes ago. In Jesus prayer in John 17, he said, "'This is eternal life, that we may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.'" And dear friends, that is the purpose of what every faithful pastor will do on a Sunday morning. We are here to open up the Word of God so that you might know who God really is, and to know His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, You will recall that it was for this reason that Paul said, I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. And so we are here to learn more about these things, especially as we look at the prayer life of this choice servant of God, that lived many years ago, a man that we will one day see and be able to fellowship with, for eternity, an amazing thought is not? Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones said, "It is in prayer that we come as near as we ever shall, in this world, to the ultimate purpose for which God has created and redeemed us. That is, that we might know Him and glorify Him." Dear friends, disciplined, fervent, persistent prayer will be the very air that a Christian breathes if indeed, they truly love the lover of their soul. It will be a part of who you are. The truest passions of a man's heart can be heard most clearly in his or her prayers. For it is there that the Spirit's secret work is most evident, and his power is most manifested. In fact, Spurgeon said, "Prayer is the cylinder nerve that moves the muscle of omnipotence." He also said, "It is the highest activity of which the human soul is capable." So as we come to the word this morning, we do so with these things in mind as we examin Daniel's prayer of confession and intercession.

May I remind you that Daniel nine is divided into two parts, the first 19 verses speak to the issue of his prayer. And then the final verses speak, regarding God's answer to his prayer. And we've been examining this chapter under four headings. We've looked so far at the impetus of his prayer and the focus of his prayer. And now this morning, we will conclude the study on the humility of his prayer and the burden of his prayer. Let me give you a bit of a review here regarding the impetus of his prayer. In the first two verses there we read, "In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, of Median descent, who was made king over the kingdom of the Chaldeans. In the first year of his reign, I Daniel observed in the books, the number of the years, which was revealed as the word of the Lord to Jeremiah, the prophet, for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years." So here, once again, we see that the impetus for Daniel's prayer was his study of the Word of God as it was revealed to the prophet Jeremiah concerning the 70 years of judgment that God had imposed upon his nation Israel, because of their idolatry, and especially because of their neglect of his appointed sabbatical years. And there's warnings about this, for example, in Leviticus 26. And Daniel was also familiar with the last seven chapters of Deuteronomy. That's Deuteronomy 28 through 34 that provide as David Larson says, quote, "The matrix out of which the great prophecies of the Old Testament regarding Israel emerge." I wanted that for an overhead last week, and we weren't able to get that. So now you have it in your bulletin. So you can study that later. So you see it once again, that these are the types of things that Daniel would have understood as a student of the word. So he knew what God had said, but he didn't really know when the clock had started to tick when the judgment would be over and so forth. But to be sure, the word of God animated within his heart, a desire to come before God, and to cry out to him for understanding. And certainly the study of the Word will always be the the spirit generated wind in our sails, that move us along, in worship and praise in our life. Shallow study, I might add, will produce shallow praying, and all of that will produce a shallow Christian life that will forfeit blessing. So the emphasis of his prayer was, when is the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely the seventy sevens, when is that going to occur?

Secondly, by way of review the focus of his prayer, verse three, we see, "I gave my attention to the Lord to seek Him by prayer, and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes." Again, the because of the deep burden for his countrymen, his rebellious countrymen, and because he longed for the glory of God to be manifest in the world, he jettisoned all of the distractions in his life, that he might focus his attention solely on the Lord. Adonai, here, the Lord, master the Lord God. And He alone is the ruler of heaven and earth, all authority is his. He is the object of faith and worship. And so he looked intently to God, nothing else got in his way.

And that brings us now number three to the humility of his prayer. And we will begin here, especially in verse five, and we are going to see that his humility has manifested primarily in his sensitivity to sin, and hatred of sin, not only in his countrymen, but also in his own heart. Again, verse four, "I prayed to the Lord my God and confessed and said, 'Alas, oh Lord, the great and awesome God who keeps His covenant and loving kindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments, we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly, and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances.'" Here beloved, we witness one of the most common effects of in-depth study of Scripture. Notice what he says, "I prayed to the Lord," be translated Yawei, which is the sacred and personal name that God derived from what is called the tetragrammaton, meaning the four letters, the four Hebrew, consonants translated in English as Yahweh, Y H. W. H. You will recall that when Moses came before God at the burning bush, and inquired of God, concerning his name in Exodus three, God responded to him and said, "'I am who I am. Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, 'I am' has sent you.'" And in this we see the great theological truths concerning the great I Am. He is saying that I am the self-existent eternal one that always has existed and always will exist. So this name speaks to his self-existence, his preexistence, the one who has no beginning and no end. That's who Daniel is praying to. He is the one that is eternal and unchanging in his nature. He is the infinitely Holy covenant making and covenant keeping God of Israel who was gracious to all upon whom he has set his love. And apart from this understanding of the one true God, dear friend, your prayers will be superficial, at best, and self-serving at worst. So this is where we must begin.

I might add to this is, it's important for you to understand. So I'm going to dwell on this for a moment. This person in the name of God, Yahweh is used 6800 times in the Old Testament. But in the book of Daniel, it is only used in this chapter and it's done so seven times. We see this as well in the New Testament with reference to Jesus, the Son of God. You will recall, for example, in John one and verse one, we read, "In the beginning was the Word," and the word "was" is the imperfect tense of the verb, "to be" from which we get "I am." The point is, in the beginning, the great I AM, the Lord Jesus Christ, was already in existence, because there was never a time in which he did not exist. And repeatedly in the New Testament, especially in John's gospel, we read about the "I am." Jesus repeatedly uses this as his title. He said, "I am the bread of life." "I am the light of the world." "I am the door of the sheep." "I am the good shepherd." "I am the resurrection and the life" "I am the true and the living way." "I am the true vine." You will recall as well, when Judas and the officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees along with their troops when they came to arrest Jesus, Jesus said to them, "'Whom do you seek?' They answered him, 'Jesus the Nazarene.' And he said to them, 'I am he.' When he said to them, "I am he,' they drew back and fell to the ground." John 18. I might add that in the original language, the word "he" is not there. He simply said, "I am." He is the great I Am, Jesus was claiming for himself, the name of God, that is rooted in Exodus 3:14, "I am."

Now back to Daniel, although he did not know how Yahweh would one day reveal himself as the incarnate Christ, he knew who God was, he understood this and he worshipped him in spirit and in truth. So indeed, he says, verse four, "I prayed to the Lord, my God," to the great I AM, and once you notice that, he says, "my God," it's not some impersonal force, but rather he speaking of a personal Savior, a personal master in his life, the one he worshipped and loved and served. He goes on to say, "and confessed, and said, 'Alas, oh Lord, the great and awesome God.' The term "awesome" here could be translated, "the one who is to be feared." You are "'the great and awesome God who keeps His covenant and loving kindnesses for those who love Him and keep His commandments.'" Now, once you notice the startling contrast here. Here we read of a great and an awesome God beyond our ability to even comprehend, and yet he is also the one who "keeps his covenant and loving kindnesses for those who love Him and keep His commandments." The ineffable tetragrammaton, meaning the too wondrous to utter from the lips, four letters, YWHY, this is the one the one who is exalted in the heavens, beyond our ability to fathom, is also the one who condescends to our lowly estate, in all of our sin, to save us from our sin, and to reconcile us unto himself. Daniel sees the essence of this, in his prayer. Reminds me of the great hymn that we've sung many times that written by Isaac Watts. "Alas, and did my Savior bleed and did my sovereign die. Would he devote that sacred head for sinners such as I? Was it for crimes that I had done, he groaned upon the tree, amazing pity, grace unknown, and love beyond decree."

So dear friends, these astounding truths pertaining to the character of God, the perfections, of who he is, are concentrated here in Daniel's prayer. And in light of this, we might pause for a moment and say, how should we live? Given all that God is. Well, there are many answers to that, but certainly in Romans 12 and verse one, Paul says, "Therefore," in other words, in light of all that God is and all that he has done, that he's spoken of, in the previous 11 chapters, "Therefore, I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living in the holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship."

So back to Daniel's prayer in verse four, "I prayed to the Lord my God, and confessed and said,' Alas, o Lord, the great and awesome God who keeps His covenant and loving kindnesses for those who love Him and keep His commandments, we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly, and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances." Dear christian, there's much instruction here. One that will be the truest expression of humble worship. May I pause for a moment and give you a few things to think about? First of all, when it comes to the kind of prayer that is really effective, that honors God, it is going to flow out of a heart, number one, that is consumed with God's glory. This is what we see with Daniel. Daniel is overwhelmed with the character of God, the infinite perfections of God, as he has revealed himself in Scripture. This was what silenced Job you will recall, after he demanded an audience with God to plead his case, thinking that perhaps God lacked information. Or even worse yet, maybe he was being unfair. And you will recall what God did. He intimidated Job with his glory for a number of chapters. And finally, God changed his perspective. He didn't change his circumstances, but he changed his perspective. Job said in Job 45 or 42, verse five, "I have heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eyes sees you. Therefore I retract, and I repent in dust and ashes." Dear Christian I might add that like never before in my life, I believe that today is the day when the church needs to have a zeal for the glory of God. And I fear that is missing. We need to have a zeal that can only come from a soul captivating, a soul exhilarating, a sin destroying vision of the majesty of God. "Soli deo Gloria" was the bedrock affirmation of the Reformation. We see this in the eternal purpose of God's plan of redemption to bring glory to himself. And of course, this includes two basic things, he's going to restore the kingdom and he's going to redeem the people. He's going to transform us in such a way as that our life will redound to his glory. But this all begins when we are consumed with his glory. And this only, this only occurs when we have a decisive commitment to personal righteousness and holiness, anchored in the bedrock of divine revelation where we learn who God is.

But once you're consumed with God's glory, as Daniel was, the next thing that happens is confession of sin. Confession of sin, there we can say, with Isaiah, remember when he saw the Lord, high and lofty lifted up, he said, "Woe is me, for I am undone." We can say with the Apostle Paul in Romans 7, "O, wretched men that I am, who will free me from the body of this death," referring to the sin that remained is in his unredeemed humaneness. Oh Child of God, please hear me. If you're not first amazed at the character of God, at the holiness of God, in contrast to your sin, you will never be amazed by God's grace. And you should not sing that hymn. When we see him for who he really is, we will be reduced to nothing. And all that will be left is for us to cry out to him for mercy. And as we experience that mercy, as we confess our sin, we experience that mercy, and we celebrate his grace. This is what we read in Hebrews 10 verse 19, "Therefore brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh, and since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water."

So when we're consumed With God's glory, it will produce within us a desire to confess our sin. First John one nine, you're all familiar with it, "If we confess our sin," confess in Greek is a compound word "homologeo." "Homo" means the "same," "logeo" means "to say." When we confess, we are saying the same things about our sin, as God does. We're agreeing with God. And when we come before him, and we agree with God about who we really are, what we really do, etcetera, what does he do? "He is faithful, and he is righteous, to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

And this will produce number three: confidence in God's precious promises. This is what we see with Daniel. Daniel was convinced because of the promises of God, because he was the covenant making and the covenant keeping God that he would forgive those who come to him in brokenness of sin. Again, for the Lord is "the great and awesome God," verse four, "who keeps His covenant and loving kindnesses," which can be translated, "his steadfast love," "for those who love Him and keep His commandments." Dear friends, he knows our weaknesses. He knows our frailty, our inability to be perfectly obedient. And so what does he do in his great love for sinners? He extends his steadfast love, his loving kindness. The Hebrew term "hesed," is the one that is used. The term connotes not only his willingness to forgive, but his loyalty in keeping his covenant promises. Daniel understood these things. He understood that God keeps His promises even though his people don't. Isaiah 66 two, the prophet says, "But to this one, I will look," God is speaking through the prophet here. "But to this one I will look," this is what gets God's attention, "To him who is humble and contrite of spirit and who trembles at My word." Beloved, I hope that is the attitude of your heart.

So when we're consumed with God's glory, we confess our sin when we have confidence in his promises. And finally, it produces a commitment to serve Him, come what may, that he might be glorified. And that's going to be the theme later on in the prayer here in verses 16 through 19. You will recall, Isaiah's confession, and his subsequent forgiveness, caused him to hear the voice of the Lord. When he said Whom shall I send? Who will go for us? And what did he say? Here am I send me? Well, this is the passion of "all who love Him and keep His commandments," verse four. So I might add, that if you have no desire to obey the Lord, no desire to serve him, on the basis of the Word of God, you do not love him. Don't kid yourself. Verse five, again, he says, "we have sinned." He's including himself here. How often we're prone to see the speck in your brother's eye, but we don't see the log on our own. But he says, "we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly, and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances." Boy he covers the full spectrum of sin here. And the shocking nature of their sin is even amplified further in verse six. "Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land." In other words, it's bad enough to disregard your written word, but beyond that, they rejected the words of the prophets that God had sent to them, to call them to repentance, to warn them of impending judgment.

We read in the Old Testament that even in the days of revival during the reign of Hezekiah, when the king's messengers went to the land, and called all of the people to Passover in Jerusalem, according to Second Chronicles 13, verse 10, it says, "Many of the people laughed them to scorn and mocked them." Boy, if that isn't an indictment of our culture today. And by the way, they laughed them to scorn and mocked them, knowing that the Assyrians had already been successful in conquering some of the cities. I mean, folks sin is insanity. You know, it's insanity. We see this in our country today. It is disintegrating before our very eyes freedoms being stripped away. You've got gross immorality dominating our culture; our economy is suffering. We are hopelessly in debt. Our borders are overrun with illegal aliens. Marxists totalitarians continue to force us to adhere to their demands. We have demented fools, basically, that are ruling over us. I use "fool" in the biblical sense. The fool is a person that has no fear of God. Our enemies no longer fear us. But despite all of these things going on, when we come along and warn people and offer them the gospel, what do they do? They laugh us to scorn. And they mock us. Boy, nothing has changed in 2500 years, right? Nothing is changed.

Look again at the contrast presented in verses seven through nine. "Righteousness belongs to You, O Lord, but to us open shame, as it is this day--to the men of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and all Israel, those who are who are nearby and those who are far away in all the countries to which You have driven them because of their unfaithful deeds which they have committed against You." I want you to also notice that he brings no indictment here against the Lord, as if he were wrong in his judgment. I'm reminded of Isaiah 30 and verse 18, where we read, "Therefore the Lord longs to be gracious to you, and therefore he waits on high to have compassion on you, for the Lord is a God of justice. How blessed are those who long for him?" As we look at verses eight through 10, we see more of these contrasts with respect to their stubbornness, their contumacy, their intransigence, versus the compassionate mercy of the Lord, verse eight; "Open shame belongs to us, O Lord, to our kings, our princes and fathers." Fathers used here metaphorically to describe the leaders of Israel. Why? "because we have sinned against you." But then he goes on to say in verse nine with the contrast, "To the Lord our God, belong compassion and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against Him; nor have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God to walk in His teachings, which He set before us through His servants the prophets."

You see, friends, like all of us, the people were blind to the horrible power of their sin nature. They were so deceived, they couldn't see the deceitfulness of their own heart, and were it not for God's grace and his word and the power of the Spirit, that's where we would be as well. Verse 11, "Indeed, all Israel has transgressed Your law and turned aside, not obeying Your voice; so the curse has been poured out on us, along with the oath which is written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, for we have sinned against Him." By the way, this is a specific reference to the covenant curses recorded in Leviticus 26, and Deuteronomy 28, and so forth. And then Daniel goes on to specify the evils that God is going to pour out upon his people Israel, because of the rebellion. In verse 12 we read, "Thus He has confirmed His words which He had spoken against us, and against our rulers who ruled us, to bring on us great calamity for under the whole heaven, there has not been done anything like what was done to Jerusalem. As it is written in the law of Moses, all this calamity has come on us; yet we have not sought the favor of the Lord our God by turning from our iniquity and giving attention to Your truth. Therefore," verse 14, "the Lord has kept the calamity in store and brought it on us; for the Lord our God is righteous with respect to all his deeds, which he has done, but we have not obeyed his voice."

I want to give you some Old Testament background, which requires us to hear some of the passages of Scripture that many times we overlook. I want to take you back some 900 years prior to what Daniel was talking about when God revealed through Moses what he would do to the people if they failed to obey him. And of course, now Daniel sees that come to fruition. There are curses that are promised in Deuteronomy 28. First of all, beginning in verse 49. Let me give you a sample of this. "The Lord will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as the eagle swoops down, a nation whose language you shall not understand, a nation of fierce countenance who will have no respect for the old nor show favor to the young. Moreover, it shall eat the offspring of your herd and the produce of your ground until you are destroyed, who also leaves you no grain, new wine or oil, nor the increase of your herd or the young of your flock until they have caused you to perish. It shall besiege you in all your towns until your high and fortified walls in which you trusted come down throughout your land, and it shall besiege you and all your towns throughout your land which the Lord your God has given to you. Then you shall eat the offspring of your own body, the flesh of your sons and your daughters in the Lord your God has given you during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress you." In other words, the enemy will starve you until you will resort to cannibalism, which is exactly what happened. If you've ever studied siege warfare, it's an amazing thing. I've been to places in Israel where you can see the remnants of the siege warfare like at Lachish with Sennacherib and the Assyrians, the great fortified city of Lachish. Also at Masada. What they would do first of all, is the hoard would come in, and they would take months and they would build a stone fence around the entire city. For all of you to see, to say to you, there is no escape. There is no escape. And they post their military people all around. And then they find the best way, the closest way to build a ramp up to the walls. They also find other places where they can build other ramps and other towers. And they little by little over time, began to build around so that they can breach the walls. And all along they are starving the people. As people died within the city of Jerusalem, during the Babylonian siege, their corpses were more than they could bury so they would throw them over the walls. The stench of putrefaction was so great it would, just imagine how it would choke you. Of course, anyone that handles corpses knows that it's easy to contract all manner of diseases. And that's what happened after two and a half years of siege. Imagine that, two and a half years, as the Babylonians surrounded Jerusalem, starvation set in. And that caused the people to begin to eat their young and those that would die. God warned them about this some 900 years prior Leviticus 26:29, "You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters you will eat." I want you to obey me and I'll bless you, if you disobey me, I will bring my wrath down upon you. Ezekial warned of this, in Ezekial 5:10, "Therefore fathers will eat their sons among you and sons will eat their fathers. For I will execute judgments on you and scatter all your remnant to every wind." Likewise, Jeremiah 19, verse nine, "I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters. And they will eat one another's flesh in the siege and in the distress with which their enemies and those who seek their life will distress them." But they ignored all of the warnings of the prophets. We're militarily invincible, we can handle it. After all God is on our side. Lamentations 2, after it had happened. Jeremiah laments, "See O Lord and look with whom you have dealt. Thus, should women eat offspring, the little ones who were born healthy." Chapter four verse 10, "the hands of compassionate women boiled their own children that became food for them because of the destruction of the daughter of my people. The Lord has accomplished his wrath. He has poured out his fierce anger and he has kindled a fire in Zion, which has consumed its foundations."

Back to the warnings, the curses in Deuteronomy 28 verse 54, "The man who is refined and very delicate among you shall be hostile toward his brother and toward the wife he cherishes and toward the rest of his children who remain, so that he will not give even one of them any of the flesh of his children which he will eat, since he has nothing else left during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress you, and all your towns. The refined and delicate women among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground of delicateness and refinement, shall be hostile toward the husband she cherishes and toward her son and daughter, and toward her afterbirth, which issues from between her legs, and toward her children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of anything else, during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress you in your towns." Beginning in verse 58, of Deuteronomy 28, "If you are not careful to observe all the words of this law, which are written in this book, to fear this honored and awesome name, the Lord your God, then the Lord will bring extraordinary plagues on you and your descendants, even severe and lasting plagues and miserable and chronic sicknesses. He will bring back on you all of the diseases of Egypt of which you were afraid, and they will cling to you. Also every sickness and every plague which, not written in the book of this law, the Lord will bring on you until you are destroyed. Then you shall be left few in number, whereas you are as numerous as the stars of heaven, because you did not obey the Lord your God. It shall come about that as the Lord delighted over you to prosper you and multiply you, so the Lord will delight over you to make you perish and destroy you; and you will be torn from the land where you are entering to possess it. Moreover, the Lord will scatter you among all the peoples from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth. And there you shall serve other gods, wood and stone which you are your father's have not known. Among those nations you shall find no rest and there will be no resting place for the sole of your foot; but the Lord will give you a trembling heart, failing of eyes and despair of soul. So your life shall hang and doubt before you and you will be in dread night and day, and you shall have no assurance of your life. In the morning, you shall say, 'Would that it were evening!' And at evening you shall say, 'Would that it were morning!' because of the dread of your heart which you dread and for the side of your eyes, which you will see. The Lord will bring you back to Egypt and ships by the way, which I spoke to you, 'You will never see it again!' And there you will offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer." Let me read you some ancient history from Josephus, regarding what Daniel saw on the siege of Jerusalem, and why he was passionate about praying to the Lord, that the desolations of Jerusalem would come to an end for his for the glory of the Lord. Here's what Josephus the ancient Jewish historian said, "Now the king of Babylon was very intent and earnest upon the siege of Jerusalem, and he erected towers upon great banks of Earth, and from them, repelled those that stood upon the walls. He also made a great number of such banks, round about the whole city, the height of which was equal to those walls. However, those that were within bore the siege with courage and alacrity, for they were not discouraged either by the famine or by the pestilential distemper, but were of cheerful minds in the prosecution of the war. Although those miseries within oppressed them also. And they did not suffer themselves to be terrified either by the contrivances of the enemy, or by their engines of war, but contrive still different engines to oppose all the other with all till indeed, there seemed to be an entire struggle between the Babylonians and the people of Jerusalem, who had the greater sagacity and skill. The former party, supposing they should be, there by too hard for the other, for the destruction of the city. The latter placing their hopes of deliverance and nothing else but in persevering in such inventions, in opposition to the other as might demonstrate the enemy's engines were useless to them. And the seeds they endured for 18 months until they were destroyed by the famine, and by the darts which the enemy threw at them from the towers." He goes on to say, "Now the city was taken on the ninth day of the fourth month in the 11th year of the reign of Zedekiah. And when the city was taken about midnight, and the enemy's generals were entered into the two ample, and when Zedekiah was sensible of it, he took his wives and his children and his captains and friends and with them fled out of the city through the fortified ditch and through the desert, and when certain of the deserted had informed the Babylonians of this at break of day, they made haste to pursue after Zedekiah and overtook him not far from Jericho, and encompassed him about with those friends and captains of Zedekiah, who had fled out of the city with him. When they saw their enemies near them, they left him and dispersed themselves, some one way, some another, and everyone resolved to save himself. So the enemy took Zedekiah alive when he was deserted by all, but a few with his children and his wives and brought him to the king. Then, Nebuchadnezzar began to call him a wicked wretch, a covenant breaker, and one that had forgotten his former words when he promised to keep the country for him." Josephus went on to say, "And when he had used these words, Zedekiah, he commanded his sons and his friends to be slain while Zedekiah on the rest of the captain's looked on, after which he pulled out the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him and carried him to Babylon. And these things happened to him as Jeremiah and Ezekiel had foretold." He went on to say, "And now it was that the king of Babylon sent Nebuzaradan, the general of his army to Jerusalem, to pillage the temple, who had it also in command to burn it in the royal palace and to lay the city even with the ground and to transplant the people into Babylon. Accordingly, he came to Jerusalem in the 11th year of King Zedekiah and pillaged the temple and carried out the vessels of God both gold and silver, and particularly, that large labor which Solomon dedicated as also the pillars of brass and their chapters, with the golden tablets and the candlesticks. And when they had carried these off, he set fire to the temple in the fifth month, the first day of the month in the 11th year of the reign of Zedekiah. And in the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar. He also burnt the palace and overthrew the city." Then we read, "The general of the Babylonian king now overthrew the city to the very foundations, removed all the people and took for prisoners the high priests Araya, and Zephaniah, the priests that was next to him and the rulers that guarded the temple, who were three in number. And the eunuch who was over the armed men, and seven friends of Zedekiah and his scribe, and 60 other rulers, all whom, together with the vessels, they had pillaged. He carried to the king of Babylon, to Riblah city of Syria. So, the king commanded the heads of the high priests of the rulers to be cut off there. But he himself led all the captains and Zedekiah to Babylon. He also led Josedech, the high priest away, bound."

That gives you a flavor of what happened, dear friends. You understand now the passion of Daniel's heart. People were warned, but they ignored the one that loved them enough to call them unto himself. Verse 12, back to Daniel nine. "Thus He has confirmed His words which He had spoken against us and against our rulers who ruled us, to bring us great calamity; for under the whole heaven, there has not been done anything, like what was done to Jerusalem." So we see the humility of his prayer, most prominently in his confession. And finally, we see the burden of his prayer. And here, he petitions the Lord for forgiveness for restoration.

Notice verse 15. "And now, o Lord our God, who have brought Your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and have made a name for Yourself, as it is this day--we have sinned, we have been wicked." Now mind you, here he is reminiscing about the God of glory that delivered his people out of the bondage of Egypt, to put his glory on display. Later on in the New Testament, he delivers both Jew and the Gentile from the penalty in the bondage of sin, through his death and his resurrection, and in Christ. As we've seen in other passages in Daniel, one day, there will be a future millennial reign upon the earth and there he will once again manifest his glory to the people as he re gathers Israel. And has he restores them to their land. As we read in Jeremiah 16, and many other Old Testament passages, verse 16, then of Daniel's prayer, he says, "O Lord, in accordance with all Your righteous acts, let now Your anger and wrath turn away from Your city Jerusalem, Your holy mountain; for because of our sins and the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and Your people have become a reproach to all those around us. So now, our God, listen to the prayer of Your servant, and to his supplications. And for Your sake, O Lord, let Your face shine on your desolate sanctuary."

And then finally, we come to an eloquent crescendo of his prayer, in verses 18 and 19, where he says, "O my God, incline Your ear!" It literally it could be translated, stretch out your ear, it's like hold your ear with a cup of your hand and listen carefully to my plea. "O my God, incline Your ear and hear! Open Your eyes and see our desolations in the city which is called by Your name; for we are not presenting our supplications before You on account of any merits of our own, but on account of Your great compassion. O, Lord hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, listen and take action! For Your own sake, O my God, do not delay, because Your city and Your people are called by Your name." He uses five verbs here: forgive, listen, take action, do not delay. Once again, dear friends, you see a passion for God's glory, to deliver his people who are called by his name and thus to bring honor to himself.

Oh dear friends in closing, I hope you don't miss the great truths herein. Not only are these great historical facts that we can look back to, but they also demonstrate some great theological truths, not the least of which is this; God means what He says. God means what He says. All sin is going to be punished. And thankfully, he has made a way for someone other than ourselves, to pay for our sins, and that is His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He paid in full the penalty of the sins of all who would place their trust in Him as their only hope of salvation. But hear this. If you reject his call to repentance, to come to faith in Christ, your sin will be paid for not by Christ, but by you yourself. And you will pay for that, in the torments of an eternal hell. Because God means what He says. Dear Christian, I hope you will give heed to the instructions that we gleaned from Daniel's prayer. There's such a pattern here. And here we see the truest expression of humble worship. I pray that when you come before the Lord your God, you will, as we discussed be, first of all, just absolutely consumed with his glory, understanding who he is, as he has revealed himself in Scripture. And if you begin there, what will automatically happen is you will confess your sin. Because whenever we stand in the presence of his holiness, we are laid bare. In that confession, will by the power of the Spirit of God, cause us to have confidence in the precious promises of God that are inherent in the Gospel promises available to all who are broken over their sin, and cry out for mercy. And that will lead finally to a commitment to serve him, come what may, that he might be glorified. And that we might experience the fullness of joy that he longs for us to experience. So let's bear these things in mind. And I would ask you to read this prayer again, in your study this week, with these things in mind, and let the Spirit of God teach you even further. Let's pray together.

Father, thank You for these eternal truths that speaks so directly to our hearts. Despite the fact that these things happened millennia ago, Lord, nevertheless, you are an unchanging God, you are a holy and a sovereign God. And yet you are a forgiving, long suffering God who longs to reconcile sinners unto yourself. May we all be reminded of these great truths. And because of this, be animated to further worship and praise and service to you. So we commit the preaching of your word, to the power of your Spirit to do what you will, for your glory. In Christ's name I pray. Amen.

Solely on the basis of God's grace, I have been given the responsibility of opening up the Word of God to you, to help you to understand it and to apply it to your lives. And so, with this in mind, I ask that you take your Bibles and turn to Daniel, chapter nine. If you haven't been with us, we go verse by verse through whatever book of the Bible we are studying. And we now come to Daniel's prayer of confession, and intercession here in Daniel nine. This will be part one of a little series on this because it'll take a little while to get through this. In fact, today I will be addressing basically the first three verses. But let me read Daniel's prayer through verse 19. Daniel nine beginning in verse one. "In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, of Median descent, who was made king over the kingdom of the Chaldeans. In the first year of his reign, I Daniel observed in the books, the number of the years, which was revealed as the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet, for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years. So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and confessed and said, 'Alas, oh Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant and lovingkindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments, we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly, and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances. Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants, the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land. Righteousness belongs to you, oh, Lord, but to us, open shame, as it is this day, to the men of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all Israel, those who are nearby and those who are far away and all the countries to which You have driven them, because of their unfaithful deeds which they have committed against You. Open shame belongs to us, oh Lord, to our kings, our princes and our fathers, because we have sinned against You. To the Lord our God belong compassion and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against Him; nor have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God to walk in His teachings, which He set before us through His servants, the prophets. Indeed, all Israel has transgressed Your law and turned aside not obeying Your voice. So the curse has been poured out on us, along with the oath which is written in the Law of Moses, the servant of God, for we have sinned against Him. Thus He has confirmed His words which He had spoken against us, and against our rulers who ruled us, to bring on us great calamity for under the whole heaven, there has not been done anything like what was done to Jerusalem. As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come on us; yet we have not sought the favor of the Lord our God by turning from our iniquity and giving attention to Your truth. Therefore, the Lord has kept the calamity in store and brought it on us. For the Lord our God is righteous with respect to all His deeds, which He has done, but we have not obeyed His voice. And now, oh Lord, our God, who have brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and have made a name for Yourself as it is this day, we have sinned, we have been wicked. Oh, Lord, in accordance with all your righteous acts, let now Your anger and Your wrath turn away from Your city, Jerusalem, Your holy mountain, for because of our sins and the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and Your people have become a reproach to all those around us. So now our God, listen to the prayer of Your servant, and to his supplications and for Your sake, O Lord, let your face shine on Your desolate sanctuary. O my God, incline Your ear and hear! Open Your eyes and see our desolations and the city which is called by Your name, for we are not presenting our supplications before You on account of any merits of our own, but on account of Your great compassion. O Lord hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, listen and take action! For Your own sake, O my god, do not delay because Your city and Your people are called by Your name.'"

What a magnificent model for prayer that we have here before us. Here we have an 82-year-old servant of God pouring out his heart before the Lord. The same model by the way we can see in an Ezra's prayer in Ezra nine. We can see it as well in Nehemiah's prayer in Nehemiah nine. And certainly, it's a pattern that we would all do well to emulate as we will discover. But I might add that the comprehensive structure of Daniel's prophecies for both Gentiles and Israel has earned it the well-deserved title of the revelation of the Old Testament. Daniel nine is perhaps the key to understanding God's redemptive purposes down through history. That's why it is so important for us to understand it very well, especially as it relates to God's chosen people, Israel and the coming of their Messiah, and our Messiah, to the earth to reign.

Now, by way of introduction, Daniel nine can be divided into two parts. The first 19 verses consist of Daniel's prayer. And the final verses consist of God's response. And today, I will briefly introduce God's response, but primarily focus on Daniel's prayer. And I might add that you cannot properly understand God's response apart from understanding Daniel's prayer. They go hand in hand; not only the contents and nature of his prayer, but also, I might add the heart attitude of this choice servant of God. And here, beloved, we will see that it's not merely a man's words that makes his prayer effective, it is the attitude of his heart. And here we will learn much of that as we study a man whose godly character shines most brightly in his prayer of confession and intercession.

So let's embark upon this amazing journey through Daniel nine. I'd like to do so under four headings. First of all, we will look at the impetus of his prayer. Secondly, the focus of his prayer. Thirdly, the humility of his prayer and finally, the burden of his prayer. And we'll just look at the first two this morning. So the impetus of his prayer, notice verse one. And this basically gives us the context, gives us the setting. Daniel writes, "In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus of Median descent, who was made king over the kingdom of the Chaldeans," that is the Babylonians. So, what we are reading here occurred after Darius the Mead, who was a subordinate of King Cyrus, was tricked into throwing Daniel in the lion's den. All right. So this occurs after that, and I have to stop and pause for a moment. Imagine all that Daniel, I mean, he's about 82 years old. Now imagine all that he has been through thus far in his life, to be exiled to Babylon, as a teenager, to receive divine revelation during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar concerning the great image of chapter two, concerning the high tree of chapter four. And then the vision of the four great beasts during the reign of Belshazzar. Imagine going through all of that. And then 14 years later, he sees the handwriting on the wall and explains that to the king, followed immediately by the invasion of the Medo-Persians. Then the subterfuge of his jealous colleagues that eventually land did him in a lion's den, on and on it goes, it's amazing. And yet through it all, he remained faithful, and God blessed him. And God blesses us because of him, as he is doing here today. Think of all the ways that God protected him, and used him, and how through the miraculous agencies of divine providence, Daniel, accomplished everything that God had ordained for him, and for the world; in the world to be accomplished in the secret counsels of his will.

So, we move on, "In the first year," verse two, "of his reign, I, Daniel, observed in the books the number of the years which was revealed as the word of the Lord," or of Yahweh, "to Jeremiah, the prophet for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 sevens." So, he observes the word of Yahweh, which is the personal covenantal name of God. In verse four, he describes him as the one who keeps his covenant and loving kindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments." And so Daniel had the utmost confidence in Israel's covenant relationship with YAWEH. So this is where he goes. And he's inquiring about the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years. And here in beloved is the impetus of his prayer. This is what is driving him to his knees. This is the great burden of his heart. He has studied the Word of God that God has given to his servant Jeremiah, concerning the 70-year judgment that God imposed upon his nation, Israel, because of their idolatry, and because of their neglect of his appointed sabbatical years. And he gave this warning, God gave this warning back in Leviticus, chapter 26, verse 14, he says, "If you do not obey Me and do not carry out all these commandments," and he goes on to list things that he's going to do, which include beginning in verse 31, "I will lay waste your cities as well, and will make your sanctuaries desolate and I will not smell your soothing aromas. I will make the land desolate so that your enemies who settle in it will be appalled over it. You however, I will scatter among the nations and will draw out a sword after you as your land becomes desolate, and your cities become waste, then the land will enjoy it Sabbath's all the days of the desolation, while you and your enemies' land, then the land will rest and enjoy its Sabbath. All the days of its desolation, it will observe the rest which it did not observe on your Sabbath while you were living on it." So the covenant people violated the commandments concerning many things, but especially the land Sabbath, and this became the basis of God's punishment upon them, the 70 year judgments that they are now experiencing a Babylonian captivity.

By the way, I hope you get the idea that God is serious about his commands. He means what He says. Now, Daniel would have also been very familiar with the last seven chapters of Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy 28, through 34. And in those last seven chapters, we have as David Larson says, "The Matrix out of which the great prophecies of the Old Testament regarding Israel emerge." Let me take you there for a moment. I believe there is an overhead to this end. But in Deuteronomy 26, verse three through verse 13, and Deuteronomy 28, verses one through 14, we read about the conditions of blessing to follow obedience. Evidently, you don't have an overhead. I'm sorry, that was supposed to be... I'll tell you what, I will get this to you. Okay. So I won't read all of these verses. I'll just give you the flow, alright? So if you look at these chapters, you will see first the conditions of blessing to follow obedience. Then the coming apostasy. He warned of the affliction that God would bring upon Israel while still in the land because of her apostasy. We read about how Israel will be taken captive, the enemies of Israel will possess her land for a time, the land itself will remain desolate. Israel will be scattered among the nations, though punished, Israel will not be destroyed. If she repents, Israel will repent in her tribulation. And finally, in chapter 30, verses three through 10, Israel will be gathered from the nations and brought back to her divinely given land. Daniel would have been aware of all of these things because he was a great student of the word. He knew what God said. But what he didn't know is when and how these events would occur.

So back to verse two, he says, "I observed in the books the number of the years which was revealed as the word of the Lord to Jeremiah, the prophet, for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years.' Now, we know that the prophet Jeremiah predicted this, in 605 BC, 67 years prior to Daniel's prayer. Jeremiah's prophecies were first uttered in Jerusalem when Daniel was just a young teenager. We read about them in Jeremiah 25, beginning in verse 11. There, the Spirit of God speaks through His servant and says, "'This whole land will be a desolation and a horror and these nations will serve the king of Babylon 70 years, then it will be when 70 years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation,' declares the LORD, 'for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans and I will make it an everlasting desolation.'" It's interesting to note that according to Jeremiah 26, Jeremiah's words were so abhorrent to King Jehoiakim, king of Judah, at that time, that he had them cut in little pieces, in stages, almost like a ceremony, and had them thrown in the fire. Sinful people only hear what they want to hear, right? It's always been that way. People that have no fear of God, they care nothing about what God has to say. This is precisely what we see in our country today with politicians that criminalize biblical morality, and they legalize immorality give free reign to public schools and educators to indoctrinate their children in the disgusting sexual deviancies of the LGBTQ lifestyle and the racist Neo Marxist ideologies of critical race theory. And it goes on and on and on.

So God's covenant people Israel heard the word but they ignored what God said. They despised the prophets. They rejected them despite their warnings, and they embraced the wicked culture around them. Oh, how people hate the truth when it does not fit their agenda. It's always been that way, always will be. It's for this reason that Paul says that they will "turn away their ears from the truth and they will turn aside unto myths." And the myths just go on and on even in our culture today. I mean, what moron would believe that there are more than two biological genders. Jesus said this is why eternal judgment comes upon man. Although the light of Christ has come into the world, Jesus said that "men love the darkness rather than the light, because their deeds are evil." So this is what happened back in Jeremiah's day, and Daniel's day. Let me give you a little of the history from the Word of God with respect to the fall of Jerusalem.

In Second Chronicles 36, beginning in verse 16. We read "they continually mocked the messengers of God," boy, doesn't that sound familiar today? "They continually mocked the messengers of God, despised His words and scoffed at His prophets until the wrath of the Lord arose against His people, until there was no remedy. Therefore, he brought up against them the king of the Chaldeans who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary." Literally he took young men into the sanctuary of the temple and butchered them there. Goes on to say, "he had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or infirm; He gave them," God gave them, "all into his hand. All the articles of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the Lord, and the treasures of the king and of his officers, he brought them all to Babylon. Then they burned the house of God and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burned all its fortified buildings with fire and destroyed all its valuable articles. Those who had escaped from the sword he carried away to Babylon; and they were servants to him and to his sons until the rule of the kingdom of Persia," catch this, "to fulfill the word of the Lord, by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its sabbaths. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath until 70 years were complete." Ah, but God warned them. He warned them, for example, through Jeremiah the prophet, but they would not listen. In fact, King Zedekiah also resented Jeremiah's prophecies, resented the warnings about impending judgment. And it was King Zedekiah that had Jeremiah lowered by a rope into a waterless system until he sank into the mire. We read about that in Jeremiah 38. He would have perished had God not rescued him. Dear friends, please hear me, whether you like it or not, whatever the Lord God says, he will surely do. And when he commands you to repent, and place your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, he means what he says. And if you reject that, you will perish in your sins and spend eternity in hell. God means what he says and we see this all through redemptive history, all through Scripture.

The Great 19th century Jewish historian and scholar Alfred Edersheim, who by the way, was a Jewish convert to Christianity, gives us some historical details of the final Babylonian takeover because it did happen in stages. Edersheim says this, "Then the king and all the regular army sought safety and flight during the darkness of the night, Jeremiah 39 four, as the Chaldeans held the northern part of the city they fled southwards between the two walls, through the Tyropoeon, then out of the fountain gate and through the king's garden. They made haste to gain the Jordan, but their flight could not remain unobserved, they were pursued and overtaken in the plains of Jericho. The soldiers dispersed in various directions, but the king himself and his household were taken captives, and carried to the headquarters at Riblah, where Nebuchadnezzar himself was at the time. Here, King Zedekiah was formally arraigned and sentence given against him. His daughters were set free, but his sons were slain before him. It was the last sight the king saw. His eyes were then put out, he was bound hands and feet with double fetters of brass, and so carried to Babylon. There he died in ward, Jeremiah 52:11." How tragic. Let's put this in perspective. What if China comes and takes us over? Slays your children in front of you, kills perhaps your wife, your husband, your loved ones, and then takes you to be a slave to China. That's what we're talking about here friends. Fascinating story, however, regarding Jeremiah's unfailing commitment to the Lord his God trusting in all that he promised, he was so certain that God would restore Israel both spiritually and physically; restoring them to their land that we read that while he was in prison, the Lord had him purchase a piece of property, Jeremiah 32 and verse eight. It says "a field that is in Anathoth," which is in the country of Benjamin, and he purchased that for 17 shekels of silver. It's a fascinating story. Let me read you just a little of it because it encourages all of us to see one who was so faithful in trusting in what God says he will do. Jeremiah 32, beginning in verse 11. Jeremiah says, "Then I took the deeds of purchase, both the sealed copy containing the terms and conditions and the open copy; and I gave the deed of purchase to Baruch, the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, in the sight of Hanamel my uncle's son and in the sight of the witnesses who signed the deed of purchase, before all the Jews who were sitting in the court of the guard." By the way, what we see here in this context is they were all imprisoned here. All right, so all of this happened in that context. Then we read, "And I commanded Baruch in their presence, saying, 'Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, "Take these deeds, the seal deed of purchase and this open deed, and put them in an earthenware jar, that they may last a long time." For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, "Houses and fields and vineyards will again, be bought in this land."" What amazing confidence. Truths that God had revealed to him. Jeremiah then prayed for understanding. He was wanting to understand more, why would you have any purchased this land. And then we read more in that chapter of God's assurance of Israel's future restoration. Jeremiah 32, verse 37, and following, he says this, "'Behold, I will gather them out of all the lands to which I have driven them in My anger, and My wrath and in great indignation; and I will bring them back to this place, and make them dwell and safety. They shall be My people, and I will be their God. And I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me always for their own good and for the good of their children after them. I will make an everlasting covenant with them that I will not turn away from them, to do them good; and I will put the fear of Me in their hearts so that they will not turn away from Me. I will rejoice over them to do them good and will faithfully plant them in this land, with all My heart and with all My soul. For thus says the Lord, 'Just as I brought all this great disaster on this people, so I am going to bring on them all the good that I am promising them.'" Then he says this, "'Fields will be bought in this land of which you say, "It is the desolation, without man or beast, it is given into the hands of the Chaldeans.'" And then he goes on to add, "'Men will buy fields for money, sign and seal deeds, and call in witnesses in the land of Benjamin, in the environs of Jerusalem, in the cities of Judah, in the cities of the hill country, in the cities of the lowland and in the cities of the Negev, for I will restore their fortune,' declares the Lord.'" Of course, none of this has happened yet. Neither spiritually, nor physically, nor can it happen, until God does a work of grace in the heart of his people and they come to faith in the living Christ that they have rejected, only then will they return to their ancient land, which is consistent with the terms of the new covenant that we read in Jeremiah 31 and Ezekiel 37. That's when all of the land promises will be fulfilled.

So with this knowledge, Jeremiah could now anticipate that one day, think about this, one day in his resurrected body, God would allow him to redeem the land that he had purchased while in prison. It's an amazing thought, oh, what glorious anticipation? What an encouragement to that beleaguered imprisoned prophet and all that were around him. Ezekiel speaks of this as well in Ezekial 36 beginning in verse 35, "'They will say, '"his desolate land has become like the Garden of Eden; and the waste, desolate and ruined cities are fortified and inhabited." Then the nations that are left around about you will know that I the Lord have rebuilt the ruined places and planted that which was desolate; I, the LORD have spoken, and we'll do it.'"

Now, back to Daniel nine, and the impetus of his prayer. While praying about these issues, after studying these ancient scrolls of Jeremiah, again, he's reminded in verse two, "Of the years which was revealed, as the word of the Lord to Jeremiah, the prophet for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years." So this makes perfect sense, he's 80 plus years old, and he's thinking you know what, this time period should be pretty much over. What's fascinating is he did not question the literal fulfillment of this prophecy or a literal interpretation of the words, the numbers of 70, the time period of years. But rather, he was wondering when did the clock start ticking so we can determine when it will stop ticking. That's the burden of his heart. He had certainly read what Jeremiah wrote to his fellow exiles in Jeremiah 29, beginning of verse 10, "For thus says the Lord, 'When 70 years had been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans that I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for calamity, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to Me and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart, I will be found by you declares the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you declares the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you in to exile.'" By the way, this text is sadly used out of context, very often as a warning, and an encouragement to America. As if God is addressing America here. Beloved, I hope you understand that is ridiculous. America is not a theocracy. God's plans for America is the same plan that he has for every other pagan nation. It is a plan of judgment. One day, this great country will disappear and it will be replaced forever by the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. So please don't be, I know some of you probably have that up on your wall or on facebook, please take it down or at least explain the context there. Okay?

So Daniel is longing for this calamity to end, his longing for a restoration to begin, and we can now see in history, that the first 69 weeks of years were completed at Christ's first coming as promised in Daniel 9:26. We'll study that more when we get there, though Daniel didn't understand that meaning. And now in this 21st century era of redemptive history, and because of the New Testament record, we can understand something more that we will discover once we get there. And that is that there exists an extended period of time, prior to the final 70 years, that final seven-year period, a seven year period that will culminate in Christ's glorious return and the establishment of his kingdom. That's a period known as the Great Tribulation. There is no seven-year period in history that has clearly fulfilled the last unit of seven in Daniel's prophecy. The culmination of Daniel's prophecy is the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, that we await. And when he returns, the 70th seven of Israel to judgment will be fulfilled. And the times of the Gentiles will be over, all of which are pictured in Daniel's prophecies of the four great world empires that we have been studying. But Daniel didn't understand this. And he's praying that the 70-year judgment had run its course. After all, Daniel's vision recorded in Daniel nine occurred in 538 BC, about 67 years after the Babylonians captured Jerusalem and Daniel had been taken into captivity 605 BC. I might add a footnote here, through the angel Gabriel we are going to see in verses 24 and 27 that God will graciously give him a very detailed and very stunning answer to his prayer. The "terminus a quo," or the earliest possible date of the starting point for all of this would have been 605 BC. Which also takes into consideration the desolations of Jerusalem, which would have been the destruction of all the territory that occurred around Jerusalem that predated her actual fall. And the "terminus ad quem," or in other words, the close of the period, as we will see is 539 BC, when the Jews returned to the land. And when they returned to the land, I might also add, that God providentially prevented them from actually rebuilding the temple until the actual 70 years after the destruction of the previous a temple had elapsed. So I'm just giving you kind of an overview here, God is very precise with these things. More details coming when we get to verses 24 and following.

So Daniel knew that these promises were going to be fulfilled literally. But what is also true is that Daniel knew, now catch this, that God uses human agency to accomplish his sovereign purposes. He uses the faithful, humble prayers of his saints, to accomplish what he has ordained. Thus, Daniel prays. Moreover, Daniel knew that effective prayer requires utmost humility and confession and faith and obedience on the part of the supplicant. James 5:16, tells us that "the effective prayer," that the fervent passionate prayer, "of a righteous man can accomplish much." Those who know themselves to be both sinners, as well as righteous because of Christ. Those people when they humbly come before God, and their lives are centered upon the word of God, when they pray, it moves the heart of God to accomplish what he has already ordained. Daniel is a prime example of this.

So we've now understood the impetus of his prayer, when the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely the 77 years would occur when they'd be over. And now we move secondly to the focus of his prayer in verse three, he says, "So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer, and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes." As I alluded to earlier in my discussion of the prophetic matrix of Israel's history that we see in Deuteronomy 28, through 24, Daniel understood that the final curse would result in her exile. But he also knew that according to Deuteronomy 30, verses one through five, God is going to restore them, if they will repent. And so he's going to pray to that end. And it is with this spirit with this heart attitude, of genuine repentance, not just for his people, but for himself, he comes before the throne of grace, verse three, "So I gave my attention to the Lord;" gave my attention could be translated, "so I set my face, I turned my face," it's like God, I'm looking for you. To address you face to face, he's probably looking heavenward. And because of his deep burden for his rebellious countrymen, and because he accurately assesses even his own depravity, what he does here is, he removes all of the distractions in his life that might divert his attention, so he could focus exclusively on the Lord, give his undivided attention on he says, "the Lord God," Lord here is Adonai; Lord, master. He alone is the ruler of heaven and earth. So he approaches him, he is the object of Daniel's faith, the object of his worship, I trust, the same can be said for you. When you approach the Lord your God, do you see him not only as the covenant making, the covenant keeping God, but do you also see him as the Lord and Master, the ruler of heaven and earth. Too often we come into the presence of God as if we're multitasking, distracted with other things. As if we're talking with him while looking at our cell phone. You've seen people do that in restaurants. They'll come in and usually before they sit down, they pull out their phone and they start looking at their cell phones. You'll have four people sitting at a booth and not one of them are looking at each other. Folks, by the way, that is rude. That is rude. Often, that's how we pray. We're so distracted with other things. We're self-centered rather than God centered. And when we do that, we show a lack of respect for the Lord our God and no real burden. Beloved, get serious about your prayer life. When you come into the presence of the Lord, make it an event, not an afterthought. See it as a priority worthy of your utmost attention, not some intrusion on your time. See him as the thrice Holy God of Isaiah six, who is surrounded by the seraphim, seated upon his throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of his robe, filling the temple and on and on, see him that way. And when you see him as he really is, believe me, you will not be distracted by anything else. That's the attitude that we need to have, when we pray. Don't see him as some smiley face deity that's lucky to have you on his team, only deserving of some occasional and hurried interaction. It's perhaps no better gauge of a man's spiritual maturity than his secret devotion to God and prayer. You show me a man or a woman who is lacks in prayer and I will show you a man or a woman who is a spiritual infant. A person who fails to grasp the majesty and the holiness of God that deserves our utmost worship, in prayer. The incarnate Son of God was our supreme example, wasn't he? Mark 1:35. We read that in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went away to a secluded place and was praying there. Pre-dawn, private worship was the habit of our Savior, is it yours? Daniel prayed three times a day. What about you? And I'm not saying that there needs to be some prescription here. But the point is, is this a priority in your life? It certainly was for Daniel. And may I remind you is that God is honored by our trust in his infinite resources. Do you realize that? He is honored when we come before him and we cry out to him for understanding and for help. He delights in meeting our needs. Just like a heavenly Father, or our earthly father would do, so too our Heavenly Father.

In his sermon, "The Most High: a Prayer Hearing God," Jonathan Edwards preached on this issue in the context of quote, "A fast appointed on the account of epidemical sickness at the eastward of Boston." They had a great pandemic there. And his text was, "O Thou that hears prayer, Psalm 65, two," here's a small part of what he said, and I believe you have this in your bulletin. "Why is God so ready to hear the prayers of men? To this I answer, because he is a God of infinite grace and mercy. It is indeed a very wonderful thing that so great a God should be so ready to hear our prayers. That we are so despicable and unworthy. That he should give free access at all times to everyone, should allow us to be important without esteeming it and in decent boldness, and should be so rich and mercy to them that call upon Him. That worms of the dust should have such power with God by prayer, that he should do such great things in answer to their prayers and should show himself as it were overcome by them. This is a very wonderful when we consider the distance between God and us, and how we have provoked him by our sins and how unworthy we are of the least gracious notice. It cannot be from any need that God stands in of us, for our goodness extends not to him, neither can it be from anything in us to incline the heart of God to us. It cannot be from any worthiness in our prayers, which are in themselves polluted things. But it is because God delights in mercy and condescension. He is herein infinitely distinguished from all other gods. He is the great fountain of all good from whom goodness flows as light from the sun." Beloved, please understand, the blessings that we receive from his beneficence are only secondary to the glory that he receives in giving. You must bear that in mind. No wonder Paul says we're to rejoice always, that we are to pray what? Without ceasing, It needs to be the attitude of our heart. "Pray without ceasing and everything giving thanks for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." Dear Christian, I challenge you here. If you have no real desire to spend intimate time alone with the Lord your God, then he is not the source of your greatest satisfaction and joy and you are pursuing other lovers. As I have written elsewhere, concerning pastors and church leaders, "While a lack of self-discipline contributes to this laxity, it is primarily a consequence of loving other things more than God. Some idol has taken the place of God and distracted you from this essential discipline and privilege. Frankly, no ministry will be effective. No marriage will be fulfilling. No family will ever be blessed apart from the pleadings of private prayer. To be sure prayer will never be the early dawn priority of the sluggard who likes to sleep in, nor will it be the priority of the Sunday morning pastor or church leader who pretends to be serving Christ for a few hours on Sunday, but the rest of the week lives for himself. But it will be the priority of the battle-weary soldier of the cross in desperate need of strength. That warrior who begs for more discernment, for more endurance, humility, love, patience and fruit, who pleas for more light and the word and boldness in battle. Because that soldier knows that apart from Christ, he can do nothing." Dear friends, this was the heart of Daniel. This needs to be our heart.

So verse three, "I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer," prayer being intercession, "and supplication," which refers to just entreaty for mercy. He looked intently to the Lord his God to express his own heart, confession, and to plead for more answers. And of course, we know that prayer is the great work of the Spirit of God in the heart of the redeemed. It is the Spirit of God that that animates our hearts, to pray to seek after the only one who can meet our needs. This is as we read earlier, in Zechariah 12:10, "The Spirit of grace and supplication." The apostle Paul described this in Romans eight beginning in verse 26. He says, "The Spirit helps our weakness, for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints, according to the will of God." So Daniel, gives his attention, his undivided attention, on the Lord, his God, seeking Him, it says, "By prayer, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes." And certainly, these things reveal the attitude of his heart, attitude of utmost reverence and humility. I want you to understand, he didn't fast to somehow impress God. He didn't fast to somehow gain God's attention. He fasted primarily for two reasons. First of all, he was so deeply burdened, he had no appetite. When you're deeply burdened, you lose your appetite, right? But secondly, more importantly, he didn't want to be distracted by anything that would take his time away from coming before the Lord his God, and having to make meals and be a part of all of that would do that. Beloved, when you do business with God, when you come boldly before the throne of grace, make that the undisturbed priority of your life.

He also wore sackcloth, which was a coarse, dark colored garment, sometimes they just wore it around their waist. Sometimes they wore it over their whole body. It was made out of goat's hair, typically worn in times of mourning. Certainly this would manifest what was going on in his heart. He also spoke of ashes, which was typically sprinkled on a person's head; sometimes they would sit in ashes or both. And that symbolized deep penitence, a sign of, of distress. A sign of repentance for sin committed. And so here we have it, with great humility and faith, Daniel comes before the Lord his God to understand these things. Burdened to see when there would be relief. And as we will see, his prayer is one of both personal and national confession.

Friends, I trust you share Daniel's burden for the return of Christ. Trust that you long for repentance in your own heart and in the lives of those around you that you long for purity of life. And I trust that you will make prayer more of a priority in your life. Make that a lifestyle, the lifestyle of disciplined, fervent, private, persistent prayer and watch what God will do. We will continue to see what Daniel prayed for and how God answered him, Lord willing, the next time we're together. Let's pray.

Father, thank You for these eternal truths. I pray that you will cause them to find lodging in each of our hearts. That you will germinate them by the power of your Spirit, that they might grow forth a great plant that will manifest the fruit of the glory of Christ, in our lives in your church, that many will come to saving faith in our precious Savior. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

So once again, we come to Daniel, in our study of that amazing book. And we are in Daniel chapter eight, as we have just read a few minutes ago, a few remarks to prepare our hearts for the word this morning. As I think about it, having lived in a country that has been largely sympathetic to Christianity, it's hard for us to realize the seething and growing hatred people have towards those who love and worship Christ. Our world today can be likened to the wickedness that was upon the face of the earth during the days of Noah, that resulted in God's judgment through the worldwide flood. You may recall that in Genesis six, five, we read "That the Lord saw the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." Certainly, that is an apt description of much of what we see, in our world today, even in our country. The militant unbelief in our country validated by the gross immorality, and the sheer insanity of our culture is certain proof that Satan is alive and well. And that he has launched a full-scale attack on the kingdom of God. The Bible, the Gospel, the Lord Jesus Christ, and His true church, all of these things are mocked and ridiculed. And it's just a matter of time that they will be outlawed. After all, what fellowship does light have with darkness. Jesus said, "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own, but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world because of this, the world hates you." But I fear today we underestimate the level of hatred. In fact, just try sharing the gospel with people and see the reaction. And if you're going to be honest with the gospel, you have to begin with the bad news that all that we are, and all that we do is fundamentally offensive to a holy God. That you are born with a sin nature, and you will perish in your sins, unless you place your faith in the living Christ, who paid the penalty for them. Try telling that to people and watch the reaction. Were it not for the freedoms embedded in the Constitution and frankly, more importantly, the mercy of a sovereign God, I fear that we would all be put to death. This has been what has happened over the course of many years of history. And today, we see government officials that do everything they can to legislate what God loathes and criminalize that which God loves. And of course, this has happened down through the millennia of time, and Satan will continue to do everything he can to thwart the purposes of God. But ultimately, I might add to no avail, because in the end, because our God reigns, the kingdom will come.

Now, what we have here in Daniel eight, is an illustration of Satan's wrath being poured out upon God's covenant people Israel in that day, especially under the past rule of Antiochus Epiphanes, which, as you will see, I believe foreshadows an even greater persecution in the future, for Israel and for all who love Christ, under the rule of antichrist. Israel's only hope, the hope of all Gentiles, is ultimately in Christ alone. And we can be thankful that in him we are more than conquerors; "hupernika," we are super conquerors in Christ. He alone is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Now, this is a bit technical, I want to try to make it as simple as possible. Let me tell you what, in summary, what the chapter says; give you an overview, we'll look at it a little bit more in detail and then summarize it.

This vision paints in very broad strokes, the future history of the Medo-Persian and the Grecian Empire. The second and third empires, in Daniel's history of quote "the times of the Gentiles." But with much greater detail, he describes the exceedingly wicked ruler and Antiochus Epiphanes who served as one of the kings of the Syrian division of Alexander's great empire after Alexander the Great died. And however, the prophecy, I believe, goes beyond the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes and foreshadows a future leader that will persecute Israel even more greatly referring to the Antichrist, the final world leader. Now once more as we look at this vision, we see that the Spirit of God uses animals to symbolize these kingdoms. You will recall in chapter two; a bear was used to symbolize the Medo-Persian Empire and the leopard to symbolize Greece. Now in Chapter eight you have a two horned ram symbolizing Medo-Persia, and a one horned male goat symbolizing Greece. However, the one horn on the male goat, as we're going to see, is suddenly broken off and replaced by four conspicuous horns, which symbolizes the four kingdoms of the Diadochi it was called, which means successors, the four rival generals that emerged after Alexander died. And these generals fought for control of his kingdom. And in this vision, we're also going to see that a little horn appears and grows from among those other four horns. A horn that grows to be exceedingly great and that symbolizes Antiochus Epiphanes, the eighth king of the Syrian dynasty of the Seleucid Empire, who came out of one of the four kingdoms of Alexander's successors. He is like the little horn of the fourth kingdom, which was Rome in Daniel seven, he's like him, the one that brought such great persecution upon Israel. However, the one horned male goat that we're going to see here, in Daniel eight is not Rome, nor is the little horn in chapter eight, a reference to the antichrist that will defeat be defeated an the Messiah’s kingdom will come and replace that as we see in Daniel seven. You got to be careful, just because something is similar, doesn't mean that it's identical. A mistake that many Bible expositors I fear make. So bottom line, unlike Daniel's vision recorded in Daniel seven that summarizes the times of the Gentiles in the coming of the messianic kingdom that will replace the Gentile kingdoms when Christ returns, the vision here in chapter eight finds its primary fulfillment in the Medo-Persian and Grecian empires. However, when the angel Gabriel interprets the vision to Daniel, his explanation seems to go beyond Antiochus, to a future world ruler, of which he is merely the type of a greater antitype, the greater antitype being the ultimate King that will oppose Israel in the last days, namely the Antichrist. So as we look at the text, first of all, the first verses here we see the historical setting.

Notice verse one, "In the third year of the reign of Belshazzar the king a vision appeared to me, Daniel, subsequent to the one which appeared to me previously. I looked in the vision and while I was looking, I was in the citadel of Susa, which is in the province of Elam; and I looked in the vision, and I myself was beside the Ulai Canal." Or it could be translated "river." Interesting enough, the Hebrew word "ram" springs from the same root as Elam. You're going to see some of the significance here in a moment. Now bear in mind, this is the second vision God gave to Daniel. At this point Daniel was the same age as I am today, 69 years old. I'm sure he didn't look as young as I do, but that was his age. This occurred in 551 BC, 12 years before Belshazzar's feast, you will recall in Daniel five, where he saw the handwriting on the wall, handwriting pertaining to God's judgment upon him and the Babylonian Empire. Now Susa was a city about 230 miles east of Babylon, and about 120 miles north of the Persian Gulf, that several years later became the one of the Royal cities of the middle Persian Empire. This was the place by the way, where the famous code of Hammurabi was found. The Babylonian law code that dates all the way back to 1772 BCE, that was the Babylonian law written by King Hammurabi of Babylon. By the way, it's still on display in the Louvre Museum in Paris. And I might also add that later on, this was the same Palace region where Esther served as queen. And later it was also the place where Nehemiah was the cup bearer of Artaxerxes the First. So that's a little bit of the background.

So that's the setting now to the vision, verse three, "Then I lifted my eyes and looked, and behold, a ram, which had two horns was standing in front of the canal. Now the two horns were long, but one was longer than the other, with the longer wind coming up last, I saw the ram, budding westward, northward and southward and no other beasts could stand before him, nor was there anyone to rescue from his power, but he did as he pleased and magnified himself." Now, first of all, you're going to see that I'm going to go back and forth between what these verses say and Gabriel's interpretation of them in verses 15 through 27. So we have an interpretation here of what we just read in verse 20, "The ram which you saw with the two horns, represents the kings of Media and Persia." So this speaks of the dual monarchy of Medo-Persia, symbolized by the silver arms; the two arms of the image in Daniel 2:32. And the two sided bear that we read about in Daniel seven. Under Cyrus we know that Persia eventually became the dominant of the two empires, and they superseded the Median side of this dual monarchy. And it's also interesting to note that the Persian rulers bore the head of a ram a jeweled ram's head whenever they stood in front of their army, according to the fourth century historian Arminius or Salinas. Likewise, Kyle says, quote, "In the Bundehesh," which was a Persian religious book, "In the Bundehesh, the guardian spirit of the Persian kingdom appears under the form of a ram with clean feet and sharp pointed horns. And the Persian King when he stood at the head of the army bore instead of the diadem, the head of a ram." Now m,ind you the Spirit of God is revealing this to Daniel long before it happened. And here a ram symbolizes as we see, the Medo-Persian Empire, and later on the Grecian Empire is going to be symbolized by a male goat. My friend, Dr. Walvoord, said this, "Not only are both the ram and the goat mentioned in the Old Testament as symbols of power, but different lands were assigned to the signs of the zodiac, according to astronomical geography, geography. In this view Persia is thought of as under the zodiacal sign of Aries, the ram. And Greece as sharing with Syria, the principal territory of the Seleucid monarchy, the zodiacal sign of Capricorn, the goat. The word Capricorn is derived from the Latin capri, a goat, and cornu, a horn." End quote. Can't you see the hand of Satan through all of these things? Now notice in verse three "The two horns were long but one was longer than the other with a longer one coming up last." And then he says, "I saw the ram butting westward, northward and southward and no other beasts could stand before him nor was there anyone to rescue from his power. But he did as he pleased and magnified himself. Now folks this is amazing prophecy, absolutely astounding to predict what we know historically happened. The primary military conquests of Cyrus and his successors advanced in three different directions westward to Babylonia to Syria to the Asia Minor, northward to Armenia and all the way up into the Caspian Sea region, and then southward into Egypt and Ethiopia. This is exactly what God predicted.

Now, as Daniel just describes this, he says in verse four, no other beasts were basically able to stand against the Medo-Persian horns. So obviously, there's some other unnamed animals that he's seeing here, symbolic of their powers. And we know that historically, this ram was without equal in that day. History reveals how Cyrus marched virtually unopposed across northern Mesopotamia, to Asia Minor, and there he conquered, everything, including the wealthly Croesus, you remember that story. And then he headed on to Babylon without hardly any effort. We read about this, by the way, in Isaiah chapter 45, the first four verses, and here you see how God even uses the wicked to accomplish his purposes. There we read, "Thus says the Lord to Cyrus His anointed, who might have taken by the right hand, to subdue nations before him, and to loose the loins of kings, to open doors before him so that gates will not be shut: I will go before you and make the rough places smooth, they will shatter the doors of bronze, and cut through their iron bars, I will give you the treasures of darkness and hidden wealth of secret places, so that you may know that it is I, the Lord the God of Israel, who calls you by your name. For the sake of Jacob My servant, and Israel, My chosen one, I have called you by your name, I have given you a title of honor, Though you have not known Me."

So verse four, "no other beasts could stand before him, nor was there anyone to rescue from his power, but he did as he pleased and magnified himself." So what we see is that a sovereign God orchestrates all of these things. And by divine design, the Medo-Persian Empire became the undisputed, dominant Gentile empire of its day. Until Alexander the Great came along. That's what he sees next in verse five. "While I was observing behold, a male goat was coming from the west over the surface of the whole earth without touching the ground; and the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes. He came up to the rim that had the two horns which I had seen standing in front of the canal and rushed at him in his mighty wrath." Now, if we look at the interpretation in verse 21, we see what Gabriel describes. "The shaggy goat, he says, represents the kingdom of Greece, and the large horn that is between his eyes is the first king." And we know this to be Alexander the Great. Once again, astounding accuracy of what would happen some 300 years after Daniel's vision. Beloved, only a sovereign omnipotent, omniscient God could accomplish this. Indeed as Daniel records in verse five, "a male goat," by the way, a male goat is greater in strength and in agility than a ram sheep. The "male goat was coming from the west over the surface of the whole earth without touching the ground." And we know historically that Alexander began his conquest in the west and he moved to the east with uncanny speed. And this is even symbolized by the phrase over the surface of the whole earth without touching the ground. You will recall in chapter seven in verse six, he was represented by the four wings of a leopard, indicating that speed once again. Verse five, "and the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes." Now, normally, a male goat is going to have two horns. But this one is unique; here he has one very large, very conspicuous, or it could even be translated prominent horn, and to be sure this is Alexander the Great, who was a military genius, educated, by the way, by Aristotle. He was born in 356. He was the son of Philip of Macedon, who was a great warrior and a statesman, who ruled Macedon for three decades. You may recall he lost his right eye in a battle due to an arrow. But eventually he was assassinated, resulting in his son Alexander, succeeding him as king in 336 BC; Alexander was 20 years old. Alexander knew that his father hated the Persians. In fact, all of the Greeks hated them since the days of Cyrus. He also knew that his father was preparing to invade them so fueled with seething hatred for an oppressive enemy. He set out to accomplish his father's wishes a year and a half after he had taken the throne. And he began his conquest in 334 BC.

Verse six, "He came up to the ram that had two horns, which I had seen standing in front of the canal and rushed at him in his mighty wrath." Could be translated his powerful fury or his infuriating strength, he was empowered by the feelings of intense anger. The Greeks hated these people. And so it was time for revenge. So they attacked them. Verse seven, "I saw him come beside the ram, and he was enraged at him, and he struck the ram and shattered his two horns and the Ram had no strength to withstand him. So he hurled him to the ground and trampled on him, and there was none to rescue the ram from his power. Then the male goat magnified himself exceedingly." Indeed, we know historically with around 40,000 men, he annihilated the Persians taking all of Asia Minor, even northern Syria. He conquered the island fortress of Tyre, went on to Egypt and Mesopotamia, all the way to modern Afghanistan, all the way to the borders of India. Maybe you've seen on some of the old movies, the great victory that he had over King Porus with the war elephants. The Battle of Jhelum in 326 BCE, and he carved out an empire of 1.5 million square miles. And he did that in 10 years. That's astounding. So indeed, the male goat magnified himself exceedingly.

Well, as we all know, pride comes before a fall. In verse eight, we see "But as soon as he was mighty, the large horn was broken." We know that history records how he claimed to be a god, and he provoked many of his Macedonian leaders to rebel. In doing so, they were frustrated with him because he merged some of the Persians with the Greek elements of his army, he married some of the Persian women and so forth. Historians Green and Renault say this quote, "His mind full of new projects, Alexander built a fleet to explore the coasts of Arabia and Africa. He sailed up the Tigris to Opus, the ancient Assyrian city where Cyrus the Persian had defeated the Babylonians in 539. They went on to say that Alexander entered Babylon for the last time in the spring of 323, worn out by wounds, hardship, and overdrinking. He fell ill of a fever. Soon he could neither move nor speak. He was propped up and each officer and soldier filed past, He acknowledged each man with his eyes or a slight movement of his head. Within two days Alexander died, and he was not yet 33 years old." So the large horn was broken.

Verse eight, the and it says, "And in its place there came up for conspicuous horns toward the four winds of heaven." We find the interpretation in verse 22, "the broken horn and the four horns that arose in its place represent four kingdoms, which will arise from his nation, although not with his power." And indeed, these four generals did not have the same intellect, the same power as Alexander. You must remember that Alexander's empire, though it was vast, it was not united politically, governmentally, as an empire. So soon after his death, the generals began to fight amongst each other over who's going to be in charge and over what area. And we know that four dominant generals emerged Antigones of Babylon and North Syria, Ptolemy, the first solder of Egypt, Cassander of Macedonias and Lysimacus of Thrace and Bithynia. I might also add that you see the same divisions described in Daniel 11 and verse four.

But notice a fascinating development here in verse nine. "Out of one of them came forth a rather small horn which grew exceedingly great toward the south, toward the east, and toward the Beautiful Land," referring to the land of Palestine, the land of Israel. Now a little historical background here, General Antigones lost Babylon and Syria to Seleucus the First of Nicator, the first of the kings of the north, listed in chapter 11 of Daniel. And then a little over 100 years later, and the Seleucid dynasty came forth a small horn, as Daniel says, by the name of Antiochus, the Fourth Epiphanes. He was the eighth king of this dynasty. He ruled from 175 to 164 BC. He is described in Daniel 11:21 as the quote, "despicable person." How would you like to have that title, the despicable person? I think I've been called that as well. One of the most vicious persecutors of Israel, but it's it's interesting, by the way, Epiphanes, translated means the "illustrious one." And because the Jews hated him so much, they called him Epimanes, which means madman.

Verse 10, "It grew up to the host of heaven and caused some of the hosts and some of the stars to fall to the earth and it trampled them down." Now we know that stars can at times refer to angels in Scripture, but in other places, it is used to describe spiritual leaders. We see this in Daniel 12 and verse three. And we see now the interpretation that Daniel gives. And here in this interpretation, you're going to begin to see the elements of a dual prophecy, describing not only the events and the person of Antiochus Epiphanes, but also the future antichrist. Verse 23, "'The later period of the rule when the transgressors have run their course, a king will arise insolent and skilled in intrigue. His power will be mighty, but not by his own power, and he will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will; He will destroy mighty men and the holy people.'" Indeed, we know in verse 10, he will trample them down. So let's go back to verse 11. It is the small horn now that emerges and grew large it says "it even magnified itself to be equal with the Commander of the host," mostly likely a reference to God himself, and "it removed the regular sacrifice from Him." "Regular sacrifice" can be translated, "the continual ceremonial sacrifices," the observances of the Jews in the temple. So he "removed the regular sacrifice from him, and the place of His sanctuary was thrown down."

Now, I want to take you for a moment to Second Maccabees, where we can get some historical details about what happened during this time. First and Second Maccabees, written in the first century by unknown Jewish historians, part of the apocryphal books, they're not canonical books; they're not inspired, but we get a lot of history from them. So here's what we read. "Two years later, the king," referring to Antiochus, "sent the mission commander, the chief collector to the cities of Judah, and he came to Jerusalem with a strong force. He spoke to them deceitfully in peaceful terms, and they believed him. Then he attacked the city suddenly, in a great onslaught and destroyed many of the people in Israel. He plundered the city and set fire to it. Demolished its houses and its surrounding walls. And they took captive the women and children and seized the animals. Then the king wrote to his whole kingdom that all should be one people and abandon their particular customs. All the Gentiles conform to the command of the king and many Israelites delighted in his religion. They sacrificed to idols and profane to the Sabbath." He goes on to say, "The king sent letters by messenger to Jerusalem and to the cities of Judah, ordering them to follow customs foreign to their land, to prohibit burnt offering sacrifices and libations in the sanctuary; to profane the Sabbath and feast days; to desecrate the sanctuary and the sacred ministers; to build pagan altars and temples and shrines; to sacrifice swine and unclean animals; to leave their sons uncircumcised, and to defile themselves with every kind of impurity and abomination, so that they might forget the law and change all its ordinances. Whoever refused to act according to the command of the king, was put to death." We go on to read, "Many of the people, those who abandoned the law, joined them and committed evil in the land." We read how they, "drove Israel into hiding wherever places of refuge could be found. And then on the 15th, day of the month, Kislev in the year 145, the king erected the desolating abomination, upon the altar of burnt offerings. And in the surrounding cities of Judah, they built pagan altars. They also burned incense at the doors of houses, and in the streets, any scrolls of the law that they found were tore up and burned, whoever was found with a scroll of the covenant, and whoever observed the law was condemned to death by royal decree." So they use their power against Israel against those who were caught each month in the cities. On the 25th day of each month, they sacrificed on the pagan altar that was over the altar of burnt offerings. In keeping with the decree, they put to death, women who had their children circumcised, and they hung their babies from their necks, their families also, and those who had circumcised them were killed. Circumcision, of course, being a sign of the Mosaic Covenant. So Daniel sees the terrible future for his people Israel. Verse 12, " And on account of transgression, the host will be given over to the horn along with the regular sacrifice and it will fling truth to the ground and perform its will and prosper." By the way, we must bear in mind that Satan knows that true worship is dependent upon the written law, dependent upon the Scriptures, the truth of the Word of God. So he will, as he has always done, do everything he can to eliminate first, the credibility of the word. And then secondly, the word itself.

Verse 13, "Then I heard a holy one speaking and another holy one said to that particular one who was speaking, 'How long will the vision about the regular sacrifice apply while the transgression causes horror so as to allow both the holy place and the host to be trampled?' He said to me, 'For 2300 evenings and mornings, then the holy place will be properly restored.'" Now we know that according to the creation count in Genesis one, that the formula "evening and morning" refers to a literal day. And while we can't be dogmatic about the precise dates that are mentioned here, according to First Maccabees four verses 52 through 59, we see how the Holy Place was properly restored on the 25th day of the ninth month of 164 BC. And if we work backward 2300 days from that day, we come to the fall of 170 BC. We get a sense of this in First Maccabees one beginning in verse 10. Let me read this to you. "They're sprang from these a sinful off shoot. Antiochus Epiphanes son of King Antiochus. Once a hostage at Rome, he became king in the 137th year of the kingdom of the Greeks. In those days there appeared in Israel transgressions of the law, who seduced many saying, 'Let us go and make a covenant with the Gentiles all around us since we are separated from them, many evils have come upon us.' So the proposal was agreeable. Some from among the people promptly went to the king and he authorized them to introduce the ordinances of the Gentiles. Thereupon, they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem according to the Gentile custom. They disguised their circumcision and abandoned the holy covenant. They allied themselves with the Gentiles and sold themselves to wrongdoing. When his kingdom seemed secure, Antiochus undertook to become king of the land of Egypt, and to rule over both kingdoms. He invaded Egypt with a strong force with chariots, elephants in calvary, and with a large fleet to make war on Ptolemy king of Egypt. Ptolemy was frightened that his presence and fled and many were wounded and fell dead. The fortified cities in the land of Egypt were captured and Antiochus plundered the land of Egypt. After Antiochus defeated Egypt, in the 143rd year, he returned and went up against Israel and Jerusalem with a strong force. He insolently entered the sanctuary, and took away the golden altar, the lamp stand for the light with all its utensils, the offering table, the cups and bowls, the golden sensors and the curtain, the cornices and the golden ornament on the facade of the temple. He stripped it all off, and he took away the silver and gold and the precious vessels. He also took all the hidden treasures he could find." Dr. Whitcomb said, quote, "We can see from this portion of the remarkably accurate historical document of First Maccabees that the beginning of the 2300 days of trampling of, quote, 'the host,' here in Daniel 8:13, as well as the holy place, could very easily have occurred in the fall of 170 BC. It was when the apostate Jews, quote, 'abandoned the holy covenant.' End quote, and received official authorization from Antiochus to, quote, 'observe the ordinances of the Gentiles,' end quote. It was then that this six year and four month period of horror began just as God prophesied."

We see some of the interpretation back in verse 25. Gabriel says, "'And through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence.'" Once again, bear in mind, the dual prophecy of not only Antiochus Epiphanes, then, but the Antichrist yet future. "'Through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence; he will magnify himself in his heart and he will destroy many while they are at ease. He will even oppose the Prince of princes, but he will be broken without human agency.'" That is, he will be destroyed without human intervention. And we know that Antiochus Epiphanes died of a foul disease. We also know that he learned, on his deathbed while he was sick, that his armies had gone into the land of Judah, and had been routed by the Maccabean revolt. You remember Judas Maccabeus. And according to First Maccabee six, beginning in verse eight, we read this "When the king heard this news, he was astonished and very much shaken. Sick with grief because his designs had failed, he took to his bed, there he remained many days assailed by waves of grief, for he thought he was going to die. So he called in all his friends and said to them, quote, 'Sleep has departed from my eyes and my heart sinks from anxiety, I said to myself, into what tribulation have I come, and in what floods of sorrow am I now? Yet I was kindly and beloved in my rule, but I now recall the evils I did in Jerusalem. When I carried away all the vessels of silver and gold that were in it, for no cause gave orders that the inhabitants of Judah be destroyed. I know that this is why these evils have overtaken me. And now I am dying in bitter grief in a foreign land.'" How sad the dying words of a wicked man who is now enduring the torments of solitary confinement, in an eternal hell.

So Gabriel closes his interpretation to Daniel, verse 26, "'The vision of the evenings in the mornings which has been told is true; but keep the vision secret," in other words, keep it sealed up, "for it pertains to many days in the future.' Then I, Daniel was exhausted and sick for days.'" The idea here is that when he begins to see the horrors that await his beloved Israel, it just took a toll on him emotionally. "'I was exhausted and sick for days. Then I got up again and carried on the king's business. But I was astounded at the vision, and there was none to explain it.'"

Now, as we wrap this up this morning, we need to back up, want you to notice the full context of the interpretation beginning in verse 15. And here, we will have a better understanding of what Daniel's vision says, I believe, about the future of the Antichrist. Verse 15, "'When I Daniel had seen the vision, I sought to understand it, and behold, standing before me was one who looked like a man. And I heard the voice of a man between the banks of Ulai, and he called out and said, 'Gabriel, give this man an understanding of the vision.'" This was probably the voice of God; God calling Gabriel. Gabriel, by the way, is a term that means "Mighty One of God." I might also add that Gabriel was the one that announced to Zacharias and to Elizabeth that they were going to have a son whose name was John the Baptist. It was Gabriel as well that announced the birth of Christ, to Mary. And so this is who we have here, verse 17, "So he came near to me where I was standing." In other words, it would appear that, that he's seeing all this and he sees this angelic person that looks like a man, and he starts coming towards him. I'm trying to, you know, get a vision of this in my own mind what that might be like, the whole thing is just so overwhelming. "So he came here to where I was standing and when he came, I was frightened and fell on my face; but he said to me, 'Son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end.' Now, while he was talking with me, I sank into a deep sleep." literally, he fainted. I think I would do its just, this is just overwhelming. You just can't handle it. "I sank into a deep sleep with my face to the ground, but he touched me and made me stand upright." So apparently, he sees the angel from a distance, comes towards him, scares him to death. He's overpowered by the manifestation of perfected holiness, which by the way, is always the response that you see of people in Scripture. Dear friends, anyone who has a cavalier attitude, when they say, oh, yeah, I talked with an angel or I talked with God, any person that talks that way, is a liar. Because this is the response that would happen.

Now notice the phrase at the end of verse 17, "'Son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end.'" Also, in verse 19, we see the phrase used again, "'Behold, I'm going to let you know what will occur at the final period of the indignation for it pertains to the appointed time of the end." Now, what did these phrases mean? Do they only refer to the last days of the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes? I think not. I cannot see how his six years of persecuting Israel could be considered, quote, "the final period of the indignation pertaining to the appointed time of the end." I mean, what ended at that time at some level of persecution of Israel for just a moment, but I mean, he died 100 years before his kingdom came to an end. And when he died, Israel's persecution and suffering continued at the hands of Gentile domination. And there was certainly no outpouring of blessing upon Israel after the Seleucid Empire. So that just doesn't make sense to me that it's just referring to that time. Moreover, their suffering only increased because what followed the Seleucid reign? Rome. The iron legions of Rome. So surely Gabriel's reference to quote, "the final period of the indignation," (break in audio, not able to be transcribed)...That is exceedingly more significant than the final historical events at the close of Antiochus' reign. And most premillennial scholars agree that Gabriel's interpretation encompasses more than just those events, but sees this pointing to the wicked rule of one who is foreshadowed by Antiochus Epiphanes, namely the wicked rule of the Antichrist, the one whose future character and conduct can be seen in the details of verses 23 through 25 that describes not only Antiochus Epiphanes, but also the Antichrist.

The fourth century AD, Latin scholar and Bible translator, and theologian by the name of Jerome reported that the Jews of his day saw more than Antiochus in this prophecy, Jerome said, quote, "This is also our understanding concerning the Antichrist who shadow has thus been projected before." End quote. So I believe it is reasonable, let me put it that way, to assume that the appointed time of the end, for example, in verse 19, refers to the final God ordained defeat of the Gentile domination over Israel. When, as Jesus said in Luke 21:24, "the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled." In other words, when Christ returns at the end of God's judgment of Daniel 70th week, the tribulation period, only then will the reign of the Antichrist and Gentile domination be over forever. Only then, will messianic blessing replace God's continuing indignation against Israel through Gentile oppression. Only then will Israel be able to experience the spiritual and the physical blessings that God promised them in the Abrahamic covenant. So when Gabriel tells Daniel in verse 17, "Son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end." And when he says in verse 19, "Behold, I am going to let you know what will occur at the final period of the indignation for it pertains to the appointed time of the end," it is reasonable to believe that this is pointing to the culmination of God's 70th week of judgment. We read about it, for example, in Daniel nine verse 24. "Seventy weeks had been decreed for your people in your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy place." So, in my humble opinion, the oppression of antichrist is only a partial fulfillment of the prophetic vision. Whereas the final rule of the Antichrist, which I might add, was presented in Nebuchadnezzar's dream in Daniel's first vision. That final rule fulfills every aspect of this vision, especially as it relates to those phrases. Verse 17, the vision pertains to the time of the end. And the final period of the indignation for it pertains to the appointed time of the end.

Dr. David Larsen, who you, some of you that were here years ago, may recall when he came to speak to us, puts this in perspective in his excellent book, "Jews and Gentiles in the Church." He says this, "At the halfway point in the seven years of tribulation, the smoldering and latent anti semitism of the world ruler bursts into a flame of fury, and a frenetic rage, according to Daniel 9:27, he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the temple, he will set up an abomination that causes desolation." Let me pause for a second, where have we heard that before? Dr. Larsen went on to say, "Something happens among the Jews in Israel in response to the testimony of the two witnesses of Revelation 11 and the great hatred that Antiochus Epiphanes had for the Jews. In the second century BC, there is a fore glimpse of the Antichrist's vicious aggression toward the Jews in the tribulation period. The world ruler will then turn his evil genius to the final solution to do what Hitler and all the anti Semites of history have been unsuccessful in doing. The little land of Israel and Jerusalem, become the objects of universal scorn and hostility." End quote.

But thankfully, dear friends, we know that because of God's faithfulness, because of his covenant promises, because of his infinite grace, he will indeed save all that he has promised to save, including a remnant of Israel, of ethnic Israel. We read about this, for example, in Romans 11, beginning in verse 25. Paul says "a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. This is my covenant with them, when I take away their sins.'" Oh, dear Christian, I pray that these great prophetic truths will animate your heart to a more dedicated sense of worship and service, knowing that the Lord is going to come again. May he find each of us faithful at our post, and I hope that you will be overwhelmed as I am when I study these things, that once again, we serve a sovereign God who has ordained to the end from the beginning. He is an omnipotent, omniscient God, that in his providence, in the miracle of his divine providence, can orchestrate all of the events of history of everyone's life, to somehow accomplish all that he has promised. And then to think that we're a part of that by his grace. Folks, if that doesn't get you excited; I'm not a real emotional person, but believe me in my heart, this just, this thrills me. This is overwhelming to think; what God has promised, what he is doing, what he will do, and to think that he has saved us. That he is our Savior, our Redeemer, and our King. And so I pray that this will motivate you. May I challenge you to live in light of his glorious return and warn others that need to come to him and repentant faith. Make your life a life that manifests the love of Christ, that others will see him in you? Amen? Amen.

Let's pray. Father, thank you for these eternal truths that are so overwhelming. Thank you for the promises that are ours in Christ. Thank you for your saving grace, and certainly for the power of your word, that your Spirit uses to sanctify us and conform us evermore into the likeness of your beloved Son, our Savior, the Lord Jesus. And Lord, for those that do not know you as Savior, that know nothing of the intimate joy of communion (break in audio, not able to be transcribed).

As always, I am humbled and I assume you are as well, to be able to open up the Word of God and submit ourselves to what the Spirit of God has for us this morning. So will you take your bibles and turn once again to Daniel chapter seven, we will be looking at these verses in this amazing book. And we are (audio is not able to be transcribed). This is the fourth and final part of this little series emerging from Daniel seven. Now, before we look at the text, may I just say that our study of bible prophecy is a great encouragement to every believer. And certainly, it was intended to be so in the ancient days of Israel, while those dear people were under exile. And so when we come to the prophetic word, we find our hearts just being animated with joy, because we can see that God has a plan. And he is working it precisely the way he intended. The coming Messiah was the main focus of the Old Testament beginning in Genesis three, following Adam's fall when God promised that the seed of the woman would crush the serpent's head. You will recall in Genesis 3:15, and then all the way through to the last book of the Old Testament (break in audio; not able to be transcribed).

And more than 100 of those promises were literally filled (break in audio; not able to be transcribed) reason that the remaining two thirds will also be literally fulfilled. So how encouraging it is for us to look into the prophetic word and see what God has in store, especially during these days in our culture and around the world today. In fact, Christians today are witnessing biblical values being replaced by laws that impose a godless, immoral, oppressiveness toward conservative values in general, Basically, a war in the country, an ideological war, a civil war that's raging out of control. I was thinking my, here we are in the United States of America, a place that was once that great bastion of freedom and protector of the world and we're just watching it crumble under the weight of out-of-control spending and crippling debt and open borders, incoherent foreign policies. We're watching our country being led by corrupt and incompetent, frankly, totalitarian politicians. We've got a president that's clearly in a state of cognitive decline. We see the rise of, of Neo Marxism all around the country. We're being swept away by a tsunami of immorality, as we drowned, frankly, in the sewage of the LGBTQ w x, y, z, sexual deviancy and the the woke culture that even many evangelical churches are embracing. We are seeing escalating violence because police are afraid to do what they need to do. We're seeing the COVID pandemic with the massive impact that it has had on human life and on the economy. And then the growing threat of totalitarian world powers. It's frightening to read what China and what Russia are creating with respect to their military powers and their plans and so forth. I mean, folks, we all know that our children are being raised in a radically different America than it even was 20 years ago. And I shudder to think what their life is going to be like. We're looking at a godless, immoral idolatry country. And it can be infuriating. It can be disheartening and it's easy for us to start wringing our hands and losing hope as if all is lost, but folks once again God is in control. Yeah, things are probably going to get a whole lot worse, but in the end, Jesus is coming; our hope is in the Lord. It's not in America. It's not in our military powers. It's certainly not in our politicians. We fix our hope completely, as Peter said, "on the grace to be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ." And in our text this morning, we are given hope, a certain hope, a blessed hope of a coming King, our Redeemer, our Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, let me once again, because I know this can be complicated. Let me review a little bit of where we've come thus far in Daniel chapter seven and give you the context. Remember that in the first eight verses of Daniel seven, the Spirit of God gives his servant Daniel, basically a panoramic view of world history, including the rise and fall of four Gentile Empires symbolized by four great beasts that rose up from the sea; empires that would dominate, certainly Jerusalem and God's covenant people. And the fourth beast as we've studied, the Roman Empire, was very different. It had 10 horns on the head of a great monster, of reference we know, to 10 actual kingdoms that will exist simultaneously during Daniel's 70th week of judgment or the future tribulation period, just prior to Christ's return. And as we've studied that has to refer to a revived Roman Empire, yet future, in the New Testament era. And also we saw there that an 11th horn appeared, a little horn that comes up after the others, which is revealed to be the Antichrist. And then later, if you jump over to verse 15, through verse 28, we see that an angelic interpreter gives Daniel a big picture, general interpretation of all that he saw, and he explained how that those beasts represent human kings and their kingdoms, and he also reveals their kingdoms will not last. But they will ultimately be replaced by God's kingdom and ruled by the saints of the highest one. That's us, folks. How exciting. But in between verse 18, and the angelic interpretation that you see in verse 15, and following, there is an abrupt cutaway scene, if you will, in the narrative. Immediately after that terrifying description of that fourth beast, with its blasphemous, little horn, the Antichrist uttering great boasts, Daniel was suddenly transported into the presence of God. And as if to confirm to him that, hey, I'm in control, I will judge and I will establish my kingdom. And in that section, that we began to look at last week, there are two dominant themes that emerge. Number one, God is the omniscient judge. That's what we studied last time. And then today, we're going to see that Christ is the coming King, in verses 13 and 14. So by way of eschatological or end times context, with the pre kingdom, tribulation judgments upon the nations of the world now complete, the Messiah King, the Lord Jesus Christ, has been presented now before God the Father, the Ancient of Days, to receive the father's gift of the worldwide kingdom that is to come.

So in verse 13, we read this, "'I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming."'" Now, the phrase "clouds of heaven" depicts the majesty and the power and the authority of his glorious person. And repeatedly in Scripture, we see that the clouds of heaven are used to depict the revelation of deity. And when it says, "one like a Son of Man was coming," this is in contrast to the beastly character of the other kingdoms. So Christ is being referred to here; he is human-like, he's not beast like, he's like a Son of Man, though God very God, he will come and manifest all the perfections of unfallen humanity and he will reign in human form.

In Matthew 26, you may recall when Jesus was under oath in the high priest court, he prophesied regarding his eschatological coming his "parousia" and he made reference to this very passage there in Matthew 26 beginning in verse 63, we read this, "And the high priest said to Him, 'I adjure You by the living God, that You tell us whether You are the Christ, the Son of God.' Jesus said to him, 'You have said it yourself; nevertheless, I tell you, hereafter, you will see the Son of Man, sitting at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven.'" Beloved, this is what was revealed to Daniel; this is what is being revealed to us. This is the one we await. This is the one that the world will witness one day. Luke also records the same details in Acts one verses nine through 11, in the context of Jesus' ascension back into glory, and his promised return. There we read, "And after He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And as they were gazing intently into the sky, while He was going, behold, two men in white clothing stood beside them. They also said, 'Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you've watched Him go into heaven.'"

So back to Daniel, Daniel sees the Messiah coming and in verse 13, he goes on to say, "'And he came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him.'" Here we witness the sovereign bestow of the eternal kingdom of the self-existent, preexisting, uncreated Creator of heaven and earth, the Lord Jesus Christ. As we read, for example, in John one, the first three verses, astoundingly now, Jesus Christ, will be installed as God's mediatorial kingdom on a renovated earth. He will be given regal authority and he will exercise it by divine grant. I'm reminded of Psalm chapter two and verse six, where God says, "'I have installed My King upon Zion, My holy mountain.'" This is what we're seeing here. Beloved, he is the redeemer King. He is the one that has purchased our redemption by his very blood, He is the one that has made us Kingdom citizens. He is the one according to Hebrews two, where "Through death, He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is the devil, and might free those who through fear of death, were subject to slavery all of their lives." This is the Jesus that we worship.

Back to verse 14, "'And to Him was given," three things, "dominion, glory and a kingdom.'" Dominion is a reference to his ruling authority, glory is obviously a reference to the majesty of his regal authority, and a kingdom speaks of an organized form of his government. Now think about this, unlike the previous four empires that were described, even in Daniel two, as well as in Daniel seven, empires that were ruled by fallen men and destined to fail, Christ's supernatural kingdom, that is coming, will never fail. We read this, where he goes on to say, "'That all the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him.'" Can you imagine that day? No more Congress, no more Senate. No more all of that stuff. No more CNN. "All the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him." Folks, I can't tell you how motivating that is to me. I hope it is to you as well. His dominion is an everlasting dominion. It's not waiting for the next voting cycle. It's an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away and his kingdom is one which will not be destroyed. Dr. Alva J. McClain, the founder and first president of my alma mater, Grace Theological Seminary, wrote this in his book "The Greatness of the Kingdom," which by the way, it is one of the greatest books that I have ever read, I would encourage you to read it, "The Greatness of the Kingdom." Here's what Dr. McClain said, "All the functions of government are centered in the glorious person of this mediatorial king. The prophet Isaiah paints a vivid picture of the political situation in the days of the established kingdom; "Then the eyes of men shall see the King and His beauty, ruling upon the earth as a judge, law giver and King" (reference is out of Isaiah 33). A remarkable forecast of the conventional divisions of modern government; judicial, legislative and executive." He goes on to say, "The chief problem in the operation of government has always been to keep these necessary functions in a state of proper balance, and at the same time to provide some center of unification. This problem has never been wholly solved. Human government therefore always swings between the two opposite poles of regimentation and fragmentation. The former leading to a sacrifice of liberty in the interest of strength, the latter to a sacrifice of strength, in the interest of liberty. And the head of the state tends to become either a dictator or a mere symbol." Sound familiar? But McLain goes on to say, "When God's own glorious king takes over the kingdoms of Earth, it will be safe at last to concentrate all the functions of the state in one Person, capital 'P'. This does not mean that he will do everything, but rather that he will be the directing head and final authority. Thus providing a unifying center, both infinitely wise and good for all of the activities of government, something which no state on earth has ever enjoyed. Under his beneficent rule, it will no longer be necessary to sacrifice political unity and strength in the interest of political liberty." And then he quotes John 8:36. "If the Son therefore shall make you free, you shall be free indeed."

So, folks, this is what we have to look forward to, in the second coming of Christ when he establishes his earthly kingdom, and his rule for 1000 years that will eventually merge into the eternal state. The millennial reign of Christ will be the glorious prelude, you might say, of the everlasting kingdom of Jesus Christ. And although good Christians may disagree on certain aspects of eschatology, we must as John Calvin said, quote, "Hunger after Christ, till the dawning of that great day when our Lord will fully manifest the glory of His Kingdom, the whole family of the faithful will then keep this in view that day." End quote.

Now, I want to put what we've learned in Daniel seven, in perspective, as it relates to biblical history, frankly, world history. You know, history has many themes, typically dependent upon the perspective of the historian, and those themes will often focus on the unique background of a specific culture, as we all know, and this has been stated in many ways; whoever wins the war gets to write the history. And many times that history isn't accurate. Typically, the historical narrative will include convenient revisions necessary to promote the agenda of a particular political group, or particular culture, like most Muslims, for example, deny the Holocaust. Many people believe that the Civil War was all about slavery, and that had very little to do with any of it. It had to do with tariffs and states rights and big central government and so forth. But what is missing from virtually every historical record, all of the history books regarding world history, is the big picture that God has revealed to us in His Word. And I want to give you a little flavor of that. This is a history that begins with in the beginning; God created the heavens and the earth. And it ends with the Lord Jesus Christ saying, "Yes, I am coming quickly." To which the apostle John says, "Amen. Come, Lord Jesus, the grace of the Lord Jesus be with all men."

Now, what I'm about to do in reviewing some of this requires me to go rather quickly. I'm giving you some technical things, and I would encourage you to not take notes because you will get lost. Instead, just listen, get a flavor of this and then if you want to take notes, go back and listen to it online, I think that would probably be helpful. If you want to take notes, that's fine. But I'm just saying that you might get lost because I'm not going to wait for you to write these things down, or I'll never get through this, okay? I want you all to maintain the big picture of God's plan of redemption in history. And in order to do that, think of it this way, there are two dominant themes in Scripture. Number one, we see that God has a plan to redeem his people. And this is pictured as a sacrificial lamb as a Savior, a suffering servant, and so forth. But not only is his intention to redeem the people, but also to restore the kingdom. And there we see emphasis on the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Messiah King. And all through Scripture, you're going to see those two themes being articulated. We see for example, a picture of a promise lamb, in Genesis after the original sin. You will recall when God killed an innocent animal, a substitute had to die, to cover sin, a shadow of a coming Redeemer that would one day make atonement for sin. And we see this Lamb pictured in the deliverance of the Jewish people in Egypt. And the sacrificial system, we see it pictured as well in all the prophecies throughout the Old Testament. And then eventually, when we come to the Gospels, we see Jesus coming in utter obscurity and in humiliation. But at the end of the New Testament, we see him coming in the book of Revelation in exultation. When he arrives in the gospel, he has a lamb that opens not his mouth. The one who died to save sinners. And then all through the New Testament, we learn about his plan of redemption, about the signs that will point to his return as King of kings and how we are to live for His glory, and so forth. And again, in the gospels, you see him in his humiliation as the sacrificial lamb, and then the "Apokalypsis lesou Christos," the revelation of Jesus Christ. You see him in his exultation, the Lion of Judah, the King of Israel, who will return and establish his glorious kingdom. Folks, that's the big picture.

Now, let me take you a little bit deeper into some of the details that I hope will be helpful. If we examine the detailed genealogical record in Genesis, we learn that 1656 years after he created Adam, because of extreme wickedness, God destroyed the whole planet, in a flood. All except eight people who, according to Scripture, found favor in the eyes of the Lord, referring to Noah, his wife, his three sons and their wives. Adam saw the world into its ninth generation, and Adam died, literally one generation before the flood. 500 years after the flood, we see that God sent his uninfluenced elective love on a particular ethnic group of people, the Jewish people, later became Israel. And we know according to scripture that he made a unilateral, unconditional, irreversible covenant with Abraham that would further demonstrate his sovereign plan to redeem the people and restore the kingdom; those two themes. That covenant is found, for example, in Genesis 12, and it contains four primary elements. We see that out of Abraham would come number one, a seed, referring to Christ, the Messiah, who would be both Redeemer and King, both the lamb and the lion. But in that covenant, it also included the promises of a land, a specific territory that would be set apart by God as a place for his people, a place where he would one day dwell with them in holy and intimate communion. And also the promise of a nation whereby Abraham's magnificent reputation and legacy would be displayed materially and, and spiritually and socially, and the glory of God's grace would ultimately be put on display. And then also finally, in that covenant, there was a promise of divine blessing, as well as protection. God would curse those who curse them and bless them who bless them. And the great promises that are in the Abrahamic Covenant are reiterated over and over and over again in the Old Testament and in the New Testament.

Then if you jump ahead some 600 years later, God made another covenant with the sons of Abraham, one given to Moses. And that covenant was temporal in nature, one that was bilateral and conditional. And that was the Mosaic Covenant. On Mount Sinai, God gave his law to his chosen people, Israel, to demonstrate that they were sinners, that the sinfulness of sin was rampant even in their heart. To demonstrate to them their utter inability to save themselves and their desperate need for a Savior, and eventually, a king. Moses became therefore, the first mediatorial ruler of a theocratic kingdom in history. And he was authorized to stand before Israel according to Exodus four 16, quote, "instead of God." In fact, Moses is presented in Scripture as a type of Christ, who alone, Christ alone, will be the one who is the perfect embodiment of God's mediatorial ruler in the Messianic kingdom. But this historical kingdom was broadened at Mount Sinai now to include the people of Israel. Exodus 19 Six, God says, "You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." At Sinai, God commissioned Israel to be the ones to mediate blessing to the whole world, to be a witness nation, to be the custodians of divine truth. And during that time, God inspired Moses to frame a civil government to exist upon the earth, that would ultimately illustrate the kingdom of God. And the theocracy of Israel became the greatest model of government in the history of the world. A sample of a future kingdom problem promised to Abraham, where God himself will reign as Messiah, Messiah of Israel.

And then over the course of history we see many other mediatorial rulers being set in place. These were leaders and judges of Israel. We see them from Joshua to Samuel; men chosen directly by God, invested with regal functions empowered by the Holy Spirit. And then God established a monarchial form of government whereby he mediated his rule through various kings, all of which were sinful, but which pointed to the need for a righteous king that would one day defeat Satan, sin and death. All of this is pointing to the one who would redeem the people and restore the Kingdom. The only remedy for this problem, of course, was the promised Messiah, the Savior king. And for this reason, about 1000 years after God made his covenant with Abraham, and about 500 years after he gave his law to Moses, God made another promise to one of his mediatorial rulers, whose name was David. The covenant that God made to David, the Davidic Covenant as it is called, is found in Second Samuel seven. And it was basically a reaffirmation of the regal terms of the Abrahamic covenant, but also with the addition that the ultimate provision of those covenantal rights would be permanently attached to a historic dynasty of King David. In other words, King David's throne would ultimately belong to his descendant, the son of David, the Lord Jesus Christ. And although its ultimate fulfillment would be interrupted for a season, it would eventually be fulfilled in a future kingdom, a restored Israel, where finally, the covenant nation would be all that it was intended to be, originally.

Repeatedly the Old Testament prophets spoke of this coming earthly kingdom and its Messiah King. And despite Israel's repeated unfaithfulness, God promises over and over again, how he will remain faithful to them. But eventually because of Israel sin, we know that God transferred world power to the Gentiles as recorded in Daniel two. And ultimately, the presence of God's blessing left them as recorded in Ezekiel 10 and 11. And because of Israel's long trend toward apostasy, God pronounced judgment upon them through the prophet Daniel and the 70 weeks of years, the 490 years we'll get to that in Daniel chapter nine, verses 24 through 27. And this judgment would would span from the Persian Artaxerxes' decree to rebuild the temple in 445 BC to the Messianic Kingdom. The first 69 weeks of that judgment, or 483, years were completed when the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, entered into Jerusalem on nine Nissan AD 30, and was cut off, as was predicted, in other words crucified, just as Daniel had prophesied. And this means as we've studied, and as we will continue to study, that there are seven years of judgment that remain, Daniel's 70th week, seven years of tribulation, the pre-kingdom judgments that will come upon the earth, where finally, the unholy trinity of Satan, the Antichrist, and the false prophet, will be defeated and the nations of the world will be judged and defeated; all those that hate Christ.

Now, because Israel rejected her Messiah, according to Ephesians, three, the mystery phase of the kingdom was ushered in as the church became the temporary replacement of Israel as the new custodians of truth. The body of Christ where Jews and Gentiles are described as, as heirs together sharers together, in the promises of the Lord Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ. But I do not believe that Israel is ever absorbed into the church. I believe it remains distinct from the church as an ethnic people. And as a nation, I believe that Israel still has a prophetic future. And we can see this, can we not, in the miracle of the Israeli state today, rising up out of the ash heap of the Holocaust, they're now returning to their land, even in unbelief, as the prophets predicted, they're surviving against all odds. It's amazing. So the present church age, I believe, must be seen as an ongoing fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy that ultimately culminates in the Messianic Kingdom and not merely some disconnected parentheses. The church shares in the promises of Israel, but not in her unique identity as a chosen nation, as Paul described in Romans 11:16 through 24, as the natural branches from a cultivated olive tree, some of which have now been broken off at the present time due to a hardening of heart. And there Paul reminds us that the Gentile church is the wild olive branches that had been grafted into the rich root, he says. Which is the covenant privileges originally promised to Abraham. So we're partakers of all of that, all by God's grace and deed. The church you might say, shares in the promises with Israel, but never takes her place as a nation. Despite the rebellion, God has not abandoned his chosen people. Paul understood this, you will remember, in Romans nine, Romans 10 and Romans 11. In Romans nine Paul describes Israel's election, in Romans 10 he describes Israel's defection and in Romans 11 he describes Israel's salvation when their Messiah King returns. And what an amazing history folks, ultimately, this is his story, right? The one who is going to redeem the people and restore the kingdom. And Israel is just this magnificent object lesson in how God deals with all mankind, saving some, judging others, all to reveal his glory through Christ who is both Lamb and Lion. In Isaiah 59, after describing the multiplied transgressions of Israel and his judgment upon them, that text closes with a message of certain redemption and restoration that we read. And later on in Isaiah 60, but in Isaiah 59, verse 20, let me give you a sample of this, he speaks of, quote, "A redeemer will come to Zion, a redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression and Jacob declares the Lord. As for me, this is my covenant with them, says the Lord, my spirit which is upon you, and my words, which I have put in your mouth shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your offspring, nor from the mouth of your offspring’s offspring, says the Lord from now on and forever." My what a day that will be.

Then the dominating theme of Isaiah 60, that we read earlier in our scripture reading, is the restoration and the world supremacy of the nation of Israel. As we read in the first three verses of Isaiah 60, Arise, shine, for your light has come and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples; but the Lord will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you, nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising." We go on and study that chapter, we see that in verses four through nine, how they returned to their promised land after worldwide dispersion, and how all the nations that want to oppress them will come and pay homage to them, as God's chosen people. They will contribute even to the prosperity and the adornment of the sanctuary of God, and the Lord Jesus Christ; days of apostasy and idolatry and destruction and exile will finally be over according to verse 18 of Isaiah 60. Israel will finally function according to its original and intended purpose as a chosen nation. As God said in Isaiah 41, beginning in verse eight, "But you Israel, My servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, descendant of Abraham, My friend, you whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called from its remotest parts, and said to you, 'You are My servant, I have chosen you, and not rejected you.'" Again, Exodus 19 two, “You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." Only God can bring that to fruition.

So Israel will finally enjoy world supremacy in the coming Kingdom, where it will fulfill its grand purpose of being a blessing to all of the nations as asserted in the original covenant in Genesis 12 and verse three, where we read, "And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed." Now, folks think of this, Daniel is seeing this picture, in his dream, and he's already had to deal with this with Nebuchadnezzar's dream earlier in Daniel two. But here in Daniel seven, Daniel is 67 years old, he's been in exile all of these years, what an encouragement to hear all of this, to see all of this. And what an encouragement it should be to us. You know, man has always dreamed of living in paradise, right? A place far different from the existence that we have now. You know, today we have diseases and death, violence, war, poverty, endless work, a myriad of other problems that remind us that we're really made for something very different, right? Don't we all feel that, especially as things get worse here in our country? I mean, everything culture has dreamed of in a utopian world. Every longing makes us frankly, easy prey to the next politician who's going to come along and say, vote for me, I will give it to you. I remember Obama, Obama's theme was hope and change. Well, that worked out great. And then Trump comes along make America great again.

That's not working out too good either, is it? But now we have Joe Biden, build back better. That's almost laughable, what's happening. But my point is all of these promises, they never come to fruition, right? I mean, think about this, all of the advances we have in technology, in healthcare, science, philosophy, education, and yet all of these things still plague us. All of the problems of the world, ah, but dear friends, our hope is in the Lord. And Scripture describes, shall we say, a divine utopia that is coming, where the Lord Jesus Christ will reign, one that is brought about by God, not by man. That's the point.

So we know according to Bible prophecy that after seven years of cataclysmic judgment upon the earth and the utter destruction and even reconfiguration of the Earth, what was lost in the garden will suddenly be regained for 1000 years. The millennial kingdom will be ruled by the Messiah, a world dominated by truth and holiness and righteousness and judgment. A world that, according to Scripture will be transformed spiritually and socially, morally, politically. I mean, even the geologic structure of the earth and its climate and the animal kingdom, religious life, all of these things are going to be radically altered and maintained by the rule of God Himself. It's going to be a day when the effects of sin on society and the environment will be reclaimed. When all of the social injustices will be reversed, Israel will finally be restored as the witness nation of Jehovah, which was her original purpose; again, to be a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation, proclaiming that there is one who will redeem the people and restore the kingdom. And finally, in Jerusalem, the covenant God of Israel will reign as the mediatorial King according to Zechariah eight three, "Thus saith the Lord, 'I am returned under Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem.'" In a day when God Himself will erect a magnificent temple beyond anything that we could imagine. Zechariah 14 verse nine, "And the Lord will be," I love this, "king over all the earth; in that day, the Lord will be the only one and His name the only one."

If we go to the New Testament, we see this as well. The kingdom was promised there. We see it promised in stages, we learn, for example, in Luke's gospel that a new institution, the church, will temporarily replace Israel until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. Luke 21:24, In answer to the disciple's question, in acts one six, when they asked, "Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" You will remember what he said. He replied that it was "not for them to know times or seasons, which the Father has fixed by his own authority," in verse seven. Though he does not answer their question, he used the terms "times and seasons," "chronos and kairos," which seems to indicate two different periods, not one. But then as he departs, the angel gives us a clue about his return and says, "He will come in the same way you saw Him go into heaven," verse 11. Obviously, this will be a time of when the restoration takes place. And God reveals these things through his servant Luke in his Gospel, as well as in the book of Acts; that the kingdom is going to come really in two stages. It is here both already, but also not yet. The kingdom was already there in a spiritual sense, and that God was rebuilding the house of David through his greater son in the raised and the reigning Jesus. In Christ's first advent, the Abrahamic and the Davidic and new covenants all receive an initial, shall we say, partial fulfillment, but obviously, much more was to come. That's what we are awaiting, in fact, in Luke one, remember Mary was promised that her son will be great, that the Lord will give him the throne of his father David and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will have no end. And after that, you can put, "not yet, not yet; we're waiting for that." In Luke one the Holy Spirit spoke through Zacharias and promised that the Lord God of Israel would, according to verse 72, "To show mercy toward our fathers, and to remember His holy covenant, the oath which He swore to Abraham our father, to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days." And after that you can put, "not yet." In Acts two beginning in verse 30, through verse 36, Luke tells us that Jesus is currently right now, sits at the right hand of on the throne of the Father on the throne of David already, that's already happening. But he also adds that he will rule over the house of Israel and make his enemies a footstool for his feet, "not yet." We see this as well in Jesus' promise that he would not celebrate the Passover feast with his apostles again until all of the kingdom promises were fulfilled. In Luke 22 and in Matthew 26, beginning of verse 29, he says, "But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine, from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom." "Not yet." Moreover, the kingdom had not yet come to its fullness in the New Testament, because the apostles were not sitting, according to verse 30, of Matthew 26, "on thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel," "not yet." So indeed, we see the already, but "not yet" promise of a messianic kingdom, in the New Testament, where it is referred to by different names. In Matthew 19, verse 28, Jesus called it the regeneration, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne. In Acts three and verse 19, Peter called it the "times of refreshing that will come from the presence of the Lord." And then in verse 21, he goes on to describe it as the "period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from ancient time." And then in Ephesians, one and verse 10, Paul described it as "an administration," which can be translated dispensation, "suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens, and things upon the earth." And we know that at the end of the Messianic age, God will utterly destroy both heaven and earth and create a new heaven and earth that has never been, nor ever will be, polluted by sin. Oh child of God, this is the big picture of history, his story.

Often when I'm in the vault of study, I've got music playing. And it just so happened, that when I came to kind of the end of all of these thoughts, I was listening to our good friend Mo Pitney, Blake, I think you know, your brother. And he was singing Fernando Ortega's, "Give me Jesus." And I was thinking, my what a fitting way to just end my thoughts with you this morning. "You can have all this world. You can have all this world, you can have all this world. But give me Jesus, the one who redeems his people, and restores his kingdom."

Let's pray together. Father, we're always overwhelmed when we immerse ourselves in your word and see how you have revealed things to us that the world does not know, does not want to know to the natural man. The things of the Spirit are foolishness, he cannot understand them because he is spiritually appraised. And Lord, we know that were it not for your grace, we would not understand them either. Certainly, we would not embrace them as the magnificent truths of your sovereign plan to redeem your people and restore your kingdom. So we give you praise for your word, for the indwelling Spirit that causes us to understand it as you illumine our minds. But Lord, we praise you as well, for the Spirit who indwells us, that we might live these truths out in such a way as to bring great glory to the Lord Jesus Christ in great joy to our hearts. May that be the passion of every believer within the sound of my voice. And Father, as always, for those that do not know you as the living Christ, those who have never truly been born again and have really no desire for the things of the Spirit, I pray that you will convict them of their sin, that you will give them no rest upon their pillow until they cry out for your saving grace and experience the miracle of the new life of regeneration. So we commit this to you as always, Father, we thank you We give you praise in Jesus name, and for his sake. Amen.

What a joy it is to be able to open up the Word of God and to hear from him. So if you will take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter seven, Daniel chapter seven, I might say that I hope you have your Bible with you, I know many of you use your little devices, I would encourage you not to do that. No serious Bible student will ever just use a little device, you need your Bible, you need to make notes in it, you need to underline things. And after a while, you will see all of Scripture kind of as one piece, not a little screenshot. Moreover, you will learn where passages are based on where they reside on a page. Sometimes I can't remember the exact place, but I know it's up in the right-hand corner. You know how that is. So when I say, open your Bibles, I hope you will do that. Now. Now that I've offended some of you.

Nevertheless, let's look at Daniel seven. Okay. And this morning, we are going to look at verses nine through 12, under the heading The Great Panorama of World History, and this is the third part, we will have one more part, I believe, next Sunday. And then we will conclude Daniel seven. Now before we look at the text. As I was thinking about this, and all that is revealed here in this passage of Scripture, I think, my isn't it wonderful that we have the word of God and that we can come together and worship, you know, we should never take that for granted. I mean, think about it, we live in a culture that is shaped by satanic deception, and idolatry. This is where we live. It's like living in Sodom and Gomorrah. We have leaders that seek to legitimize the grossest forms of immorality through legislation. We live in a culture where our leaders will fight for the right to kill unwanted babies. We have people in leadership today that actually believe that boys can become girls can become boys, or both, or neither. Absolutely insane. And so isn't it a blessing to be able to step out of the kingdom of darkness, so to speak, and come here, and be able to worship the Lord our God and spirit and in truth, what a joy and so we come again, to the Word of God, where we have an opportunity to hear from him. And again, when you think about it, sometimes because of all of the difficulties, especially in our culture, these days, sometimes it's easy to feel a bit cut off from the presence of God. I mean, we see no burning bush, we have no parting of the Red Sea. We have no pillar of cloud by, by day and fire by night, we have no Shekinah glory, illuminating a tabernacle, or the temple. So it is easy for us to lose a sense of awe when we come into the presence of the Almighty. And you might say we need a Jacob's Ladder, that spans the great chasm between heaven and earth. Between the transcendent holiness of God and the mundane existence in this world that's filled with so much evil. And beloved, we have that ladder in the Word of God. So let's climb it today. Whenever we open up his word, we enter into the presence of the one who should make us tremble. We are suddenly stricken with a sense of awe with a holy delight, that begs language, and I might add, if this is not your experience, when we open up the Word, there is something terribly wrong with your heart, perhaps even the status of your soul. So as we open up the God breathed word this morning, let's do so with a sense of reverential awe and joy. For in so doing we are entering into the presence of God. This is the closest we can get this side of glory right?

So having said that, let's look at Daniel seven beginning in verse nine. Let me read the text this morning, that we will be looking at and then we will examine it closely. Daniel says, "I kept looking until thrones were set up in the Ancient of Days took His seat. His vesture was like white snow, and the hair of His head like pure wool. His throne was ablaze with flames. Its wheels were a burning fire. A river of fire was flowing and coming out from before Him; 1000s upon 1000s were attending Him and myriads upon myriad's were standing before Him; the court sat and the books were opened. Then I kept looking because of the sound of the boastful words, which the horn was speaking; I kept looking until the beast was slain, and its body was destroyed and given to the burning fire. As for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was taken away but an extension of life was granted them for an appointed period of time. I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming, and he came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away; and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed."

Now, by way of review, in the first eight verses of chapter seven, the Spirit of God speaks through His servant, Daniel, and he gives us a panoramic view of world history, including the rise and fall of four great Gentile Empires that were symbolized by four great beasts rising up out of the sea, empires that would dominate Jerusalem and God's covenant people down through the millennia. The fourth beast is also symbolized by ten horns on the head of a great monster. And you will recall that an 11th horn appears a little horn comes up after them, which is revealed to be the Antichrist. And then later, as we examined last week, in verses 15 through 28, an angelic interpreter helps Daniel understand the big picture, a general interpretation of what Daniel saw. And he set the stage for more actors and for more drama and he explains how those beasts represent human kings and kingdoms that will come. He also reveals their kingdoms will not last, but they will one day be replaced by God's kingdom and ruled by the saints of the highest one. But in between verse eight, and the interpretation beginning in verse 15, there is an abrupt cutaway scene that we will be looking at today. You know how sometimes you will be watching some movie, and then all of a sudden, they'll cut away to something that is relevant to it, but it's very different. And it helps explain, and that's what we have here. So immediately after the terrifying description of the fourth beast with its blasphemous, little horn, uttering great boasts referring to the Antichrist rule over a future revived Roman Empire, Daniel is suddenly transported, if you will, into the very presence of God. It's as if God is saying, Look, Daniel, don't worry. I've got it all under control. This is all part of my plan. And as we look at this passage this morning, I believe there are two dominant themes that will help us understand better what the Spirit of God would have us know. First of all, we're going to see that God is the omniscient judge. And secondly, Christ is the coming King. We will examine the first one this morning. And I might also add, for all of us as twice born saints, this should cause us to just break forth in praise, right? And glad adoration; I mean, aren't you glad that we don't live in a random universe? Aren't you glad that the signs that are popping up all over everywhere that say, enjoy life now there is no afterlife. Have you seen those? They're popping up all over; Aren't you glad that's a lie? Aren't you glad Jesus said in John 6:47, "'Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has ever lasting life.'" Now, aren't you glad that our God reigns in absolute authority over all of his creation? He is the one Isaiah tells us in chapter 46 and verse 10, who declares "the end from the beginning, and from ancient times, things which have not been done, saying, 'My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.'" So let's look closely at what God revealed to Daniel, pertaining to events yet future. And I want to emphasize this I say “yet future because there are some who believe that the fourth empire really reflects the Grecian empire of Alexander the Great, some believe, perhaps, even the Roman, the historical Roman Empire. But I would agree with other conservative Bible expositors that there are at least three factors, in verses nine through 14, that cannot be explained by what occurred during the duration of those two empires. First, Daniel's vision is one of, of God, the Father standing upon a throne to pronounce final judgment to the nations, which includes their utter and their permanent disillusion. And also, it includes being replaced by the everlasting kingdom of God, ruled by the Son of Man. And I would submit to you that nothing close to any of this has ever happened. Secondly, in verses 11, and 12, the little horn representing the ruler, the last rule, or I should say, of the times of the Gentiles, is destroyed, along with his empire. And there exists no reasonable explanation of this during the historical Greek and Roman Empires. And thirdly, the fifth Kingdom is established by the Son of man who comes with the clouds of heaven, he is presented before God the Father, beginning his everlasting kingdom. And again, no satisfactory interpretation can account for any of this in the ancient Greek and Roman Empires. Therefore, the only reasonable conclusion is that these things belong to a future consummation.

So with that little introduction, notice first, how Daniel and all of us, are reminded that God is the sovereign ruler, he is the one that is the judge. Notice in verse nine, he says, "'I kept looking until thrones were set up.'" In other words, he seeing here a courtroom is set up for the proper dispensing of justice upon the Antichrist and his kingdom, in the fourth kingdom. Now, I might add, this is a bit technical, but I want to make sure you understand these things. This is not a reference to the Great White Throne Judgment that takes place at the end of the millennial reign of Christ that you read about in Revelation 20, verses 11 through 15. But rather, this is either a special judgment or a special judgment relating to the little horn, the Antichrist, and the beast, the kingdom. Or it's the sheep and goat judgments that we read about in Matthew 25, which is going to take place at the end of the tribulation, it could be one in the same we're not really sure. But that will occur just before Christ establishes his millennial reign. Now, when Jesus returns to earth, in power, and in great glory, he will judge the inhabitants that are living on the earth, all of the nations, as we've read, will gather before him. And the purpose of that judgment is to determine who will inherit the kingdom and who will not. That's what we read about in Matthew 25, a little bit ago. That's the sheep and goat judgment, but the purpose of the Great White Throne Judgment is very different. It's to see who will be sent into the lake of fire. That's Revelation Chapter 20 and verse 15. Moreover, the subjects of the sheep and goat judgment are both believers and non-believers who are alive when Jesus returns. Thus the labels, sheep, and goats read about that in Matthew 25:32. But the subjects of the Great White Throne Judgment are only nonbelievers. It involves, for example, the resurrection of the last. Let me read you the passage in Revelation 20 began beginning in verse 13, "And the sea gave up the dead which were in it and death and Hades gave up the dead, which were in them; and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds, Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire." So the sheep and goat judgment occurs at the end of the tribulation, and is therefore associated with the second coming of Christ, it's to determine who will enter into the millennial kingdom. Whereas the Great White Throne Judgment occurs at the end of the millennium after the 1000 year reign of Christ with his saints, according to Revelation 20, verses four through seven. And all of that is associated with the transition into the eternal state. So a little bit of theology there; little eschatology to help you keep things in perspective.

Now back to what Daniel sees here, in this courtroom that's being set up for what I believe is either a special judgment on the Antichrist and the final kingdom, or maybe the sheep and goat judgment may be one in the same we can't be sure. But think about this. What a magnificent contrast from verses seven and eight, where the blasphemous scoffing of the little horn, depicting the vile nature of the Antichrist, who's going to rule in that final revived Roman Empire just before Christ returns. I mean, what a contrast. We see here, all of a sudden, he's seeing God the Father sitting upon his throne. And you know, when you think about these blasphemous, scoffing things, I mean, we see that today all the time, every time I turn on the news, and I hear our leaders in Washington, I hear the same type of stuff. It's frightening, and I also am reminded of what God sees and his attitude towards it. You will recall in Psalm chapter two, beginning of verse two, "The kings of the earth," he says, "take their stand, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, 'Let us tear their fetters apart, and cast away their cords from us!'" I love this next sentence, "He who sits in the heavens laughs, Tthe Lord scoffs at them. Then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in His fury, saying, but as for Me, I have installed My King upon Zion, My holy mountain." And that beloved, is my king, and your king, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Back to verse nine, notice these thrones "were set up." And you wonder, okay, "Thrones," there plural here, who else will be present at this tribunal? Well, we can see from scripture that it will be the saints of God, including, and especially the tribulation saints who were executed for their faith in Christ, and their refusal to wear the mark of the beast and worship him. We see the same identical symbolism in Revelation 20 and verse four. There we read, "Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus, and because of the word of God and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead, and on their hand, and they came to life and reigned with Christ for 1000 years." Now back again to verse nine. He says, "'I kept looking until thrones were set up and the Ancient of Days took His seat.'" If you've ever been in a courtroom, you know what it's like. The judge comes in, everybody stands and he comes in, he sits down, and that means it's time to begin the proceedings. I believe this to be God the Father, not the Son. The Son is introduced later on in verse 13, as the Son of Man who is seen approaching the Ancient of Days and who is presented before him. Then he says, "His vesture was like white snow and the hair of His head like pure wool.'" You can tell Daniel is trying to describe the indescribable. This emphasizes his purity, his omniscience, is truthfulness. We see the same symbolism, for example, in Isaiah chapter one and verse 18. There we read that familiar passage, "Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be," what? "as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool." And in David's contrition, you will remember how he prayed in Psalm 51 and verse seven, he said, "Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." We see the same symbols of God's purity and his omniscience and his truthfulness in rendering judgment in Revelation three and Revelation four and Revelation 19. In fact, this whole scene corresponds with what John saw and recorded in Revelation chapter four, and five. He goes on, and he says, "His throne was ablaze with flames, its wheels were a burning fire. I'm not sure what this really means. But somehow, you get this feel that it's like a chariot throne that that can move according to his command. But flames and fire, we know, are often associated with holiness and the terrifying judgment of God. We see this throughout Scripture. You will recall when Moses warned the covenant people of the dangerous consequences of their idolatry. He said this in Deuteronomy four in verse 24, "For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God." Not surprisingly, Daniel's description of the throne of God parallels what is Ezekial saw. In Ezekial one in verse four, we read, "As I looked, behold, a storm wind was coming from the north, a great cloud with flashing fire forth continually and a bright light around it and it's in its midst something like glowing metal in the midst of the fire." Again, you can tell Ezekiel is just trying to wrap words around that which is utterly ineffable, Oh, child of God, don't miss this. God is not to be trifled with. He is infinitely holy, and he will judge sin on the basis of his character.

The Psalmist tells us in Psalm 97, and beginning in verse two, "Clouds and thick darkness around Him, righteousness and justice, are the foundation of His throne. Fire goes before Him and burns up His adversaries round about." I must add, like God the Father, Christ as the Son of Man is equally glorious, and terrifying in his judgment. We read, for example, in Revelation one beginning in verse 14, where John describes the Lord Jesus in similar terms. There we read "His head and His hair were white, like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like burnished bronze, when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and His voice was like the sound of many waters." Beloved, once again, this is the mighty sovereign that I serve, that you serve. This is the Lord our God. We cannot even imagine what the judgment will be like upon the nations who refuse to honor him. God has promised a day of vengeance, dear friends; his holiness demands it. His pure character demands that his justice must and will prevail. And we know that even prior to that judgment, at the end of the tribulation, the wrath of God is going to be so fierce that it will cause people to want to die. We read about this in Revelation six, beginning in verse 15. And as I read this, think about your friends and your loved ones that reject Christ. Think about all of the arrogant people, even in our country, who mock the Lord Jesus Christ and mock his word, and who think we are idiots for believing that he's actually going to return. Here's what we read in Revelation six beginning in verse 15, And this is in the context of the pre kingdom judgments that will be poured out upon the earth, just prior to our Lord's return, "Then the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves, and among the rocks of the mountains; and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, 'Fall on us, and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of their wrath is come and who is able to stand?'" Matthew 25, that we read earlier, verses 34, as well as 41. Jesus says, "'Then the King will say to those on His right, 'Come, you who are blessed to have My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.'" And in verse 41, he says, "'Then he will also say to those on His left, 'Depart from me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire, which has been prepared for the devil and his angels.'"

Now Daniel continues in verse 10, to describe the throne of God. There he says, "A river of fire was flowing, and coming out from before Him." So again, this is a further depiction of the glory and judgment of God upon his adversaries. It's like it's flowing out from him. "1000s," he says, "upon 1000s were attending Him and myriads upon myriads were standing before Him." In other words, innumerable saints and angels are surrounding him, worshipping Him, ready to do his bidding. This is a scene that underscores just the majesty and the power and the purity of the righteous judgment that he is about to administer. This is reminiscent of that day when the law was mediated to Moses on Mount Sinai; recorded in Deuteronomy 33 and verse two, there we read, "The Lord came from Sinai, and dawned on them from Seir; He shone forth from Mount Paran, and he came from the midst of 10,000 holy ones; at His right hand, there was flashing lightning for them." You know, it's impossible to even guess how many angels there are. One of my grandkids, I forget which one, asked me, "Papa, how many, how many angels are there?" We don't know, just a whole bunch of them. Look up in the stars, t's kind of like that, you can't even begin to count them. Indeed, their number is vast beyond measure. We know that holy angels are elect angels, who do not need redemption from a fallen state, unlike Satan, and the demons who sinned, there is no salvation for them. These are, these are magnificent creatures that we can't even imagine. They are not bound by physical space. They can be invisible or visible, they are without gender, they cannot reproduce after their own kind. And when they appear, they always appear as a man, never as a woman. These are ageless, immortal beings that are messengers of God, messengers of God's truth. They serve him perfectly, as well as ministering to us; they are our ministering spirits. And I would submit to you that they're all around us right in here. They can't see us, I mean, we can't see them, but they can see us. It's amazing. And this is what Daniel sees, surrounding the throne of God, "1000s upon 1000s were attending Him and myriads upon myriads were standing before Him."

And then the drama continues. Its almost as though you can hear a pin drop. It says, "The court sat, and the books were opened." Literally, the original says "the judgment sat." So in other words, the court is now in session, and it is ready to render justice.

Now, it was customary for the ancient Persians to record in a book all of the acts of a person worthy a future reward. You can read about that, for example, even in the Bible, in Esther chapter six verses one and two. So this would have been a familiar concept for Daniel and for the Jewish people that were in exile, that he was encouraging. And repeatedly in scripture we learn that God keeps a record of human actions. Deuteronomy 32:34, Psalm 56 eight, Isaiah 65 six, the passage we're in here, Malachi three and verse 16. In fact, in Matthew 12, verses 36 and 37, you will recall how Jesus condemned the Pharisees, saying that "every careless word that men shall speak, they shall render account for it in the Day of Judgment." You see, folks, God is omniscient. There is nothing that he does not know, nothing that he ever forgets. So he has a precise record of all the evil deeds. You know, I mean, it's still inconceivable, but it's probably more conceivable to us than it would have been to my grandparents and great grandparents, because they didn't have computers that can keep track of everything these days, right? We see this in Isaiah chapter 65, beginning of verse six, "'Behold, it is written before Me," God says, In other words, their guilt is recorded before me. "I will not keep silent, but I will repay; I will even repay into their bosom, both their and their own iniquities in the iniquities of their fathers together,' says the Lord." We see another similar description of books being opened in the context of the Great White Throne Judgment in Revelation 20 and verse 12. That final and that short-lived reunion of the damned. There we read, "And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened, and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books according to their deeds." Malachi offers another example. The context here in Molokai chapter three, is to encourage the true and righteous remnant of Israel, those that loved and served God but knew that judgment was coming upon Israel, God wanted to encourage them by telling them how he remembered them. And in Malachi three, beginning in verse 16, we read, "Those who feared the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord gave attention and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him, for those who fear the Lord, and who esteem His name." Then we read, "'They shall be Mine,' says the Lord of hosts, 'on the day that I prepare My own possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his own son, who serves him.'" This book of remembrance may well be synonymous with the book of life in which the names of God's children are recorded. We can read about that in Exodus 32, verses 32 and 34, as well as Daniel chapter 12 and verse one. Jesus said in Luke 10, in verse 20, "Rejoice that your names are recorded in heaven." We read about the book of life as well in Revelation 13, in verse eight, where it speaks of "the book of life of the Lamb, who has been slain." Even tells us when those names were recorded, you will recall, they were recorded, it says, "from the foundation of the world," absolutely astounding. God chose us according to his elective purposes, before creation. Before creation. The death of Christ sealed our redemption forever. Once again, I'm convinced that all that Daniel sees here, demands a fulfillment that is yet future and there's just no reasonable explanation that can point to anything in history that can be attributed to what God reveals to Daniel. And again, what a what a powerful encouragement, I hope you share this. This is such an empowering, powerful encouragement to me, knowing that God is working a plan. And one day he's going to right all the wrongs. He's going to make the crooked straight, as Isaiah records. What a motivator to serve Christ and to wait for his return. Notice what Daniel sees next in verse 11, "Then I kept looking," and here's why, "because of the sound of the boastful words which the horn was speaking." Obviously, this is speaking of the arrogant blasphemies of the Antichrist. And this catches his attention. That's what he's saying here. It's almost as if he's saying, and this is my own paraphrase here, "Lord, how long are you going to put up with this pompous clown. I mean, I just keep hearing this guy making all this noise." When I think about this, I am reminded of times, when my children, when they were little, as well as now, my grandchildren, I've still got a couple of little ones, when they're out with me at a place like Walmart or whatever. And there's some spoiled, rotten brat, that is just pitching a fit, cussing out his parents or whatever. And what do my kids do? They're looking at me like, are you going to...Is anybody... You know, how long are you going to put up with this? As if you know, I can do anything about it. That's kind of the same thing that's going on here. Daniel's just wondering, again, "I kept looking because of the sound of the boastful words which the horn was speaking."

I want to pause here for a moment. You know, many of us look at what's going on in our country today and we say the same thing. When we see our political leaders and hear what they say, we say to ourselves, "Lord, how long are you going to tolerate this? This is beyond insanity." I mean, you would expect people to think this way if they were drooling lunatics, but these people are supposedly sane. And they're saying these things and doing these things. How long before you meet out your judgment upon these emissaries of Satan, who mock you? We all grow impatient, do we not? And increasingly frustrated. We can all join with the Psalmist who lamented in Psalm 13, beginning in verse one, when he said, "How long O, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul? Having sorrow in my heart all the day long? How long will my enemy be exalted over me?" Psalm 13, one and two. But dear friends, we must remember that God's ways are not our ways. And God's timing is always perfect. We tend to measure time in terms of days and months and years. And he measures time, in terms of millennia. For a day is like 1000 years to the Lord. Remember what Peter says in Second Peter three, beginning of verse seven, "But by His word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men." In other words, judgment is coming. But he goes on to say, "But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like 1000 years and 1000 years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but," here it is, "is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance." So dear friends, be patient. I have to tell myself that, Lord, hurry up and teach me patience, right? Trust in God's promises. As the psalmist said in Psalm 30, verse five, "weeping may last for the night, but a shout of joy comes in the morning."

A beautiful picture hangs on our wall in our living room, some of you have probably seen it. It's a picture of this magnificent eagle flying in the mountains through the trees. And there's a verse attached to that. The great text out of Isaiah 40, beginning in verse 29, where we read, "He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous young men stumble badly, yet those who," what? "wait for the Lord; Those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run and not get tired they will walk and not become weary."

Now, back Daniel's dream, verse 11, "Then I kept looking because of the sound of the boastful words, which the horn was speaking, I kept looking until," you've heard me say it before; I love the word "until." I love...that means something's about to happen that needs to happen. "I kept looking until the beast was slain, and its body was destroyed and given to the burning fire." Don't you know if you could have seen Daniel's response like, finally, finally. Think of all the stories that we've read and all of the movies that we've seen, where the villain just wins every battle. It's like, don't we ever get any justice here, and they just keep bringing you to a point where you're about to scream, and then all of a sudden, there's justice. That's what we have here. Justice will prevail.

Now, practically speaking, the books that were opened, prove the guilt of the beast. And speaking here of this restored form of the Roman Empire that the Antichrist will use, yet will rule yet future, the sentence of death is therefore justified. I also find it interesting here; of course, the beast, that meaning the kingdom as well as the little horn, the Antichrist, all of that is going to be destroyed together. And as I think about it, there will be no mausoleum to house the physical remains of this coming and final world dictator. Notice the ignominious end of this vile tyrant. It says "its body was destroyed and given to the burning fire." Dear friends, the lowest bowels of hell, await those who try to be like God. And in his description of the fall of the king of Babylon, Isaiah tells us in Isaiah 14 what happens, and this is also a picture we believe of Lucifer, the fall of Lucifer, where we saw the same kind of arrogance in the judgment to follow. Isaiah 14 beginning in verse 14, "'I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High. Nevertheless, you will be thrust down to Sheol, to the recesses of the pit. Those who see you will gaze at you, they will ponder over you, saying, 'Is this the man who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms, who made the world like a wilderness and overthrew its cities, who did not allow his prisoners to go home? All the kings of the nations lie in glory, each in his own tomb. But you have been cast out of your tomb like a rejected branch clothed with the slain who are pierced with a sword, who go down to the stones of the pit, like a trampled corpse.'" There is nothing more ignominious, nothing more monarch than having his body trampled underfoot. Now bear in mind here, the slaying of the beasts that Daniel sees, this destruction of a revived Roman Empire, will be achieved as a result of the Ancient of Days judgment when the Messiah King returns. And we know from other passages of Scripture when, that when the Lord returns, He will destroy the Antichrist's vast army that will be assembled in the valley of Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat, by the way, means "Yahweh judges." That will be the battle of Armageddon, read about it in various passages. Zachariah 14, one through four, Joel three. Let me read you a little bit of this beginning in verse 12, of Joel three. "Let the nations be aroused and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat, for there I will sit to judge all of the surrounding nations. Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine press is full, the vast overflow, for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! But the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision The sun and moon grow dark and the stars lose their brightness. The Lord roars from Zion and utters His voice from Jerusalem and the heavens in the earth tremble, but the Lord is a refuge for his people, and a stronghold to the sons of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, dwelling in Zion, My holy mountain. So Jerusalem will be holy, and strangers will pass through it no more."

So Daniel has been given here a, a front row seat to all that's going to happen with this arrogant, blasphemous little horn and his kingdom. The beast that was slain and its body was destroyed and given to the burning fire. Let me take you to Revelation chapter 19, which describes what's going to happen with the Antichrist, his capture, as well as the false prophet that will work with him. Beginning in verse 20, of Revelation 19, we read this, "And the Beast was seized," meaning captured alive, "and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast, and those who worshiped his image; these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone."

Now, finally, having witnessed the judgment of the beast and the little horn, he then focuses his attention to the rest of the beast, as it says here, referring to the lion, which represented Babylon and the bear, Medo-Persia, and the leopard that represented the Grecian Empire. So in verse 12, we read, "As for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was taken away, but an extension of life was granted to them for an appointed period of time." Now, to understand this, you must remember that whenever one of the three previous kingdoms were conquered, the people and their culture, were all absorbed into that new kingdom. And even to this day, we see elements of those vast ancient empires in all of the nations of the world. And this continuation will exist, even in the final empire that revived Roman Empire under the rule of the Antichrist. Thus, as Daniel says here, "an extension of life was granted to them for an appointed period of time." But listen carefully, unlike the previous three beasts, the fourth beast, that final kingdom will come to a sudden, in a violent and a permanent end. As Leon Woods rightfully states, quote, "This contrast for the fourth is understandable. For the rule succeeding it will be the millennial reign of Christ, which will not absorb Rome's people and culture, with all their deficient, degenerate features. That will be a new, unique rule perfect, righteous, and equitable in every way." End quote. And these dear friends will be the subject of verses 13 and 14 that we will examine the next time.

Now, may I challenge you in closing? Oh, dear Christian, live in light of eternity. Jesus is coming. If you don't believe that, again, there is something terribly deficient with your faith. Give yourself completely to Christ, in worship and in service. Don't forfeit the blessings that he longs to lavish upon you, because of your faith and your obedience. Be bold and uncompromising in your gospel witness, in your testimony for Christ. So that when, not if, but when Christ returns in all of his glory, he will find you and me faithful at our post. Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain for the Lord, amen?

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for revealing to us these things that strengthen, confirm, our faith in all that you have promised. Thank you that someday you will indeed be glorified in all of the earth. And Lord thank you that by your grace you have saved us. And Father, if there be one here today that knows nothing of what it really means to be united to Christ in saving faith, I pray that you will remove from them all of the phony excuses and all of the false religious pretenses that would somehow make them believe that they are yours, when in fact they're not. I pray, Lord, that you will overwhelm them with the guilt of their sin and the glory of the cross; that this will be the day that they will repent. They will come to you in saving faith, crying out for a mercy they do not deserve, a grace that they cannot merit, that today will be the day that they will experience the miracle of the new birth. We commit that to you. We plead this for the glory of Christ. For its in his name I pray. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles this morning and turn to Daniel chapter seven, we are going to look at verses 15 through 28 today under the heading, "The Great Panorama of World history." This is the second part in a little series that flows from this text. And I might just share my heart with you for a moment, whenever I lock myself in the vault of study during the week, and certainly when I come before you, I'm just, frankly, overwhelmed with the privilege that I have and that we all have to look into the Word of God to realize that he has spoken to us. Whenever I humble myself before the word under the banner of sola scriptura, whenever I just allow the text to speak to myself to my heart, I just find myself lost in wonder. We don't ever want to take for granted the fact that we have the truth. In a world of lies, we've got the truth. And I'm not only amazed at God's sovereignty, in other words, he has absolute authority, and rule over all things; when I look into scripture, especially when I look at the prophetic word, but I'm also amazed at his condescension, that he would voluntarily descend from his glorious holy throne, in order to communicate to a worm like me, and you. It's an amazing thought. Again, that our ineffably glorious and holy God would reveal Himself to us is staggering to me, and what a privilege that we have, as twice born saints, to have his inspired word, a word that reveals his character, a word that reveals his judgment for sin and disobedience, the word that reveals the blessings that we have for faith and obedience. And all of the things that goes with the revelation of who Christ is, the one who voluntarily bore our sin in his body on the cross, the revelation of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm so weary of all that we hear in our country. It's just depressing, you know. So it's so good to be able to look and see the truths about the kingdom. You know, that's, that's coming. And that's what we do here. And to be sure, as Peter says, “we are aliens and strangers in this world.” Don't you feel like an alien and a stranger here? We are citizens of another kingdom. We don't belong here. And moreover, God has revealed things to us; think about this, that the rest of the world does not know. And I don't say that to be haughty. They just don't know. And they don't want to know. And this certainly includes the detailed outline of the series of events that will precede and portend the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ in all of his glory, as we have been studying here in Daniel's prophecies.

Now, before we look at the text, I know that eschatology, the study of the end times, Bible prophecy, and so forth, can be confusing to a lot of people. So I want to give you the big picture. And I was trying to think of an analogy, and one that came to my mind is that of a jigsaw puzzle. My father, before he died, liked to work jigsaw puzzles, and there was one it was like, 1000 pieces. And he spent months on that. And you know, it'd be really hard to put that jigsaw puzzle together if you didn't have the picture of what it's going to look like on the box, right? If he just had the pieces of the puzzle. And so sometimes we need to back up with Bible prophecy. And we need to see the big picture. And sometimes we just need one of those puzzles like our children have, that's just got like 15 pieces, you know, and we can kind of put that together and then we can begin to build from there. So I'm gonna give you a little bit of Bible prophecy that on the corner of the box, it says two to four years, okay? Doesn't mean two to four years to put it together. It means you know, two to four years old could do this. So scripture, as we look at it, real simply, suggest that the next event on the prophetic timetable, and by the way, I'm speaking now as a pre-millenarian, as someone that takes the word very, very literally taking into consideration the symbolic meanings and so forth. The next event on the prophetic timetable is the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, that will occur in two stages. The first stage is the rapture of the church. When he comes for his saints. Underline the word "for" he comes for his saints, and they are caught up to meet him in the air, as First Thessalonians 4:14 through 17 tells us. And then the second stage is his physical return to Earth when he comes with his saints, not for his saints, but with his saints, as we read, for example, in Jude 14; he comes to execute judgment against his enemies and so forth. And in between those two stages, we have seven years of tribulation. And that tribulation period is sometimes, or can be called, and is often called, interchangeably with the idea of Daniel's 70th week. So when you hear me talk about Daniel's 70th week, it's the same as the tribulation. Daniel 9:24, through 27 describes this there, and we will get to that eventually. But that describes 70 weeks of years or 490 years of judgment that God has committed to Israel, and 69 of those weeks or 483 of those years have been fulfilled precisely, again, as you will see. And when the Antichrist arises on the scene, he will rule during that time; he has not yet appeared because the rapture of the church has not yet transpired. And so Daniel 70th, week is also the tribulation period and with the church removed, during that time, God will once again focus his attention on national Israel. And during that tribulation period, the Antichrist will rise to power. And he will rule over a revived Roman Empire until the Messiah returns and defeats all of his enemies.

And again, now the rapture of the church, which is the snatching away, or the removal of the church, will mark the beginning of a very painful process for unbelieving national ethnic Israel. But that will be a time eventually, when they will be grafted back into the olive tree of God's covenantal blessing that was originally theirs, as we read about in Romans 11:24. But if you look at the next verse in Romans 11, you will see it will also be a time indicating the end of the Gentile rule, the fullness of the Gentiles has come, Paul says, and that period of time will lead up to the national redemption of Israel, that is spoken of in verse 26, of Romans 11, when, quote, "all Israel will be saved, as it is written, 'The deliverer will come out of Zion, and he will turn away ungodliness from Jacob.'" There's many passages that speak about what will happen during that period of time, that period of judgment during the tribulation. Jeremiah 30, in verse seven is a key text in understanding this, There we read, "Alas! for that day is great, there is none like it; and it is the time of Jacob's distress, but he will be saved from it.'" referring to Israel. And clearly, the pre kingdom judgments upon the earth during Daniel's 70th week pertain to ethnic and national Israel, not to the church. I believe there's a distinction between the two, I do not believe that the church has permanently replaced Israel. In fact, nowhere is the church mentioned in any of the Bible's descriptions of the tribulation, it has been removed. However, you also need to understand that many Jews and many Gentiles will come to saving faith during the time of the tribulation, after the rapture during the Tribulation. And they will be persecuted severely for their faith. And I might also add that what we're witnessing in our world, yea even in our country today, is a precursor to that final period of unprecedented hatred and persecution towards those who follow Christ. All of that is satanically empowered and we see satanically empowered Neo-Marxist liberals in our country. They hate everything that is holy.

Now, with that little background as we return to the prophecies of Daniel seven, which let me remind you, parallel that of Daniel two remember? We have learned that there will be a succession of four Gentile Empires that will dominate Jerusalem and God's covenant people until the Messiah returns and establishes his earthly kingdom. However, remember now, there is a vast time gap that exists between the close of the fourth kingdom of Rome and its powerful future reemergence under the rule of the Antichrist, who was called in Daniel seven, eight, "the little horn" or "the little king." And remember, as we look back there, in Daniel seven, we see that he came up among 10 others. In Daniel seven, eight we read, this is a horn that "possessed eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth, uttering great boasts." And it is here that we're going to focus our attention yet again this morning in verses 15 through 28.

Now, I am deliberately skipping verses nine through 14, we're going to come back to that. There, Daniel records his vision of heaven when God makes his final judgment on the earth. And he utterly and permanently destroys the little horn, and the Antichrist and his vast empire, that time when the Son of Man returns and establishes his kingdom. Again, none of those things have transpired during the historical Greek and Roman age, as some might claim, but await a future and glorious consummation. So with that background, there's a few of the big pieces alright? So let's come now and let's look again, at what the Spirit of God reveals to Daniel.

A little bit of background again here with Daniel; Daniel sees these four great beasts in verse three, they're coming up from the sea, they're different from one another. And he sees these amazing descriptions of each one of them. We examined that last week. But then notice in verse seven, "'After this,'" he says, "'I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying, and extremely strong; and it had large iron teeth. It devoured and crushed and trampled down the remainder with its feet; and it was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had 10 horns. While I was contemplating the horns, behold, another horn, a little one came up among them, and three of the first horns were pulled out by the roots before it; and behold, this horn possessed eyes, like the eyes of a man and a mouth, uttering great boasts.'" Alright, so Daniel sees all of this, he's overwhelmed by it. And naturally, he would like to have some further understanding of what all of this meant. And here's what was going through his mind beginning in verse 15. "'As for me, Daniel, my spirit was distressed within me. And the visions in my mind kept alarming me.'" Now, as one might expect, if you put yourself in that position, you would want to know more; what in the world is going on here. And I might also add, like every single believer who has an insatiable appetite for the truth of the Word of God, God is going to feed you. And that's exactly what we see happening here; verse 16, "'I approached one of those who were standing by,'" referring to one of the angels, "'and began asking him the exact meaning of all this. So he told me it made known to me the interpretation of these things.'" So beginning of verse 17, we have the angelic interpretation, notice what he says, "'These great beasts, which are four in number, are four kings who will arise from the earth. But the saints of the highest one will receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever for all ages to come.'" So here, this angelic interpreter gives a big picture, kind of a general interpretation to set the stage for more of the actors and more of the drama that's going to come about.

And we see here that, first of all, that these beasts represent human kings and their kingdoms and secondly, we see that their kingdoms are not going to last. I'm so glad that that's the case that they will not last, they will be replaced by God's kingdom and ruled by his saints. Now, it's also important to note that this is the first time in the vision that we are introduced to the saints of the Highest One, which I believe suggests they have had no part to play in the panorama of world history until this final stage, when they are said to, quote, "receive the kingdom," which is the same kingdom, given to the Son of Man in verse 14, the eternal King of that final realm. Other Scriptures reveal that the citizens of this kingdom are indeed the saints of the Highest One, those who have been made holy by faith in Christ. But this will also include Jews and Gentiles who will come to faith in Christ during the time of the tribulation; but they are going to suffer greatly under the rule of the Antichrist. In fact, Zechariah speaks a bit about this in chapter 13, beginning in verse eight, There we read, "'It will come about in all the land,' declares the Lord, 'that two parts in it will be cut off and perish; but the third will be left in it. And I will bring the third part through the fire refined them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested, they will call on My name, and I will answer them, I will say 'They are My people.' And they will say, 'the Lord is my God.'" Indeed, the Lord will one day perform a greater deliverance even than that of Exodus. Jeremiah speaks of this in Jeremiah 16, beginning of verse 14, "'Therefore, behold, days are coming,' declares the Lord, 'when it will no longer be said, 'As the Lord lives, who brought up the sons of Israel, out of the land of Egypt.' but 'As the Lord lives who brought up the sons of Israel, from the land of the north, and from all the countries where He had banished them,' For I will restore them to their land, which I gave to their fathers.'" And we're beginning to see some of that occur even today.

So again, back to verse 18, "'the saints of the Highest One will receive the kingdom, and possess the kingdom forever, for all ages to come.'" This word "possess," in the original language carries the idea of ownership, the idea of authority. Satan, and his demonic and human agents will no longer rule the earth, as he does today, as they do today. Satan is going to be bound, he is going to be sealed up in the abyss during the millennial reign of Christ. We read about that in Revelation 20, beginning in verse one. There, John says, "Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding the key of the abyss, and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for 1000 years. And he threw him into the abyss and shut it and sealed it over him. So that he would not deceive the nations any longer, until the 1000 years were completed." So again, the saints of the highest one will receive, they're going to possess the kingdom forever. That's us, folks, we can celebrate that we can rejoice in that. I mean, this is our inheritance. It's an amazing thought.

I was thinking about what Paul said in Colossians 1:12. If you want to look there for a moment, there, he says, we’re to give "thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light." Paul is saying that in that context, that because of the finished work of Christ, and all that he has done for us, God has qualified, the term could be authorized, it could be translated, "authorized" or "empowered us" to be partakers of "the inheritance of the saints in the Light." It literally can be translated for the portion of the lot. It's a fascinating thought. This reaches back to the individual partitioning of Israel's inheritance in the Promised Land of Canaan. You can read about it in Numbers 26 and Joshua 14. So what he's saying is that each one of us, as believers, will receive our own individual portion of the total divine inheritance. There are other passages that speak to this but I think of Romans 8:17, "If children," Paul tells us, we are "heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ." An amazing thought, what an astounding promise.

So indeed, as the angel revealed to Daniel, the saints are going to receive and possess the coming Kingdom. We're going to reign with him. Second Timothy two verse 11, "It is a trustworthy statement," Paul says, "For if we died with Him, we will also live with Him; if we endure, we will also reign with Him." Revelation 5:10 says the same thing, "And thou has made them to be a kingdom, and priests to our God and they will reign upon the earth." Verse 20, or chapter 20, and verse four of Revelation, "And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus, and because of the word of God and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead and on their hand and they came to life," and here we go, "reigned with Christ for 1000 years." Now, obviously, this is all in stark contrast to the four kingdoms of Daniel's prophetic dream. You don't have any saints reigning there. That's the time of the Gentiles. Can you even imagine what it will be like? When according to Zechariah 14 and verse nine, "The LORD will be king over all the earth." All right? You turn on the television, you don't see Joe Biden, you know, you see the Lord. "When the LORD will be king over all the earth; in that day, the Lord will be the only one and His name the only one." Can you imagine what it will be like when according to Habakkuk, two and verse 14, "The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." Can you imagine that day? No more corrupt, greedy, self-serving lying politicians; the Lord will be ruling.

So Daniel learns now how the saints of the Highest One are going to receive and possess this eternal kingdom that was given to the Son of Man. But notice what else troubled his mind in verse 19, "Then I desired to know the exact meaning of the fourth beast, which was different from all the others exceedingly dreadful, with its teeth of iron and its claws of bronze." The claws of bronze, by the way, is a new detail here, in the whole scene of this, "and which devoured," he says, "crushed and trampled down the remainder with its feet." And he wants to know, "the meaning of the 10 horns that were on its head, and the other horn which came up, and before which three of them fell, namely, that horn which had eyes and a mouth uttering great boasts and which was larger in appearance." The original there carries the idea that it was, it was greater, it was sturdier, and it became even more imposing. It was larger in appearance than its associates. And then it says in verse 21, "'I kept looking and that horn was waging war with the saints and overpowering them.'" Well, we know that this is again, a reference to the Antichrist, he is the beast, for example, in Revelation 13, let me take you there for a moment. Revelation 13, beginning in verse five. "And there was given to him a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies, and authority to act for 42 months was given to him." I want you to notice, this was given to him here, the Lord reminds us that He is the sovereign God who is even ordained this. So God ordains, this 42 month season of blasphemy against himself, he is going to use this ultimately, for his purpose. And this will include blasphemy against three things, back to Revelation 13, six, "And he opened his mouth and blasphemies against God, to blaspheme His name." God's name encompasses the consummate sum of all of his infinite perfections. Not only his name, but it says "and His tabernacle." In other words, where God resides, and in transcendent glory in heaven, the place from which Satan was expelled, so he's blaspheming, that, and also "those who dwell in heaven," referring to the saints and the holy angels, whom Satan hates. And then we see his murderous campaign in verse seven of Revelation 13, "And it was given to him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him." Verse eight, and "All who dwell on the earth," which by the way, in the book of Revelation is a phrase used to describe unbelievers, and "All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world and the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." In the New Testament, the phrase "the foundation of the world" is a synonym for before time began, or eternity past. So remember now two thirds of the Jews during this time will be killed by the Antichrist during the Tribulation as we read in Zechariah 13, eight through nine. And then according to Zechariah, 14, one through five, Jerusalem is even going to succumb to his forces. Beginning in verse one of Zechariah 14, "Behold, a day is coming for the Lord, when the spoil taken from you will be divided among you. For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle." By the way, don't we see the precursor of all that right now? "I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle and the city will be captured, the houses plundered the women ravished and half of the city exiled, but the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city."

But dear friends, that is not the end, and the hour of Israel's greatest peril, a deliverer is going to come as promised. And that's what we see in the very next verse, verse three of Zechariah 14, "Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations as when He fights on a day of battle. In that day, his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives will be split in its middle from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will move toward the north and the other half toward the south." He promised to return physically, didn't he? And he's going to return the same place from which he left, verse five, You will flee by the valley of My mountains, for the valley of My mountains will reach to Azel; yes, you will flee just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Then the Lord, my God will come, and all the holy ones with Him! There is the glory of the Second Coming. In the rapture, he comes for His saints, in the second part of his Second Coming, that second stage, he comes with his saints.

Now back to Daniel 11. This is what the angel reveals to Daniel in his interpretation of verse 21. The horns waging war with the saints, he's overpowering them. And then verse 22, "Until," I love that word "until," that's a great study in and of itself in the New Testament, until.... horrible things are happening... until then there's victory. "Until" verse 22, "the Ancient of Days came and judgment was passed in favor of the saints of the Highest One, and the time arrived when the saints took possession of the kingdom." When I was a boy, I used to watch a program. And the guy would say, "I love it when a plan comes together." You remember that? I love it when this plan comes together, and it will. Now you might say, Well, what's going to happen to the little horn? What's going to happen to the Antichrist? Ah, I'm so glad you asked. Turn to Revelation 19, for a moment, beginning in verse 19. Here, John is seeing the theater of operations. Verse 19, of Revelation 19, we read, "And I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies," referring to the Antichrist and his allies, "assembled to make war against Him who sat upon the horse and against His army." Now, as a footnote, the Lord may already be in Jerusalem by this time with the army of the saints and his angelic forces somehow hovering in the skies. We don't know for sure. This might help explain why some of the Jewish inhabitants of Jerusalem will suddenly give glory to the God of heaven, according to Revelation 11:13. But we do know that the Antichrist and his allies will amass their forces in this region to "make war against Him who sat upon the horse and against His army." When you think about it, amassing such a vast force will take weeks, and I believe the satanically empowered antichrist will deliberately assemble all of his troops, and we'll be awaiting the warrior king’s arrival, knowing that the three and a half years of his promise coming is about to elapse. In fact, Daniel 11:45 We read, "He," referring to the Antichrist, "will pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain; yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him." And that's a description of the geography there between the Mediterranean Sea and Jerusalem. Now, we're not told anything about the specifics of his attack, but we know the outcome is going to be instant. It is going to be devastating and the next scene is a cause for great rejoicing Revelation 19 verse 20, "And the beast was seized," carries the idea there of being captured alive, he "was seized, and with him the false prophet, who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast, and those who worshipped his image." And the false prophet is the one who promoted the false worship. And he's going to be treated the same as the beast. It goes on to say these "two were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone." I've never had this happen to me, and I hope it don't ever have it happened to me, but as a man, I can't think of anything more humiliating than being picked up and thrown. And that's what's going to happen to be "thrown alive" even worse yet, "into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone." To be thrown alive by your arch enemy is a mortification that begs language.

But dear friends, this is the horrific fate of the Antichrist and given the fact that they will be thrown alive into the lake of fire indicates that then either instantly, probably instantly, they're going to be equipped with some kind of body suited for the torments of hell. And then notice again, the ultimate fate of these vile creatures in verse 20, of Revelation 19. "These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone." Now, brimstone is a sulfuric chemical that can become explosively hot. You can see remnants of it, in fact, you can go on YouTube, and you can see evidence of this and the ancient realm of Sodom and Gomorrah, where little balls, little white balls of brimstone, the only place that they exist on the planet, they're little pellets made up of 99%, pure sulfur, and they are embedded in the ashes. You can see Sodom and Gomorrah and some of the other cities that were destroyed in that way. And you can see people taking a lighter and you light that, and it'll just be a blue hot flame that will burn. Well, this will be the final abode, dear friends, for Satan, for his demonic forces, for the Antichrist, for all unbelievers; horrific. Revelation 14:11 describes the suffering of hell as a place where quote, "the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever; they have no rest, day and night." Unimaginable.

Now, back to the angelic interpretation of Daniel's dream, look at verse 23, "'Thus he said: the fourth beast will be a fourth kingdom on the earth,' referring to the Antichrist kingdom, 'which will be different from all the other kingdoms and will devour the whole earth and tread it down and crush it.'" Now remember, this fourth kingdom includes not only the ancient Roman Empire, but there's been a big time gap here now, and we believe that there will be a future revived Roman Empire, as we have already studied some. We see this referenced in Revelation chapter 13, as well as 17. And this is affirmed even in the next verse 24. "'As for the 10 horns,'" the interpreter says, "'out of this kingdom, 10 kings will arise and another will arise after them.'" So the Antichrist is going to arise after the first 10. Verse eight, you will recall tells us that he is going to come up from among them. But this the sudden rise, due to the power of his charismatic personality and political promises, is going to be even more understood during that time because of his conquests. And this is what's going to make him different from his contemporaries. Notice the end of verse 24, "'and he will be different from the previous ones and will subdue three kings.'" Now, if we go back to verse eight, we read three of the first horns were pulled up by the roots before it. So again, we see a reference here that the antichrist is going to uproot or displace three of his predecessors during that time; he's going to take over their kingdoms for himself. I might add that nothing like this has ever happened, in the ancient, the early Roman Empire, so I believe that this must refer to a revived Roman Empire. Moreover, that the Antichrist's rule future Empire will initially be divided into 10 administrative districts ruled by 10 kings, is further underscored in Revelation 17 and verse 12, There we read, "Then 10 horns, which you saw are 10 kings, who have not yet received the kingdom, but they receive authority as kings with the beast for one hour. These have one purpose, and they give their power and authority to the beast." I might add that this restoration idea is is further underscored by the events that are described in the remaining three visions of Daniel especially in Daniel 8:23 and Daniel nine, verses 26 and 27.

The interpreter then continues in verse 25, he says, "He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One." "Wear down" means exactly what it sounds; it carries the idea of just being oppressed by unjust authority. Boy, we're feeling evidence of that even now. But it'll be exponentially worse during that time. You know, in general terms, Moses predicted the sufferings of Israelite believers during this time of tribulation, in Deuteronomy six, and I should say, 28, I think is Deuteronomy 28. And Leviticus 26. And Isaiah even prophesied a future period of great purging, in chapter four, verses three and four. As did Jeremiah. He described it as "the times of Jacob's distress, “Jeremiah 30, in verse seven. We see the same thing in Ezekiel 20 and Zechariah 12, Malachi three.

Dr. Whitcomb said, quote, "So devastating will be that final phase of the day of man that two thirds of the nation of Israel will die, quote, 'and I will bring the third part through the fire,' Zechariah 13 Nine. Israel's Messiah," he went on to say, "assured her that," quote, "then there will be a great tribulation such has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever shall, Matthew 24:21. In fact, unless those days are," quote, "cut, short, none will survive at all. But as Jesus said, in Matthew 24:22, for the sake of the elect, those days shall be cut short."

Now, according to other prophecies, this will actually begin when the Antichrist deceives the world with presumably, some resurrection from the dead, we read about this in Revelation 13. If we were to look at the context there, he will have broken his covenant with Israel that's described in Daniel 9:27. And according to Revelation 13, the False Prophet has helped to create this image of the Antichrist, this large image in the Jerusalem temple, to be worshipped by all mankind. And certainly that's always been Satan's desire. And so his quote, "speaking out against the Most High, and his wearing down of the saints," is going to happen in the last half of Daniel's 70th week, the last half of the tribulation, and it will continue for 42 months, we're told. During that time, the Antichrist is going to be given authority, quote, "to make war with the saints and to overcome them," Revelation 13 seven.

Now, by this time in the tribulation, many of the Jewish believers will have fled into the wilderness to somehow seek protection. You read about this in Revelation 12. And Jesus warned and told them, advised them to do this. You can read about that in Matthew 24, verses 15 through 20. However, we also know that there's going to be a magnificent missionary core of redeemed Jews consisting of 12,000 men from each of the 12 tribes called the 144,000. And they will be protected from death by God and Jesus speaks of this in Revelation 24:14. They will carry this gospel of the kingdom to the whole world for a witness to all nations, and then the end shall come. In other words, they will finally do what he intended for them to do in the beginning.

So again, verse 25, "He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend," not succeed, "intend to make alterations in times and in law." This is probably a reference to the Antichrist attempt to change God's sovereignly allotted time to reign, to allow him to reign with such blasphemy and terror before his promised demise. I recall how Hitler promised that the right would reign for 1000 years, it didn't quite happen. But this is the same type of thinking. Furthermore, we read the Antichrist is going to attempt to alter God's righteous law, he will try to do that in every form. And of course, that's not a surprise. I mean, he's being inspired and empowered by Satan, who is the father of lies. Second Thessalonians two and verse three, Paul calls him the man, the Antichrist, the "man of lawlessness." And, you know, again, we see elements of this growing rapidly, I can't tell you how many people I've talked with, that have said, I just can't believe how quickly things are going down the tubes here in the country. It's absolutely astounding. In fact, if you look at the platform of the Democratic Party, it basically reads as a diatribe against everything that God deems holy. It's for this reason that no discerning Christian could ever support these people. In Isaiah five and verse 20, you will recall, ancient Judah was being judged for a number of things, but one of them is recorded there. "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight!"

And we learn more of how the Antichrist is going to try to change the times in the laws. Daniel 11, beginning in verse 36, "Then the King will do as he pleases, and he will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods, and he will prosper until the indignation is finished, for that which is decreed will be done." And then it says, "He will show no regard for the gods of his fathers, or for the desire of women," probably meaning he will be a homosexual, "nor will he show regard for any other god, for he will magnify himself above them all." In other words, he is going to be the quintessential megalomaniac of all times. This is who is coming.

Back to Daniel seven at the end of verse 25, "And they will be given into his hand referring to the saints for a time, times, and half the time." This signifies the final period, the final three and a half years in Daniel's prophetic 70th week, the last three years of the tribulation. Now, as a note here, with the church removed, the conditions at the beginning of the Tribulation will be very much like what we saw at Christ's first coming. To quote, Dr. Charles Feinberg, who by the way was a great Jewish scholar, studying to be a rabbi that came to saving faith in Christ, taught at Talbot Seminary. He was one of John MacArthur's teachers, and many others; A great and godly man who's now gone home with the Lord. But here's what he says, quote, "Israel will be back in the land, the sacrificial system will be in force. Because of the rebuilt temple. The nation will be reconstituted as a homogeneous national entity with its leaders who will be able to negotiate contracts with foreign powers, specifically the Roman Prince," referring to the Antichrist, "and the Sabbath, (and by implication, all the religious calendar which was interrupted by the crucifixion of Christ, and the scattering of Israel worldwide), will be in force again, according to Matthew 24:16, through 21." So the point here is, all of the saints will be given into his hand for this period of time when he calls times, times and a half a time. The church has been removed now, Daniel 70th week, the Tribulation, will begin.

And I might remind you that as we look at the prophetic calendar through the lens of Scripture, we see that at the beginning, the first half of the tribulation, the Antichrist begins to rise to power. The pre kingdom judgments that are described in Revelation six through 18, will begin and they will increase in frequency and in severity, like a woman in travail with a child. Persecution will begin early on against believers, both Jews and Gentiles, but they are going to gain momentum in terms of severity and frequency, again, like labor pains. And then according to Daniel 9:27, in the middle of the week, the abomination of desolation will occur. And that's when the Antichrist will break his original covenant with Israel, which again, decided that they needed to resume their ancient sacrificial system in their temple and so forth. And this desolation, this ruin, is what the Jews, when this happens, the Jews will realize that the Antichrist is turned against them. It will ruin, it will desecrate all that is holy in their temple, the presence of God they believe is there, and so forth.

And at the middle point of the tribulation, midway through the Tribulation, that's when all hell begins to break loose on the earth; a horrific period of tribulation and hardship like the world has never known. Jesus spoke about it, again in Matthew 24, and verse 21, and so forth. But God is going to use all of this to save a remnant of his people. I might also add that the church, the pure Bride of Christ, during that time, is going to be replaced by the great whore, the great harlot, which will be a false apostate, ecclesiastical monstrosity, the type of thing that we even see growing today, this demand in the world for us all to just coexist. That's what's going to happen under the leadership of the Antichrist, but he will ultimately be the one that sets himself up to be God, and that great harlot will ultimately require the world to worship the beast. Now, this will continue, it says, "For a time, times and a half the time." Again, the second half of Daniel's 70th week, it's measured in several ways in Scripture. It's also described as 42 months in Revelation 11 two and chapter 13, in verse five. It's also described as 1260 days in Revelation 11, three and 12 six, and also "times and times and half the time" in the text that we're in now, as well as Revelation 12:14. So the saints then are given into his hands during that period of persecution. But notice this, verse 26, "But the court will sit for judgment." This is the same expression that is used in verse 10 that we will examine the next time when the Ancient of Days will pronounce judgment on the little horn on the Antichrist. "The court will sit for judgment and his dominion will be taken away annihilated and destroyed forever." In other words, no other ruler from that point on, will assume power. It's an amazing thought.

And that final hour just before the Lord returns when Jerusalem, which would be the last stronghold of the saints, when the Jerusalem is on the brink of collapse, Zechariah tells us that the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, Zechariah 14 one through three. And I love verse 27, "Then the sovereignty, the dominion, and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven, will be given to the people of the saints of the Highest One." That's us, folks. Then it says, "His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom, and all the dominions will serve and obey Him." Beloved, think about this, throughout the course of human history, obviously throughout the course of our lives, we have never known anything but corrupt tyrannical leaders. I mean you look at Washington today, and they're as crooked as a barrel of snakes. We've never known anything like what's being described here. But one day, all of that is going to come to an end. Verse 28, "At this point, the revelation ended. As for me," that’s Daniel, "my thoughts were greatly alarming me and my face grew pale, but I kept the matter to myself." You know, we have a great advantage over Daniel, in that we not only have the complete canon of Scripture to help us understand these things, but also we can look back and see what he was looking forward to and couldn't see, the only thing he couldn't see is the same thing we cannot see. And that's the final revived Roman Empire and the Antichrist. And so to that extent, we ought to also be, as he was, greatly alarmed, greatly alarmed at the judgments that are to come upon the earth.

You know, I think about that all the time. I see people going about their lives, going about their business, they're having their families, they're having fun, they're going to the Titans game, they're doing all these things that you know, a lot of them are legitimate, but they have no idea what God is up to. And unless they repent and place their faith in Christ, they will perish in their sins. They will be destroyed forever. Dear friends, I pray that we will all have an increased burden for the lost because of this; that we will be salt and light in this decaying and very dark world, as we await the imminent return of our Savior and our King. Great, great truths, what we have to look forward to.

Let's pray. Thank you, Lord, for your Word that speaks to our hearts. While we never can understand fully all of the things that you have revealed to us, we can certainly see that again, you are a sovereign God working your perfect plan, to bring glory to yourself. And to think that somehow, we are a part of all of that, it's absolutely astounding. So I pray that these great truths will humble us and will ignite us with an ardent zeal for evangelism that many will hear the good news of the gospel from our lips and from our lives, certainly from this church. We thank You, Lord, and we pray that you will come quickly in Jesus name. Amen.

This morning I would like to begin, what will be at least a two part, maybe a three part, maybe a four part, I'm not sure, series coming out of Daniel chapter seven. I've entitled the series "The Great Panorama of World History." So if you will take your Bibles and turn to Daniel seven. In a few minutes, we will look closely at the first eight verses. You know, though our country is rotting from the head down, and that we find ourselves struggling under the corruption of all that we see in the world, especially the militant unbelief, that is fomenting more and more hatred towards Christianity, isn't it wonderful to know that our God reigns? And this is what we will see here. As we begin this study of Daniel seven, if you haven't been with us, we've been going verse by verse. We've been going through Daniel, verse by verse and now we're coming here to Daniel chapter seven. And I need to help you understand a bit of the context in the first six chapters of Daniel. Primarily, what we have is a lot of history. It's historic in nature with very little predictive prophecy. But now we're coming to the second half of Daniel, where we look predominantly at predictive prophecy, rather than history. So there will be very little history here. And once again in chapter seven, as you may recall, from our previous studies, we have what's called a "chiastic pattern" being used to create emphasis and repetition, clarification. It's from the Greek word "chi," which is their x. And in a caustic pattern, you will remember that elements one and four of the pattern, and that you will find in one or more verses or chapters, will parallel in thought with elements two and three and another part of that verse or another part of the chapter. So structurally, what we see is Daniel seven, parallels Daniel chapter two. And I want you to understand that and thus, Daniel seven completes that "chiastic" arrangement. For example, in chapter two, you have four Gentile empires symbolized by different parts of a colossal human image and in chapter seven, you have the same Gentile empire symbolized by four great beasts rising up out of the sea. And chapter two, we read of a 10-fold division of a fourth kingdom symbolized by 10 toes on the feet of an image, whereas in chapter seven, they are symbolized as ten horns on the head of a great monster. In chapter two, the 10-fold subdivisions of the fourth kingdom of Gentile domination will be smashed by the stone, which is Christ, and we see something similar in chapter seven. There, we learn that an 11th horn is also going to appear a little horn that comes up after them and grows to be larger than all of them. And that is a revelation of the final Antichrist. And what we see as well in Daniel seven is the rise and fall at the hands of the great stone, which is Christ. That will be the primary emphasis in Daniel seven. Moreover, in both visions, in chapter two and chapter seven, we see differences in perspective. The magnificent beauty of the human image in chapter two depicts, quote, "human achievement in government, culture, art and science," according to Whitcomb. He went on to say, "but in the seventh chapter, we see that same fourfold empire of man from God's perspective, and how does it appear as wild and ravenous beasts that is how a holy God views the sinful and satanic maneuverings of nations upon the earth. Men's achievements apart from and in opposition to him are not spectacular from heaven's perspective. In fact, they are far worse than the activities of wild carnivorous animals for no animal ever sins or, for that matter is ever cruel. What they do is done by genetically programmed instinct patterns that were warped from God's curse upon Adam and his progeny. There is no hell for the animal kingdom. But men are wicked and cruel in the sight of God, and are under his judgment," That Whitcomb says, is the emphasis of chapter seven. Now please remember, both chapters, as well as the entirety of the book of Daniel, are meant to encourage the exiled Jews, his Jewish kinsmen, and frankly, all of the redeemed by explaining the succession of four Gentile empires that will dominate Jerusalem that will dominate God's covenant people, yea dominate the world, until the Messiah returns and establishes His kingdom. In fact, Leon Wood says, quote, "When God's people were taken captive to Babylonia, it seemed from the human perspective that God was through with them." And certainly, I would add, that's what the Jewish people thought. We see it in Scripture, for example, in Jeremiah 33, beginning in verse 24, we read this, "Have you not observed what this people have spoken, saying, 'The two families which the Lord chose, He has rejected them'? Thus they despise My people, no longer are they as a nation in their sight. Thus says the Lord, 'If My covenant for day and night stand not, and the fixed patterns of heaven and earth I have not established, then I would reject the descendants of Jacob and David, My servant, not taking from his descendants rulers over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But I will restore their fortunes and will have mercy on them.'" What a magnificent promise of future restoration and blessing. Wood goes on to say "God was not through with them. However, and he desired that they know he was not. An effective way to do this was to reveal the historical future which God had in mind for them. They not only would return from this captivity, but would in due time see their Messiah, come to deliver them from spiritual bondage to sin, and later from physical bondage to a powerful earthly empire, this latter deliverance to be followed by a grand kingdom period on their own," end quote.

So once again, the Spirit of God speaks through His servant Daniel, and in so doing, he provides a magnificent panoramic view of world history, including the future events that culminate in the inauguration of the future and final kingdom and eternal kingdom of God. And we know that the prophecies herein, parallel other, not only Old Testament, but New Testament prophecies. For example, descriptions of a future abomination, committed by one who makes desolate. That's prophesied in Daniel 9:27, as well as chapter 12 and verse 11, are also predicted by Christ Himself, in Matthew 24 and verse 15. Also, the final stage of Daniel's fourth empire, prophesied in Daniel chapter seven, and eight, and nine and 11, where a beast is seen rising up out of the sea, parallels Revelation, chapter 13, is a description of the coming out of antichrist that will emerge from Satan's world system. And we will look closely at many of these parallel passages as we continue to make our way through Daniel's prophecies.

I might also add that as we approach the sacred text this morning, it's important for you to realize that there is a time gap that exists between the close of the fourth kingdom of Rome and its powerful future emergence under the rule of the Antichrist, and we now anticipate this. And I might also add that this is not coincidental. What man calls coincidence God calls providence. It was no twist of fate, that Christ at his first appearing occurred during an ancient period of Roman domination. And dear friends, it will be no twist of fate, that he will come again during a second period of Roman domination, the final stage of what Jesus called in Luke 21:24, "the times of the Gentiles." So these and many other astounding truths await the diligent student of Bible prophecy, especially here in Daniel. No wonder so many conservative scholars agree that Daniel could be called the revelation of the Old Testament, of which the Lord promised in Revelation one, three, "Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and heed the things which are written in it; for the time is near."

You know, it's sad, many Christians have very little understanding of the prophetic literature in Scripture, and frankly, many are indifferent towards it. They're more interested in who the Titans are playing than the second coming of Christ. But this was certainly not true of Daniel, when he received the special revelation of God, to give to his people, it deeply impacted him. And that's why as we read earlier, in Daniel seven, in verse 15, we read, "'As for me, Daniel, my spirit was distressed within me, and the visions in my mind kept alarming me.'" Then he says, "'I approached one of those who were standing by,'" referring to one of the angelic beings, "'and began asking him the exact meaning of all this. So he told me and made known to me the interpretation of these things.'" And then we go on to read how the inspired angel gave him the interpretation of the intervening verses. In verse 28, he says, "'At this point, the revelation ended. As for me, Daniel, my thoughts were greatly alarming me, and my face grew pale, but I kept the matter to myself.'" Oh, child of God, please hear me, a day is coming when God is going to judge this world, and Christ is going to return in power and great glory. And he will establish his millennial reign upon a renovated earth. And today, the world mocks at all of this, they mock Christians, they consider all of this to be the ravings of some lunatic fringe, but a day is coming for them. And I say this with great regret, when according to Revelation six and verse 16, they will cry out to the mountains into the rocks, 'Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?'" So I trust that your heart is prepared to hear these things. And that you will be animated to further praise, knowing what God is up to, and that you're a part of this. And what a joy to know that our God will prevail, that He will reign supreme upon the earth. To know that one day at the name of Jesus according to Philippians 2:10, "Every knee will bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth And that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

All right, so hang on, here we go. Let me give you the context here of Daniel seven. Daniel seven is a flashback to the reign of Belshazzar. He reigned around 553 BC. Nebuchadnezzar by this time has been dead for about nine years, Daniel would have been 67 years old when he received this vision, this dream. And so this also, therefore took place for years prior to the miraculous handwriting on the palace wall on the night of Belshazzar's death, and the fall of Babylon that's described in chapter five. So the events of chapter seven occur chronologically between Daniel four and Daniel five.

Now let's examine what God has revealed to us. Verse one, "In the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel saw a dream and visions in his mind as he lay on his bed; then he wrote the dream down and related the following summary of it. Daniel said, 'I was looking in my vision by night and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea.'" Stirring up could be translated, bursting forth upon. Now we know that the word wind is used about 90 times in the Old Testament, and 30 times in the New Testament and over half of the time, it is used to describe the sovereign power the unassailable rule of God. And of course, that's the dominating theme of Daniel. And the sea typically represents the mass of a fallen humanity, or the nations of the world. So the symbolism here seems to indicate the sovereign power of God, striving against sinful humanity, probably through the use of angelic forces, coming at them from the four winds of heaven, in other words from every direction, stirring up a storm of strife, and trouble and turmoil in order to ultimately accomplish God's purposes. And of course, we see these winds gaining strength in our day and the destruction of our own nation. Frankly, we should fear the godless rulers over us more than we fear COVID or anything else. COVID is a great distraction to the real enemy.

But notice what Daniel sees next in verse three, "'And four great beasts were coming up from the sea, different from one another.'" We know from verse 17, there's an indication there that these four great beasts are four kings, who will arise from the earth. So verse four, "'The first was like a lion, and had the wings of an eagle. I kept looking until its wings were plucked, and it was lifted up from the ground and made to stand on two feet like a man; the human mind also was given to it.'" And of course, we know this is a reference to Nebuchadnezzar, who Jeremiah described as, quote, a "lion from the thickets of the Jordan," Jeremiah 49, verse 19, as well as chapter 50 and verse 44. You see, every year the Jordan River would flood in the spring, it would, it would flood all of the thickets and that would cause the lions to leave the valley of the river and go into the villages and destroy many people. And so that is how Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians were described here. Moreover, because of the great speed in which deadly competitors, armies, could operate, and conquer their enemies, Ezekiel describes him as having the wings of an eagle; Ezekial 17 three as well as verse seven. But as Daniel witnessed in his dream here, this eagle's wings were plucked. I don't know if you've ever seen a bird with all of its feathers plucked, but it's a pretty humiliating, kind of a ghastly sight. And that's what we have here. There's a prophecy that the proud feathers, of that majestic king of all the birds, would be removed. And we know that God humbled Nebuchadnezzar, during the seven years of his insanity. And his beastly character was tamed, ultimately, by God who transformed the nature of the beast, you might say, into that of a human, and eventually he surrendered to the will of the Most High God.

But then Daniel goes on and he sees something else in verse five, "'And behold, another beast, a second one resembling a bear.'" Now, it's interesting here, unlike the first beast, here, the empire alone is symbolized not its ruler. And we know biblically that the bear symbolizes the Medo-Persian empire that was mentioned repeatedly in chapter six. And then it says something interesting here, "'It was raised up on one side;'" it's a very curious description. And as I studied the original language and studied different commentaries, frankly, I never found anything that really satisfied my conclusion as to what this means. And frankly, what I'm going to tell you, I'm not real sure about, but I can give you what some think. Some believe this is a reference to the Persian dominance. At first we know that the Medes the Midian influence, dominated the empire under the reign of Cyrus and his son Cambyses, but, but 50 years later, the Persians gained the dominance under the rule of Xerxes. And during that time, the Persians basically absorbed all of the Medes into its empire. And we also know in Daniel's second vision, recorded in chapter eight, the Medo-Persian empire is symbolized in verse three by two horns of a ram, and then the second horn comes up last and grows higher than the first. So you know, when it says "this bear was raised up on one side," some think it may have something to do with that. I'm not sure. But I do know this, having experienced grizzlies in the wild, I'll tell you a very brief story. I was in the middle of Alaska on a hunting trip, I had been bow hunting caribou, I'd killed my caribou and I had another older gentleman with me that had never been in the bush before. And I had a frightening experience with probably the same grizzly that I'm about to tell you about the day before. So he wanted to go with me. He had a rifle. I had my 300 Magnum with me as well. We go up, we're taking pictures, I'm taking pictures of an eagle, I say, "Adrian, put this in my backpack." So he puts it in my backpack, and all of a sudden he goes, "Dave." And I turned around, and here was this grizzly. And he ran up to us and stopped about 15 feet away. And so I just stood there with my gun, not knowing what he was going to do. But I will never forget what he did. He raised up on one side. What he did is he raised up on one side like this with his paw like this. And he started grunting, going back and forth looking at me. And then he would stop and just stare. And then he would put his paw down and he would move a little bit. I knew what he was trying to do because I could see his nose. He was trying to get wind, he moves over about five or six feet, gets up on one side again, and starts at grunting and going back and forth looking at me and then he would stop and his nose would go up. He did that about five or six times until he got at about a complete semicircle around me. And all of a sudden, he made this loud noise and spun around and took off like a scalded dog in the opposite direction. I'll never forget he threw gravel all over us, he took off so fast. What happened is he got wind of us. Okay? By the way, the one thing that's predictable about a grizzly bear is that they're completely unpredictable. Thank God for guardian angels, and 300 magnums, right? But my point is, I know from firsthand experience, that when a grizzly wants to intimidate you, and is in a position to strike, he's going to raise up on one side. And that is a very intimidating position. And that very well may be the meaning of what the Spirit of God is saying here, that this second bear resembling a bear, or the second beast that resembles a bear was raised up on one side. Notice also, we read that "'three ribs were in its mouth between its teeth; and thus they said to it, 'Arise, devour much meat.'" And this probably represents the three great conquests of the Medo-Persians that we know historically, where they conquered Media, in Asia Minor in 546. Then they conquered Babylon in 539 BC and then Egypt in 525 BC. And we know that this powerful bear of the Medo-Persian Empire absolutely dominated the world for over 200 years until Alexander the Great came on the scene. And we see him here in verse six. "'And after this, I kept looking and behold another one like a leopard, which had on its back four wings of a bird; the beast also had four heads, and dominion was given to it.'" In other words, it was granted to him by the providence of God that he could rule. Now frequently in the Old Testament, we see leopards used to symbolize that which is swift, that which is ferocious, that which is cunning. For example, in Jeremiah five six and Hosea 13 and verse seven, it speaks of how they will lie in wait for their prey, and anyone who encounters them will be torn to pieces. And that is certainly an apt description of the Grecian army under Alexander the Great. You will recall that they were the ones that invented the Greek phalanx, a single rectangular mass of military formation, interlocking shields, with spears and spikes. The spikes were the long ones were called "sarissas." Had long spears, they were about 13 to 20 feet long. They had a sharp iron head shaped like a leaf and a bronze plate and that they would anchor that into ground to stop chargers and so on. They were basically an unstoppable force. These spears could penetrate the armor of the enemies. And it's interesting as well in verse four, Nebuchadnezzar is described as having the wings of an eagle, an eagle has two wings, right? But Alexander has four wings, doubling Nebuchadnezzar's speed and his agility, and thus his ability to invade and conquer. And we know that history proves this. He conquered Asia Minor, the entire middle Persian Empire, including Syria and Palestine, and all of Egypt, and all of the eastern territories, all the way up to the borders of India. He did this in 10 years, and he died at age 33. It was said that his army of around 40,000 could move at such speed and agility that they were able to defeat much larger armies like the Persians; vastly outnumbered them some three to five times more.

But notice also what Daniel sees, "this beast also had four heads." Now, that these four heads are mentioned, after the four wings, indicates that something happens that occurred after these rapid conquests. And no doubt this points to the four major sectors of Alexander's vast Grecian empire that were ruled by his four generals after his death. Babylon in in North Syria was ruled by Antigonus. Egypt was ruled by Ptolemy, the first Soter, and then Macedonia was ruled by Cassander, Thrace and Bithynia by Lysimachus. It's important to note that these four heads, conformed to the four horns of the male goat, that we will read about in chapter eight.

But then notice what else God reveals to Daniel in verse seven, "'After this, I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, the fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying and extremely strong; and it had large iron teeth. It devoured and crushed and trampled down the remainder with its feet.'" And of course, this is a reference to the Roman Empire with its Roman legions. This is the most dreadful and terrifying and the strongest of all of the preceding empires. Daniel somehow sees its ferocious teeth as it growls violently at anyone that would dare stand in its way. And unlike Alexander, who seldom crushed the people that he conquered, the Roman Empire, this beast was very, very different. As it says "they devoured and crushed and trampled down the remainder with its feet." They were absolutely ruthless. When you read the history, they were brutal in their subjugation, they would torture people and, and kill hundreds of 1000s, then they would take them into slavery and sell them as slaves. But notice also in verse seven, it says, "'and it was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns.'" Now, as I said earlier, this parallels Daniel chapter two. And there we even read the same substance it was of iron and the 10, toes of the feet, and so forth. We'll address that more in a moment. But historically, we know that in 241 BC, Rome began by occupying Sicily, and then it moved in the second century BC to conquer Spain. When we've been in Spain, we saw lots of remnants of a Roman rule there, then on to Carthage, at the Battle of Zama in North Africa in 202 BC. It gradually turned the Mediterranean Sea into its own private lake, frankly, it conquered everything all around it. And after subjugating the lands of North Italy, it moved eastward to conquer Macedonia and Greece and Asia Minor. And then the Roman General Pompeii conquered the remnants of the Seleucid Empire, which was Syria, and then it went on to subjugate Jerusalem in 63 BC. And so little by little they continued this massive expansion; decade after a decade gaining control eventually of southern Britain and France and Belgium and Switzerland and Germany west of the Rhine River. Dr. Wolvoord says, quote, "The Roman Empire continued to gradually grow for more than four centuries reaching its height in AD 117, in contrast to the sudden rise of the preceding empires. It likewise declined slowly beginning In the third century. The decline became obvious in the fifth century AD when the Romans leaving Britain in AD 407 and suffering a sack of Rome in 410 by the Visigoths. It was not until AD 1453 that the last Roman or Byzantine ruler was killed in battle. And that was when the Sultan Mehmet conquered Constantinople." Now, I want you to understand that Rome's influence in our world today and in our country can still be seen, especially in Europe and in the United States. Not just physically but socially and religiously, legally. Our art and architecture, science, technology, farming, literature, on and on it goes. We know that Latin for example, is the basis of French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese and Romanian and Catalan languages. And many of our English words have Latin roots. Latin words continue to influence our western justice system. Our court proceedings mimic the proceedings of ancient Rome, the curved roofs that we see and large scale arches that are used to support our enormous buildings and bridges came from Rome. The amphitheaters and sports stadiums with tiered seating came from the Roman Colosseum. And religiously, after the early persecution of Christianity by the Roman government in 65, to about 300 AD, the Roman Emperor Constantine came along and he established himself as the head of the church. Instead of Christ, he was the head of the church, and around 313, he made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. And of course, that gave birth to the apostate religious system that we see today, known as Roman Catholicism. The first actual Pope in Rome was probably Leo the First in 440 ad. And we know that Constantine embraced his version of Christianity, he granted its special status. He formalized and centralized its doctrinal discussions, and he imposed those decisions on quote, "an official church." And they believe, for example, that the church then permanently replaced Israel; that God was finished with the Jews. Augustine was around that time he rejected Chiliasm, which is Millenarianism, or the idea that Christ would reign upon the earth for 1000 years. There was a strong hatred of Jews in that day. Monasticism and asceticism scandalized the notion of any kind of physical delights in an earthly kingdom. And so they believe that all of that was gone. You have Origen who implemented spiritualizing the text of Scripture; Augustine came along, did the same type of thing. So you have an allegorizing method, or hermeneutics, of interpreting scripture. And this produced what's called supersessionism, replacement theology, sometimes called amillennialism, as well. And this basically became the doctrinal eschatology of the Roman Catholic Church. They basically believe that the kingdom is the Roman Catholic Church. And so all of that came out of that. But bottom line, what I want you to see is that Roman Catholicism came out of that beast, and we still have remnants of it today. And that ushered in the darkest period of history. In all of history, rightfully called the Dark Ages, between about 500 and 1500 AD. There Satan rules supreme through his popes and bishops and priests, and throughout Europe; biblical Christianity became illegal. My point is, to this day, Europe and the United States bear the marks of this ancient fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying and extremely strong.

Now, with all of this in mind, we can better appreciate some of the new elements that God reveals to Daniel in this dream, new aspects of predictive prophecy, the likes of which we've never seen; the end of verse seven, so this fourth beast, he says, "'was different from all the beasts that were before it and it had 10 horns.'" Now, what we will see as we look at other Bible prophecies and consider them all together, is that this is a reference to 10 actual kingdoms that will one day exist simultaneously during Daniel's 70th week of judgment, during the time of the tribulation, the future tribulation, the pre-kingdom judgments upon the earth, just prior to the Lord's return what many, rightfully I think call, a revive Roman Empire yet future. Leon Wood says, quote, "As this will be a time when 10 contemporary kings will rule, among whom another will arise, uprooting three in the process and they move on to become the head of all." Let me stop there for a moment. We see this elsewhere in Scripture. Let me give you an example. In Revelation chapter 17, and verse 11. There is a reference to this beast, the antichrist that will appear with 10 horns in verse 12, symbolizing 10 kings who had not yet received power in John's day in the first century AD. In Revelation 17, we read this beginning in verse 12, "The 10 horns which you saw are 10 kings who have not yet received the kingdom, but they receive authority as kings with the beast for one hour. These have one purpose and they give their power and authority to the beast." Now, Revelation was written in the last decade of the first century between about AD 94 and 96. Near the end of Emperor Domitian, which was from AD 81 through 96. And obviously, none of what John describes here in Revelation 17 had happened in his day, therefore, it has to happen later on, and we've never seen anything like it either. He goes on to say, in Revelation 17:14. To tell us when this revive Roman Empire will appear with the beast, the Antichrist, he says there, "These will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them because he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with him are the called and chosen and faithful." This of course is a reference to the battle of Armageddon just prior to the Lord's return.

So let's go back to Daniel's prophecy. We can safely conclude that the 10 horns of verse seven, have not yet appeared in the panorama of world history. But notice what else the Spirit of God reveals to Daniel in verse eight. It says, "'While I was contemplating the horns, behold, another horn, a little one came up among them.'" Again, horn is frequently used in Scripture, as a symbol of power, especially powerful rulers. For example, in Psalm 132, beginning in verse 17, in the context, there's it speaking of Christ, the Lord Jesus establishing his earthly kingdom being installed by God on the throne of David in the city of God. And there we read there, "I will cause the horn of David to spring forth; I have prepared a lamp for Mine anointed. His enemies I will close with shame, but upon himself, his crown will shine." So back to verse eight, we also see a little horn. Now the language here, in the grammar, indicates it starts small, but it gradually gains strength and size. It's like there's an seemingly insignificant ruler that begins to emerge. But by verses 24 and following, he overpowers them. There we read, "As for the 10 horns, out of this kingdom 10 kings will arise, and another will arise after them, and he will be different from the previous ones, and will subdue three kings. He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law, and they will be given into his hand for a time, times and a half of time. But the court will sit for judgment and his dominion will be taken away, annihilated and destroyed forever." On subsequent expositions, I'll explain more of that, but I might add that this also refutes the argument that this little horn is a reference to the ruler of the Greek Empire, Antiochus Epiphanes, that we read about in chapter eight. You see, this cannot be Antiochus Epiphanes, emerges from the third empire that was symbolized by the four wing, the leopard of chapter seven, that clearly responds to the four horned goat of chapter eight. And so the little horn mentioned in Daniel seven eight emerges not from that third horn but from the fourth beast, which is Rome. So again, "'While I was contemplating the horns,'" verse eight, "behold, another horn, a little one came up among them, and three of the first horns were pulled out by the roots before it.'" Now later on in verse 20, of Daniel seven, the interpreting angel amplifies this prophecy. There we read "The meaning of the 10 horns that were on its head and the other horn which came up, and before which three of them fell.'" So in other words, someday, we don't have any idea what this is actually going to look like other than one day, the Antichrist is going to, to rise in power and prominence, and he's going to destroy three of the future kings. Verse 24, says "he will subdue three kings." Now we'll go back to verse 20, of Daniel seven. And who is this diabolical ruler to come? Well, namely, that horn, which had eyes and a mouth, uttering great boasts, and which was larger in appearance than its associates. So that's some of the interpretation.

Go back to verse eight of Daniel seven. Again, we read that, "this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth, uttering great boasts." So what do we have here? Well, we have a future revived Roman Empire, out of which another king is going to emerge, described as the beast, of for example, Revelation 17, as we've looked at, but also Revelation 13. So I want you to turn there and see the parallels in Revelation 13, with Daniel seven. Revelation 13, beginning in verse one. "And he," which is a reference to Satan, who's called the dragon in the previous chapter in chapter 12, verse nine and 17, and Satan "stood on the sand of the seashore." Again, this is symbolic of the nations of the world, over which now, Satan is standing as the self appointed ruler. And then we read this, and "I saw a beast." In Greek, "therion," it could be translated a monster, something that is ferocious and a violent creature. "I saw a beast coming up out of the sea," the same imagery. Once again, the metaphor of the sea is used to describe in the Old Testament, that realm of wickedness, the sphere of Satan, the source of satanic sea monsters, if you will. In fact, the ancients considered the sea to be the quote, "reservoir of evil." They likened it to the abyss. In fact, in Revelation 11, seven, and 17, the beast is seen coming up out of the abyss, that prison that incarcerates the most vile demons where Satan will be incarcerated during the final days of the millennial kingdom. So John sees this this monstrous man arising from this wretched penitentiary. The diabolical and desecrating nature of this future demon possessed man can be seen all in the epithets used to describe him in Scripture. For example, Daniel calls him not only the little horn, but the insolent King, the prince who has to come, the one who makes desolate, the despicable person, the strong-willed King. Zechariah calls him the worthless shepherd. Paul called him in Second Thessalonians two and verse three, "the man of lawlessness, the son of destruction." And in verse eight, "the lawless one." And again in where we are in Revelation, he's called the beast. So this man will be a charismatic demagogue, brilliant, persuasive, yet deceptive and deadly and cruel.

And next in Revelation 13, we see the likeness that he has to the one that empowers him, and in verse one, it says, "having 10 horns and seven heads." We have almost the identical description of Satan in chapter 12 and verse three, where we read "the great red dragon having seven heads and 10 horns, and on his heads were seven diadems." As indicated earlier, horns is emblematic of strength and power. And in this symbolism, we see the beast, Antichrist, is going to rule over these 10 nations, these 10 kings. Again, Daniel seven in verse 16, we that we've that we're looking at the number 10 is emblematic of the political and military power of the Antichrist and in Daniel 7:23 we read that he will one day rule the whole world. And he there he is pictured as the fourth beast; there will be a fourth kingdom on the earth. And so this is again a description from Daniel that links the fourth kingdom of Daniel's vision, to the statue that King Nebuchadnezzar saw in Daniel chapter two, the kingdom of Rome with "legs of iron, yet his feet partly of iron and partly of clay." And remember, this will be the one that quote, "a stone will cut out without hands," picturing Christ and it's going to strike it on the feet of clay and crush it, as we read in verses 33 and 34. So the Lord tells us through John's vision that this beast has 10 horns, again, symbolic of a coming revived Roman Empire and seven heads, representative, I believe, of the seven successive world empires that we read about in Revelation 17, which would have been Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, Rome, and then the final kingdom of the antichrist. These all make up once again, the times of the Gentiles. And notice on his tin horns were 10 diadems; "diadema" in the original language, a crown that marked the regal status of a subordinate king. And this is symbolic of the regal authority associated with these 10 rulers and their empires, all of which will be subordinate to the beast to the Antichrist.

And finally, we see that on his heads were blasphemous names. These names will demonstrate their allegiance to the beast, whom they will deify, rather than God himself. And this was practiced, by the way, in the days of ancient Rome, where emperors used various divine titles and put it on them, and obviously, such an inscription is blasphemous. And in verse two, we read, “And the beast which I saw was like a leopard and his feet were like those of a bear and his mouth like the mouth of a lion." Well, obviously, you can see that the imagery here is rooted in Daniel seven, where Daniel portrayed the four beasts, the lion, the bear, the leopard, and then the fourth beast, which is a composite of the first three described as that dreadful and terrifying and extremely strong beast. By the way, I find it interesting here, that John lists these animals in reverse, because he is looking back into history, whereas Daniel was looking into the future. So these three animals, the leopard and the bear, and the lion symbolizes the ferocious, vicious power of these three successive worlds empires of Babylon, Medo-Persia and Greece. But the fourth beast, representing the Roman Empire is emblematic of that future final kingdom of the antichrist that will incorporate all of the cruelty and all of the power of the first three. This empire will be unparalleled in human history.

You know, as we watch our presidential elections, and I've been able to see several of them over the course of my life now, it's amazing how people can completely utterly abandon all logic, all history and all common sense and end up worshipping a man. And it's fascinating that when people are desperate, when they're afraid, when they're unsure about the future, they will turn to man rather than to God. And that's what we will see here. And you know, every dictator in the history of the world has preyed upon people in such a way. They will, if there aren't any fears, they will create fears to somehow subjugate them. Adolf Hitler seized upon a depressed economy and the fears of the German people and he guaranteed quote, "peace with honor, peace for our time," and the people bought it. And the rest is history.

Well, dear friends, the rule of the Antichrist is going to exceed the deceptions and wickedness of Hitler 1000-fold and for good reason. Notice in verse two of Daniel 13, or of Revelation 13, "And the dragon gave him his power and his throne and great authority." You know, it's hard to imagine what this world will be like when the church is removed at the rapture. But think of the utter freefall of morality when the Holy Spirit quote "steps aside" as he will, according to Second Thessalonians two seven, "when he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way," literally steps aside, which we know he will do in the midpoint of the tribulation. This will allow Satan's dictator to come onto the scene to rule without restraint for 42 months, according to Daniel 7:25 and Revelation 13 five.

Well as we close, back to Daniel, chapter seven, verse eight, we read that, "this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth uttering great boasts." You know, he may be alive today, we don't know. But he's coming. You know, there's an old adage that says, nature abhors a vacuum. And indeed, whenever a vacuum is created, it is immediately filled with something, you know, whether it's water or air or some other form of matter. But our country, yea, our world, is experiencing a leadership vacuum, a vacuum of righteous leadership that's essential to our survival. The world needs a leader and, in their minds, they need a political hero. In fact, one prominent Belgian diplomat and astute European strategist by the name of Paul-Henri Spaak, put it this way, quote, "We do not want another committee, we have too many already. What we want is a man of sufficient stature, to hold the allegiance of all people and to lift us out of the economic morass into which we are sinking. Send us such a man, be he God or devil, and we will receive him." Well, dear friend, Satan is going to supply this leader. And he is the beast of Daniel seven. That horn that "will possess eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth, uttering great boasts." But friends, let me encourage you, make no mistake, God is still in control. All of this is part of his plan. And we know that at the end of the seven-year period of Judgment, the LORD Jesus Christ is going to return and he is going to destroy all of those who oppose him. And he will put an end to the times of the Gentiles. My how I look forward to that day. And in the parallel account, that we read in Daniel two verse 44. We can be encouraged, there we read “'In the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed and that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. Inasmuch as you saw that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands. And then it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold, the great God has made known to the king, what will take place in the future; so the dream is true, and its interpretation is trustworthy.'" Oh, dear Christian, fear not. The Lord is on his throne, our King is coming. And a day is coming when the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.

Let's pray together. Father, we thank you so much for these prophecies that not only encourage the hearts of the exiled Jews so many years ago but have encouraged the hearts of the redeemed down through the centuries. To know that you are the sovereign ruler of heaven and earth and that in unassailable power, you accomplish all that you have ordained in eternity past. Lord again, we thank you that we are part of this whole kingdom plan. We are the undeserved recipients of your favor. We are debtors to your grace. So we thank you. We give you praise, and we pray, Lord Jesus, that you will come quickly. And finally, Lord, I pray that if anyone is within the sound of my voice that really knows nothing of what it means to be reconciled to a holy God through faith in Christ, they know nothing of what it means to have the intimate fellowship and joy that's available to those who have been born again, I pray that you will bring conviction to their heart and that today they will confess their sin, and that they will confess that Jesus is indeed Lord, they will ask him to save them by his grace. So we thank you. We give you praise, and we commit these things to you, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.

This morning we are in Daniel chapter six. And I've entitled my discourse, "Daniel in the Lion's Den." A story I'm sure you're all very familiar with. I remember those pictures in my Bible story books when I was a little boy. And then the Sunday school classroom, pictures of Daniel. And for some reason, there are always three lions. But I am going to dispute that fact in a little bit, as you will see, but you're familiar with this story, a marvelous example of exemplary faith and of godliness in Daniel, but it's also a vivid illustration of vanity among political leaders, a picture of jealousy among political subordinates, also a picture of just the vicious hatred the ungodly have toward the righteous, something that we experience in our culture. And we will also see some of the common strategies that the enemy uses to defeat us. You will see remarkable similarities between the political machinations and legal maneuverings of the wicked in ancient Medo-Persia, and that empire, with what we see here in the ungodly politicians in the United States and other nations. We will also see how they enact laws that they know godly people will not obey and criminalize those things that God honors, so that we can be destroyed. But more importantly, what we're going to see is the character, and the conduct of godliness and the blessings that God will lavish upon those who are committed to him, and serve him and trust him with all of their heart.

Well, let me give you an overall summary and then we're going to look at the text this morning. What we have here are political colleagues and subordinates of Daniel, who served as one of the three chief officers under Darius, the Mede. And we're going to see how these men grew increasingly jealous of Daniel, who was clearly the favorite of the king. But worse yet, Daniel was a godly man, a righteous man. And ungodly people hate that kind of person. So these guys end up hatching a plot to get rid of Daniel and they appeal to the king's vanity. They tricked him into signing a law that they knew Daniel would not obey. And when that proved to be the case, the king was forced to sentence Daniel to a gruesome death in a lion's den, although he tried many ways to prevent it. And then what we're gonna see, as you know, God delivered Daniel, to the king's delight. And then knowing that he had been tricked, the king sentenced Daniel's accusers to be thrown into the den along with their families. Now, some technical things, if I don't deal with this, I know some of you are going to ask me so let's just settle it right now. Okay. Who was Darius? Or Darius? Sometimes it's pronounced, there's much debate concerning his identity. The "Darius," the title, is really a title rather than a proper name, and it can it means holder of the scepter. Now, some like my former professor in seminary, Dr. John Whitcomb, will argue compellingly that this was Gubaru, a subordinate of Cyrus the Great, who according to chapter nine, verse one was made king over the kingdom of the Chaldeans, "was made king" is in the passive voice. So there's the assumption that Cyrus made Gubaru the king; Cyrus appointed him as governor over Babel and immediately after its fall. In fact, Dr. Whitcomb says quote, "from 535 to 525 BCE, the name Gubaru appears frequently in cuneiform texts as the," quote "governor of Babylon and the region beyond the river," end quote. Exercising almost kingly powers in this vast domain covering all of Babylonia, Syria, Palestine, and the entire Fertile Crescent during the prolonged absence of his administrative superior, Cyrus the Great. And also if you look in into the Nabonidus Chronicle, Gubaru we see, installed sub-governors it says in Babel. So that's one argument. Another side says, quite compellingly, that Darius the Mede is another name of Cyrus the Persian. This is based upon, at least in part, a translation of a verse we're gonna see here in chapter six verse 28, where the Aramaic permits it to read, "Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius even the reign of Cyrus the Persian." So, which is it? I don't have a clue. Nobody does. And you know what, it really doesn't matter. The point is, this was the king during this time.

So like all nations and empires, the great Babylonian Empire has been conquered. And it has disappeared and it has been replaced by the Medo-Persian Empire. Many wonder how much longer the United States will last? Well, we don't know. That is in God's hands. Remember, in Daniel 2:21, we read "He removes kings and establishes kings." And concerning the nations of the world, Paul told the Athenians in Acts 17:26, that God has "determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation." So we can trust God with that, even with our own country. Nebuchadnezzar learned this the hard way. Remember, it caused him to confess in Daniel four 17, that "the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind, and bestows it on whom he wishes and sets over it the lowliest of men." And certainly we're watching the systematic destruction of our country, because of the leadership and the kind of people that put these people in power. But despite the confidence that many people have, over the great power of the United States, both economically and militarily, we must know that eventually this country will wither. And it will die like all great nations and all people have throughout the centuries. And we can be comforted knowing that although godless empires have always tried to thwart the purposes of God in various ways, we know that in the end, what they do has zero effect on the kingdom purposes of God. And we can be comforted in that. In fact, in Isaiah chapter 40, verse 15, we read "Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales. Behold, He lifts up the islands like fine dust," went on to say, "All the nations are as nothing before Him. They are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless."

So again, the Babylonian Empire has been defeated and been destroyed. Medo-Persian Empire has taken over, and Darius the Mede begins now to organize his rule that takes us to the text. Notice verse one. "It seemed good to Darius to appoint 120 satraps," that means kingdom protectors, "to appoint 120 satraps over the kingdom, that they would be in charge of the whole kingdom, and over them three commissioners, (of whom Daniel was one), that the satraps might be accountable to them, and that the king might not suffer loss." Then we read a verse three, "Then this Daniel began distinguishing himself among the commissioners and satraps because he possessed an extraordinary spirit." That means, by the way, something more than he was just a really nice guy. In the original it carries the idea of one who demonstrated exceptional abilities. So much so that, "the king plan to appoint him over the entire kingdom." So Daniel, it says "began distinguishing." The grammar here is a participle indicating continued action. So there's this ongoing and obvious pattern, that in his life that demonstrates his superior wisdom, and abilities. Now, what we're going to see here is what we've all seen throughout the days of our lives. And that is wherever God blesses, Satan curses. Right? And the only thing that Satan despises more than godliness is the public promotion of a godly man in government. And that's what we're going to see here.

But by the way, that's why you see so little godly people in government in positions of power, godliness is quickly canceled in our ungodly culture. And remember, as John says, In First John 5:19, that "the whole world lies in the power of the evil one." And so what the enemy does is he places people in power that are going to promote his agenda. So what we have here is the king is very impressed with Daniel, who, by the way, by this time is somewhere close to 90 years old. Let's just round it and say he's 90 years old. And he makes Daniel now second in command. By the way, I find that to be encouraging as I age, I mean, who says you're washed up when you're 90, right? I mean, look at this guy, It's amazing.

So, Daniel was put into this position, and my what a long road it has been for him. I mean, think he started out as a as a young man who refused to eat the king's food and therefore worship the idols of the Babylonians. And now look where he is. I'm reminded of Second Corinthians 16 Nine, that reads "The eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the world, that He may strongly support those whose heart are completely His." But oh, pity the gifted, godly man who ascends to some coveted position of power and prestige. That kind of promotion will surely unleash the green eyed monster of jealousy among colleagues and political foes, not to mention the rage of the unregenerate world. So notice verse four. "Then the commissioners and satraps began trying to find a ground of accusation against Daniel, in regard to government affairs; but they could find no ground of accusation or evidence of corruption in as much as he was faithful, and no negligence or corruption was to be found in him." My would that we all have such an exemplary life, and testimony. You might want to ask yourself, how would other people describe me? How would they determine for themselves whether or not I am truly a man that is following God? Or am I just a man like most that follows the culture and so forth? Verse five, "Then these men said, 'We will not find any ground of accusation against this Daniel unless we find it against him with regard to the law of his God.'" So in other words, let's find a way to make his devotion to his God illegal, right. Sound familiar? Let's find something he believes in and outlaw that. We see this all the time, don't we? Cultures legalize unrighteousness and criminalize righteousness. They pack the Supreme Court with people that are going to legislate from the bench to push their agenda and so forth. By the way, this is at the heart of the whole woke cult that is growing so rapidly in America. Let's celebrate and let's legislate what God hates and condemn and criminalize those things that he loves. Let's make sure we defend everyone's right to liberty so that they can do whatever they want; without opposition, which by the way, includes killing their unborn baby Let's even celebrate the gross immorality and the deviancy and the insanity of the LGBTQ community and condemn everyone who opposes that. I know, let's also fabricate some demonstrably false claims about white supremacy, and systemic racism and demand social justice. And that way we can foment resentment between ethnic groups, and gender, and ultimately turn people against anyone that disagrees; then we can break down society, and we can remake it the way we want. Which by the way, is way more than equal opportunity is equal outcome, the equal distribution of wealth and political power, and so forth, basically, Marxist socialism. And then, when people don't obey the rules of social justice, which by the way, has nothing to do with the justice of God, when they don't obey that, then they can be treated as criminals. And of course, this dear friends is the legacy of socialism, communism, which can never coexist with biblical Christianity. I hope you understand that. However, it thrives in woke Christianity, which is not Christianity at all.

So these jealous conspirators hatch a plot to criminalize Daniels devotion to Yahweh so that they can get rid of him. And I'm reminded of John 3:19, that some "men love darkness rather than Light." Why? Because their "deeds are evil," and Daniel's life was a shining light of righteousness. Ungodly people hate that. Now, to be sure, these wicked characters knew about Daniel's devotion to Yahweh and his very public prayer life. which reminds me many times I will hear Christians say, especially Christian politicians say, you know, my faith is a private matter. But not if you're a Christian; our faith is not to be a private matter. Ours is a public profession of faith in the living Christ. We're not ashamed of the gospel are we? Christ Himself has commissioned us to make disciples of all the nations. How are you going to do that f you hide in a closet, so to speak. I was thinking of this, this morning, in fact. Matthew 5:16, and you don't have this verse on the on the screen here. But there the Lord said, "Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven." That's how we need to live. That's how Daniel lived. And we read in Luke 12, beginning in verse eight, Jesus says, "'And I say to you, everyone who confesses Me before men, the Son of Man will confess Him also before the angels of God, but he who denies Me before men, will be denied before the angels of God.'"

So everyone knew who Daniel worshipped, who he proclaimed, his life was a living testimony. And again, I trust that your life is the same. I hope that if I were to ask your friends, what do you think about so and so? Well, I, you know, I'm not real sure. I think they go to church somewhere. I hope they would say, oh, you know, that person is a devoted worshipper of Jesus Christ. So that's what we have with Daniel. And by the way, I find it interesting that in the first year of Darius, his reign, which was around 538 or 537 BC, he issued a decree to allow all of the Jewish exiles to go back to Jerusalem after their 70 years of captivity. And that occurred prior to the scenario that we are reading here. So without a doubt, Daniel would have had much to do with that since he was second in command, right? You can imagine that Daniel's character and his conduct had a profound influence on the king and everybody around him. He was God's man. God empowered him to accomplish his purposes. And I might add that this is his desire for your life as well. Every single one of us, who have truly come to saving faith in Christ are now inhabited by the living God. We have been gifted to put his glory on display, we're all part of this magnificent spiritual organism, the body of Christ. Why? So that our life will redound to His glory. So that's what we have here with Daniel.

Go to verse six. "Then these commissioners and satraps came by agreement to the king." Obviously, they've been collaborating together, they've been scheming, "and spoke to him as follows: 'King Darius, live forever! All the commissioners of the kingdom,'" which by the way, was probably a bit of an exaggeration, but it sounds good. "'All the commissioners of the kingdom, the prefects and the satraps the high officials and the governors have consulted together that the king should establish a statute and enforce an injunction that anyone who makes a petition to any god or man besides you, O king, for 30 days, shall be cast into the lion's den.'" Which of course, was one of the most cruel and terrifying forms of punishment, a powerful deterrent against anyone who would dare rebel against the king. Now, we must understand that throughout history, ancient monarchs were looked upon as a manifestation of deity. So such a tribute to his glory would not have been considered foreign to them. This was fairly common. And of course, such flattery certainly appeal to the king's vanity, which is a weakness that we all must guard against. And they probably figured, you know, 30 days is long enough for us to catch him in the act so that we can tell on him to the king. Verse eight, Now, O king, establish the injunction and sign the document so that it may not be changed according to the law of the Medes and Persians, which may not be revoked.'" So, in other words, we just love you so much king, we just worship you, are just the greatest. By the way, there's a whole lot more that would have been said than what we have here in the text, but can't you imagine, you're just the greatest, and they're just laying it on here, you know? Okay. So this is what they're asking him to do.

Now, this idea of "laws of Medes and Persians that can't be revoked," you see, this was very different than when Nebuchadnezzar ruled Babylon. You see, with Nebuchadnezzar, his every desire was law. And if he changed his mind, that was the new law, but it didn't work that way with the Medes and the Persians. Whatever the king said, was bound by the unchangeable nature of his decrees. In fact we get a sample of this and Esther chapter one and verse 19, where we read how the laws of the Medes and the Persians "cannot be repealed." And in chapter eight and verse eight, "a decree which is written in the name of the king and sealed with the king signet ring, may not be revoked." But you also must understand it was thought that for a king to decree something, and then later on change his mind, indicated that he made a mistake. Oh, well, we can't have that. Because the king is infallible, he's like a god. And to admit that he made a mistake would undermine his credibility and his authority. I have to laugh how often do you hear a president say, you know, folks, I am really sorry, I blew it, man, was that a mistake, please forgive me. You know, you're never gonna hear that. Instead, they're gonna double down on some some stupid decision and brag about how great it was and and how successful they are. And then if there's any problem with it, they're gonna blame it on somebody else and, and then quickly shift the public's attention along with a complicit media so that they're not looking at it anymore. And then they just move on. We've seen that, I've seen this my whole life. So have you. This has always been and will always be the modus operandi of arrogant, corruptive and deceptive little buffoons that are often put in authority over us.

So in a moment of weakness, the king lets his ego get the best of him. Verse nine, "Therefore, King Darius signed the document, that is, the injunction." Now, the trap has been set. Verse ten, "Now when Daniel knew that the document was signed, he entered his house (now in his roof chamber, he had windows open towards Jerusalem);" and he closed the window so no one could see him pray. Oh, no, that's not what it says, does it? No. "And he continued kneeling on his knees three times a day, praying and giving thanks before his God, as he had been doing previously." Man, what a testimony, I just love, I can't wait to meet Daniel someday, I can't wait to meet him. I mean, here's a guy that feared God, not man. He obeyed God, not man. He trusted in God to do whatever God deemed best with his life. Oh, dear friends, would we be the same way? Then Daniel didn't change his habit of worshipping the one true God simply because some, frankly, puny, little, depraved creature that God has made and put in authority said that I want you to disobey your God. No, I'm not going to do that. By the way, remember this the next time a group of politicians enact some law that requires you to bow the knee to Baal. Folks, when that happens, when they ask us to disobey God, we need to blow them off like a telemarketer at dinnertime. See them as little Lilliputians from Lilliput. You guys remember that? Okay, Jonathan Swift, the great novel Gulliver's Travels.

So, Daniel, hears the threat, all right? And he knows what these characters are up to. He knows their character, he knows what's going on. And he, I'm sure, he also knows their somewhere out there in the shadow, they're watching right now. But he shows no fear. He's going to continue to pray, as he always has. He's not going to embrace the world. He is not going to capitulate to the culture, his life is going to confront it. I might add a few minutes ago, we read from Psalm 55. You remember when David's heart was in anguish, and he was afraid, and the tears of death fell upon him because of his enemies? What did he say? He said this "As for me, I shall call upon God, and the Lord will save me evening and morning and at noon," three times a day. "I will complain and murmur, and he will hear my voice. He will redeem my soul in peace from the battle which is against me, for they are many who strive with me." Well, this was Daniel's pattern, as well. Three times a day in good times as well as now in bad times. And I trust that you all have a habit of prayer; doesn't necessarily have to be three times a day. But hopefully you will pray without ceasing, as the Scripture says. You will pray at all times, that there's a sense in which you're in constant communion with your God...(audio is not translatable).....

In other words, they came, they came purposely to witness the rebellion. That's the idea here, "and found Daniel making petition and supplication before his God." Gotcha. "Then they approach," verse 12, "and spoke before the king about the king's injunction, 'Did you not sign an injunction that any man who makes a petition to any god or man besides you, O king, for thirty days, is to be cast into the lion's den?' The king replied, 'The statement is true, according to the law of the Medes and Persians.'" Now, let me pause here. It doesn't say this... (audio is not translatable)....but it began to weep a little bit. Oh, dear friend, our colleague pays no attention to you. Can't you hear it? Oh, King he keeps making his petition three times a day. We can't believe it, it's Daniel.

Verse 14, "Then, as soon as the king heard the statement, he was deeply distressed and set his mind on delivering Daniel; and even until sunset he kept exerting himself to rescue him. You see what was going on here, is the king suddenly realized that he had been hoodwinked by these jealous colleagues of Daniel. Now it has sprung; he could see how his pride had gotten the best of him. And he's probably gathered all of his counsel, his legal counsel around said, guys, okay, we got to do something here. What can we do? Can we find a loophole in the law, somehow, some way to deliver this great man? Well, so we see that he keeps exerting himself to rescue him in verse 14. And then these devious plotters come again to press the matter in verse 15, "Then these men came by agreement to the king and said to the king, 'Recognize, O king, that it is a law of the Medes and Persians that no injunction or statute, which the king established may be changed.'" And again, I'm sure they put on a real show, feigning sorrow. Verse 16, "'Then the king gave orders, and Daniel was brought in and cast into the lion's den." in the aramaic (audio is not translatable)....

Archeologists have discovered a number of these pits in various places. And Carl F. Kyle, the famous 19th century Old Testament scholar, describes one he says, quote, "It consisted of a large square cavern under the earth, having a partition wall in the middle of it, which is furnished with a door which the keeper can open and close from above. By throwing in the food, he entices the lions from one chamber into the other, and then having shut the door, they enter the vacant space for the purpose of cleaning it. The Cavern is open above; its mouth being surrounded by a wall of a yard and a half high, over which one can look into the den." So it would have been something like this. Go back to verse 16, Daniel was brought in, cast into the lion's den, and then we read that, "The King spoke and said to Daniel, 'Your God, whom you constantly serve, will Himself deliver you.'" The language here, in the whole context, suggests that he probably said this, as Daniel was entering the den. They typically had a side, as well as a top opening with metal grates allowing on the side for people to view the horror. And also, for ventilation, Daniel probably went in through the side opening. But my what a testimony right? For the king to say, "Your God, whom you constantly serve." I love that. Folks, I don't care how much people hate you for the cause of Christ, that must be our testimony, that this is the God that we constantly serve. And he says, "He will deliver you." This is what he's hoping.

So verse 17, "A stone was brought and laid over the mouth of the den; and the king sealed it with his own signet ring, and with the signet rings of his nobles, so that nothing would be changed in regard to Daniel." So this stone would have been the type of thing like even on Jesus tomb or round stone that would have been rolled, to kind of help with the gate with all that's on the side of the den. And it is sealed with the king's signet ring as well as the rest of the nobles. Now, I said that I doubt if there were three lions let me chase that rabbit for a moment. Because I've always thought about things like this as a little boy, I was wondering how many lions were in there, they say three, but it doesn't say that in the Bible. I don't know. I've always been curious about things like that. But you know, given the large number of people that were later thrown into the den, we could safely safely estimate that it was a whole lot more than three. Probably a couple of dozen or more. I mean later in verse 24, we read that Daniels quote, "malicious accusers, their children and wives were all thrown into the den, and they had not reached the bottom of the den before the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones." Now, even if the only men accused consisted of a dozen or so of the ringleaders out of the 120 along with their families, just the group that would have lived in Babylon, it would suggest that there had to have been more than three lions so to speak. It would suggest that as well, that these lions and we know from other historical records, that many times they would be practically starved in order to be ready for the people to be thrown into the pit. Now I have seen lions in the wild in Africa. They are fearsome beasts, they can be between three and 500 pounds. A lion can consume 20 to 30 pounds of meat in a single day. And 20 children. And let's say that each of them offer about 20 pounds of meat. That's 800 pounds. If one lion were to eat 20 pounds, that's 40 lions. So I don't know how many were there. But let me just say, this is a horrifying thing. There had to have been a number of lions in there. You know, that's the type of odds that God likes, right?

So Daniel enters the den and the gate is sealed, verse 18, "Then the king went off to his palace and spent the night fasting, and no entertainment was brought before him; and his sleep fled from him." He is greatly distressed over all of this, he has no appetite. He wants no diversion (audio is not translatable).....

",,,,and went in haste to see the lion's den. When he had come near the den to Daniel, he cried out with a troubled voice. The king spoke and said to Daniel, "Daniel, servant of the living God,'" I have to have to smile their "servant of the living God;" I'm sure in the back of his mind...(audio is not translatable)... "Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God, whom you constantly serve, been able to deliver you from the lions?' Then Daniel spoke to the king, 'O king, live forever!'" I'm not sure I would have said that in my flesh. If I did, I'd probably be thinking, wait till I get my hands on you. "'Oh, king, live forever! My God sent His angel and shut the lion's mouths and they have not harmed me, inasmuch as I was found innocent before Him; and also toward you. O king, I have committed no crime.'" Don't you wonder what his colleagues that put him in this situation, what they were thinking when they, I don't know, if they were there to see this? They certainly heard about it later. Can't you imagine what would have gone through their mind? I mean, this adds new meaning to the deer in the headlight look, you know? I mean, they knew they were dead meat. I guess there is a pun there. And I also have to think, my, these guardian angels, so to speak. Obviously, this angel was visible to Daniel. Text doesn't say this, but don't you know that as he goes in there, and the lions then are released into his chamber from the little sliding door that they have, don't you know that somehow the angel appeared to him doesn't say what he looked like. But I could just imagine the angel saying, "Daniel, come here, don't worry, puts his arm around him. You'll be alright. God's at work here." And then lions come in and just kind of lay down or something. We don't know. But my goodness. When God delivers, he delivers gloriously.

Now, did Daniel see the pre-icarnate Christ? Was that who this was? The text doesn't say, might have been. That might have been who was with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, we don't know. But Scripture does have much to say about angels. Psalm 34 seven, "The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him and rescues them." Psalm 91 verse 11, "He will give His angels charge concerning you to guard you in all your ways. They will bear you up in their hands that you do not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread upon the lion and cobra, the young lion and the serpent you will trample down." (audio is not translatable).... those who will inherit salvation. I've often thought over the course of my life, my goodness, I have absolutely given the angels a run for their money in protecting me, and you could say the same thing. Who knows?

Now back to the king. I can't imagine what would have gone through his mind. Daniel's not hurt. He's innocent. He had to have known that what he was witnessing was a miracle. And he had to have known that that miracle was caused by the true living God that Daniel worshipped, Yahweh. And he had to have also known that he had been tricked into doing this whole thing. And so I would imagine he was a bit steamed, verse 23, "Then the king was very pleased and gave orders for Daniel to be taken up out of the den. So Daniel was taken up out of the den and no injury whatever was found on him, because he had trusted in his God." So again, he probably went in through the side entrance, they had opened the door, all of the lions had come in. Now, Daniel is standing there, and the lions are still in that area, he can't go out the way he came in, because all of that has been sealed. And the lions are there, so what do they do, they probably drop a rope or something down and they they pull him up out of the top. Now, I want to pause here for a moment, dear friends. Please understand, that though we can trust in the Lord our God with all of our heart, that doesn't mean that he's always going to deliver us the way we want. Sometimes he allows the lions to devour us. Sometimes the flames consume us. Sometimes the cancer is not healed, right? Think of all of the martyrs who testify to these truths. But what we can be assured of is that his grace will always be sufficient, regardless of what we endure, he will always be there and if we die, we will pass immediately through the veil of death into glory, and receive..(audio is not translatable). And Daniel understood this, he trusted God come what may. And here we see God miraculously delivering his servant from Satan's attempt to destroy...(audio is not translatable) God judges the wicked, even at times on Earth, which is nothing compared to eternity.

Verse 24, "Then the king gave orders, and they brought those men who had maliciously accused Daniel, and they cast them, their children and their wives into the lions' den, and they had not reached the bottom of the den before the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones." So they were dropped down from the top since the lions would have already been in that section. Obviously, the angels restraint had been lifted. And these terrifying beasts were now being used to judge the wicked. I can only imagine in my mind the terror in the hearts of those people, those men and their wives and their children. I have heard lions up close. I've heard them roar, and it is deafening. It is terrifying. Imagine being lined up and hearing all that's going on, until it was your turn. But oh dear friends, the judgment of God and hell is so exceedingly worse than that, we can't even begin to imagine it. Which makes us rejoice all the more in the grace of God through the gospel.

By the way, this was a common practice to kill the whole family and the children among Persian monarchs. In fact, the ancient Roman historian and soldier, Ammianus Marcellinus states, quote, "the laws among them," referring to the Persians, "are formidable, by which on account of the guilt of one, all the kindred perish."

So verse 25, "Then Darius the king wrote to all the peoples, nations and men of every language who were living in all the land: 'May your peace abound!'" And then I might add that in verses 26, through 27, it is really written in the original language in the form of a hymn, and Daniel probably helped him write this. But notice what it says, "'I make a decree that in all the dominion of my kingdom, men are to fear and tremble before the God of Daniel; for He is the Living God and enduring forever and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed and His dominion will be forever. He delivers and rescues and performs signs and wonders in heaven and on earth, who has also delivered Daniel from the power of the lions.' So, this Daniel enjoyed success in the reign of Darius and in the reign of Cyrus the Persian." Again, it could read, "even in the reign of Cyrus the Persian."

Oh dear friends what a magnificent demonstration of the faithfulness of God and the power of God. And oh dear Christian, we need to celebrate this, don't we? This is the God that we serve. This is the God that we love. And I know many of you are struggling in difficult circumstances today. Life can be very, very hard. But I'm reminded of Second Corinthians 1:5, "Though the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance," it says, we know that we can find relief knowing that Satan's rule is just temporary. All of the stuff that we endure is temporary, the Lord is coming. And there is going to be complete deliverance far beyond what Daniel experienced in the lion's den. And I would add that the tragedies and the atrocities of life should animate our hatred towards Satan, and toward sin. It should never stir up anger towards God and the inevitable sorrows of life. In the sin cursed world are really opportunities for us to long all the more for glory, when according to Revelation 21 four, "He will wipe away every tear from our eyes, there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying or pain, the first things have passed away." But until that glorious day, we must remember that God has never abandoned us in our sufferings, for indeed, in his permissive providence, he has ordained to allow them to accomplish his glorious purposes in us, and through us. And through life's storms, we can trust God, and we can experience the joy of who he is. That's the amazing thing about all of it. And we can remember that his goodness, and justice remains untarnished in everything that he does. We can never accuse God of being unjust or being unfair. In fact, Moses said in Deuteronomy 32, four, "The Rock! His work is perfect, for all His ways are just; a God of faithfulness and without injustice, righteous and upright is He. And it's for this reason that Peter encouraged the persecuted saints, in first Peter five, beginning of verse seven, he says, "Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you at the proper time, Casting all your anxiety upon Him, because He cares for you." Folks, even in the hopelessness and helplessness of excruciating sorrow, and gratuitous evil, we can rest assured in his promises that He will never leave us nor forsake us. Moreover, as in the case of Daniel, whenever we look closely, at whatever trial we find ourselves in, we can always see his tender mercies, we can always see His goodness, we can always look and see his power being put on display. And then in the midst of the pain, as we see those things, we find comfort, do we not? We find comfort, we experience just the soul satisfying joy of his presence, consistent with those promises. Again, he will never leave us nor forsake us His grace will always be sufficient, as we read and Second Corinthians 12 nine and his throne is always accessible. Hebrews 4:16 "Therefore, let us what let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." Oh, dear friends, truly as we read in Lamentations 3:22 "The Lord's loving kindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness." And in light of these great truths, we can affirm what James said in James one beginning in verse two, "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." Oh, we have so much to be thankful for do we not? Let's pray together.

Father, thank ou for this magnificent story that teaches us so much about your character, your love, your faithfulness, your power, your sovereign rule over all things. And we thank you that through the life of Daniel, we can see how you long to lavish your blessings upon those who are devoted to you truly, without compromise, Father, may we be that kind of people. And Lord, for those that know nothing of what it is to be united to you through faith in Christ, who know nothing of what it is to truly love the Lord with all their heart, to have an appetite for your word and, and long to spend time with you and enjoy the intimacy of fellowship that belongs to the redeemed Lord, for those that know nothing of that, once you bring conviction to their heart today, overwhelm them with the horror of their sin caused them to see the sword of your wrath dangling over them. But by the same token, help them to see their for the grace that is there as the forgiveness that is theirs. For all who will cry out to you and repentant faith. Thank you, Lord, that you save sinners. Thank you that you have saved us. Bless us encourage our hearts through what we've heard today. In Jesus name, Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter five as we continue to look into this amazing Old Testament book. I have been titled my discourse to you this morning, "Godless Defiance and Divine Judgment." And you will understand more of what that means as we look at this text to this morning. Living in a morally bankrupt society that could be likened to Sodom and Gomorrah and having to endure many of the political issues that are so anti-Christian can be both depressing as well as infuriating. I understand that, you understand that. However, despite the righteous indignation that believers might have, towards those who mock Christ, and those who hate all who belong to Him, we should all shudder when we consider what awaits them if they choose not to repent and place their faith in Christ. I want to remind you of this before we look at this text. Dear friends a day is coming, according to scripture, when unbelievers will stand in abject horror, before the Lord Jesus Christ seated upon his great white throne of judgment, they will stand before the divine bar of justice. A time is coming when they will appear as condemned prisoners in the indescribable emptiness between the end of the present universe in the creation of the new heaven and the new earth. A time is coming when they will look upon the one whom they have ignored and ridiculed and defied and rejected all their life. It will be a time, according to Scripture, when the unrighteous dead will hover in the unspeakable void of empty space and look upon the righteous, omniscient, omnipotent, sovereign creator of the universe, and there, they will appear with new resurrected bodies, suited for the eternal torments of hell. This is what Jesus referred to in John 5:29 as the "resurrection of condemnation." There they will be judged for their works, for every thought, for every word, for every action, everything will be measured against the righteousness of God. And they will be found wanting. And were it not for the righteousness of Christ, we would be with them, were it not for his grace, we would stand with them. Revelation Chapter 20. We're given a glimpse of the scene. There we read beginning in verse 11. "Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them, and they were judged every one of them according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire."

Whenever I think about God's judgment upon the wicked, two things immediately well up within me. One is how thankful I am for his saving grace in my life. But secondly, just an overwhelming sense of burden for those that don't know Christ. We all need to bear this in mind as we endure some of the wickedness that's all around us, as we endure people that hate us. Yes, today, they have the power, so to speak. They live in Satan's world; he is the god of this world; God has allowed that temporarily. But as the old preacher said," There's payday someday. There is payday someday." The apostle Paul addresses this in Second Thessalonians, one beginning in verse six. He says, "For after all, it is only just for God to repay with affliction, those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted, and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God, and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed, for our testimony to you was believed." The inspired apostle went on to describe the nature of his prayer for all of the persecuted saints. And this is what we need to hear. He says, "To this end, also, we pray for you always, that our God will count you worthy of your calling, and fulfill every desire for goodness in the work of faith with power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified in you, and you and him, according to the grace of our God, and the Lord Jesus Christ." This, beloved, must be the decisive commitment of your heart, even in the midst of righteous indignation that you might have towards ungodly oppressors. And what we see today, in the text before us, is a prime example of God's judgment on those who defy him, what I would call godless defiance. And we see this all of the time, all you have to do is turn on the television. Listen to the news, you see it all the time. And as we examine this historical narrative this morning, we glean some very clear patterns that emerge from the text. Patterns regarding human depravity and how it is often manifested and how it progresses. So as we come to Daniel five, let me take you back to the context. This is ancient Babylon. And this is the story of Belshazzar, the ungodly grandson of Nebuchadnezzar that is now dead. Daniel was an old man, the prophet Daniel was an old man by now, about 81 years old. Now Belshazzar was a co-regent with his father Nabonidus, who was an absent king, who basically abandoned the capital city of Babylon for many years at a time. In fact, he maintained a separate royal residence at Tema in Northwest Arabia, which would be southeast of Edom. It's recorded that there was one period of 14 years when he never even visited the capital. The famous Nabonidus chronicle speaks of Belshazzar as quote "the Crown Prince, who was regarded as king," because he was left there in Babylon to control the military from at least 549 to 545 BCE, while his father, Nabonidus was establishing a new military and commercial fortress at Tema. You can also read in a text called a "Persian Verse Account of Nabonidus," the following, quote, "He freed his hand," referring to Nabonidus, freeing the hand of Belshazzar. "He entrusted the kingship to him, then he himself undertook a distant campaign." Also, the Babylonian Chronicles which were written in Babylonian cuneiform discovered in some of the excavations in the 19th century. There we know exactly when this story happened. From that ancient document it happened on the 16th day of the month, Tishri, Nabonidus' 17th year. That translates into Saturday, October 12 539 BC.

In fact, the cuneiform reads, quote, "The army of Cyrus entered Babylon without a battle." You'll understand that more him here in a minute. And the Greek historian and leader there in Greece many years ago during that time, Herodotus, notes that "Babylon failed during a time of festival, and celebration." So that's a little background here. So let's examine the text. And let's do so with a view towards understanding some of the key elements that occurs when people defy who God really is; when they have no fear of God. People that have no fear of God are called fools in the Bible. So let's look at a fool beginning in verse one.

"Belshazzar the king held a great feast for 1000 of his nobles, and he was drinking wine in the presence of the 1000." Now here we see a common characteristic of a defiant fool. That is a passion for drunken debauchery. These people love to party, they love to use alcohol and drugs to create a fool's paradise, so that they can deny the works and the Word of the living God. In fact, if you go to Isaiah five, you will see that this is one of the reasons why God judged ancient Judah. Now, I want you to understand how foolish this is what I just read about Belshazzar, having a great feast of 1000 nobles drinking wine in their presence. You see the context here is as follows: The Persians had already conquered all of the territory surrounding the city of Babylon. They had already defeated Nabonidus in battle, and he had fled for his life. And he left his son, Belshazzar, there in Babylon with the remaining forces to somehow fight the Persians from behind the walls. So now what you have, is this enormously powerful Persian military surrounding the city. Morale was extremely low. We know that the people were fed up with their leadership, you might say Belshazzar's approval ratings had slipped very, very low. If you took a poll of the people in Babylon, they would, the majority would say the Empire is going in the wrong direction. So that's what's going on here. So what should you do as a leader? Throw a party, throw a party, tell the press secretary to spin the situation. You know, let's boost the morale of the people beginning with the leaders. And it's time to exalt the king, fuel his pride, bolster his self-image and his own self-confidence. And like most petty dictators, kings, or even presidents that have ever existed, Belshazzar had an insatiable appetite for self-aggrandizement. So let's gather 1000 of the nobles, let's impress them with my cavalier attitude towards danger. Let's somehow help them understand that we can handle this. Our military is powerful, we can defeat this enemy. And moreover, as you're going to see, let's bring everybody together so that I can publicly defy the God of ancient Judah.

By the way, these large banquets were not at all uncommon. History records that Persian monarchs would feed as many as 15,000 guests at daily feasts. Imagine that. And we know that there were 10,000 guests at the marriage feast of Alexander the Great. So this is how they functioned in those days. But you need to also understand that this was an opportunity for Belshazzar to reaffirm their commitment and their faith in their Babylonian gods that they believed had protected them in the past. So bring on the food and the drink. And the women. Verse two says that he ordered his wives and his concubines to join them. You see, this was for the purpose of providing sexual pleasure. Inevitably these events would end up in a drunken orgy. So the spin machine now is set into full motion. It's time to enjoy some carefree hilarity. It's time for drunken debauchery. And we all know how quickly alcohol consumption can cloud a man's judgment, temporarily drown out your sorrows. Proverbs 20 verse one says "Wine is a mocker, strong drink a brawler, and whoever is intoxicated, intoxicated by it is not wise." So godless defiance will often manifest itself in a passion for drunken debauchery.

But there's a second characteristic that we see emerging from the text and that is a fearless disregard for God's judgment. I want you to see how this plays out beginning in verse two, "When Belshazzar tasted the wine," by the way, in the original the idea here is, is not only sensing its flavor, but also feeling its intoxicating effects beginning to take over. So, "when Belshazzar tasted the wine, he gave orders to bring the gold and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem, so that the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines might drink from them." By the way, when it says "Nebuchadnezzar, his father," that term is also used to describe a grandfather, which Nebuchadnezzar was. So this was an act of, of unbridled pride, of defeat, of defiance, deliberate blasphemy, to somehow say, I am not intimidated with Yahweh, who I know judged my grandfather. But you know, at least his grandfather kept the sacred vessels according to chapter one and verse two, "in the treasure house of his God." No Babylonian king had ever done such a thing, taking the sacred vessels that they had taken from the temple in Jerusalem. And again, he's wanting to demonstrate his fearless disregard for the Judean God that had humbled his grandfather through his judgment. That's why later on in verse 23, Daniel is going to say to him, "but you Belshazzar, have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven; they have brought the vessels of His house before you and you and your nobles, your wives, and your concubines have been drinking wine from them, and you have praised the gods of silver and gold of bronze iron, wood and stone, which do not see here or understand. But the God in whose hand are your life-breath and all your ways you have not glorified." I'm reminded of Proverbs nine and verse 10, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." But fools have no fear of the Lord, the God of the Bible. In fact, in Psalm 14 one we read that, "The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God.' They are corrupt, they have done abominable things." Proverbs 26 and verse 10, "The great God who formed everything gives the fool his hire and the transgressor his wages." And that dear friends is about to happen. As the story unfolds, notice verse three. "Then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken out of the temple, the house of God, which was in Jerusalem; and the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines drank from them. They drank the wine and praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood and stone."

By the way, history records that the way they did their praise was through singing. So they are singing with instruments to their false gods. I'm reminded of Romans chapter one, beginning in verse 22, where the apostle Paul says, "Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and of four-footed and animals and crawling creatures. Therefore, God gave them over and the lusts of their hearts to impurity." Then he goes on, he gives them over as well to "degrading passions," that of homosexuality, and then finally to "a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper." And sadly, the things that he goes on to describe are basically those things that many of our politicians exalt and celebrate and force upon us. It says, they're "being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them."

So now Belshazzar, who wants to tell everybody that he is not intimidated with the God of Judea, the one that had proved himself so powerful in the past with his grandfather, this king now, is about to be humbled. So imagine the scene. Try to go there in your imagination. The king is all liquored up along with the nobles, they're laughing it up. They're having a big party having a gay old time drinking and singing. I mean, folks, this is spring break in Babylon, you get the picture. It's spring break in Babylon. And imagine the beautiful golden and silver vessels falling to the floor in the midst of drunken revelry. An orgy of Satan loves to mock the one true God. Notice what happens next. "Suddenly, the fingers of a man's hand emerged." As I studied the original language here, it's really fascinating. When it says emerge, it's the idea of coming out. And so this hand is coming out of the wall, in what we would call a three dimensional materialization. So it looks like a huge hand coming out of the wall. And this hand "began writing opposite the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king's palace." So this was the perfect place for it to be illumined where everybody could see. And we read "and the king saw the back of the hand that did the writing." Boy, imagine the scene. How quickly all of that gaiety turned to sobriety, to terror. I'm sure at that point, you could have heard a pin drop. These people that had suppressed the truth in unrighteousness we're now experiencing the reality of the living God doing something to pry the lid off of their foolish denial. I'm sure no one in that room doubted his power at that moment, even though they weren't sure what was going on. But surely, these people were very familiar with the Judean Yawei the history of what he had done over the years, even from Egypt on, was astounding and terrifying. And now with the Medo-Persian siege warfare machine surrounding the city, they undoubtedly knew that whatever was said on that wall was a harbinger of something very bad. Something horrible, was about to happen.

Now, it's interesting that the German archaeologist, Koldewey, when he excavated Babylon, he says that the largest room he found in the palace complex was 55 feet wide by 169 feet long, and they had plastered walls. He also describes a niche in one of the long walls opposite the entrance, where it is suggested that the king would have been seated during times of feasting, so you get the scene. Notice verse six, "Then the king's face grew pale, and his thoughts alarmed him and his hip joints went slack and his knees began knocking together." This is symptomatic of sheer terror. When it says that his hip joints, which could be translated the joints of his loins when they went slack, it's an indication that there was a real possibility that he suddenly lost bladder and bowel control. Which is a common physiological reaction under circumstances of acute stress and extreme fear also, the term "loins" in Scripture is often used to describe the seat of our body of our strength. And so all of his bottomly strength suddenly vanished. Pride comes before destruction dear friends, mark it. And that's what we see happening here. And I find it most telling to see what he did next. One would think that suddenly he would know what's going on. Because he knew his own heart, he knows what he was trying to do. You would think that suddenly he would cry out to the Judean God, Yahweh, for mercy, for forgiveness for trying to desecrate his sacred vessel. You would think that he would suddenly humble himself and plead for undeserved mercy, that he would repent. But no, that's not what he did.

Notice in verse seven, "The king called allowed to bring in the conjurers, the Chaldeans and the diviners." Dear friends, not only do defiant fools, have a passion for defiant, debauchery, and a fearless disregard for God's judgment. But thirdly, and this is what we see here, they seek the wisdom of man rather than God in their hour of need. They seek the wisdom of man rather than God in the hour, their hour of need. I mean, I think, even with our own country, a country that is so incredibly divided, a country that is struggling with disease, a country that is weakened. Wouldn't it be wonderful to see our leaders humble themselves before the living God? The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Wouldn't it be wonderful to have our president give an executive order to bring in all of the godly pastors that they could find, to seek counsel from them, and then to call for a day of public repentance? For the way they have mocked the living God for so long here in this country? Wouldn't it be amazing to declare not just a day of prayer, but a month of prayer to seek forgiveness and mercy? And then to commit together to resending all of the laws that make a mockery of who God is? Laws that have enacted and legislated things that God abhors. But no, they will not do that, they will seek the counsel of other depraved men who have no answers.

Worse yet, as we come back to Belshazzar, he's going to buy their loyalty and bribe them to tell them what he wants them. To tell them he wants to hear something. So notice what he does. In verse seven, "The king spoke and said to the wise men of Babylon, 'Any man who can read this inscription and explain its interpretation to me shall be clothed with purple and have a necklace of gold around his neck and have authority as third ruler in the kingdom.' Then all the king's wise men came in, but they could not read the inscription, or make known its interpretation to the king. Then King Belshazzar was greatly alarmed, his grace grew even paler, and his nobles were perplexed." According to one scholar, Hitzig, the grammar here in the original language indicates that the phrase "were perplexed" in this form, quote, "not only comprehends the idea of alarm, but also that of confusion and excited movement." Get the scene of a cage filled with rats, surrounded by cats. And you'll see the frenzy that's going on in this room. People pacing about wondering what is happening.

And then notice verse 10, "The queen entered the banquet hall because of the words of the kings and nobles." Now someone goes and tells the queen what's happening. Now who is this queen? Well, some evidence suggests that this was the queen mother, Belshazzar, his own mother, Nitocris, the daughter of Nebuchadnezzar and the wife of Nabonidus. Others would argue, and this is compelling as well, that this might have been the aged widow of Nebuchadnezzar Amytis, for whom he had built the Hanging Gardens, because she was so homesick for the hills of her beloved Media. But whoever it was, it's obvious that this woman was well acquainted with Daniel well acquainted with Yaweh. So much so that she may have been a genuine convert. So she's careful to describe Daniel here, by the way, and in ways that Nebuchadnezzar described him in chapter four, verses eight, verses nine and verses 18. This is what she says, "Then the queen spoke, 'O king, live forever! Do not let your thoughts alarm you or your face be pale. There is a man in your kingdom, in whom is a spirit of the holy gods.'"

Let me pause here. You will remember when we studied chapter four, this phrase "holy gods" came up, and it can be translated, and I think better translated, "the Holy God," because the plural gods can refer to a single deity in both Aramaic as well as in Hebrew. "'There is a man in your kingdom in whom is the spirit of the holy God and in the days of your father,'" referring to his grandfather, Nebuchadnezzar, "'illumination, insight and wisdom, like the wisdom of the gods were given in him. And King Nebuchadnezzar, your father the king, appointed him chief of the magician's, conjurers, Chaldeans and diviners. This was because an extraordinary spirit, knowledge and insight, interpretation of dreams, explanation of enigmas and solving of difficult problems were found in this Daniel, whom the king named Belteshazzar. Let Daniel now be summoned and he will declare the interpretation.'" Isn't it interesting? She did a real "no, no" here in the king's court. She used Daniel's Hebrew name. Moreover, her intimate knowledge of Daniel, as well as his God, and her willingness to speak so boldly to the king, are indications again, that she not only knew Daniel well, but may have been a convert to the Judean God, our God, the One True God.

Verse 13, "Then Daniel was brought in before the king. The king spoke and said to Daniel, 'Are you that Daniel, who is one of the exiles from Judah, who my father, the king, brought from Judah? Now I have heard about you that a spirit of the gods is in you, and that illumination, insight and extraordinary wisdom have been found in you. Just now the wise men and the conjurers were brought in before me that they might read this inscription and make its interpretation known to me, but they could not declare the interpretation of the message.'" Now, mind you, what is inscribed on the wall is still there. Verse 16, "'But I personally have heard about you, that you are able to give interpretations and solve difficult problems. Now if you are able to read the inscription and make its interpretation known to me, you will be clothed with purple and wear a necklace of gold around your neck, and you will have authority as the third ruler in the kingdom.' Then Daniel answered and said before the king, 'Keep your gifts for yourself, or give your rewards to someone else; however, I will read the inscription to the king and make the interpretation known to him. Oh king, The Most High God, granted sovereignty, grandeur, glory and majesty to Nebuchadnezzar your father. Because of the grandeur which He bestowed on him, all the peoples, nations and men of every language feared and trembled before him; whomever he wished he killed and whomever he wished he spared alive, and whomever he wished he elevated and whomever he wished he humbled. But when his heart was lifted up, and his spirit became so proud that he behaved arrogantly, he was deposed from his royal throne, and his glory was taken away from him. He was also driven away from mankind and his heart was made like that of beasts, and his dwelling place was with the wild donkeys. He was given grass to eat like cattle and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until he recognized that the Most High God is ruler over the realm of mankind, and that He sets over it whomever He wishes. Yet you his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart, even though you knew all this, but you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven; and they have brought the vessels of His house before you and you and your nobles, your wives and your concubines have been drinking wine from them; and you have praised the gods of silver and gold and bronze iron, wood and stone which do not see hear or understand. But the God and whose hand are your life- breath and all your ways, you have not glorified. Then the hand was sent from Him, and this inscription was written out. Now, this is the inscription that was written out: 'MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN,' This is the interpretation of the message: Mene-- God has numbered your kingdom and put an end to it. TEKEL-- you have been weighed on the scales and found deficient. PERES-- your kingdom has been divided.'" In other words, it's about to be broken and given over to the Medes and Persians. Fascinating.

So, knowing Daniel served the Most High God, that he was deliberately trying to dishonor, that he was deliberately defying, and fearing that what Daniel said, just might be right, we read in verse 29, "Belshazzar gave orders and they clothed Daniel with purple and put a necklace of gold around his neck and issued a proclamation concerning him that he now had authority as the third ruler in the kingdom." How sad. There's not a hint of repentance. There is not a hint of a contrite heart pleading for undeserved mercy. Therefore, there's no saving grace. Friends, if you ever believe that it's somehow man, rather than God, that initiates salvation, You simply don't understand Scripture. God must do that. And for whatever reason here God has not done that.

Verse 30, that same night Belshazzar the Chaldean King was slain. So Darius the Mede received the kingdom at about the age of 62." Oh, how quickly and how violently God can humble the proud, the high and the mighty. What happened that night? Well, the Athenian born military leader, philosopher and historian Xenophon said that" Cyrus diverted the river Euphrates" so that quote, "the bed of the river, where it traverses the city became passable for men." And he also recorded that this happened while the Babylonians were feasting in a time of drunken revelry. He also stated that Gabrius was the commander under Cyrus led the men into the palace where they found the king, quote, "already risen with a dagger in his hand," and then we read that they overpowered him, along with his attendants and killed them. The Nabonidus chronicle says that Cyrus commander, Gabrius has entered, quote, "Babylon without a battle." How tragic. The great Babylonian Empire, how quickly it deteriorated because of incompetent, corrupt and morally bankrupt leadership. It reminds me of our country today, and all that we see happening in it. The rise and fall of empires, dear friends, is always superintended by a sovereign God, who orchestrates all of the events of history, to accomplish his purposes, to ultimately bring glory to himself. The magnificent Babylonian Empire, you will recall was depicted as the golden head of the image in Nebuchadnezzar's dream recorded in Daniel two. You remember that? It would be vanquished by another power depicted by the chest and arms of silver. And of course, that's what we're seeing here. The Medo-Persians came in and defeated them.

And according to that image, according to the prophecy, the Greeks and then the Romans would follow suit, consistent with that prophetic outline of the rise and the fall of four great empires, world empires, that will finally be replaced by a fifth Empire, the kingdom of heaven. Oh, dear Christian, please know, great empires will continue to rise, they will continue to rebel and they will continue to fall including the last Gentile empire of the Antichrist. And it will one day be defeated by the one that we worship here today, the King of kings and the Lord of lords, Jesus Christ. Who will return in power and great glory and establish His kingdom that will never end.

Daniel will go on to say in chapter seven beginning in verse 13, "I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming. And He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed."

Well, dear friends, I trust that you will examine your own heart and your own life, in light of this. Certainly if you're one here today, or within the sound of my voice, that defies the Living God, ignores him, just lives for yourself, then you will probably fit somehow into some of the things that we have seen in Belshazzar. You will at least have a penchant for defiant debauchery, love to party, so that you can ignore and deny the reality of your sin and your need for a Savior. You will also be one that has a fearless disregard of God's judgment because you have no fear of God, and therefore you are a fool. And you will seek the wisdom of man rather than the wisdom of God and you will do that even in your hour of need. And if this describes you, you must know that like Belshazzar, you have been weighed in the balance and you have been found wanting. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and our only hope is in Christ. But oh, dear friends, those of you who know and love Christ, those of us who are debtors to his grace, knowing the judgment that is coming upon the unregenerate, knowing according to Second Peter 3:10, the "day of the Lord will come like a thief...the heavens will disappear with a roar,,,the elements will be destroyed by fire and the earth and everything done and it will be laid bare." Dear friends, knowing all of this, we must honor Christ in our life. Come what may. Verse 11, of that same text. We are told, "Since everything will be destroyed in this way," what kind of people ought you to be? You are to "live a holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed it's coming, that the day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with his promise, we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth where righteousness dwells." So then, difference, "since you are looking forward to this make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him."

In closing, John MacArthur, summarizes this so well, all that we've seen from this text and what I'm trying to communicate to you. He says, quote, "True believers must realize that the state of our society is the result of the righteous judgment of God. God has not commissioned his people to reconstruct society. We are not called to expend our energy or his energies for moral reform. We are salt, a preservative for a decaying generation, Matthew 5:13. And we are lights, designed to shine in a way that enables people who see our good works to glorify our Heavenly Father, Matthew five, verses 14 through 16. In other words," he goes on to say "our primary task is to preach the truth of God's word, live in obedience to that truth, and to keep ourselves unstained by the world, James 1:27. Our influence on society must be the fruit of that kind of living, not the product of fleshly energy, or political clout." Dear friends, we serve a glorious, a good, a redeeming God. And we can trust him to do everything that he has promised to do. So let's live in light if his coming. Let's dedicate ourselves to living holy lives and lives that are deeply moved with compassion towards those who do not know the Savior. So they can look at us and see something different. And by God's grace, give us an opportunity to present to them the only truth that can save and sanctify and glorify. Let's pray together.

Father, we are so thankful for the gospel for all that you have done for us. But again, our hearts are broken for those that do not know you. And we know that apart from your regenerating grace, they will never know you. So we pray that you will move upon them continue to use us as salt and light that they might see the truth that they might believe and that they might be saved. So we thank you for the hope that is ours in Christ. Bless us, encourage us, especially in these dark days, and use us mightily for the sake of the kingdom and our coming King. For it’s in his name that I pray. Amen.

As we continue to make our way through the book of Daniel, we find ourselves this morning in Daniel chapter four. So will you take your Bibles and join with me? As we examine this amazing chapter, under the heading "God's Humbling Grace." We know from scripture that God is opposed to the proud but he gives grace to the humble. And to be sure, apart from God's grace, true humility is absolutely impossible. As sinful beings we are so blinded by our pride that we cannot see it. We are told in Proverbs 16 and verse 18, that "pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before stumbling." And in Proverbs 18, verse 12, we read before destruction, the heart of man is haughty." And I'm sure you will all agree that at the root of marriages and families that have been destroyed, you will find pride. In fact, pride destroys communities, and even nations. Today, we are witnessing the systematic destruction of our great nation due to the unbridled pride of ungodly political leaders and those who put them in office. About 150 years ago, the great English pastor, Charles Spurgeon said this, "Almost every event has its prophetic prelude. It is an old and common saying that coming events cast their shadows before them. When destruction walks through the land, it casts its shadow. It is in the shape of pride. Pride is as surely the sign of destruction, as the change of mercury in the weather glass is the sign of rain. Everything hath its prelude. The prelude of destruction is pride. There is nothing into which the heart of man so easily falls as pride. And yet there is no vice which is more frequently, more emphatically, and more eloquently condemned in scripture. Against pride, prophets have lifted up their voices, evangelists have spoken and teachers have discoursed. Yea more, the everlasting God has mounted to the very heights of eloquence when he would condemn the man of pride. And the full gushing of the Eternal's mighty language has been most gloriously displayed in the condemnation of the pride of human nature."

Like all monarchs, including the political leaders that we have here in America and those around the world, Nebuchadnezzar was blind to the reality that all earthly sovereigns are completely subject to the ruler of heaven and earth. Who is the Lord Jesus Christ. Indeed, Jesus declared in Matthew 28, in verse 18, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven, and on earth." Indeed, Peter testified in Acts chapter 10, verse 42, that God "ordered us to preach to the people, and solemnly to testify that this is the One who has been appointed by God as Judge of the living and the dead." Dear friends, every man and every woman who has ever drawn breath or whoever will draw breath, will ultimately stand before the Lord Jesus Christ, in worship or in terror. He will either be their Savior and Lord, or their judge and executioner. We are reminded of this, for example, in Philippians, chapter two, beginning in verse nine, where we read that "God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name so that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Through the prophet Isaiah, God expresses his holy anger against the proud and what will ultimately come about as a consequence of their arrogance in Isaiah chapter 14, beginning in verse nine, he addressed Belshazzar, the final king of ancient Babylon, and by extension, all of the pompous godless rulers of the world that many of us are even forced to endure this day. And there we read hell "from beneath is excited about you, to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the dead for you, all the chief ones of the earth that has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations, they all shall speak and say to you, Have you also become as weak as we have, you become like us? Your Pomp is brought down to Sheol and the sound of your stringed instruments. The maggot is spread under you, and worms cover you."

Well, we can all be thankful, can we not? That God's grace is available to all of us who are proud. He has his ways of humbling even the most pompous. And that is what we will see in the text before us in Daniel chapter four. At the beginning of this chapter, Daniel, includes an introduction that was written by Nebuchadnezzar, where he exalts the one true God who had humbled him and restored him to his throne, as we will see, so I want to go through this, read it to you make some explanations, and then some applications. Beginning in verse one, "Nebuchadnezzar, the king to all the peoples, nations and men of every language that live in all the earth: 'May your peace abound! It has seemed good to me,'" or literally, it was beautiful before me, '"to declare the signs and wonders which the Most High God has done for me. How great are His signs and how mighty are His wonders! His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom and His dominion is from generation to generation.'" My, what a contrast to human kingdoms that rise and fall and often exchange rulers multiple times within a single generation. And next, the king tells of his dream, which by the way, must have occurred sometime around the end of his reign, some sometime between 605 and 562 BC, I might add just a little footnote, archeologists have discovered a fragmentary tablet which reads, quote, "in the 37th year, which began April 23, 568 BC, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against Egypt to deliver a battle." And we know historically that he went to Egypt at this time, and he suppressed a revolt. And they returned home, celebrating yet another victory over a vanquished foe, which undoubtedly fanned the flames of his pride, all the more. Now back to verse four, "'I Nebuchadnezzar was at ease in my house, and flourishing in my palace,'" he says, In other words, all was at rest in his vast kingdom, and even in his mind, and then we read, "'I saw a dream, and it made me fearful.'" The original helps us understand that it was terrifying to him. '"And these fantasies as I lay on my bed, and the visions in my mind kept alarming me. So I gave orders to bring into my presence all the wise men of Babylon, that they might make known to me the interpretation of the dream. Then the magicians, the conjurers, the Chaldeans and the Diviners came in and I related the dream to them, but they could not make its interpretation known to me. But finally, Daniel came in before me, whose name is Belteshazzar, according to the name of my god, and in whom is a spirit of the holy gods; and I related the dream to him."

Now, it's interesting that Daniel came in last, we're not told why. But I would imagine that he wanted to give the other men an opportunity to prove their ineffectiveness. And so he comes in. And Nebuchadnezzar says, "In Him is a spirit of the holy gods." I think a better interpretation here is singular, the Holy God, the reason I say that, is the plural, gods can refer to a single deity in both Aramaic and in Hebrew. And I think given the context, and we will see this by the way, again, in verse nine and verse 18, I believe it's better to interpret this, "and in whom is a spirit of the Holy God," referring to Daniel's God. "And I related the dream to him saying, 'O Belteshazzar, chief of the magicians, since I know that a spirit of the Holy God is in you and no mystery baffles you, tell me the visions of my dream, which I have seen along with its interpretation. Now, these were the visions in my mind as I lay on my bed: I was looking, and behold, there was a tree in the midst of the earth, and its height was great. The tree grew large and became strong, and its height reached to the sky. And it was visible to the end of the whole earth. Its foliage was beautiful and its fruit abundant. And in it was food for all the beasts of the field found shade under it, and the birds of the sky dwelt in its branches, and all living creatures fed themselves from it. I was looking into visions in my mind as I lay on my bed, and behold, an angelic watcher, a holy one, descended from heaven. He shouted out and spoke as follows: Chop down the tree and cut off its branches, Strip off its foliage and scatter its fruit; Let the beasts flee from under it and the birds from its branches. Yet, leave the stump, with its roots in the ground. But with a band of iron and bronze around it, in the new grass of the field; and let him be drenched with the dew of heaven and let him share with the beasts in the grass of the earth. Let his mind be changed from that of a man and let it and let a beast's mind be given to him. And let seven periods of time pass over him.'" Fascinating, "let his mind be changed from that of a man to a beast." In other words, let him begin to reason and act like an animal. Many times, this is what we see in a, in a disorder called lycanthropy, where a person thinks they are an animal, typically a wolf. This is kind of at the heart of the old world, wolf myths and all of this type of thing. But here it could be boanthropy, where he thinks of himself as an ox. So this is the curse that God placed upon him for seven years. Verse 17, "'This sentence is by the decree of the angelic watchers and the decision is a command of the holy ones in order that the living may know that the Most High is a ruler over the realm of mankind, and bestows it on whom he wishes and sets over it the lowliest of men. This is the dream which I, King Nebuchadnezzar, have seen. Now you, Belteshazzar, tell me its interpretation, inasmuch as none of the wisemen of my kingdom is able to make known to me the interpretation; but you are able for a spirit of the Holy God is in you.'" Verse 19, "Then Daniel whose name is Belteshazzar, was appalled for a while, as his thoughts alarmed him. The king responded and said, 'Belteshazzar, do not let the dream or its interpretation alarm you.' Belteshazzar replied, 'My lord, if only the dream applied to those who hate you, and its interpretation to your adversaries! The tree that you saw, which became large and grew strong, whose height reached to the sky, and was visible to all the earth and whose foliage was beautiful and its fruit abundant, and in which was food for all under which the beasts of the field dwelt in whose branches the birds of the sky lodged-- it is you, O king; for you have become great and grown strong, and your majesty has become great and reached to the sky and your dominion to the end of the earth. In that the king saw an angelic watcher, a holy one, descending from heaven and saying, 'Chop down the tree and destroy it; yet leave the stump with its roots in the ground, but with a band of iron and bronze around it in the new grass of the field, and let him be drenched with the dew of heaven, and let him share with the beasts of the field, until seven periods of time pass over him,' this is the interpretation, O king, and this is the decree of the Most High, which has come upon my lord the king: that you be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place, be with the beasts of the field. And you'll be given grass to eat like cattle and be drenched with the dew of heaven; and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever He wishes. And in that it was commanded to leave the stump with the roots of the tree, your kingdom will be assured to you after you recognize that it is Heaven that rules. Therefore, O king, may my advice, be pleasing to you: break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor, in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity.'" In other words, Daniel takes a real risk here in offering his advice to the king. Kings of that day, certainly Nebuchadnezzar would be among them, were cruel to the people that worked for them. The many poor that built their vast walls and cities, injustices also existed among their judges, that was commonplace. So basically, Daniel is pleading with him to correct your sinful life, conduct yourself with righteousness and perhaps God would be merciful. Perhaps, your change of heart would mitigate the severity of his judgment upon you.

And then we read this in verse 28. "All this happened to Nebuchadnezzar, the king. Twelve months later, he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon." I want you to notice was walking is a participle. It indicates that he was pacing back and forth on the roof of his palace, admiring all of the glory of his kingdom. Verse 30, "The king reflected and said, 'Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built as a royal residence, by the might of my power, and for the glory of my majesty?' That betrayed his heart of pride.

Let me digress for a moment and give you a little glimpse into what his kingdom looked like. Much of the ruins of Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon have been recovered by the German archaeologist Robert Conaway. He discovered much of it from 1899 to 1917. I've seen remnants of it in various museums around the world. And here's some of the remarkable characteristics of what was found, according to various sources of documentation. The city was protected by a system of great double walls. The outer line extending 10 miles around the double walls were each 25 feet thick, with 40 feet between and a total of 260 Towers 160 feet apart. Through the center of the city for two thirds of a mile, extended the great 70 feet wide stone paved procession street, having walls decorated with enameled brick showing 120 Lions and 575 dragons and bulls arranged in alternate rows. By the way, the dragons in the bowls were symbols of Marduk and Baal, their idols. The figure of each animal stood out against the uniform background tinted blue with powdered lapis lazuli. Lapis Lazuli is a a very beautiful deep blue, metaphoric rock that's used as a semi-precious stone.

The architecture and ornamentation were skillfully adapted to each other, the animals were carved to scale. And despite their multitude the arrangement was orderly and harmonious. At the northern end of the procession street was the famous Ishtar Gate 35 feet high, decorated with 557 animals in bright colors against a glazed blue background. The city was dominated by a seven story ziggurat, which is a step pyramid 288 feet high known as the Tower of Babel, and nearly 60 million fired bricks were used to construct this huge tower. And on the top of it stood "Etemenanki" which means house of the foundation of heaven and earth. It contained a solid gold statue of Marduk, which weighed 52,000 pounds. According to fifth century BC, Greek historian, Herodotus, you can take the price of gold per pound today, multiply it by 52,000. I tried doing that this last week on my little iPhone computer, it started smoking and so I just backed off but it's somewhere over a trillion dollars. That's a lot of gold. More than 50 temples existed within the city walls. At the north end of the city near the Ishtar Gate was Nebuchadnezzar's palace, his throne room was 171 by 56 feet, having a triple gateway and a richly decorated facade of glazed bricks. Yellow columns who superimposed ionic capitals were crowned by palmettes linked together or linked to each other by a garland of lotus buds. At the northeast angle of the palace are the remains of vaults, thought to be supports for the terrace quote, Hanging Gardens built by Nebuchadnezzar for Amytis, his Median wife, as a reminder of her homeland, it was built upon stone arches, and was equipped with a draw well and chain pump. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were counted as one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. So that gives you a little idea of what existed in Babylon.

So all of this, of course, symbolizes to him, and to the ancient world, the majesty and the glory and the power of the king, which just fueled his pride. So you can see why he would say in verse 30, "'The king reflected and said, 'Is this not Babylon the Great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?'" And then we read this in verse 31, "'While the word was in the king's mouth, a voice came from heaven saying, 'King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared.'" I have to stop there for a moment, this is what the king is used to saying, "to you, it is declared," and now all of a sudden, he gets a voice from heaven saying, "to you, it is declared, sovereignty has been removed from you, and you will be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place will be with the beasts of the field, you will be given grass to eat like cattle and seven periods of time will pass over you, until you recognize that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind, and bestows it on whomever He wishes.'" Then in verse 33, we read "Immediately," or it could also be translated that very hour, and I would imagine it was a little bit of time here for all of this to sink into his mind what he just heard, to reflect upon the reality that God had spoken to him, to come to grips with the horror that was about to befall him. So that very hour, "the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled."

Now if you think about it, undoubtedly it took a few days for the king's physicians and the other rulers to figure out what on earth has happened to this guy. And I'm sure Daniel filled them in. So they had to figure out, now what are we going to do with him? So it took some time to determine how to treat him, where to put him. They probably put him in a royal forest, so to speak. Someplace where he could be out of sight of other people, so that no one would know what was going on. He had to be held in the strictest of confidence all that was happening. Otherwise other people would take advantage. So he was driven the text says "away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle. And his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagle's feathers and his nails like bird's claws. Oh, dear friends, the power in the judgment of God. Think of it; how quickly the mighty fall before him.

Then seven years later, we read this in verse 34, "But at the end of that period, I, Nebuchadnezzar raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me." Obviously, it is God who initiated his humble heavenward gaze that constituted, frankly, the initial phase of his return to rationality, to normal. And as that happened, notice what he says, "I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Jim who lives forever." He did not shake his fist in God's face. But rather, he humbly praised him. Three verbs used synonymously, to express the depths of his worship, and his personal dependency upon the Most High God, I blessed, praised and honored, the most high God.

Then he says, "For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation." My what a contrast with his own temporal kingdom, and all other kingdoms. The Kingdom of the Most High is everlasting, it endures from generation to generation, there is no changing of the guards in God's kingdom. Then he says in verse 35, "All of the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing," and obviously, he's including himself here, but he referring to the Most High God, "does according to His will, in the host of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth." In other words, he is the sovereign God that does whatever he pleases. "And no one," he says, "can ward off," or literally strike, "His hand." The idea of tapping a hand of a child as they reach for something, no, no. We can't do that with God. "No one can ward off His hand," no one can alter what he desires, and what he has ordained to come to pass. Whatever he chooses to do, he does. Then he adds this, "Or say to Him, 'What have you done?'" In other words, here we have a clear acknowledgement of the sovereignty of God, as well as the omnipotence of God, the one who can do anything he pleases, but also the righteousness of God that everything that he does is perfectly just including what he had done for seven years to the king.

Verse 36, he says at that time, "'My reason returned to me. And my majesty, and splendor were restored to me for the glory of my kingdom. And my counselors and my nobles began seeking me out.'" It's the idea here that they approached him to restore him to his former position as king. "'So I was reestablished in my sovereignty and surpassing greatness was added to me.'" Now in ways that were not told God, blessed Nebuchadnezzar, and his kingdom in ways that exceeded the previous glory and greatness. And I find it interesting that during that seven years of time, word didn't get out so that someone or some group would come along and take the kingdom during that time of vulnerability. Instead, his men and probably primarily, Daniel, continued the rule in the king's absence. And again, I would imagine even though the text doesn't say this, that Daniel gathered all of them around and say, Listen, this was the king's dream. Here's what God is going to do. Don't mess with this. He'll be back in seven years.

Verse 37, "'Now I Nebuchadnezzar, praise, exalt and Honor the king of heaven.'" Three active participles denoting continuous action. In other words, this became the modus operandi of his life, a man who praised and exalted and honored the King of heaven. And what a contrast to the temporary worship that characterizes Nebuchadnezzar. Especially with his previous reaction to the dream that he saw in Daniel two and the supernatural deliverance of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego from the fiery furnace. Obviously, he saw those things, and he was impressed for a while, and then he reverted right back to his idolatry. I believe that what we read here, along with other passages indicates that Nebuchadnezzar was truly converted. I believe we will see him in heaven someday. You know, I can think of no world ruler in my lifetime that could be characterized in such a way as a man who continually praises, exalts and honors the King of Heaven. In fact, there's a dearth of professing Christians that conduct themselves in such a way. I mean, how many people do you know that could be described as a man and a woman whose character and conduct is clearly motivated by a heart desire to give glory to God and all that they do? Very few people. By God's grace, there's many here amongst the saints at Calvary Bible Church and other churches I know, but as a whole, you don't see too many people who have a passionate desire to proclaim the excellencies of Christ, the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to give praise to the one true God of heaven, who has revealed himself in creation, and in Scripture, and in the person in the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Again, how many people do you know, who have a consuming zeal and an exhilarating fervor to put God's glory on display in their life, in their family, and their business, who longs to see his kingdom come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And again, I can't even begin to imagine what it would be like to have a president like this. I mean, we're used to being ruled by those who do the complete opposite. People who celebrate and legislate that which God hates, and those things which condemn people to an eternal hell. And I want you to notice in the text, why Nebuchadnezzar worshipped the Most High. Why he was worthy of such adoring praise. He says, "For all His works," could be translated his course of conduct, the methods that he uses to accomplish his purposes, the ways by which he responds to situations, "all His works are true," or right or righteous. In other words, whatever he does corresponds with his righteous standards. That's why I worship him. That's why I praise him. That's why I exalt Him. "All His works are true." All his works are always an accurate reflection of his holiness. They are always consistent with the perfections of his character, his righteousness.

And then he says, "and His ways are just," meaning they're equitable. They're fair. They're absolutely fair. They conform again to his, his standard of righteousness. And then he adds this, "and he is able to humble those who walk in pride." My what an understatement after what he had just endured. He is able to humble those who walk in pride. A verse really hits me. I hope it does you as well. We all struggle with it, but my what a confession of this man, what a testimony of God's saving grace. His humbling grace, right?

You know, about 20 years later, an aged Daniel would explain to Belshazzar, who was Nebuchadnezzar son, that took his place; he would explain to him about his father, who experienced insanity because of his pride. And here's what we read, out of Daniel five beginning of verse 21. Daniel says to him, "'He was also driven away from mankind and his heart was made, like that of beasts and his dwelling place was with the wild donkeys. He was given grass to eat like cattle and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven, until he recognized that the Most High God is ruler over the realm of mankind and that H sets over it whomever He wishes. Yet you, his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart, even though you knew all this, but you have exalted yourself against the Lord of Heaven.'" Again, this seems to attest to Nebuchadnezzar's true conversion, unlike his son, who would perish in his sins.

John Walvoord concludes quote, "Nebuchadnezzar reaches a new spiritual perspicacity," a term that means discernment. "Prior to his experience of insanity, his confessions were those of a pagan whose polytheism permitted the addition of new gods. Now Nebuchadnezzar apparently worships the King of Heaven only. For this reason, his autobiography is truly remarkable and reflects the fruitfulness of Daniel's influence upon him and probably of Daniel's daily prayers for him. Certainly, God is no respecter of persons, and can save the high and mighty in this world, as well as the lowly." Dear friends, pride is a deadly sin. And one of the most deceitful of all sins. It's so easy for us to see it in others and not in ourselves. We must recognize that this is a weed that grows faster than all others in the garden of our spiritual life. It is the kind of weed that chokes out all of the desired virtues of Christ's likeness, that we long to see manifest themselves. Those virtues that rob us of true humility, and therefore we need to pray that God will be merciful to us and help us by his grace, to see our own pride, to uproot those hideous evils in the garden of our life. Proverbs 16 in verse five, "Everyone proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord." We know that it was pride, was it not, that condemned the devil? We know that is for this reason, we are warned to never put a novice in a position of leadership in the church. According to First Timothy three, six "less being puffed up with pride, he fall into the same condemnation of the devil." Pride is a characteristic of the world that that all believers must battle, we can all identify with that. John tells us "for all that is in the world,": First John 216, "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life is not of the Father but of the world." And in Proverbs 26:12, we read "Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him."

As we look through Scripture, we see the people who are filled with pride, despise authority, they resent correction. They hardened their heart. It's a besetting sin, especially of the wealthy and the powerful. It leads to, it leads people to contempt and rejection of God's Word and those who administer it. It leads people to persecute the poor to stir up strife and contention, even in a church and it leads to self-deception. And ultimately, according to Scripture, the deadly fruit of pride that you will see in a person's life will ultimately be that of shame, debasement and destruction. And those guilty of it shall be a base, according to First Peter five that I've quoted before, "For God is opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble." And again, "pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall," Proverbs 16:18. You know, folks, pride is the opposite of Christ's likeness. That's what we've got to bear in mind. Christ's likeness is characterized by selflessness, by self-sacrificial love. By humility. I think of First Corinthians 13 one, we read that if we do not humble ourselves in love, we have "become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal." I mean, nobody can stand the obnoxious noise that those instruments make. I know they have their place, but you don't want to hear that long term right? It goes on in verse four, "Love is patient," but can I put it this way, pride is not. Pride is impatient. You want to measure your own life here. Love is patient, pride is impatient. Love is kind, not so with pride. Pride is critical, it is overbearing, it is rude. Love is not jealous we're told, oh pride is. Love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecoming. Not so with pride. Pride is ugly, it is inappropriate is indecent. It is unmannerly. Love does not seek its own. But pride demands its own; my way or the highway. Love is not easily provoked. But pride is a raw wound that will instantly retaliate in the most vicious of ways. Love does not take into account a wrong suffered. So with pride. Pride keeps a record of wrongs and it never forgets, because it wants to make you pay. Love does not rejoice in unrighteousness but rejoices with the truth. Oh, not so with pride. Pride loves juicy gossip and spins the truth to its advantage to destroy other people and exalt itself. Love "bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." Not so with pride. Pride bears nothing, believes nothing, sees the worst in everything and tolerates nothing, unless it fits its agenda. And beloved, if you fail to see yourself somewhere in that list, there is only one reason. Its pride. And what an amazing thing that we as believers of all people, we have no reason to be proud, right? We are debtors to God's grace, we deserve no accolades of praise whatsoever our boast is in the Lord, not in us. And this is at the very heart of the gospel of grace, especially when we understand that in his infinite love, he chose us before time began, set his love upon us, drew us unto himself and saved us by his grace, not through any merit of our own. Boy, when you really get a hold of that every ounce of conceit is shattered forever. Our only glory is in the Lord. Paul said this in First Corinthians one verse 26, "For consider your calling, brethren." You believers here at Calvary Bible Church, "that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised, God has chosen the things that are not so that he may nullify the things that are so that no man may boast before God. But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that just as it is written, let him who boasts, boast in the Lord."

Well, dear friends, we know that pride is going to continue to abound in these last days. I don't have this text before you but I'm reminded of Second Timothy three and verse one, Paul says, "But realize this that in the last days, difficult times will come." Savage times, perilous times; the idea that they're going to mount up layer upon layer upon layer upon layer. And here's what we will see "For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power." And then he says, "Avoid such men as these." Folks we should not be surprised at the arrogance of fools who have no fear of God, but we should be deeply concerned about our own hearts. And that's what I would challenge you with here today. You know, God may not cause us to eat grass in the fields with the cattle for seven years, he might do something far worse, we don't know. But certainly it is his desire to humble us. Because in our sanctification, he wants us to become more like Jesus. And that means that every vestige of arrogance and self-conceit must be done away with. And because he loves us, he will see to it that that happens. He chastens those that he loves. He's constantly at work in us to conform us into the likeness of Christ. In fact, Jesus said in Matthew 23:12, "Whoever exalts himself will be humbled. And he who humbles himself will be exalted."

"My worth is not in what I own, not in the strength of flesh and bone, but in the costly wounds of love, at the cross." Indeed, we boast in Christ who has saved us by his grace. Amen? Let's pray together. Father, we're so thankful for what you have done for us. My what a humbling reality. And as we read of what happened so many years ago, we see the implications of it even in our own lives, certainly in the world in which we live, and we thank you, that your all-sufficient grace is always available to those who will humble themselves in repented faith. So, Lord, we thank you, we give you praise. Continue to speak to our hearts, grow us into the likeness of Christ. And for those that do not know Christ, I pray that today will be the day that they will humble themselves before the Most High and cry out for saving grace. Father, hear the cry of our heart I pray. We thank you. We give you praise. In Jesus name. Amen.

Once again, we have the privilege of looking into the Word of the living God. And I would ask you to take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter three. Actually, we will probably look at a few verses before that, but that will get you in the vicinity. And I might also say that this will be a little bit unusual in that I have a lot of Scripture to give you today. So, you'll have to hang on for the ride, if you will. Before we look at the text closely. May I say that the disintegration and humiliation of America brought upon us by woke leftists and the staggering incompetence of our President and his administration makes me long, all the more, for a righteous king, and an everlasting kingdom. According to Daniel seven, and many other passages, that kingdom is coming. In verse 13, we read "I kept looking in the night visions and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming. And He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom and that all the peoples nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away, and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed." While sinful human beings who are part of Satan's kingdom of darkness will always rebel against the Most High God, until Christ returns, whether they like it or not, God's universal kingdom operates without interruption. That's exciting to know. And all his creation are ultimately subject to his rule. And today, we can rejoice knowing that as Paul says, "our citizenship is in heaven." Our citizenship is in heaven, Philippians 3:20, "from which also we eagerly wait for his Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ." And today we experience and enjoy the spiritual aspects of God's invisible kingdom that exist within the hearts of those who have placed their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. But we also longingly await that future day when we are able to experience and enjoy the physical aspects of God's mediatorial kingdom, which will include a literal 1000 year reign of Christ upon the earth, consistent with Revelation 20, where he will rule as the last Adam, that final reign of Christ, often called the Messianic Kingdom, the millennial kingdom, when he will finally transform everything on this planet into conformity with the perfect will of God and His universal kingdom that exists right now. God has given us clear evidence of this progression in Bible prophecy, especially in Daniel two, as you will recall, and there we studied that prophetic outline of the rise and fall of four great world empires that will finally and permanently be replaced by a fifth Empire, the kingdom of heaven. And we can rejoice knowing that God has promised to bring that kingdom. And if we look in Daniel two beginning in verse 44, we read this, "In the days of those king," and by the way, the context here is the, the 10 toes of the iron kingdom that was described in the previous verses 41 through 42, referring to 10 future kings who will continue to control a territory of a revived Roman Empire under the rule of the Antichrist. That will happen during Daniel's 70th week of judgments as we will understand when we get to Daniel 9:24 through 27. But, "In the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed. And that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. Inasmuch as you saw that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold, the Great God has made known to the king what will take place in the future; so the dream is true and its interpretation trustworthy."

Of course, you will recall the symbolism of the stone cut out of the mountain without hands clearly indicates divine origination. Clearly the kingdom of God will not only replace every vestige of all the preceding Gentile kingdoms that have dominated Israel and the world, but also that kingdom will utterly destroy them. Nothing like this has ever happened. There is no evidence in history that fulfills the promise of Revelation 19:15, where Christ is said to "strike down the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron." Gentile domination in the world today is as strong as it has ever been. But dear friends, that stone cut out from the mountain without hands will one day accomplish exactly what God has promised. When Christ the King returns in power and great glory as the lion of the tribe of Judah. We read about this, when he comes to destroy that last Roman king, the Antichrist, Revelation 19:11. We read, “And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war." He goes on to say beginning in verse 19, "And I saw the beast of the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army. And the beast," referring to the Antichrist, "was seized and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worship his image; these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone. And the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh."

Beloved, as I watched all that was unfolding in Afghanistan this week. My heart longed to go to the word to hear the end of the story. Because what we're seeing is not the end of the story. Zechariah 14, beginning in verse four, "In that day, His feet," referring to Jesus, "will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives will be split in its middle from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will move toward the north and the other half toward the south. You will flee by the valley of My mountains, for the valley of the mountains will reach to Azel; yes, you will flee just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Then the Lord, my God, will come, and all the holy ones with Him!" Indeed, according to Colossians, three, four, "When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also, as believers, we, "will be revealed with Him in glory." Paul said as much in Second Timothy two in verse 12, we shall "also reign with Him." Tribulation believers, along with the redeemed from both the Old Testament and New Testament eras will reign with Christ for 1000 years as they're promised in Revelation 20 and verse four. Beloved, this is the glory that awaits us. This is the glory we long for, its glory that will be our solely because of God's sovereign grace, and his undeterred plan to bring glory to himself.

Now with that introduction, let's go back to Daniel two for a moment, because we want to get a running start into Daniel three. So little segue here, you will remember the context; Daniel reveals both the dream and the interpretation to Nebuchadnezzar, verse 46, "Then Nebuchadnezzar fell on his face and did homage to Daniel and gave orders to present to him an offering and fragrant incense." This by by the way, it was a way of the Babylonians expressing worship to Daniel's God. Verse 47, "The king answered Daniel and said, 'Surely your God is a God of gods and a Lord of kings and a revealer of mysteries, since you have been able to reveal this mystery.' Then the king promoted Daniel and gave him many great gifts and he made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon and chief prefect over all the wise men of Babylon."

Pretty amazing, isn't it? For a guy about 20 years old, pretty amazing. And it all began when he refused to eat the food and the drink of the king and thus embrace his idols. Truly, God is rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Verse 49, "And Daniel made requests of the king and he appointed Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego over the administration of the province of Babylon while Daniel was at the king's court." So he brings his friends in, they're obviously going to live somewhere else, Daniel gets to live in the palace.

Now, we come to Daniel three. You must understand that what takes place in Daniel three happened about 10 plus years later. In fact, the events of Daniel two occurred at the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar's reign in about 602 BC. And we know that the fourth chapter of Daniel occurred about the end, which would have been about 568 to 562 BC. And according to the Babylonian Chronicles, which were discovered in 1860, in the region of Nineveh, I have seen them they're displayed in the British Museum if you ever get there, but there's so many things you can see half the Bible is in the British Museum. But there you will read in the Babylonian Chronicles that there was a failed coup attempt against Nebuchadnezzar that occurred in December 595 through January 594 BC. Therefore, it is fair to say that the context of Daniel three is likely the king's response to that failed coup event, where he now summons all of his royal subjects to pledge their loyalty to him. And some scholars believe as well that this may have been written sometime after 585 BC, just after Nebuchadnezzar went back and destroyed Jerusalem. And he probably thought that Israel's God at that time had been severely disgraced if not defeated. In fact, we know, and here in chapter three and verse 15, he says, "what God is there who can deliver you out of my hands?" And so he was strutting his stuff by this time, okay? This is the context.

Now let's examine this historical narrative. It's amazing. Verse one, "Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold." Here, you must understand this was probably, as they would typically do, a wooden image overlaid with gold, and perhaps knowing that he was symbolized by the golden head and the dream that had been revealed to him, maybe he decided to expand that a little bit and make the whole image portray him. We're not sure. But the king makes an image of gold, "the height of which was 60 cubits, and it's with six cubits". So it's 90 feet high and nine feet wide, tall, skinny thing. "He set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon." That, by the way, is a valley plain, several miles southeast of Babylon. And to set that thing in the middle of this valley plain would have been a prime piece of real estate for everybody to be able to see this thing for miles and miles around. I might also add an interesting note, at least it's interesting to me. The Babylonians used a sexagesimal, rather than the decimal numbering system, with a sexagesimal system, the 60 is its base, where 60 is the smallest number that is divisible by every number from one to six. I find that interesting. By the way, we continue to use elements of that today, don't we? There's 60 minutes in an hour, right? There's 360 degrees in a circle. We speak of a dozen eggs or a half dozen. So we still have elements of that today. But I find it interesting that the number six, which is prominent in Scripture is designated as the number of man, Revelation 13:18, which is one number short of God's perfect number seven. In fact, in Revelation 13:18, we read, "Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast," referred to the Antichrist, "for the number is that of a man and his number is 666." The context there is during the tribulation, the Antichrist will be able to be identified somehow by this numbering system. And I find it fascinating that ancient Babylon which we know is a symbol of Satan's wicked world system and kingdom, embraces the number of man. Do with that what you wish, I don't want to start a new denomination based on that, but I just find it interesting.

So here Nebuchadnezzar erects this magnificent idol, to evoke an oath of loyalty and worship, exalting his power and his prestige. Verse two, "Then Nebuchadnezzar the king sent word to assemble to the satraps, the prefects and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates, and all the rulers of the provinces to come to the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. Then the satraps, the prefects and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates, and all the rulers of the provinces, were a symbol for the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up; and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. Then the herald loudly proclaimed, 'To you, the command is given, O peoples, nations and men of every language, that at the moment, you hear the sound of the horn, flute, the lyre, trigon, the psaltery, the bagpipe, and all kinds of music, you are all to fall down and worship, the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king has set up." By the way, as a footnote, for those of you like me who have Scottish background, this is not a bagpipe, like we think of a bagpipe. So the Scots weren't there. Right? In the original language, this is really a term, it's really poorly translated here. It's really refers to a percussion instrument, a drum, a timpani. So, that's the scene. When you hear the music when you hear the instrument. Everybody's got a bow down. I was thinking about a passage in Psalm 137, three, where we read how the Babylonian soldiers were so cruel to the Israelites. When they captured them, they would make them sing songs of Yahweh that they sang in the temple. And in that passage we read, "For there our captors demanded of us songs, and our tormentors, mirth, saying, 'Sing us one of the songs of Zion.'" Now again, remember, ancient Babylon is a symbol of the final empire of the Antichrist and the enormous amalgam of apostate religion that will be led by the False Prophet. Revelation 17, five describes it as "a mystery, 'Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and of the abominations of the earth.'" And in Isaiah chapter 14, in verse 11, God promises even there the destruction of the final Babylon at the end of the Tribulation. And I was thinking about this with respect to the music. Isaiah 14:11, "'Your pomp and the music of your harps have been brought down to Sheol; maggots are spread out as your bed beneath you, and worms are your covering.'" So again, when you hear the music, you've got to bow, worship the image. Verse six, "But whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire." This would have been a large brick kiln, there's many of them that they have found; very common. "Therefore," verse seven, "at that time, when all the peoples heard the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, trigon, psaltery, bagpipe, and all kinds of music, all the peoples, nations and men of every language fell down and worshipped the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. For this reason, at that time, certain Chaldeans came forward and brought charges against the Jews." Surprise, surprise, right? Ah, cancel culture all the way back in those days, right? The Chaldeans were the original woke police attacking those that did not share their worldview. And they were also undoubtedly jealous of these Judeans who had been elevated to such levels of prestige. These guys that had achieved much more than they had, you know that's not fair. Plus, these guys aren't worshipping our Babylonian gods. You know, pride produces jealousy and resentment, right? We all know that. Let's be honest with ourselves. We've all been there. And whenever you see that in the Bible, especially jealousy, almost inevitably, the next word is, "and strife." Jealousy and strife. When at the core, this is at the core of our depraved nature.

By the way, this is at the heart of all this social justice insanity that you see. I mean, the real problem is not social injustice, it's human depravity. But nobody wants to address that. That's what drives division in the United States, James four beginning in verse one, "What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel." So the Chaldeans come forward with their charges, verse nine, "They responded and said to Nebuchadnezzar, the king: 'O king, live forever!'" You know, they're just dripping with worship; salivating, hoping that they can replace these guys, "'You, O king, have made a decree that every man who hears the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, trigon, psaltery, and bagpipe, and all kinds of music, is to fall down and worship the golden image. But whoever does not fall down and worship shall be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire. There are certain Jews, whom you have appointed over the administration of the province of Babylon, namely Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.'" It doesn't say it, but I'm sure they had some little pictures of them they had drawn. "'These men O king have disregarded you; they do not serve your gods or worship, the golden image which you have set up.'"

So what we have here, folks are essentially three charges against them. First of all, as we see they disregarded the king, which betrayed a lack of loyalty to him, which could basically be construed as treasonous. And secondly, they refuse to serve the Babylonian gods, who had favored the king and given him victory. And if you don't favor the gods, you might lose the next battle. And then finally, they refused to worship the golden image which represented the king himself. So their refusal to bow you must understand, was perceived as a threat to national security, but also an insult to the king. And I'm sure even though the text doesn't say this, I'm sure the king was very aware of the personal jealousies that were driving all of this, but he also knew that he could not tolerate insubordination at such high levels. And of course, the biggest issue for the king was wounded pride, wounded pride; that violent fuel of revenge, and retaliation. Look how it plays out in verse 13, "Then Nebuchadnezzar in rage and anger gave orders to bring Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego; then these men were brought before the king. Nebuchadnezzar responded and said to them, 'Is it true Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods, or worship the golden image that I have set up? Now, if you're ready,' in other words, I want to give you another chance here, 'if you are ready, at the moment, you hear the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, trigon, psaltery and bagpipe and all kinds of music to fall down and worship the image that I have made, very well. But if you do not worship, you will immediately be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire; and what god is there who can deliver you out of my hands?'" Oh, such astounding arrogance. Pride comes before a fall right? You can see it coming and how quickly he forgot the one true God of Israel that had given him the dream and the interpretation, all of which revealed the infinite superiority of Yahweh.

Verse 16, "Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to the king, 'O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this matter,'" meaning, we admit our guilt, we have nothing else to say in this matter. And then, folks, these faithful young men give one of the most succinct and profound responses in all of Scripture, expressing their confidence in the goodness and the sovereignty of God. Verse seven, "If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.'" You know, what's fascinating friends is they had no guarantee that God was going to save them, but they had absolute confidence in his power to do so. You see, the issue was not whether or not he would, or he was able to do this, but rather, is this within the purview of his will. And for them, whatever God chose to do is perfect. Good with it. Good to go.

Verse 19, "Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with wrath, and his facial expression was altered toward Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego." I mean, you can just see, can't you in your mind's eye, this apoplectic grimace? This rage begins to distort his face. He's just foaming at the mouth here at this point. "He answered by giving orders to heat the furnace seven times more than it was usually heated." Which is really kind of crazy, you know, I mean, why not lower it a little bit and torture the guy some right? I mean, I don't know. Anyway, he's lost it here. "He commanded certain valiant warriors who were in his army to tie up Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, in order to cast them into the furnace of blazing fire. Then these men were tied up in their trousers, their coats, their caps, and their other clothes and were cast into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire." Now, it doesn't say this, but it is reasonable to assume that a large crowd had gathered by now to watch the spectacle. There was great expectation to see this horror. Verse 22 "For this reason, because the king's command was urgent and the furnace had been made extremely hot, the flame of the fire slew those men who carried up Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. But these three men Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego fell into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire still tied up." You know I have to smile these are exactly the kind of odds that God loves, right? I mean, I mean, let's just make it so over the top ridiculously impossible so that I will get all the glory reminded of Jeremiah 32, beginning of verse 17. "Ah, Lord God, behold, you have made the heavens in the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm, nothing is too difficult for you." And later on in verse 27, God says, "Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too difficult for me?" Verse 24, "Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astounded, and stood up in haste; he said to his high officials, 'Was it not three men we cast bound into the midst of the fire?' They replied to the king, 'Certainly, O king.' He said, 'Look! I see four men, loosed, and walking about in the midst of the fire, without harm and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods!" So he sees these guys walking around in there, they're unharmed, they're untied, and he sees a fourth supernatural being. Is this an angel? Is it is it the pre-incarnate Christ? We don't know, that would be speculation. But certainly, God is up to something, it is supernatural.

"Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door of the furnace of the blazing fire; he responded and said, 'Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego come out, you servants of the Most High God and come here! I mean he's on a rescue mission now, right? He's on a rescue mission. "Then Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the midst of the fire." My what an astounding spectacle. Can you imagine what everybody's thinking and saying and doing? "The satraps, the prefects, the governors of the kings, high officials gathered around and saw in regard to these men that the fire had no effect on the bodies of these men nor was the hair of their head singed, nor were their trousers damaged, nor had the smell of fire even come upon them." My, so much for the schemes of evil man, right? And what a testimony of the power and the supremacy of God to deliver those who trust in him. My dear old professor, Dr. Whitcomb said this quote, "When our God delivers miraculously, he delivers completely. Not one Israelite perished in the Red Sea, not one Assyrian soldier survived to attack Jerusalem in the days of Hezekiah, not one of the 144,000 will perish in the day of Jacob's trouble. In countless cases, when our Lord Jesus Christ healed the sick and raised the dead, there was complete healing." Then he says this, "Spiritually speaking such examples are great, and reassuring to God's people." Indeed, they are.

Well, you would think maybe now these people are going to put their trust in Yahweh. Maybe some of them did, we don't know. But we see verse 28, "Nebuchadnezzar responded and said 'Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who has sent His angel and delivered His servants who put their trust in Him, violating the Kings command, and yielded up their body so as not to serve or worship any god except their own God.'" By the way, this implies how the king was originally impressed by their unyielding faith, willing to die for their faith in their God rather than worship of the gods. And by the way, what a magnificent thing it is to behold those who share such unyielding faith. I've always marveled at the testimonies of martyrs. What an amazing thing.

And by the way, what happened here was a literal fulfillment of a promise God gave to Israel over a century earlier in Isaiah 43, beginning in verse two, here's what we read there, "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, nor will the flame burn you for I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior." O dear child of God, we would all do well to remember who our Lord truly is. What we see here in this true story is a contrast between the one true God and the false gods; the false idols of the Babylonians, idols that continue to manifest themselves today in a variety of other forms. And this is a sober reminder, isn't it, that Satan, the god of this world, is the driving force behind Gentile domination in the world, but it's also a reminder that Satan and his minions and all the peoples who follow him, are doomed for eternal judgment unless they repent, and trust in Christ. They will perish in judgment at the hands of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of the Bible, who has revealed himself in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The eventual downfall of the nations depicted in Nebuchadnezzar's dream in chapter two, dear friends, really foreshadows the final destruction of all Gentile domination. What we read in Scripture, as the end of the times of the Gentiles. Again, when the Lion of the tribe of Judah returns as King of kings and Lord of lords.

So Nebuchadnezzar now has another opportunity to encounter the God of Israel, preparing him for what is believed to be his ultimate conversion in chapter four. But to close it out in verse 29, we read this, "'Therefore I make a decree that any people nation or tongue that speaks anything offensive against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb and their houses reduced to a rubbish heap, inasmuch as there is no other god who was able to deliver in this way.'" He obviously had no understanding of what it was to be seeker sensitive right? "Then the king caused Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to prosper in the province of Babylon."

Well, there you have that amazing story. But I wish to challenge you with some very practical and I believe timely truths that emerge from this passage and a few others as we wrap this up here this morning. As I said earlier, we are witnessing the disintegration and the humiliation of America. I just shake my head while woke liberals obsess over absurdities, like micro aggressions and toxic masculinity and systemic racism and LGBTQ pride and all of those things our country suffers under; the rule of fools unrestrained in their depravity. It's so heartbreaking to see this. The horrifying pandemonium and chaos of the evacuation in Kabul and the macabre scenes of carnage after the bombing, bloody corpses floating in an open sewage canal. I mean, don't think for one moment that God hasn't orchestrated all of that for the world to see. Here's where your depravity will take you, America. Images that we will never forget, images that are a testimony to the imbecilic, insane policies of progressive Democrats who are more concerned with critical race theory, and LGBTQ indoctrination and open borders, and socialist spending; more concerned with all of those things than upholding the Constitution and protecting the people, but certainly more important than worshipping the one true God. Our heart aches for those families who lost loved ones killed in that bomb. Our hearts ache for the 1000s that are going to be left behind. I can't bear to think about it. Women and girls that will basically become sex slaves, Christians that will be tortured and killed. The greatest military power in the history of the world now at the mercy of medieval sociopaths, misogynist pedophiles, driven by a satanic religion bent on dominating the world. I talked with a military officer yesterday. I was quick to go write down almost word for word what he said. We were talking about this. He was just shaking his head because he's been there. And he said, many of us are seriously concerned that the administration is somehow working with a foreign enemy. Because nobody can make this many stupid decisions that so directly impact the security of our nation. Folks, we have a national security crisis in Afghanistan. And by the way, I'm not suggesting that, you know, our administration is working with an, I don't know, I don't know what's going on. Certainly, human depravity is perfectly capable of doing all of this. All you have to do is read Romans one, when God gives people over to a worthless mind. I mean, that's probably all this is but we have a national security crisis in Afghanistan. We have a national security crisis at our southern border. I saw where 6900 migrants per day are crossing that border. We have a national security crisis, dear friends inside America, because we have a government that is absolutely bent on legalizing things that God calls an abomination. And criminalizing things that God raises up as a standard of righteousness. From redefining marriage and family and gender, to slaughtering babies in the womb. Our freedoms are being taken away. The goal of all of this, of course, is to ultimately destroy the institution of marriage and the family that God has ordained. Make our children wards of the state. We've been told for years by some of these people that it takes a village. No it doesn't. It takes a godly man and a godly woman, a godly father and a godly mother to raise a family. And when the family's gone, everything's gone. Satan knows that. We are witnessing a moral and a social freefall in America. I could go on about all of these blasphemous abominations, I don't want to do that.

The point dear friends is we are being forced to bow to a satanic image, not unlike what Nebuchadnezzar erected. An image of godless humanism. And the severity of the consequences of all of that are growing daily. As a number of you are aware, I've heard from a number of you who, your jobs are being threatened because you don't do what the culture demands you to do. So in closing, I want to prepare you for that day when you are asked to bow to whatever degree that might be. Just for a few moments, I want to close by looking at Second Thessalonians chapter one, a persecuted church. Paul gave thanks for this church, beginning in verse three, because their "faith is greatly enlarged and the love of each one of you toward one another, grows ever greater; therefore we ourselves speak proudly of you, among the churches of God for your perseverance," the original language, perseverance means the ability to hold up under severe testing, "for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure." Then in verse five, he says, "This is a plain indication of God's righteous judgment, so that you will be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering." In other words, their persecution, our persecution is always proof positive of God's righteous judgment upon those he loves. And why would he do that? Because the father chastens those that he loves, because he wants to perfect our faith, conform us into the likeness of Christ. And persecution is the refiner's fire that purifies the saints. We all know that suffering for our faith is often the most powerful and effective means that God uses to accomplish his purposes in our life. Verse six, "For after all, it is only just," meaning fitting or proper "for God to repay," literally to give back to recompense, "it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you." Jump down to verse eight, "dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus." This is referring to those who are willfully ignorant of who he really is, and also those who reject Him. Those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These are the ones that reject the promise and the offer of salvation. Like grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Verse nine, then "these will pay the penalty of eternal destruction," the idea of eternal ruin, not by the way, annihilation, but eternal ruin. Revelation 14:11 describes the suffering of hell, as a place where quote, "the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. They have no rest day and night." In Isaiah, chapter 66, verse 24, God spoke through his prophet, and describes the horrifying and eternal state of all who rebelled against him and reject to the Lord Jesus Christ, that place will be one in which "their worm will not die and their fire will not be quenched." So when Paul says here to the Thessalonians, "the penalty of eternal destruction," he speaks of eternal hopelessness, eternal misery. In fact, the term comes from ancient jurisprudence and carries the idea of, of paying the consequences for a wrong committed. Jude seven we read the guilty will suffer "the punishment of eternal fire." Jesus said in Matthew 25:41, "Then He also will say to those on His left, 'Depart from Me, accursed ones into the eternal fire, which has been prepared for the devil and his angels.'" And I find it amazing that the gospel offers the promise of eternal comfort and good hope through grace according to chapter two and verse 16. But the rejection of God's invitation in the gospel will result in the punishment in a place of unquenchable fire. According to Jude 13, a fiery furnace a place of "black darkness, that has been reserved forever." Revelation 21, eight, a fiery lake of burning sulfur. And somebody asked me not too long ago, "Do you preach hell at your church?" My response was, of course, I preach the Bible. And it was amazing how this person who had been in church all their life, said, "Well, you know, I don't believe you know, God would never do that type of thing." How sad.

But also, this penalty of eternal destruction will include, as we read, being cast away from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power. Folks, this is the idea of being shut out in the solitary confinement, confinement of an eternal hell to be excluded from the presence of the Lord, from which that judgment proceeded. And I'm sharing this with you because this will be the fate of all who persecute Christians. And we need to love them, and pity them enough to give them the gospel. Because I don't want this to happen to my worst enemy. And when will the separation occur? Well, at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Back to the text at the end of verse seven, "when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire." Drop down to verse 10, "when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day and to be marveled at among all who have believed--for our testimony to you was believed." So this will happen when the Lord Jesus will be revealed "apokalupsis" in the original language, "apo" means to take away and "kalupsis," this is a cover. So this is the unveiling or the taking away of, the uncovering, the laying bare of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. The apostle John saw this in his inspired vision on the Isle of Patmos in Revelation 19 verse 11, we read, "And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war." Oh dear friends, what a stark contrast to Jesus first coming when the King of Kings rode up upon a lonely donkey, a beast of burden when he came to bear the burden of our sin in his body. But now he symbolized as the King of kings that was riding upon a magnificent mount, a steed of splendor, the kind ridden by conquering generals in Rome, in majestic, processionals, and triumph.

Notice more about the rider, "He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True." Dear friends, can there be a more perfect title of the king? Can there be a more fitting description of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ? I think not. "Faithful" carries the idea of being totally trustworthy and dependable. In other words, all that he has decreed in eternity past will come to fruition. And he is "True," which carries the sense of real genuine, he is the very essence of truth. No deception, no spin. No Orwellian doublespeak like we're used to hearing every day. "'I am the Way and the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father but through Me,'" John 14 six. And then finally John says that he's coming "in righteousness He judges and wages war." You see, this is both the motive and the mission of the return. He's coming to judge and to conquer. Yes, today, we are increasingly asked to bow before the satanic image of godless humanism. Dear friends, expect it. We're going to see more of it. But fear God, not man, trust in God and do not bow because our King is coming. And that's what motivated the church at Thessalonica and countless others of the redeemed down through the years. And then remember as verse six says, and he will "repay with affliction those who afflict you." Verse seven and "to give relief." I love that word by the way, it means rest or refreshment, restoration. Boy I'm ready for some restoration, aren't you? For some refreshment? He is going to come, he's going to give relief to you who were afflicted, and to us as well.

Well, in closing, I want to do something that is quite different. In my studies, as I was looking at the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, I noticed that that they had inserted the apocryphal prayer of Azariah. Azariah was the Hebrew name of Abednego, as well as another ancient document called "The Song of the Three Youths," which was recorded in the Hebrew Bible. Now, mind you, the apocryphal books are not considered inspired. They're not part of the inspired canon, but I wanted to read you just one little section here that recounts what perhaps Abednego said, when he went to the furnace. If he didn't say it, it would be something very close to this. And I trust that this would be the attitude of our heart. This is entitled "The Prayer of Azariah in the Furnace." "They walked around in the midst of the flames singing hymns to God and blessing the Lord. Then Azariah stood still on the fire and prayed aloud, here's what he said, 'Blessed are You, O Lord, God of our ancestors, and worthy of praise, and glorious is your name forever. For you are just in all you have done, all your works are true and your ways right. And all your judgments are true. You have executed true judgments in all you have brought upon us and upon Jerusalem, the Holy City of our ancestors. By a true judgment you have brought all this upon us because of our sins. For we have sinned and broken your law and turning away from you in all matters, we have sinned grievously. We have not obeyed your commandments, we have not kept them or done what you have commanded us, for our own good. So all that you have brought upon us and all that you have done to us, you have done by a true judgment. You have handed us over to our enemies, lawless and hateful rebels, and to an unjust king, the most wicked in all the world. And now we cannot open our mouths. We, your servants who worship you, have become a shame and a reproach for your namesake. Do not give us up forever. And do not annul your covenant do not withdraw your mercy from us. For the sake of Abraham, your beloved and for the sake of your servant Isaac and Israel, your Holy One, to whom you promised to multiply their descendants like the stars of heaven and like the sand on the shore of the sea. For we, oh Lord, have become fewer than any other nation and abroad low this day in all the world because of our sins. In our day, we have no ruler or prophet or leader. No burnt offering or sacrifice or ablation or incense, no place to make an offering before you and defined mercy. Yet, with a contrite heart and a humble spirit, may we be accepted as though it were with burnt offerings of rams and bowls or with 10s of 1000s of fat lambs. Such may our sacrifice be in your sight today, and may we unreservedly follow you for no shame will come to those who trust in you. And now, with all our heart we follow you. We fear you and seek your presence. Do not put us to shame but deal with us in your patience, and then your abundant mercy. Deliver us in accordance with your marvelous works and bring glory to your name O Lord. Let all who do harm to your servants be put to shame. Let them be disgraced and deprived of all power and let their strength be broken. Let them know that you alone are the Lord God, glorious over the whole world."

Let's pray together. Father, may this be our testimony as well, as we reflect upon the glory of your name, as we reflect upon your goodness and your Grace. And as we long for you to come soon and to take back from the usurper that which is yours. How we long for that day when the glory of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. But until then, may we be found faithful, unyielding, unwilling to bow to the false gods of our culture, may you find us faithful and may you bless us mightily for your sake. And Father, finally, for those that may be here today that know nothing of what it is to be reconciled to a holy God through faith in the only Savior, the Lord Jesus, I pray that today you will overwhelm them with the reality of their guilt so that they might cry out for your undeserved mercy that you will lavish upon them so rich and so free. Save them by your grace. May today be the day that they experience the miracle of regeneration. Father, thank you for our time today. Strengthen us encourage us. May we be salt and light for the glory of Christ. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to the book of Daniel? We will continue our verse-by-verse study of this amazing book in the Old Testament. In a few minutes we will be looking at Daniel chapter two beginning in verse 25. In Psalm 29 two the Spirit of God speaks through the psalmist, and says, "Ascribe to the LORD the glory, due to His name." And of course, his name is the summary of all the glorious attributes of the essence of his holy character. And sadly, the humiliating defeat of our country in Afghanistan and the horror show that is being played out with this botched evacuation is a vivid illustration of what happens to a nation when it does not "Ascribe to the LORD the glory due to his name." To be sure, "pride goes before destruction," we read in Proverbs 16 and verse 18, "and a haughty spirit before stumbling." And this week, we have all witnessed what is perhaps the most chilling illustration of destruction in my lifetime, as the jihadist flag of the Taliban, now replaces Old Glory in Kabul, Afghanistan. My heart aches for the Gold Star families who have lost loved ones in that 20 Year War. And I offer my heartfelt sympathies to those of you, and I know, there are a number of our in our church, who have fought over there, people that we know who have been wounded and killed. I met with a gold star mom on Friday in Paris, Tennessee, at the dedication of a gold star Memorial Highway that will go from Paris Landing all the way into Paris. She lost her son in that war. It's heartbreaking to see what is happening. But frankly, we are a nation that has replaced the worship of the one true God who has revealed himself in creation in Scripture. And in the person in the work of the Lord Jesus Christ with a false god of secular humanism. We have embraced an anti-Christian woke culture that preaches hatred and racism and greed and victimization, in order to gain political power and money, fomenting division and strife that is ultimately leading us towards Marxist totalitarianism. We have defied creational realities by embracing gender fluidity, which is insanity. And we have denied God as the Creator of life, including the creator of two genders, male and female, both made in His image, for the purpose of bringing him glory through his church, and through the institution of marriage between one man and one woman. We have mocked all of that in our country. And while we fight over gender pronouns and transgender rights and critical race theory, our borders are being overrun with hundreds of 1000s of illegal aliens spreading COVID and crime and drugs. And for months, for months, we have listened to the self-righteous, churlish rhetoric of a president who is clearly in a state of cognitive decline, telling us how America is back. This is nothing more than Orwellian doublespeak, purposefully deceptive, confusing, self-centered speech. But while he and his woke administration insist on raising the Black Lives Matter flag and the gay pride banner over American embassies around the world. A medieval army of sociopathic, misogynistic, pedophiles, raise their flag over the American Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. It's heartbreaking. It's infuriating. It's evidence of the wrath of divine abandonment on the United States of America. Friends, our President and our elected leaders need our prayers, and we are commanded to pray for them. And I encourage you to do so; our enemies need our prayers. They need the saving, transforming power of the gospel. That's the only hope. Oh how quickly the mighty fall and how great is that fall. And this is the tragic legacy of liberalism. Wherever you see liberalism, whether it's theological liberalism, or political liberalism, it brings destruction. However, I would add that this is not a political battle that can be won by voting for the right person of the right party. Dear friends, this is a clash between two opposing kingdoms, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan. And again, the gospel is the only thing that can change men's hearts. And only the Prince of Peace can reconcile sinful men to a holy God and sinful men to each other. But frankly, I would add that the greatest threat to our nation right now is not godless liberalism that drives the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and much of the Republican Party. The greatest threat to this nation is Christless Christianity. Pseudo-Christians that are filling churches, and evangelicalism. You know, during Jesus ministry, it's interesting, the brunt of his attacks was not on Rome, was not on Caesar, but on the institutionalized self-righteousness and hypocrisy of the Pharisees. And Satan has always used the twin themes of false religion and secular government to thwart the purposes of God. And nothing has changed to this day. Evangelical pragmatism has widened the gate of destruction filling churches with false believers. We now have so many churches with predators in the pulpit, entrepreneurs in the pulpit, preaching a worldly man centered gospel rather than a Holy Christ centered gospel. Pop culture hipster churches now dominate the evangelical landscape, spewing out meaningless platitudes and psychobabble. Nothing more than religious social clubs and community centers. They worship the next private revelation. Or they worship the next personality. Or they worship the next program or their music or their entertainment; anything and everything but Christ. We have an easy believeism gospel where all you have to do is pray a prayer, walk an aisle, check a box and you're in. And then we have the prosperity gospel that basically says Jesus died to make you happy. And if you learn how to manipulate him, you can pry from his stingy fingers, all of the goodies that you want. And then of course, we have now the social justice gospel, producing woke churches. And I would argue that this is unquestionably the most destructive heresy to come upon the church since its founding at Pentecost. Dear friends, this is liberalism and Neo Marxism rolled together on steroids. It has taken over much of evangelicalism.

Proverbs nine and verse 10, we read that, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." And in Proverbs one seven, "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge." Then he says "fools despise wisdom and instruction." Today we're witnessing a government that is being ruled by fools, and worse yet, are witnessing an evangelical church that is being led by fools. And as a result, America has become a fool's paradise. And we're reaping what we have sown. Our once great country has become an enemy of the Most High God, and he has abandoned us to the consequences of our iniquities. As Romans one makes so clear, we've become a laughingstock around the world. Our enemies openly mock us, our allies are furious at us. In fact, God laughs at us, as I read in Psalm two a few minutes ago, how quickly the mighty fall and how great is that fall. But dear friends, please understand, great empires have always risen, and they have always fallen, and that will continue to happen until the Lord Jesus Christ returns. In fact, it will continue to happen even in the rise and the fall of the final gentile empire of the Antichrist. It will one day be defeated by the King of kings and Lord of lords who will return in power and great glory to establish His kingdom that will never end. Now there's the hope of the Gospel, amen? According to Daniel chapter seven, beginning in verse 13, we read this "'I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a Son of Man was coming. And He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away, and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.'" Dear friends, this is what we see here in Daniel. In God's outline of world history that was given to King Nebuchadnezzar in a dream, a dream that was also given then to Daniel who interpreted that dream.

So, let me provide for you once again, the context of where we will go this morning, you will remember, remember that Nebuchadnezzar had this terrifying dream. And he demanded all of the wise men, all of the Chaldeans to come in, and not tell him just the interpretation of the dream but tell him what the dream was. So he knew they weren't trying to snooker him, because he obviously didn't trust him. And he said that if they couldn't do that he was going to have them torn from limb to limb, and their houses would be made into a rubbish heap. Pretty serious. And in verse 11, we read that "no one else who could declare it to the king, except gods," is what they told him, o one can do that; “whose dwelling places not with mortal flesh." And of course, that's exactly what God wanted them to say. So he could prove himself powerful through his servant Daniel. Well, the king became indignant and furious with his wise man and gave orders to have them all destroyed. They go and they speak to Daniel and his three companions. And he asked if he could speak with the king, so that he could have some time. King gave him the time, he went to prayer with his friends, and we know that God revealed to Daniel, the dream, and the interpretation of the dream. He praised God and then he called the king's commander, Arioch, and he says, "Do not destroy the wise men of Babylon." He said, "Take me into the king's presence, and I will declare the interpretation to the king."

Now we pick it up at verse 25, "Then Arioch hurriedly brought Daniel into the king's presence, and spoke to him as follows, "'I have found a man among the exiles from Judah, who can make the interpretation known to the king!'" Obviously, Arioch wanted to take credit and maybe even participate in the reward right? Verse 26, "The king said to Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, 'Are you able to make known to me the dream which I have seen and its interpretation?'" Now, what I want you to notice, dear friends is Daniel didn't immediately launch into the dream and the interpretation This is very important, but rather, he actually agreed with the Chaldeans and gave all the credit to God, unlike Arioch. Notice verse 27, “Daniel answered before the king and said, 'As for the mystery about which the king has inquired, neither wise men, conjurers, magicians nor diviners are able to declare it to the king. However, there is a God in heaven, who reveals mysteries.'"

By the way, this is most important because what he's ultimately saying here is, there is a God in heaven who can do this, unlike the worthless gods of the Babylonians, which was a direct blow to the magical powers of the Chaldeans. Daniel went on to say, "'and He has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will take place in the latter days. This was your dream and the visions in your mind while you were on your bed.'" Now, the term "latter days," is an important term. It is a term used 14 times in the Old Testament. And the New Testament alludes to the Old Testament concept in a number of passages. Each one needs to be interpreted contextually. But as Dr. Walvoord says, quote, "Taking both the Old and New Testament uses together, it is clear that the latter days for Israel began as early as the division of the land to the 12 tribes, Genesis 49 and verse one, and include the first and second Advents of Christ. The last days for the church culminate at the rapture and resurrection of the church, and are not related to the time of the end for Israel. Daniel does not deal with the age between the two Advents except for the times of the end, and the New Testament does not clearly use the term quote, "latter days" of the present church age." So as Walvoord went on to say in the context of what God is revealing in Daniel two, "The latter days include all the visions that Nebuchadnezzar received and stretches from 600 BCE to the second coming of Christ, to the earth." And beloved, what we will see here is a prophetic outline of the rise and fall of four great world empires that will finally be permanently replaced by a fifth Empire, the kingdom of heaven, for which we longingly await, and for which we are commanded to pray, right? "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven."

So, the latter days encompasses the history of Gentile domination over Israel that will one day come to a sudden and a catastrophic end when Christ returns and establishes his millennial kingdom. And we read about this in verse 44, and 45, we just read this to you, we'll come again to it in a few minutes. But there we read, "'In the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom, which will never be destroyed, and that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. Inasmuch as you saw that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold, the great God has made known to the king, what will take place in the future; so the dream is true and its interpretation is trustworthy.'"

Now let's go back to verse 29. Daniel says, "'As for you, O king, while on your bed, your thoughts turned to what would take place in the future.'" Now, folks, this is absolutely staggering. Do you realize what he's saying here is that God revealed to Daniel what he was thinking about on his bed, before God even revealed the dream. It's an amazing thing. Nebuchadnezzar was basically thinking, I wonder what's going to happen after I'm done. After the Babylonian Empire, what's going to happen next?

Daniel goes on to say, "'and He,'" referring to God, "'who reveals mysteries has made known to you what will take place.'" Verse 30, "'But as for me, this mystery has not been revealed to me for any wisdom residing in me more than any other living man, but for the purpose of making the interpretation known to the king, and that you may understand the thoughts of your mind.'" So once again, Daniel's humility shines bright, as he underscores how God alone is responsible for all of this. God alone is responsible for getting you to even think about the future. God alone is responsible for giving you the revelation, and now giving you the interpretation through his servant. And what he is about to describe now, I might add, corresponds to the vision described in chapter seven, that God revealed to Daniel personally and we will see that later, when we get there.

Back to verse 31, "'You, O King, we're looking in behold, there was a single great statue; that statue, which was large and of extraordinary splendor, was standing in front of you, and its appearance was awesome.'" The word here is from a root word, meaning to fear. So what he saw was a colossal, vivid, bright image that evoked a sense of terrifying all within his heart. It was overwhelming. Verse 32, "'The head of that statue was made of fine gold, its breast and its arms of silver, its belly and its thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron, and partly of clay.'" In the original language, literally, baked clay, a piece of pottery, piece of ceramic, if you will. I want you to notice here there is a descending deterioration in the precious value of the metals from the head to the feet. Moreover, each metal is less weight, with the clay and the feet being the lightest of all. However, it's also fascinating to note that each material increases in hardness, from the head to the feet, with the noticeable exception of the clay in the feet, which is the weakest part of the image. Mixing hard brittle quote, "baked clay" or ceramic with durable iron, certainly presupposes a very weak foundation that is subject to collapse. And that's the point.

Now let's look closely at what Daniel goes on to say, verse 34, "'You continued looking,'" we have a participle here, depicting I should say that the king's constant gaze at the image; "'You continued looking until a stone was cut out without hands, and it struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and crushed them.'" So here he describes a large stone cut out of a mountain, as we see in verse 45. That strikes the feet of the image, its weakest point, and it strikes it with such force that it not only crushes the feet, that Final Empire, but caused all of the other empires that are pictured in the image to disappear without a trace. Verse 35, "'Then the iron the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were crushed, all at the same time, became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away so that not a trace of them was found. But the stone that struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.'" My what a stunning scene, right? This colossal image instantly destroyed by a stone hitting its vulnerable feet and then becoming a mountain that fills the whole earth. All those metals were rendered powerless and worthless, utterly insignificant in comparison with the stone that was cut out without hands that struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and crushed them.

Now, I find it interesting that Nebuchadnezzar here is absolutely speechless. I think I would be too. He never interjects a word. And he must have been dumbfounded to hear this 18-year-old Judean tell him exactly what he saw in his dream, and he obviously knew that a god far superior to anything that he could have ever imagined was involved in this whole scenario. Again, notice what Daniel says in verse 36, "'This was the dream; now, we will tell its interpretation before the king. You, O king, are the king of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power, the strength and the glory; and wherever the sons of men dwell, or the beasts of the field or the birds of the sky, He has given them into your hand and has caused you to rule over them all. You are the head of gold.'" Obviously, the king is the personification and symbol of the Babylonian Empire. Now I can see in my mind's eye, mind you, this isn't in the text, but I think it's fair to say we could kind of sit back and look at Nebuchadnezzar at this point, we could kind of see him sit back, kind of stick his chest out and raise his head up and you see a grin begin to form on his face. His mouth is probably wide open with pride. Although it's also clear, from what Daniel says, that all of these things were given to him by the God of heaven, who was revealing this to Daniel. And what's really interesting is that God had previously prophesied the meteoric rise of Nebuchadnezzar some six years earlier, through the prophet Jeremiah, who warned the kings of Moab and Edom in Amman and Tyre and Sidon, in Jeremiah 27. Beginning in verse six, here's what he had said six years earlier. "'Now, I have given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.'" It's amazing. This happened before it ever happened; the prophecy happened before it actually happened with Nebuchadnezzar. So, "'I've given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, My servant, and I have given him also the wild animals of the field to serve him.'" Isn't it interesting that God even uses the ungodly to serve his purposes? We need to keep that in mind given the present crisis we are in. "'All the nations shall serve him and his son and his grandson, until the time of his own land comes; then many nations and great kings will make him their servant. It will be that the nation of the kingdom which will not serve him, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and which, and which will not put its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, I will punish that nation with the sword with famine and with pestilence,' declares the Lord, 'until I have destroyed it by his hand.'" In verse 14, "'So do not listen to the words of the prophets who speak to you saying, 'You will not serve the king of Babylon,' for they prophesy a lie to you, for I have not sent them' declares the Lord, 'but they prophesy falsely in My name in order that I may drive you out, and that you may perish you and the prophets who prophesy to you.'" So here we see that God even orchestrated false teachers, to lie to them and to get the people to believe that lie so that he might judge them. And in Jeremiah 37, in verse 10, God even warned the Jews at the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar siege of Jerusalem in 588 BC, saying, "'Even if you had defeated the entire army of Chaldeans who were fighting against you, and there were only wounded men left among them, each man in his tent, they would rise up and burn the city with fire.'" So indeed, God providentially appointed Nebuchadnezzar to be not only an irresistible force, but also a magnificent, brilliant, sovereign monarch that would conquer the whole known world at that time, including apostate Israel.

Back to verse 39, Daniel to Daniel goes on to say, "'After you there will arise another kingdom inferior to you.'" And we know that this is a reference to the kingdom of the Medes and the Persians depicted in the dream as the breast and arms of silver, which probably intends to portray the dual monarchy of the Medo Persian Empire. That such a king of kings would be replaced by, quote "another kingdom inferior to you," is a bit puzzling at first glance, is it not? Especially given the fact that the Medo Persian Empire was geographically much larger than the Babylonian Empire? Most conservative scholars believe the inferiority of the Second Empire pertain to its quality of government.

Let me explain this because I think this is accurate. Historically, we know that Nebuchadnezzar reigned for 43 years as an absolute dictatorial autocrat, and he was a brilliant, astounding king. He reigned over a totally unified kingdom and he was greatly feared and respected, and the people prospered. However, when he died in 562 BC, he was replaced by his son, Evil-Merodach . Then two usurpers of the throne, Neriglissar and Nabonidus. And finally his daughter's son, Belshazzar, who was that vile man, that total fool who saw the handwriting on the wall, as you will recall. Remember he was so morally rotten, that he was weighed in Gods balances and "found wanting," Daniel five, verse 27. Well, as a result of all of this, the great Babylonian Empire began to deteriorate because of incompetent, corrupt and morally bankrupt leadership. Which, by the way, is exactly what we're seeing happening here in our country. Now, Cyrus, the ruler of the Medo-Persian Empire, was indeed inferior to the great Nebuchadnezzar; he was not able to wield an autocratic scepter, like Nebuchadnezzar, because his authority was ultimately subject to the law of the Medes and the Persians. So even as silver is about 40 times or so, less valuable than gold, the monarchy or quality of the Medo-Persian Empire, was inferior to the Neo- Babylonian kingdom. In fact, the empire of Alexander the Great that came next, that conquered the Medo- Persian Empire also lacked that kind of central authority, that superior organization and unity that Babylon had, and that the Medo-Persian Empire possessed. And of course, this is exactly what Daniel sees in the progressive inferiority in the succeeding empires. Although we've also got to bear in mind, while there is, as you will see, a descending value in the metals, there is also a ascending strength, suggesting the increased military might, that will increase over the history of the times of the Gentiles. And we especially see this in the explosion of military might that came through the unimaginable military power of the world conflict that's going to come eventually, in Revelation 16, and 19, to which Daniel refers in Daniel 11:36 through 45. Again, we will look at that when we get there.

But I also wish to add that some classical writers, such as the ancient Greek poet Hediod, who lived for about, somewhere they think 750 to 650 BCE, as well as the Roman poet Ovid, who lived from 43 BC to 18 AD. These were some of the guys that viewed history progressing in the same ways as the descending values of the metals. I find that very interesting. Think about this, contrary to evolutionary theory, man did not begin with dust and ascend to gold. Just the opposite happened. And the times of the Gentiles began with gold, but it will end in worthless dust that will disappear in the wind. And as I thought about this, even as evil entered the world through the chief angel, who was at the same level of Michael the archangel, it will end in the eternal separation of divine oblivion. And even as sinners enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin, even as sinners live for themselves and ignore God, their corruption will gradually metastasize as a cancer, until finally, it will utterly eat them away and they will be ruined. What was once promised as pleasure, will end in the solitary confinement of an eternal hell, such as the progress of sin’s corruption, dear friends; both historically as well as personally. What did Solomon say, "Vanity, vanity," it's all vanity, "striving after the wind." That's what life is, unless you fear God and obey Him, live for His glory.

Back to Daniel, two 39. At the end, Daniel then describes the third kingdom, "a kingdom of bronze," he says, "which will rule over all the earth." Now as predicted, a third kingdom arose and conquered the Medo-Persian Empire. And it did rule over all the earth and this was the kingdom of Macedonia, of Greece, ruled by Alexander the Great beginning in 334 BC. His Grecian Empire not only conquered all of the regions of the dual silver kingdom of Medo-Persia, but even further east, all the way to the borders of India. And by the end of his conquests, history reveals that he had carved out an empire of 1.5 million square miles. Now, what might we glean from the fact that the inferior quality of this bronze kingdom was somehow able to conquer the Medo-Persian kingdom, symbolized by the superior silver? Clearly silver is a superior quality of metal than bronze. So in what way were the Greeks inferior, especially given the fact that Alexander's military was mighty? Its accomplishments were far superior than the Babylonians and the Medo-Persians put together. In fact, it is said that his army of around 40,000, sometimes it went up as much as 90, but most of the time is around 40,000, moved with such speed and agility, they were able to defeat armies like the Persians, that were about three to five times larger in size. They were powerful. They invented the Greek phalanx, which was a single rectangular mass of military that locked their shields and their spears together, they had pikes, they had what were called sarissas, that they invented, these were long spears or pikes that they would hold with with two hands and between 13 to 20 feet long and they had a sharp iron head shaped like a leaf, and then they had a bronze bud spike, which could be anchored in the ground to stop charges. You've seen that in some of the movies; they put the sticks down and the horses run into them and all of that type of thing, they invented that. The spike was sharpened well enough that it could pierce through the enemy shields. They also implemented smaller and lighter shields. They developed skirmish infantry's, archery units, light cavalry, heavy cavalry, siege engines. They were so well organized that they had various divisions that were dedicated to specific responsibilities, each working together with perfect efficiency at a moment's notice. They were virtually unstoppable. You may recall they even defeated the war elephants of King Porus in the Battle of Jhelum, in 326 BC. In fact, in Daniel chapter eight, I'm going to take you there for a moment, beginning in verse five. God revealed to Daniel even more about the mighty Alexander the Great that would come. And there he depicted him as a male goat.

We read in Daniel eight beginning in verse five, "While I was observing behold, a male goat was coming from the west, over the surface of the whole earth without touching the ground;" denoting the speed, "and the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes. He came up to the ram that had two horns," referring to Medo-Persian Empire, "which I had seen standing in front of the canal and rushed him in his mighty wrath. I saw him come beside the ram and he was enraged at him; and he struck the ram and shattered his two horns, and the ram had no strength to withstand him. So he hurled him to the ground and trampled on him, and there was none to rescue the ram from his power. Then the male goat magnified himself exceedingly. But as soon as he was mighty, the large horn was broken, and in its place there came up for conspicuous horns toward the four winds of heaven."

So, why is the Grecian Empire symbolized by an inferior metal than the Medo-Persian empire that it conquered? Well, I believe the answer can be explained in that it had an inferior quality of unity, and administration. The efficiency of Alexander's empire crumbled very quickly, great division began to emerge in his kingdom, and that was, that was its ruin. And as we will see more in detail in chapter eight. At Alexander's death at age 33, in 323 BC, four of his generals became kings over four sectors of the vast Grecian Empire, and that was their undoing. Now, notice again, back to verse 32. "The head of the statue was made to find gold," that's Babylon, "its breast and its arms of silver," Medo-Persia, then the third kingdom is described with "its belly and its thighs of bronze," and then a fourth kingdom with "its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay." That's fascinating, isn't it? This third Empire designated by the "belly and its thighs of bronze," verse 32, ends with the thighs from which the legs of iron emerge, indicating it would eventually encompass the territory of both the East and the West. And of course, this is a reference ultimately to Rome, as we will understand more in days to come. Verse 40, "Then there will be a fourth kingdom, as strong as iron; inasmuch as iron crushes and shatters all things, so like iron that breaks in pieces, it will crush and break all these in pieces." And again, this is a reference to the Roman Empire that succeeded Greece historically. I might also add that the parallel symbolism of the animals in Daniel's vision in chapter seven underscores the designation and sequence of all these successive empires, the fourth beast in verse seven being a clear reference to the iron legions of Rome. Now, iron is clearly the least valuable metal in the descending quality of metals, pictured in the image, but it is also the strongest, "inasmuch as iron crushes and shatters all things," crushes and shatters all things, the original language carries the idea of, in these terms, of that which compresses something out of violence, out of its natural shape and shapes it into something else. In fact, I noticed "smashes" is a participle. And it means one which breaks by a hammer, and it denotes continued action. And that's what the Romans did. They just kept beating things down. One historian and scholar, Miller says this, "Rome ruled the nations with an iron hand and like a huge iron club shattered all who resisted its will. The Roman Empire dominated the world from the defeat of Carthage in 146 BCE to the division of the east and west empires in AD 395, approximately 500 years. The last Roman Emperor ruled in the west until 476. And the Eastern Division of the Empire continued until AD 1453."

Now Daniel goes on to tell the king in verse 41, "'In that you saw the feet and toes, partly of potter's clay,'" in other words, brittle baked clay, and partly of iron, it will be a divided kingdom, but it will have in it the toughness of iron inasmuch as you saw the iron mixed with common clay.'" So here's a portrayal of vulnerability of weakness. And I agree with Wood and others who say, quote, "The weakness of Rome, which led to its fall, and which did come to existence, especially in its latter period,” was catch this, "a deterioration of moral fiber among the people. Idleness, luxurious living and dissipation of character found their way into, and intermixed, with the still firmly structured aspects of government." Reminds me of the United States doesn't it you? Here we are in an absolute moral freefall in our country, a country that is obsessed with culture, the culture of entitlement, critical race theory, materialism, drug abuse, and the overall insanity of liberal wokeism. That's clearly the potters clay that is dividing us and will ultimately destroy us.

Back to verse 42. Daniel says, "'As the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of pottery, so some of the kingdom will be strong, and part of it will be brittle. And in that you saw the iron mixed with common clay, they will combine with one another in the seed of men; but they will not adhere to one another, even as iron does not combine with pottery.'" And in chapter seven, these 10 toes are also depicted as 10 horns. I don't want to confuse you a lot, but we're going to see that that he will speak of this again later on. And within the context of these eschatological events of Daniel seven, eight, as well as verses 24 through 27, as those things unfold, on the stage of world history, we will see that ultimately, this is going to include an 11th horn, portraying the final antichrist. Moreover, in that context, what we see is Daniel's vision flashes forward to the divine throne where judgment is going to be meted out on the fourth kingdom. We read about this in Revelation 20, beginning in verse 11, through verse 15. And because of this, I believe, as do many other conservative scholars, that it is safe to conclude that the 10 toes of the iron kingdom described here in Daniel 2:41, through 42, points to 10 future kings, who will control the territory of a revived Roman Empire, during what is called the 70th week of judgment upon Israel, that Daniel describes in Daniel nine, verses 24 through 27. And that future seven-year period of judgment will end with sins final judgment, and Christ's reign of righteousness, when Christ returns and establishes his millennial rule over the earth, which will become the consummating bridge between world history and the eternal state.

Back to verse 44, "'In the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom, which will never be destroyed, and that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever.'" Obviously, dear friends, nothing close to this has ever happened. So obviously, this must be something future. And to be sure, the spiritual aspect of Christ's kingdom today has not obliterated Gentile domination in the world. So we look at something future here, verse 45, "'Inasmuch as you saw that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay and the silver and the gold, the great God has made known to the king, what will take place in the future; so the dream is true, and its interpretation is trustworthy.'"

The symbolism of a stone cut out of the mountain without hands, clearly points to divine origination. This is something that God is going to do. Clearly this is the kingdom of God that will not only replace every vestige of all the preceding Gentile kingdoms, but this kingdom will destroy them all and replace them all forever. I can only imagine what must have gone through Nebuchadnezzar's mind when he heard all of this. I wish to close this morning with an excellent summary statement from an old friend, Dr. David Larsen, from his excellent book, "Jews, Gentiles and the Church; a New Perspective on History and Prophecy." I highly recommend that book to you. By the way, the Lord took David home this last March, he was a prolific author, Bible expository. He spoke here at Calvary Bible Church in the late 90s. And he served as a professor and chair of the practical theology department at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School from 1981 to 1996, up in Chicago. And here's what Dr. Larson said, quote, "God's call to Israel was to be a nation apart in order that she might bear effective witness to the nations. While even her dispersion and tragic history among the nations will be a real plus, in her ultimate testimony and witness, her restoration as a nation and her quote, 'resurrection from among the nations,' Ezekiel 37, one through 14, will become the fulcrum for her worldwide effectiveness at the end of the age. With her captivity, and only a remnant in the land, Israel was facing an extended period of time called by Jesus, 'the times of the Gentiles,' Luke 21:24, during which Jerusalem would be trampled on by the Gentiles. This prolonged period is the scope of the dream of the great image that God gave to the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel two and repeated to Daniel himself and the vision of the four beasts in Daniel seven. Through this extended period of many centuries, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome, in an earlier continuing and later form, will dominate world history until Jesus Christ comes back to reign. The stone smiting the image of Daniel two 44 through 45 and the coming of the Son of Man is described in Daniel 7:13 through 14."

Well, as we continue to make our way through this amazing book, these things will begin to make more and more sense to you, you'll be able to put the pieces of the puzzle together. So bear with me, read it, study it, meditate on it. But may I leave you with this challenge, dear friends, seriously, let's pray for our nation. Let's pray for our leaders. Let's pray for our soldiers. Let's pray for our enemies. And may I also encourage you strongly to pray for the true Church, that we might remain faithful and not get sucked in to all of this craziness that is out there. I'm reminded of what Paul told the Corinthian believers, he said in Second Corinthians 11, three, "But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." Dear friends, Jesus is coming again. Jesus is coming again. We are a second coming church because we are a second coming people. And as I finished my meditations on this particular passage, as is often the case, the verse of a song came to mind. It comes from Charles Wesley's great hymn, "Rejoice, the Lord is King." The last verse came to my mind and let me just read this to you in closing. "Rejoice in glorious hope. For Christ the judge shall come and take his servants up to their eternal home. Lift up your heart. Lift up your voice, rejoice again, I say, rejoice." Let that be the theme of our heart this morning.

Let's pray together. Father, we are always overwhelmed when we read your word and see your sovereign hand in everything that you say, everything that you do. We thank you that we are not living in a random world. We thank you that we serve a sovereign a faithful and a good God. We thank you that our hope is anchored securely in the person in the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, who has secured our redemption forever. So Lord in all of this, we relax, we rejoice. But we also grieve for those who have no hope. And I would ask that you would help us to have an ardent zeal for evangelism, to spread the Good News of the Gospel everywhere we possibly can, and to live it out in such a way that others will see Christ in us, the hope of glory. And, Lord, if there be one here today that knows nothing of what it means to truly be born again, to truly have an intimate walk with the living God, because they have been united to him through faith in Christ, I would plead with you that you would break their heart this day. Help them to see their sin for what it is. To acknowledge it, to run to the foot of the cross and to plead for undeserved mercy, that will be granted so rich and so free. Lord, we commit this to you as always, I pray especially for our children and our young people, as they are bombarded with all of the lies of the enemy. I pray that you will protect them and use us as parents, as grandparents, as mentors, as Sunday school teachers, all of us who have influence in their lives, Lord use us to speak truth into their hearts, by the power of your spirit and through Your Word. So Father, we thank you for this time. We love you, we praise You and we long for your soon return. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.

Well, good morning, or whatever time it is, when you're watching this, it's good to be with you via the internet. I am speaking to an empty auditorium, due to a catastrophe that we have had here at the church, due to a break-in. But I'm thankful that we have technology that allows us to continue to proclaim the Word of God. And that's what we want to do this morning. If you will take your Bibles and turn to Daniel chapter two, where we will continue our verse-by-verse exposition of this amazing book. And this morning's sermon is under the heading "Nebuchadnezzar's Dream, God's Outline of World History." And this will be part one of that particular topic. Before we look at it closely, I would like to help you think about some things that will help us really put what we're doing here today in perspective. Today, we are watching the systematic disintegration of our great country. We're watching a government, as well as false religions, do things that are destroying our country. And it's crucial, therefore, for we as Christians, to have a biblical worldview, especially as that might relate to the past, and the present, and the future. And what we have before us here in Daniel, chapter two, as well as subsequent chapters, is a magnificent gift from God, to provide for us an outline of world history, one that was revealed through a dream that God providentially induced to King Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, an event that took place over 2600 years ago. And this is a comprehensive chronology of not only what Jesus called the times of the Gentiles, for example, in Luke 21:24, but it's also a prophetic unveiling of Israel's history stretching from the days of Daniel, which would have been about 600 years before Christ, all the way to the second coming of the Messiah King when God establishes his messianic kingdom; when Christ will reign upon the earth for 1000 years, according to Bible prophecy. A time when we will, even as believers, reign with Him, a kingdom that will ultimately merge into the eternal state of the new heavens and the new earth according to Revelation 19 through chapter 22. That will be a great day when according to Revelation 11:15, "The kingdom of the world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He will reign forever and ever." This will be a time when according to Habakkuk, chapter two and verse 14, "The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." This will be a time as promised, when the Lord Jesus Christ will take his rightful place on the throne of David in a renovated Jerusalem; a time when Israel will no longer fear any of the nations of the earth or indeed, as God has promised through the prophet Isaiah, in Isaiah chapter 11, verse nine, "They will not hurt or destroy in all My holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea."

Now, as we look at our world today, we see woke Marxism as perhaps the greatest internal threat to the United States. And most experts will tell us that the greatest external threat is China. But as believers we can be comforted knowing that we are citizens of another kingdom, and we serve the Lord Jesus Christ, our King. So regardless of what happens here in the United States, we know that ultimately, the Lord is working his plan in us and through us. And even though we are alien people on this earth, even though we are a people that have received a word from another realm, and we worship a God that others do not know; even though we wait for that appointed time when he comes and delivers us from this place, despite all of those things, we know that right now we are a part of this mystical body, the church, the Body of Christ. And even churches like ours that meet together all over the world, the true Church, are nothing more than little outposts of a celestial kingdom that the world cannot comprehend. So, no matter what ill befall us here, in our country, or in the world, we know that there is nothing that Satan and his minions can do to defeat us. For indeed, Christ has promised to build his church. And he says that the gates of Hades will not overpower it. Moreover, though, Satan seeks our ruin, we can be excited to know "that greater is He that is within us than he that is in the world." So dear friends, as we come to the Word of God, we want to be encouraged. And we want to be awestruck by the sovereignty of God, who not only knows the end from the beginning, but has also ordained it for our good and for His glory.

Now, I want to give you some preliminary thoughts here, they're a bit technical, but they're very important for you to understand. The inspired writers of Scripture often used a variety of structural patterns in their writings, in order to provide different ways of adding beauty and vibrancy of various passages and even various books. And we see this for example, in the book of Daniel, it has what we call a chiastic pattern, the word chi comes from the Greek it would be our letter X. And when you think about it, if you look at an X at the top of the two lines, you could put number one and number two, and at the bottom number three, and number four. So in a chiastic pattern, what you see is elements one and four, and in some of the verses will be parallel in thought with elements two and three.

For example, in Matthew chapter seven, in verse six, we read, "Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces. There you have a chiastic pattern. In the first line, the word "dogs" or the concept of dogs is linked to line four, "they will turn and tear you to pieces." Likewise, in the second line, "throw your pearls before swine" is paralleled by a reference to being "trampled under their feet" in line three. Now, this is what we see in the book of Daniel. Daniel chapters two and seven, parallel one another. And there he encourages his exiled Jewish kinsmen by explaining the succession of four Gentile Empires that will dominate Jerusalem and God's covenant people until the Messiah comes and establishes His kingdom. But then in Daniel chapters three and six, we see that they are also linked together. There he warns the Jews of what they must endure during the times of the Gentiles. And there he exhorts them to be faithful, come what may. But then also Daniel, chapters four and five parallel each other, and there he offers exhilarating hope, to the faithful Jewish remnant that one day, every Gentile nation will bow before their Messiah. So, bear this in mind as we approach chapter two, because it will be linked in a chiastic pattern with chapter seven. And together, they explain the succession of four Gentile Empires that will dominate the Jewish people until the Messiah King returns in power and great glory. So with that introduction, let's examine what the Spirit of God has revealed through His inspired writer Daniel, and also make some applications along the way.

So, notice in Daniel chapter two, verse one, "Now in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar," let me pause here. This is a reference to the second official year of his reign, which did not include his, what was called the ascension year, or the first year of his reign, according to the Babylonian method of dating the reigns of kings. So this would have been the second year of his official reign, but the third year of the prescribed training for Daniel and his three friends, so, Daniel two probably took place about three years after the events of Daniel one, verses one through 16.

So, again, "Now, in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar had dreams; and his spirit was troubled," literally in the original language, his spirit smote itself, fascinating thought, "and his sleep left him." So he sees something that is very alarming, that awakens him from his sleep, and he's in a deep state of agitation. Verse two, "Then the king gave orders to call in the magicians, the conjurers, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans to tell the king his dreams. So they came in and stood before the king." Now, it's hard to know the unique distinctions of these classes of wise men. Because as we look at Daniel, we see that he uses a total of six different terms to describe the scholars and the priests and the sorcerers that advise the king. And certainly we know that all of their activities were demonic and strongly condemned in scripture. But we have a little hint as we look at some of the background, and some of the words that are used. The word "magicians" comes from a Hebrew, a Hebrew root meaning stylus, or graving tool. And so this would indicate that this would be a religious scribe who wrote with a stylus on clay tablets on the cuneiform. They would meticulously chronicle the movements of the stars to determine their future. You must understand that astrology and omens played a big role in their religion, especially in understanding what the gods were going to do in the future. And we see the same term used to describe the teaching priests of Egypt in Genesis 41 and verse eight. And certainly these magicians were in touch with the spirits and with the gods, at least the assumption was that that was the case. And they were also skilled with hepatoscopy, which is the art, the religious art of divination by inspecting the liver of animals. We read about this, for example, in Ezekiel 21 in verse 21. And then there also the conjurers, the Hebrew ashshaph. This may even refer to snake charmers, as the term is sometimes used, but also those who practice sorcery through enchantments. They were also necromancers. In other words, they communicated with the spirits of the dead.

And then he uses the term sorcerers. And these would be people we know that would cut herbs for charms and spells, and they would cast magical spells upon people by harnessing evil spirits to get them to do unnatural things in the world. And then he also uses the term Chaldeans. And what's interesting, in the book of Daniel, that term is used two different ways. First of all, it is used as an ethnic description of people who had migrated from or migrated into Babylonia. For example, Nebuchadnezzar himself and his father, his people, were Chaldeans. But it's also a reference to a class of priests and wise men that were skilled in astrology and sorcery. So, the Chaldeans, the term Chaldeans is a bit of a catch all term for these ancient wise men. Well, bottom line, these were the trusted counselors of Nebuchadnezzar, the man that he summoned to interpret his disturbing dream. And all these terms could basically be used interchangeably. They were all demon possessed, demon influenced, pagan idolaters, like most all of the people who give council to kings and queens and presidents even to this day. However, I want you to understand that although they were demonic, and although they were constantly participating in all of these cultish things, they were also brilliant. We know that Babylonian astronomers kept meticulous records of the movements of the stars and the planets and even comets because they wanted to know the will of the gods. And we know from history that in 500 BC, the Babylonian astronomer, Naburimanuu, used records dating back to 747 BC, to calculate the length of the year at 365 days, six hours, 15 minutes and 41 seconds, and he was only off, scientists tell us, by 26 minutes and 55 seconds. Another historian Martin Beek said this, quote, "A later Babylonian astronomer, Kidinnu, in 390 BC, made some measurements even more accurate than were known in the 19th century AD. He knew the difference between the sidereal year, that is the apparent period of revolution of the sun, from the time it occupies a certain position in relation to a fixed star until it returns to that position, and the tropical year, which is the time elapsing between two successive transits of the earth through the first point of Aries. From this, he discovered precession, which is the motion of the equinoxes on the ecliptic, in a westward direction, that is opposite to the sequence of the signs of the zodiac. Furthermore," Baek says, "he was able to predict solar and lunar eclipses accurately," end quote. So you get some idea of who these guys were. Yes, they were demonic in many ways, but they were also brilliant. And although Nebuchadnezzar's advisors were spiritually dead, they had great wisdom in other areas of sciences. And this, frankly, helps confirm the fact that the wisdom of the world and the supposed revelation from God apart from the one true God is not only worthless when it comes to spiritual matters, but it's also very deceptive. And many people today believe in the wisdom of man. They believe that man has the ability to solve all of the problems of the world. And only a fool could really say that, because as we look at the world today, despite all of the scientific discoveries, we see that it is as wicked today as it is ever been. It reminds me of what Paul said in First Corinthians one beginning in verse 18, "For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. For it is written, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the cleverness of the clever I will set aside.'" He went on to say, "Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? As not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For indeed, Jews ask for signs and Greek search for wisdom; But we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God."

So back to the story here. The king calls all these wise men together and Daniel in his companions, as we see, are not among them. That was probably because they were, they were still young, they were inexperienced. They were, they were Hebrews that had been exiled and they weren't part of the old guard of Babylonian wise men. And so the king said to them in verse three, "'I had a dream, and my spirit is anxious to understand the dream.' Then the Chaldeans spoke to the king in Aramaic." And this is significant, by the way, because from here on through chapter seven, Daniel writes in Aramaic rather than Hebrew and here's what the Chaldeans said, "'O king, live forever! Tell the dream to your servants, and we will declare the interpretation.'" Said differently, we will invent some cockamamie, ridiculous but impressive, dignified, sanctimonious sounding explanation. Now, what's interesting is there are extant, in other words, still existing manuals today that we can read. For example, there are what's called the Akkadian manuals that reveal various factors that these ancient wise men would use to properly diagnose a dream, if you will, and then render a proper interpretation. And depending upon the nature and the elements of the dream, they would apply certain rules for its interpretation. Frankly, this is not much different than a lot of the psychobabble of our day; that psychological jargon that you hear from time to time, kind of an esoteric language designed to impress the naive and the ignorant into believing a person has some deeper, more scientific grasp of the truth. This is especially prevalent in Freudian psychoanalytic theory and dream interpretation prevalent in the pseudo-scientific field of psychology.

Well, notice verse five, "The king replied to the Chaldeans, 'The command from me is firm; f you do not make known to me the dream and its interpretation, you will be torn limb from limb and your houses will be made a rubbish heap.'" A terrifying statement. And this was typical of ancient Middle East despots. They were notorious for this kind of cruelty, including the hideous execution of dismembering a human being while they were still alive. Verse six, he went on to say, "'But if you declare the dream, and its interpretation, you will receive from me gifts and a reward and great honor; therefore declare to me the dream and its interpretation.'" Now, I can only imagine in my mind, the horror on the faces of those wise men. And frankly, it's a bit comical. You see, Nebuchadnezzar is a fairly young man at this point. And he has inherited these old wise men from his father's reign. And it's obvious as we go on and read the text, that he did not trust them, he did not respect them. He doubted their supernatural abilities, just like most people scoff at the prosperity, hucksters of our day, that we see on television all the time. So it appears that he wanted to get rid of them, and perhaps bring in his own advisors. So what does he do? He gives them a task that he knows is impossible, unless they truly have a direct line from the gods. So he's probably wanting to prove them to be the demonic frauds that they really were. And I also have to laugh. Both the king and his advisors now we're servants of Satan, even though perhaps unwittingly so, but Satan doesn't really care who lives or who dies. And even today, just watch how quickly depraved politicians will turn on their own if they know that somehow by doing so they can advance their own agenda. The wicked always eat their own, and that's what we see going on here.

So again, the king wanted to make sure that they told him the dream, that they had some supernatural revelation. And he was suspect of the clever sounding claptrap that he was used to hearing from these guys. So he's saying, you tell me the dream, before you tell me the interpretation. And obviously, the wise men knew they were they were dead meat, as we would say, there's no way they could do this. Verse seven, "They answered a second time and said, 'Let the king tell the dream to his servants, and we will declare the interpretation.' The king replied, 'I know for certain that you are bargaining for time inasmuch as you have seen that the command for me is firm, that if you do not make the dream known to me, there is only one decree for you. For you have agreed together to speak lying and corrupt words before me until the situation has changed; therefore, tell me the dream that I may know that you can declare to me it's interpretations.' The Chaldeans answered the king and said, 'There is not a man on earth who could declare the matter for the king, inasmuch as no great king or ruler has ever asked anything like this of any magician, conjurer, or Chaldean. Moreover, the thing which the king demands is difficult, and there is no one else who could declare it to the king, except gods, whose dwelling place is not with mortal flesh.'" And of course, that's precisely what God wanted them to say. You see, this is a divine setup, if you will, so that God could prove himself supreme, prove himself powerful as the only one and true God.

Verse 12, "Because of this the king became indignant and very furious and gave orders to destroy all the wise men of Babylon. So, the decree went forth that the wise men should be slain; and they looked for Daniel and his friends to kill them." They probably went back to the dorm where they were living together, to find them and kill them along with all of the rest. So, what we have here is God exposing these frauds, as well as the phony gods they serve while at the same time preparing to exalt himself through his servant Daniel. Notice verse 14, "Then Daniel replied with discretion and discernment, to Arioch, the captain of the king's bodyguard who had gone forth to slay the wise men of Babylon." I want you to notice "he replies with discretion and discernment." Not with fear, not with panic, not with anger. Verse 15, "He said to Arioch, the Kings commander, 'For what reason is the decree from the king so urgent?' Then Arioch, informed Daniel about the matter." Let's stop and think about this. How would you feel if a government agent came to you and said that you were under arrest for a crime that you had not committed, and that you are going to be subject to a barbaric act of cruelty through, dismemberment. Now, obviously, in our flesh, there's going to be panic, we're going to be overwhelmed, there's going to be disbelief, there's going to be a pleading for mercy. But for those ruled by the Spirit, there's going to be something else that prevails, something that comes deep from within that person's character. There will be a quiet calm, as we see here with Daniel. There will be a reply that's wise, there will be a sense of confident assurance, because that person, like Daniel, will know that God is up to something, and that I can trust him, no matter what comes my way, whether I'm allowed to live or die. And Daniel's response, dear friends, is the result of a young man who had a secret devotion to God, a young man that was committed to a life of faithful obedience to his Lord, a man who had experienced how God had blessed him, even in the past, even though he was still a young man, probably about the age of 18. Right? At this point. You see, his was not a blind faith, but a proven faith.

I'm reminded of what the psalmist said in Psalm 55, verse 22, "Cast your burden upon the Lord, and He will sustain you." No doubt Daniel remembered this, or certainly the concept. That text goes on to say "He will never allow the righteous to be shaken. But you O, God will bring them down to the pit of destruction; Men of bloodshed and deceit will not live out half their days, but I will trust in you." Oh, dear friend, please hear me. Now is the time to prepare for battle, not when the enemy attacks, not when the executioner comes, learn well what it is to wear the full armor of God, that you may stand firm in the hour of conflict and be able to withstand the schemes of the devil. Your response in the moment of crisis will reveal the preparation of your heart and the intimacy of your walk with Christ. And for this reason, you will recall Jesus commanded his disciples in the garden in Matthew 26:41, "'Keep watching and praying.'" In other words, be vigilant in the power of the Spirit, "'that you may not enter into temptation, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.'"

Well, Daniel understood these concepts even at the young age of 18. So he responds to this terrifying news with remarkable calm and wisdom and confidence. Notice verse 16, what happens next, "So Daniel went in and requested of the king that he would give him time, in order that he might declare the interpretation to the king." My goodness, talk about faith, Daniel had no idea what the king had dreamed, much less the interpretation. And at this point, Daniel had no idea that God would reveal any of these things to him, but he trusted him to do so, he knew he could do so. And so he stepped out in faith, goes before the king, and says, give me some time that I might declare the interpretation to the king. Verse 17, "Then Daniel went to his house and informed his friends, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, about the matter, so that they might request compassion from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that Daniel and his friends would not be destroyed with the rest of the wise men of Babylon." I find it interesting, the phrase here, "the God of heaven," literally, "the God of the heavens." This is such a stark contrast to the Babylonians who worshipped the heavenly luminaries, rather than the one who created them and sustains them.

Notice what Daniel and his three friends did now. They go to prayer, they go before the Lord their God in a time of need, would that we all be so inclined, when great difficulties come our way. They didn't panic, they prayed. They knew that God was up to something in their life, they didn't know what it was. And they also knew that they could do nothing apart from Him. And so they go before the Lord in prayer. I'm sure this was a a common practice of those young men. This wasn't something new. In fact, think of what they had to endure over the previous three years with all of this training from wicked people who hate the God that they love. Think of the pressure that they had to conform to, all of the pagan values and all of the pagan ways. It reminds me of many times when I've heard parents lament over what has happened to a child after they had gone away to a college and a university, and they come back brainwashed. It's like suddenly, they're in the cult of wokeism. And within a few months, they become a card-carrying Neo Marxist liberal who hates Christianity. Imagine having three years of this type of brainwashing, imagine what they must have gone through and how they must have felt. But here we see that these young men remained faithful to the Lord. How could they possibly do that? Dear friends, the key to staying faithful is to know the truth, to meditate upon the truth, and to stay faithful to the truth, to know who God is, and to stay faithful in worshiping and serving Him and communing with him. And you will never survive the great trials of life unless you maintain a disciplined personal and private pursuit of holiness. You simply must have a secret devotion to the lover of your soul, or you will never survive. And that's what we see going on here. And what an amazing scene. Can't you just picture these four young teenage men on their faces before God pleading for his mercy, in faith believing? And I'm sure Daniel and Hananiah and Mishael and Azariah had calluses on their knees from extended periods of prayer.

And I must pause for a moment and say how thrilled I am and the elders are and others in the church, to see so many young people, both men, young men and young women coming together in prayer and Bible study, young men and women, dedicated to personal piety and a devotion to Christ. It's thrilling to see them coming together the way the way they are, and what a harvest of blessing this is going to produce in their lives and in the life of their church.

Now, notice how God answered their prayer in verse 19. "Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a night vision." Folks, you've got to stop here and put yourself in that young man's body, and in his mind, and in his heart, to whatever degree you can. This is absolutely, utterly astounding. Not only does God speak to him, but he also gives him a supernatural, shall we say, power point presentation, in 3d and color. And I think, what must have gone through his mind? This is overwhelming. Notice what Daniel does, "Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven," verse 20, We read more of what he said and what he thought, “Daniel said, 'Let the name of God be blessed forever, and ever.'" So fascinating that he begins here, "Let the name of God be blessed forever and ever." Now, as we are going to see later, in his interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar's dream, the Messiah is going to one day return as Israel's conquering king and put an end to the Gentile domination that will ultimately reach its zenith during the reign of the Antichrist. And then at the Battle of Armageddon, he is going to be destroyed. And it's interesting, why God is going to do all of this. In Ezekiel 39, beginning in verse seven, God tells us There we read, "'My holy name, I will make known in the midst of My people, Israel; and I will not let My holy name be profaned anymore. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel.'" No wonder Daniel would say, "Let the name of God be blessed forever and ever." He's just been reminded of what is going to happen.

We go back to Ezekiel 39, beginning in verse 25, we read this, "Therefore thus says the Lord God, 'Now I will restore the fortunes of Jacob and have mercy on the whole house of Israel; and I will be jealous for My holy name. They will forget their disgrace and all their treachery which they perpetrated against Me, when they live securely on their own land with no one to make them afraid. When I bring them back from the peoples and gather them from the lands of their enemies, then I shall be sanctified through them in the sight of the many nations. Then they will know that I am the LORD their God, because I made them go into exile among the nations, and then gathered them again to their own land; and I will leave none of them there any longer, I will not hide my face from them any longer, for I will have poured out my Spirit on the house of Israel,' declares the Lord GOD." So indeed, Daniel begins his praise by saying, "Let the name of God be blessed forever and ever."

May I dwell upon this just a little bit more; think of the importance of the name of God and why we should therefore never use it in vain. Remember, when Moses asked God on the mountain, "'What shall I tell the people when they ask what is your name?'" In Exodus three, in verse 14," God said to Moses, 'I am who I am.' And He said, 'Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, I AM has sent me to you.'" In other words, he's saying, I am the self-existent, preexistent, eternal one, who always has been, always is and always will be. I am the self-existent, preexisting, uncreated Creator of the universe. You will recall in John 8:58, Jesus told the unbelieving Jews, "'Before Abraham was born, I am.'" And there again he refers to himself in the present continuous tense. Why? Because he has always and will always exist. So this is a title indicating his self-existence. There has never been a time when he did not exist. So beloved, inherent in the name of God, is the summation of all of his glorious attributes. Daniel understood that the thrice Holy God, the Sovereign Lord of Glory, is in full control of all of his creation, and deserves to be worshipped, deserves to be obeyed. For indeed he is the one, the great I AM, who is returning again someday, so that the nations will know that He is the Lord, the Holy One of Israel. I must ask you, does your life exalt the name of God? Or diminish it? Do people say of you, "my there goes a man or a woman whose life is dedicated to Christ, and truly brings glory to his name?" Or would they think my, I'm sure God is ashamed of that individual who claims to serve Him? Remember this, you're a Christian because of Christ's atoning work on the cross. "For our sins," Paul said, "God highly exalted Him," Philippians two, "and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow, of those who are in, in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." I think about this, if Daniel could bless the name of God, with his limited understanding of all that he would do in his work of redemption, through His Son, our Savior, his Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, how much more should we do in bringing glory to him knowing all that he has done as we look back upon his atoning work.

So again, in verse 20, Daniel says, "'Let the name of God be blessed forever and ever, For wisdom and power belong to Him. It is he who changes the times and the epochs.'" In other words, he's saying, God is the one who controls all of the events of history, either actively or permissively. As Paul said, in Ephesians, 1:11, "He works all things after the counsel of His will." Daniel goes on to say "He removes kings, and establishes kings." And as God's vision reveals to him, he is ultimately the one who is in control of our elections. He knows who he wants in there, not just in our country, but all over the world because he has a plan to bring glory to himself.

Daniel also says, "'He gives wisdom to wise men and knowledge to men of understanding,'" verse 22, "'It is He who reveals the profound and hidden things; He knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with Him.'" Think of these dear friends, he alone is the one that can dispel the darkness, of those unsearchable and hidden things of God that we cannot see. And he does this through the power of his Spirit, as he has revealed himself in the word of God. Verse 23, "'To you, O God of my father's, I give thanks, and praise, for you have given me wisdom and power; even now You have made known to me what we requested of You, for You have made known to us the king's matter.'"

Beloved, please hear this. God is highly exalted and greatly pleased when his children praise Him. May this be the dominating trait of our conduct. May this be the theme of our song, the ultimate goal of all that we do and say. Back to verse 24, "Therefore, Daniel went in to Arioch, whom the king had appointed to destroy the wise men of Babylon; he went in and spoke to him as follows: 'Do not destroy the wise men of Babylon! Take me into the king's presence, and I will declare the interpretation to the king.'" Let's pause here for a moment. This is truly remarkable when you think about it because Daniel had the perfect opportunity to say, Arioch, here's what I would like you to tell the king, I can help him with the dream but he needs to destroy all of those phony advisors, needs to get rid of these characters. They know nothing, but I have the answers from the one true God. So we have this chance to destroy these, these corrupt religionists that had done such great damage to God's people, and brought such reproach upon God. But he doesn't do this. Why? The answer is because it wasn't God's time to judge them. As Daniel understood from the interpretation that God had given them concerning the dream, Dr. John Whitcomb said this quote, "Daniel was not a prophet in the Holy Land of Israel, where God's infinite standards of religious truth, established at Mount Sinai, were unique among all the nations of the earth. If Daniel were to accomplish the ideal mission of a prophet of God and Israel, then all Babylonians and subject peoples throughout the empire would be forced to comply with the law of Moses or perish. But this cannot happen. Until the dawn of the kingdom age when Christ rules the world with a quote, 'rod of iron,' Isaiah 11:4. Daniel was aware of this vastly important distinction. And therefore, as we must also during this age of the church, allowed God to determine the times and seasons of grace and judgment. The stone would fall in the latter days of the fourth kingdom, not the first, according to Daniel 2:44, and 45."

So Arioch, the king's executioner, here's Daniel's request, "'Do not destroy the wise men of Babylon! Take me into the king's presence, and I will declare the interpretation to the king. Then Arioch hurriedly brought Daniel into the king's presence and spoke to him as follows: 'I have found a man among the exiles from Judah, who can make the interpretation known to the king!' The king said to Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, 'Are you able to make known to me the dream which I have seen, and its interpretation?' Daniel answered before the king and said, 'As for the mystery about which the king has inquired, neither wise men, conjurers, magicians nor diviners are able to declare it to the king. However, there is a God in heaven, who reveals mysteries, and He has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar, what will take place in the latter years. This was your dream, and the visions in your mind while on your bed.'"

And this is where we will pick it up next week. But in closing, may I challenge you with just a few principles, that hopefully you will see and apply to your life. Number one, dear friends, the word of God is filled with priceless treasures, learn to search for them diligently. And when, by God's grace through His Spirit, you unearth them, all other claims of special revelation, apart from Scripture, will be rejected as worthless and deceptive counterfeits. Secondly, now is the time to prepare for battle, not when the enemy attacks, learn what it is to put on the full armor of God. Learn how to skillfully wield the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God so that you can effectively parry the blows of the enemy that is trying to tempt you, to destroy you and to destroy your family, and learn what it is to have a disciplined habit of prayer, where you commune with the lover of your soul. Thirdly, be a student of the attributes of God. Be a student of the attributes of God, here's why, because your knowledge of him is directly proportional to your faith in him. Ignorant Christians are frightened Christians, shallow Christians are weak Christians, easily defeated, easily deceived. And then finally, let your praises to Him vastly exceed your petitions of him. In other words, spend more time praising him for all he has done, is doing and will do than petitioning his help. And if this is your attitude, like Daniel, you will be able to say bless it be the name of God forever and ever for wisdom and might are his.

Let's pray together. Father, thank you for these glorious and eternal truths that reveal so much to us. It's absolutely overwhelming. We rejoice knowing that you are the sovereign ruler of all that you have created. And we praise you for the fact that you have, in your infinite love, condescended to our lowly estate and you have saved us by your grace. I pray that you will use each one of us as instruments of righteousness to bring glory to your name, that others might see Christ in us the hope of glory, that they too, might come to faith in the only one who can save and sanctify. Lord, thank you for this time we could have together we pray that great blessings will result from what we have learned and what we apply for. It's in Christ's name that I pray. Amen.

I would invite you to take your Bibles and turn to the book of Daniel in the Old Testament, chapter one. This morning, we will continue our study by looking at verses three through 21. And before we look at the text, I would simply ask you to focus as much on Daniel's piety as you do his prophecy. Even at the age of 15, we see an unwavering love and devotion to God. Traits seldom seen in adults, much less in young teenagers. And frankly, it's with great sorrow that I at times, watch some of our own, some of our own young people grow up in the church, but as you watch them, you see that they have no real desire to honor God in their lives. They have no real love for God, no fear of God, no desire to fellowship with God's people, no real hunger for his word. They prefer ungodly people, and the lure of the world is so powerful to their flesh that little by little they begin to adopt all of the ways of the world. You see it in their life. They adopt the world's values, their lifestyle, their dress, their entertainment, their perverted theologies and ideologies. They disregard Paul's warning in Romans chapter 12 and verse two, where he said, "Do not be conformed to the world." My great fear for them is summarized in first John two and verse 15, where we read, "Do not love the world, nor the things in the world, If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him." And eventually, for all of the people who love the world more than they love the Lord, you see that they are finally given over to the consequences of their iniquities. Their sins begin to develop their character in such a way as to define who they really are. And God gives them over to a depraved mind. And little by little, they believe the lies of the world, and they do things that are unimaginably wicked. We see this all the time. Because sin is a state or a disposition of the sou,l an intrinsic part of the very essence of man, we see it manifested in ungodliness. And that is the great danger. People that have no love of God and no fear of God. As Solomon said in Ecclesiastes nine and verse three, "The hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives." And certainly we are seeing this lived out, in our culture. Ungodliness, frankly, is the outworking of human depravity. We read about this, for example, in Jude beginning of verse 14, "It was," he says "about these men that Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied, saying, "Behold, the Lord came with many 1000s of His holy ones, to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him." And frankly, dear friends, ungodliness is the root cause of all of the economic and social problems that we see in the United States. Not capitalism, not conservatism, not systemic racism, or any of the other manufactured leftist boogieman that you see. The root cause is ungodliness. People that do not love God and do not fear him. And the consequences of ungodliness is divine judgment. For example, in Psalm 34, verse 16, we read, "The face of the Lord is against evildoers, to cut off the memory of them from the earth." And then Psalm 32, verse 10, "Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but he who trusts in the Lord, lovingkindness shall surround him." And as we study the book of Daniel, we see how lovingkindness surrounded him, as well as others in the book that he describes, especially his three companions. And how refreshing it is, to see a young man and other young men of about 15 years of age, demonstrating godly character and godly conduct. Living a life that epitomizes what the psalmist calls, "a tree firmly planted." It's for this reason that I've entitled my discourse, "A Tree Firmly Planted." And God blessed Daniel, for this. We read about the firmly planted tree in Psalm one, a familiar passage. There we read, "How blessed is the man," literally how happy "is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord," referring to the Scriptures. "And in His law, he meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers." And this, dear friends, is what we will see in the life of Daniel and his three colleagues.

Now, let me remind you of the context once again, Israel, the northern kingdom of Israel has already been taken over, now the southern kingdom of Judah has been taken over by the Babylonians they have sunk so low in the rebellion against God and in their idolatry, that finally God judged them. Isaiah tells us in chapter one, verse four, "Alas, sinful nation, people weighed down with iniquity, offspring of evil doers, sons who act corruptly! They have abandoned the Lord, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, and turned away from Him." And indeed, they embraced hideous forms of idolatry that they picked up from the pagans living around them. By the way, I might add that after their Babylonian captivity, the Jews never again turned to idolatry, which is an interesting thought. But I must also add that the cancer of covetousness deceived them into believing that they could ignore God's law regarding the sabbatic year. So for 490 years, they ignored him. They believe that by tilling the ground every year, rather than allowing the seventh year for the ground to lie fallow, that they would somehow be more prosperous. Their mantra was the mantra of every fool, which is basically my way is better than God's way. And because God's judgment is not always immediate, they thought they could get away with it. No big deal. God is not watching. But God was watching and he was keeping a perfect record. And it was time now to square the account. And so he sends in the Babylonians to conquer them, and take them into captivity for 70 years, allowing the land to finally keep the Sabbath one year for every seventh year, they violated his command over the course of 490 years. Now, the last time we were together, we looked at the reason for God's judgment on Judah, and the prophetic significance and symbolism of Babylon. I hope you are grasping these things because these are foundational to understanding this book, and many other passages of scripture. But today, we want to look closer at the historical narrative and the remainder of chapter one and we want to do this under three headings. Very simply, we want to look at God's providential appointments. Secondly, Daniel's unwavering devotion to God and then finally, God's blessings upon faithful servants.

Now, something important to bear in mind here because I want to make this very relevant to where we live here in our day. Please know that the historical narrative that we are about to examine took place during the reign of one of the most brilliant, wealthy, and mighty leaders in the history of the world. Nebuchadnezzar was a brilliant man. But he could not see what was happening right under his nose. Ultimately, he was merely a pawn on God's chessboard. And he didn't realize it. He had no idea that because of his pride, he would soon lose his mind and eat grass with the cattle and live among the beasts for seven years. He had no idea that within the span of about 60 years, Babylon would fall to Darius the Mede. But God had a plan and he was working it precisely. Now, likewise, the United States of America is a fabulously wealthy country. But we are covetous beyond measure. We believe that our military is invincible. And we have leaders who are every bit as narcissistic as Nebuchadnezzar were only they're not even a fraction as brilliant as he was. And what most Americans cannot see is that God has abandoned this country to the consequences of their own rebellion. They cannot see that our leaders live in a fool's paradise. They cannot see that the that the ideologies and policies of our politicians, especially that of liberal Democrats, are destroying our nation. In fact, historically, what we see is that theological and political liberalism destroys everything that it touches. It is to the church what cancer is to the body. It is to a country what toxic waste or radioactive waste is to the environment. And today we see the overall mood in America gradually disintegrating. I was reading in the daily wire that the Washington Examiner reports that the number of illegal alien apprehensions at the United States Mexico border climbed again in June, bringing the US close to 1 million illegal immigrant encounters since the beginning of 2021. Can you imagine that,1 million? it went on to say the US border officials are expected to reveal soon that they encountered nearly 190,000 illegal immigrants in June, a 450% explosion over last June. And the latest sign the President Joe Biden's open-door policy has completely redrawn migration patterns. Now obviously, the priority of our government is open borders and globalism, and to get more votes. It has nothing to do with caring for the people and protecting the people. Because so many of these people are coming into our country and they're spreading COVID all over the country. And yet they're demanding that we get vaccinated, that we wear masks, and that we shut down the economy and that we have to do all of these other things. A recent Gallup survey found that a whopping 42% of all Americans anticipate that societal disruptions related to COVID 19 will continue to be around beyond the beginning of the new year. And according to an ABC News Ipsos poll, we see that Americans optimism about the direction of the country has plummeted nearly 20 points. 55% of the public say they are pessimistic about the direction of the country, a marked change from the roughly 1/3 or 36%. That said, the same in an ABC News Ipsos poll published May 2. Folks that is a 19% shift in just three months. It gets worse since last September, a moratorium that was issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that had been protecting millions of renters who were unable or unwilling to pay their monthly rent. That moratorium is now officially over. And all of that back rent is due. For some renters that will mean that nearly a full year of rent now needs to be paid. And the millions of Americans that cannot, or will not pay this, will now be subject to eviction. And I think of the poor landlords who have lost who knows how much? Well, I want to give you the bad news so that you appreciate the good news. And that is our God's still reigns. He's working his plan perfectly just like he did when Israel was in exile. And even as he carefully placed his choice servants in the courts, in the cities, in the villages of the satanic kingdom of Babylon, he continues to do the same thing today. And I pray that we will all be exhilarated knowing that somehow we are a part of that plan. Each and every one of us. He has promised to build his church and he uses each of us to do that. There is nothing that man nor demon can do to thwart the purposes of God. And I must say that I pray constantly, for God to raise up the next Joseph, or the next Daniel, or the next Hannah, or Naomi or Ruth or Esther out of Calvary Bible Church. And I believe he is and will.

So first, I want us to look at this whole concept of God's providential appointments. Beginning in Daniel one in verse three, "Then the king ordered Ashpenaz, the chief of his officials, to bring in some of the sons of Israel, including some of the royal family and of the nobles, youths in whom was no defect." In other words, they were without physical handicap, "who were good- looking, showing intelligence and every branch of wisdom, endowed with understanding and discerning knowledge." The idea of wisdom here in the original language carries the idea of the ability to make wise decisions. And it also says "they were endowed with understanding and discerning knowledge," literally, they were knowers of knowledge, in the original, knowers of knowledge, which would have included things like science and math and language and history and so forth. And obviously, Nebuchadnezzar placed a high premium on superior intellect. And he says, "who had ability for serving in the king's court." This is a reference to young men who had a pleasing personality, they were engaging in their interpersonal style of relating, he had polished manners, noble etiquette, and so forth. You know, many times people with a high IQ have the personality of a two-toed sloth, you know, and the manners of Tarzan of the Apes, so you can't have that, okay, not in the king's court. And he says, "he ordered him," referring to Ashpenaz, "to teach them the literature and language of the Chaldeans." So imagine now you're about 14, 15 years old, you've been taken into a foreign country, a pagan country, and you don't know their language, and you've got to learn all of this. Now, their literature, by the way, that Daniel and the others had to learn was extensive. In fact, in that day, their literature dated about 1400 years back, we know, all the way to the days of Abraham. So this was a highly educated group of people in that day. And by the way, much of their literature is still extant, meaning it still exists. Thousands of clay tablets from this period have been found. They were written, by the way, through the use of a wooden stylus to make wedge shaped characters on clay. Cuneiform, it was called cuneiform. And I've seen this for example, in the British Museum, you see a lot of this and they would make these little characters on the clay and then they would bake the clay and preserve the impressions.

Now, from Nebuchadnezzar perspective, this was a very wise move, to hold hostage, these noble sons of Israel, and there were more than just Daniel and his three friends. There were many others. This was very important because this would help keep the Judean royalty in line, but it would also help him know how to govern this very peculiar people. However, it was also very important from God's perspective. God had providentially appointed these teenage men to be in Nebuchadnezzar's court, to learn how these people functioned, and how they could help preserve God's covenant people. But this was also important for Daniel to know how to navigate the treacherous political and religious waters of those pagan people. So these are truly providential appointments. This didn't just happen. God is at work.

But now, the plot thickens as they say, verse five; "The king appointed for them a daily ration from the king's, choice food, and from the wine which he drank, and appointed that they should be educated three years, at the end of which they were to enter the king's personal service. Now among them from the sons of Judah were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah. Then the commander of the officials assigned new names to them. And to Daniel he assigned the name Belteshazzar, to Hananiah Shadrach, to Mishael Meshach and to Azariah Abed-Nego." Now, Daniel, meant, in Hebrew, "God is my judge." And Belteshazzar, his new Babylonian name meant, "lady protect the king." Hananiah meant, "Yahweh is gracious." Shadrach means, "I am fearful of God." Mishael meant, "who is like God," and Meshach meant, "I am of little account." And Azariah meant, "Yahweh has helped, " and Abed-Nego simply meant, "servant of Nebo," one of their pagan gods. Now as we will see, these young men came from godly homes, which made them hate all the more that ungodliness that they saw all around them. And by the way, godliness will always be repulsed by ungodliness. And you see that in their lives. Notice verse eight, "But Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the king's choice food, or with the wine which he drank; so he sought permission from the commander of the officials that he might not defile himself." And here we come to the second point in this little outline.

Here we see Daniel's unwavering devotion to God. Now, some people might say, well, you know what, he was wrong to defy the authority that God had placed over him. But what you must understand is, Daniel knew that God's law was infinitely higher than man's law; they feared God more than man. A truth by the way that we would all do well to remember. You will recall in Acts five, when the apostles were thrown into prison, after violating the command to stop preaching the gospel in the temple, you will remember that story, an angel of the Lord came and open up the gates of the prison. We read in verse 20, of Acts five, he says, "'Go your way stand and speak to the people in the temple with the whole message of this Life.'" And so they did that. And then lo and behold, they get arrested again, and in verse 27, we read, "When they had brought them, they stood before they stood them before the Council. The high priest questioned them saying, 'We gave you strict orders not to continue teaching in this name, and yet, you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and intend to bring this man's blood upon us.' But Peter, and the apostles answered, 'We must obey God rather than men.'" That was Daniel's attitude, that must be ours as well.

Now, why was it important for Daniel to defy the king's orders? Well, let me give you two reasons, two primary reasons. First of all, some of the meat was considered unclean according to the dietary restrictions of the Mosaic law. You can read about this for example, in Leviticus chapter 11. You will remember that those dietary restrictions were given to the covenant people under the old covenant to keep them separate from their idolatrous neighbors. And I might add as a footnote, with the coming of the new covenant and the calling of the church, God ended those dietary restrictions. You will recall in Mark seven, verse 19, Jesus said, "'Whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him, because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach and is eliminated (Thus he declared all foods clean)." God also made this clear in Peter's vision, you remember the great sheet that came down from heaven filled with all kinds of animals and Acts 10. And God commanded him to rise, kill and eat those things which had previously been considered unclean. But no such provision existed during the time of Daniel under the Old Covenant.

Another reason why Daniel felt that the meat and the wine would defile them was because they knew that they had first been offered to Babylonian gods, and to eat would be tantamount to recognizing the legitimacy of those gods. And they weren't going to have any part of that. Moreover, the pagans believed, and they knew this, that eating the meat that had been dedicated to their gods would, would curry favor from those gods. And I'm sure both of those were considerations that Nebuchadnezzar had in mind. So think about it, we get these young Jewish men, let's give them good Babylonian names and get them to recognize and obey and benefit from their new gods by giving them the food and the wine that had been given to the gods and so forth. And I might add, that this is always how Satan works, isn't it? You know, force Christians to forsake the one true God in exchange for idols, and then get them to not only tolerate pagan lies, but celebrate them. And of course, he uses secular government and false religions to accomplish these purposes. I mean, I think of all of this "celebrate pride" stuff that we see and "celebrate trans;" and someone was telling me the other day they took their, their young child to the doctor and the doctor, or the I guess the nurse, first ask the child, you know, what's your name? And the second question was, what is your preferred pronoun? It's insane. And now you get in trouble if you misgender someone, if you call a biological male who thinks he's a female, a male, a "he," then you're canceled and all of that type of thing? Well, the point is, the Babylonians had their own way of forcing people to assimilate into their pagan culture. They wanted them to adopt a Babylonian name and eat the foods offered, and the wine offered to their gods, and eventually even to bow before their gods.

So Daniel and his three closest companions knew that the king's order was a way of testing their fidelity to Yahweh, or to Nebuchadnezzar and his gods. Daniel also knew that it was because of Israel's idolatry, that they were in this mess in the first place. So not going to have anything to do with that. And here we see, as I say, "a tree firmly planted by the streams of water." In other words, the nourishing water of godliness that results in spirit empowerment. And undoubtedly, he learned that from a godly family in which he grew up so he was a tree, you might say, which yields his fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither. And in whatever he does, he prospers. Would that we all, manifest such an unwavering devotion to God. And unlike so many young people today, Daniel and his three friends would not bow to the ungodly culture. They loved God, and they feared God, and they would not conform to the world. They would not defile their conscience. And I would challenge all of you young people in particular, do not yield to the pressures of the culture. Do not get near the slippery slope of all of the world's enticements that are so appealing to your flesh. Because what will gradually happen is your love for God, if it was ever there in the first place, will begin to wane. Your love for His Word will gradually disappear. Your love for His people will gradually disappear. Your love for his ways will gradually disappear. And you will become like the world and it will destroy you.

Now I want you to notice the spiritual integrity and the Spirit empowered wisdom of young Daniel, not to mention the providence of God who works all things according to the counsel of his will. Notice verse nine, "Now God granted Daniel favor and compassion in the sight of the commander of the officials and the commander of the official said to Daniel, 'I'm afraid of my lord, the king, who has appointed your food and your drink; for why should he see your faces looking more haggard than the youth who are your own age? Then you would make me forfeit my head to the king?'" In other words, you're asking me to defy the king, and if he sees that you're not developing the way you should, he'll probably take my head off. But verse 11, "Daniel said to the overseer whom the commander of the officials had appointed over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, ‘Please test your servants for 10 days.'" Well, that's remarkable wisdom, isn't it for a 15-year-old? That's divine wisdom right there. "'Test your servants for 10 days and let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink.'" Vegetables, by the way, in the original language, refers to that which is grown from seed. So it would include vegetables as well as grains, so they could have, you know, vegetables as well as bread. Now, obviously, that is not a healthy, nor a desirable diet, especially for 15-year-old boys who typically have a hollow leg and they're developing and so forth. It's certainly not what they were accustomed to. Nor was it one that they chose indefinitely, which we will see. I mean, I can hear the chef's saying to them, Well, guys, let me give you the menu for the day, we have succulent filet mignon, and we have sumptuous lamb chops. We have delicious grass-fed roast beef and gravy. And you can wash it down with the king's finest wine. And I can hear the guys saying, nah, you know, I'll have the salad and the broccoli, and the turnip greens, some carrots, piece of bread. I'll wash it down with water. You know, on second thought, I'll have some of that beef stew but no beef or gravy. You know, 10 days of that would be bad enough. I was thinking about this. And I hope I'm not offending you vegetarians, I'm sure I probably am, I don't mean to be. I couldn't handle that. I mean, one of my favorite commercials years ago was "Beef. It's what's for dinner." I mean, if I ate that, you know, especially after three years, I don't know I'd be so skinny, I'd have to run around in a shower to get wet. I just can't imagine living that way. But here's the point. Now think about this. If I knew that by eating these things, God would be dishonored and that God had said, I don't want you to eat this. And if I knew that, by honoring him, he would bless me. Then you know what I would say and I hope you would say, "give me some broccoli, a glass of water." And that's exactly what they did. So test us for 10 days. Let's see what happens.

Verse 13, "'Then let our appearance be observed in your presence and the appearance of the youths who are eating the king's choice food; and deal with your servants according to what you see.' So he listened to them in this matter and tested them for 10 days. At the end of 10 days, their appearance seemed better, and they were fatter than all the youths who had been eating the king's choice food." Now obviously, what we are witnessing here is divine intervention, you know, for for this to happen in these young men over the course of 10 days, for it to be such a noticeable advantage. Obviously God was at work.

Verse 16, "So the overseer continued to withhold their choice food and the wine they were to drink and kept giving them vegetables." So because of Daniel's unwavering devotion to God, we see number three, God's blessings upon faithful servants. And this is such an important lesson, dear friends. Bear in mind that God is always watching us. He is always faithful to bless our obedience, to bless our sacrifice, to bless our faithfulness to him. I think I think of Second Chronicles 16 nine, "For the eyes of the Lord, move to and fro throughout the whole earth, that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His." Isaiah 66 two God says, "But to this one I will look," in other words, this is the person that gets my attention, “to him who is humble and contrite of spirit and who trembles at My word." Psalm 115, verse 13, I don't think you have this on the overhead. The God says, "He will bless those who fear the Lord," we read that earlier. "He will bless those who fear the Lord, the small together with the great." Beloved, please hear this, God's way is always the best way. Though your flesh will tell you otherwise. But pastor I won't have any fun, and I won't have any friends. If I go God's way, wrong, wrong. What have we read earlier in Psalm one? "How blessed," ow happy, "is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the law of the Lord and in His law he meditates day and night, he will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither. And in whatever he does, he prospers." Dear friends, it's real simple. You either believe God or you don't. And if you don't, you will forfeit blessing in your life. And especially if you refuse to obey His command, to repent, and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, your life will end in misery which will be a prelude to your eternal hell. Proverbs 14 Verse 12, "There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." And I think of Moses in Hebrews 11 verse 24, we read, "By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to endure ill treatment with the people of God, than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, considering the reproach of Christ, greater riches than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward." Dear friends, I can tell you, having counseled probably into the 1000s of people over 35 years of ministry, I've seen pretty much everything. I've seen young women who painted themselves up and dressed immodestly to get the attention of boys gradually become sexually involved. Some of them became pregnant out of wedlock. Others got venereal diseases. Others have had multiple abortions, broken relationships. Some of them end up being single parents. Some of them end up addicted to drugs and alcohol end up in suicide. I've seen it all. They found their identity in their body. And little by little as we grow older, that body isn't what it once was. Then what do you have left? I've seen young men who were too cool for school. They wanted nothing to do with godly friends, nothing to do with the church. They did not love God nor did they fear God. They loved themselves, ruled by their lusts, they would make one foolish decision after another end up in miserable marriages, multiple children that brought nothing but heartache; alot of them end up being potheads or alcoholics. They lived in a fool's paradise. And I know a number of them that have died in their sins. I know young people who turned away their ears from the truth and turned aside into myths and they were recruited by homosexuals and they began to live that lifestyle. They were drawn into it. Young people became adults who have had literally hundreds and hundreds of sexual encounters that have destroyed their bodies. I know what it is to watch them die of AIDS. But Oh dear friends I also know of God's redeeming love. And I know of God's grace that saves sinners and sanctifies sinners. I remember one man in particular that comes to my mind that had been a homosexual for years, lived that lifestyle for years. But he came to repentant faith in Christ by God's grace. He experienced the miracle of the new birth, God changed everything about him, gave him new desires, he was married and ended up with children, very happily. And I remember one time him sharing his testimony. And with tear filled eyes, he suddenly broke into song, and he sang, "On Christ, the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand, all other ground is sinking sand." Folks, that's the power of the gospel. That's the power of obedience. Dear friends, dare to be a Daniel. love God and fear him. Don't embrace the world that God has gone to such great lengths to deliver you from. Daniel understood this, his three friends understood this and here, the Word of God, once again, as I stated earlier in first John two beginning in verse 15, this is so clear, "Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life. It's not from the Father, but is from the world. The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever."

Yes, like Daniel and his friends, God blesses those who are faithful and obedient, who love Him and fear Him. God is opposed to the proud but he gives grace to the humble, I want you to notice how God bless them in verse 17, "As for these four youths, God gave them knowledge and intelligence in every branch of literature and wisdom." Can you imagine that? They learn to read cuneiform; they learn to understand that language. And basically, they got a PhD in all this stuff in three years. Then he adds, “Daniel even understood all kinds of visions and dreams." Now, it's important to understand here that the Babylonians believed, and we read this in their literature, that there were certain methods of divination that one had to adhere to, in order to determine the will of the gods. And certainly, priests they believed, specialized in these techniques and these methods. And we know that the demons would assist them, especially in dream interpretation, and unbeknownst to them. But these young Judeans understood that true revelation only comes from God. And God enabled Daniel with a special gift, that he would later use to interpret God's revelations to Nebuchadnezzar in the form of a dream as we will see, and also later when he would use it to interpret the handwriting on the wall of Belshazzar's palace in chapter five, Leon Wood is very helpful here. He says, "While Daniel lived, he was the one gifted by God, and accordingly, the only one used to give the interpretation of them. The pagans believed that dreams regularly carried significance, and they even induced dreams for this reason, certain priests were considered experts in dream interpretation. Scripture teaches, however, that only certain dreams are revelatory, namely those which God gives for that purpose. Daniel's gift was that he was specially endowed for receiving God's interpretations of such occasions of divine communication." He goes on to say, "It may be noted further that when God gave his revelations to Nebuchadnezzar, he used only the dream type of communication, never the vision, whereas he did use the vision with Daniel. In fact, the Scripture shows God regularly employing the dream when given a revelation to pagans. The reason seems to be that, with the dream, the human personality is neutralized and made a passive instrument for the occasion. But with the vision, the person himself is often a participant, and must be constituted to respond and react in a proper manner. Something true only of a child of God. Though the revelation of Belshazzar in chapter five was not a dream, it was still of a type entirely objective to himself in which he played no part. Daniel was necessary for its interpretation, just as he had been with Nebuchadnezzar's dreams." End quote.

Now I might add, that, since the completion of the canon in Scripture, divine revelation, received and delivered through the apostles and the prophets, has ceased along with those offices. There's no such thing today as a prophet, or an apostle. In Ephesians 2:20, Paul states that the church quote "has been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone." But now that the foundation has been laid with the completion of the New Testament, those once necessary offices, are no longer needed and they no longer exist. You must bear in mind that the canon of Scripture is now closed. We read about this in Jude three and Deuteronomy four two, Deuteronomy 12, verse 32, Proverbs 30 and verse six, Revelation 22, verse 18, and 19. And therefore, to insist as some do, that God is still giving new revelation to Christians, is to deny the doctrine of sola scriptura. That the scriptures alone are the sole and fallible source of authority for faith and practice. And we don't need to go beyond the pages of Scripture to hear from God. Moreover, those who claim to receive special revelation, or sometimes you will hear them say, you know, I've received a word from the Lord or, or I've got some prophecy, people that do that, undermine the authority, as well as the sufficiency of Scripture, by placing their suppose revelations on par with the inspired, inerrant, infallible word of God. And that, dear friends, is a blasphemous presumption. This continues to cause great confusion in the church today, unfortunately. And what it does is it paves the way for Christians to elevate subjective feelings as well as personal impressions, to the status of divine revelation, to put it on par with what God has said in his word. And as a result, unfortunately, many people look to these prophets and prophetesses to hear something new and fresh from God. Rather than looking into his self-disclosure that he has given to us in His inspired record. Jude appeals to all believers pleading with us to quote, "contend earnestly for the faith, which was once for all handed down to the saints," Jude three. Likewise, Paul told Timothy in chapter three and verse 16, of Second Timothy, "All Scripture is inspired of God, is breathed out by God, and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work."

Well, enough of that, back to God's blessing on his young servants. As we wrap this up this morning, notice verse 18. "Then at the end of the days, which the king had specified for presenting them, the commander of the officials presented them before Nebuchadnezzar. The king talked with them and out of them all, not one was found like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah; so they entered the king's personal service. As for every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king consulted them, he found them 10 times better than all the magicians and conjurers, who were in all his realm." And then it says, "and Daniel continued until the first year of Cyrus the king." There Daniel reflects upon the goodness and faithfulness of God, to carry him through 66 years of service in captivity until he was about 81 years old. He served, think about it, in the high offices of Babylon through the course of four Babylonian kings and through the Babylonian defeat by at the hands of Cyrus, the Mido-Persian, which happened in 539 BC, and then served in the court of Cyrus himself and so forth. And what an amazing testimony of God's faithfulness, God's goodness and providence during those dark days of apostasy and judgment upon the Israelites. And how exciting to know that God is always in control. He is always in control. He's working his plan. And he is always using faithful servants who love him, and who fear Him to accomplish his purposes. And what a great example is we have with these faithful young men, whose testimonies continue to be a source of inspiration and encouragement for every believer, persevering in a time of trial. And may each of us stand with Daniel and Hananiah, and Mishael and Azariah. May we all stand with him in these dark days of apostasy and judgment here in our own country. And dear friends, keep looking up, because our redemption draweth nigh. The King is coming. Let's pray. Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word. Cause us to cherish them, to meditate upon them, to make them the theme of our conversation, the lyrics of our songs that you might be praised in our lives and that others might see the glory of God and his plan of redemption revealed in the Gospel. Lord, we thank you We give you praise. In Jesus name. Amen.

I invite you to take your Bibles this morning and turn to the Old Testament book of Daniel, as we really embark upon our verse by verse study, having had an introduction, the last time we were together. Daniel chapter one. And I've entitled my discourse to you "The Evil of Babylon, Past, Present, and Future." This morning we will look at the first two verses. So follow along as I read. "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, along with some of the vessels of the house of God; and he brought them to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, and he brought the vessels into the treasury of his god."

As we approach our study of this amazing book, we want to maintain the big picture of God's redemptive plan for the ages, one that God has ordained in eternity past to bring glory to himself. And this is the key, frankly, to understanding scripture, especially Bible prophecy. I want you to remember, dear friends, that there exists two opposing kingdoms in the universe, there is the kingdom of God and there is the kingdom of Satan. We see this all through Scripture. The kingdom of God is the primary theme of Scripture. It is the center of gravity around which all other themes providentially orbit, in order to bring glory to the King of kings and the Lord of lords. There are essentially three aspects to the kingdom of God that you must keep in mind. There is a universal kingdom, there is a mediatorial kingdom and there is a spiritual kingdom. God's universal kingdom can be defined as God's eternal, sovereign rule over everything that exists, everything that he created. In David's great song of majesty and love in Psalm 145, verse 13, we read, "Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and Your dominion, endures throughout all generations."

But Scripture affirms another aspect of God's universal kingdom. And that is a mediatorial kingdom, that can be defined as God's sovereign rule over the earth, through divinely chosen human representatives, who speak on his behalf, and represent the people before him. And here God exercises his absolute authority, and his invisible rule in the spiritual kingdom on earth through the agency of divinely chosen men.

And then finally, in addition to the universal and the mediatorial aspect of the kingdom of God, Scripture reveals a spiritual kingdom that can be defined as an invisible kingdom that exists in the hearts of those who have trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the king. This aspect of the kingdom, by the way, came after Israel rejected her Messiah. And while the kingdom of God can have spiritual requirements and characteristics, as we would see in Romans 14:17, for example, this does not rule out the land and the physical prosperity promises that are also included in the Abrahamic, the Davidic and the new covenants, as we read in Jeremiah 31, through 33, Ezekiel 36 through 37, as well as Deuteronomy 30 in the first 10 verses. During the 40 days between Jesus resurrection and ascension, he spoke according to Acts one three of "the things concerning the kingdom of God;" a reference there to that spiritual kingdom, the sphere of salvation where God reigns within the hearts of believers. Those who have experienced the new covenant blessings have a new heart of the indwelling Spirit, who as Paul said in Second Corinthians three six,"gives life." And aren't you thankful that he has given us life, eternal life? The New Testament epistles reveal how entrance into the spiritual kingdom comes through the message of the gospel and is granted to all believers in this church age.

Now, in opposition to the kingdom of God, is the kingdom of Satan. He has opposed the kingdom purposes of God since the very first sin in the cosmos, that he himself committed. And since his temptation of Adam and Eve to sin against God in the Garden, Satan, along with his demonic horde, has conducted a guerrilla warfare campaign to deceive and enslave men and women in his kingdom of darkness. And the world today exists in that kingdom of darkness and mankind's only hope is through the redeeming grace of God. Paul reminds us in Colossians, one beginning in verse 13, "For He rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." And in Acts 26, verse 18, we see that caused us to turn from darkness to light, and from the dominion of Satan to God. What a marvelous testimony of God's grace.

Now the anti-God world system that God allows Satan to temporary control, consists of human beings who are willing subjects to his rule, those who have rejected the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Moreover, Satan's rule is mediated in his kingdom, by what Paul said in Ephesians, 6:12, "rulers...world forces of this darkness and the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." You may recall last week we looked at some of the evidence of this in Daniel chapter 10, verses 12 through 13. In verse 20, you remember where the angel Gabriel said to Daniel that the prince of the kingdom of Persia, had battled him for 21 days until Michael, one of the chief princes came to help him. He said, For I had been left there with the kings of Persia. And then in verse 20, the angel Gabriel describes another demon, who was assigned to influence the rulers of Greece. In that passage, he says, "and now I must return to fight with the Prince of Persia. And when I have gone forth, indeed, the prince of Greece will come." Dear friends, all of the nations of the world today, including the United States of America are being controlled by demonic forces that influence their leaders. We know according to Scripture, John 12:31, that Satan is the ruler of this world, and he will remain so until the Lord Himself casts him out. First John 5:"19 says that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one." And according to Ephesians, two, two, "he is the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience." And Paul tells us in Second Corinthians 11, that Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. History is also replete with examples of human beings who wittingly, as well as unwittingly, do his bidding. Together they rebel against the Most High God and for this reason, God even cursed his own creation. Remember, we read of this in Romans eight beginning of verse 20. He says, "For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, that because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption, into the freedom of the glory of the children of God." And as we will see, Satan, attempted to establish his earthly kingdom in the land of Shinar at the Tower of Babel in the days of Nimrod, according to Genesis 11. The original city of Babylon was therefore, the breeding ground for all of the false religions that would eventually cover the earth.

We will also see that there is great significance in the fact that Babylon conquered Judah. And I want to prepare you for this so that you can understand the whole flow of what the text tells us. The wicked influence that that satanic culture had on God's covenant people, has been in effect down through the centuries. It has had, therefore, a profound spiritual, as well as eschatological, effect on them and an impact on the entire world. And this is all part of God's providential maneuvering to accomplish His plan. History is "his story", the story of the Lord Jesus Christ, the coming King; he is the Almighty sovereign. Remember in Isaiah 46:10, "He is the one who declares the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, 'My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all my good pleasure.'" And you will recall that even Nebuchadnezzar confessed that Yahweh is the God who according to chapter four and verse 35, of Daniel, "does according to His will, in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of Earth; and no one can ward off His hand or say to Him, 'What have you done?'" Indeed, our God, the One True God, is in absolute sovereign control over all of His creation, and He is the one "who works all things after the counsel of his will," Ephesians 1:11. And what comfort this is in times of trouble. I know even this week, there were several scenarios that came up in my life and my heart just breaks as I see people that I know doing things and believing things that are just such an abomination to God, watching our country just being engulfed by a tsunami of ungodliness and all of this leftist lunacy, that's absolutely destroying our country. And watching the militant LGBTQ mafia force their wickedness on all of us, it causes me to feel like Lot. Remember in Second Peter two and verse seven, we read that Lot was "oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men," referring to the homosexuals in Sodom, "(for by what he saw and heard that righteous man while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds)." And dear friends, the heart of every Christian should be tormented by the rampant immorality and idolatry and wickedness that we see in our country and is now even being promoted by woke apostate churches. It grieves my heart. But we can rejoice knowing that no matter what the circumstance, no matter how bad it gets, no matter how hopeless the condition, or how unfair our plight, God is ultimately, in absolute control of all things. And his purposes, will not be thwarted by man nor by Devil.

Now, with this reminder of the cosmic warfare between these two opposing kingdoms and kings, let's begin to see how this conflict plays out. As we look at Daniel, I've given you a real simple outline. It's just two concepts we want to see, first of all the reason for God's judgment on Judah, and secondly, the prophetic significance and symbolism of Babylon. Now, first, if you'll bear with me with something technical, but I know it'll come up if I don't. Very important, we must address an apparent contradiction that critics like to use to discredit the book of Daniel as a reliable historical document in verse one, we read, "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah." Now, there appears here to be a chronological discrepancy, because Jeremiah dates this in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, not the third year. You read that in Jeremiah 46 two, also in chapter 25 in verse one. Of course the critics say "ah, see there, there's a big problem, your Bible is not reliable." Well, this is easily resolved, in that these two men were using two different calendar systems. Daniel used his native Jewish system where the kings of Judah officially would begin their reign on the first day of the seventh month, that would be Tishri or the month of October, and that would be considered the beginning of a new year for the Jewish people. And this would have been important and appropriate for Daniel to do because his goal was to encourage his exiled countrymen that they would eventually be able to return to their homeland. But Jeremiah used the Babylonian calendar system where Nissan, or April, began the new year rather than Tishri or October. The kings of Assyria and of Babylon commenced their reigns in the spring, not the fall, and this would have been appropriate for Jeremiah, because God commissioned him to prepare apostate Judeans for exile to Babylon. So given these two distinct systems of chronology, all of the events that occurred between the spring and fall would therefore be considered one year off. And so what would appear to be a discrediting discrepancy, is in fact, another remarkable proof of the inerrancy and infallibility of Scripture. I might also add, if the book of Daniel was a forgery, as some of the liberal critics would have us believe, if he was some guy who wanted to convince the Jews of his day that his book had been written 400 years earlier, you would think he would have been much more cautious right? Not to contradict the canonical book of Jeremiah, which was written before Daniel. Well, I'm chasing rabbits here, but so much for the critical view of theological liberals on this point.

So again, back to the text, "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah." Judah now comprised of the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin. And, really, we need to stop here for a moment because I want to give you some fascinating history. Jehoiakim was the eldest son of his father the good and godly King Josiah. But what's interesting is at Josiah's death, Jehoiakim's younger brother, Jehoahaz was crowned king of Judah in 609 BC. Evidently for some reason, that we don't know, the people of Judah did not want Jehoiakim to reign over them. However, because Pharaoh Necho had recently defeated Josiah and the Judean army at Megiddo, Necho decided to dethrone Jehoahaz, who had only been ruling for three months and put Eliakim in his place. Eliakim, was really his name his but Necho changed his name to Jehoiakim. And Jehoiakim, now, proved to be just an ungodly fool who ruled from 609 to 598 BC. We know because of history, because of Scripture, that he was a very covetous man, he taxed the people to death, he made them build a magnificent palace for him and refused to pay them. He sent men to Egypt to bring back God's faithful prophet Uriah so that he could execute him. You read about that in Jeremiah 26 and Jeremiah 36. We know that he had one of the scribes read Jeremiah's prophecy, his inspired warnings, and every few verses, he would take a knife and cut it out and throw it in the fire until the whole thing was burned up. So that's the type of guy he was. He ruled for 11 years, and the last three years he rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar who retaliated with another attack on Jerusalem in 597 BCE. And Jeremiah prophesied in Jeremiah 22:19, that, "He would be buried with the burial of a donkey, dragged and cast out beyond the Gates of Jerusalem." No wonder he wanted to cut up the prophecy right? He didn't like that. And we know that that he was indeed killed in Babylon's second siege and his corpse was left to rot on the ground like a dead donkey and the scavengers ate his flesh. Well, as Paul Harvey used to say, that's the rest of the story, right? So now you know who we're dealing with. By the way, prior to the fall of Babylon in 586, Judah had 19 kings that ruled over them, eight of them were good and 11 of them were bad.

So, with that background, look at the second part of the first verse, "Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it." So this brings me to our first point that I want us to investigate. You must understand the reason for God's judgment on Judah. We could go to many passages, but I want to take you to Isaiah chapter one. Isaiah helps us understand the depths of their wickedness there in verse four, he says, "Alas, sinful nation, people weighed down with iniquity, offspring of evil doers, sons who act corruptly! They have abandoned the Lord, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, they have turned away from Him." If you go to Isaiah five, you will read seven woes that God pronounced against them. He cursed them because of their greedy materialism their drunken dissipation, they would have parties with musical accompaniment, it would be their version of a drunken rock band, Spring Break type of a thing. This was what was going on with those people. They redefined morality. You will recall in verse 20, of Isaiah five, "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil; who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness." My goodness, we could give 100 examples of that today, here in our country right now. They were cursed because of their haughty humanism, their corrupt leadership; their moral apostasy was profound. And in Isaiah 24, one through six, we read how they had forsaken the law, and ignored God's covenant. But God also solemnly warned his people through the prophet Jeremiah, as well, to repent of their idolatry, lest he judge them, but they refused. Moreover, according to Jeremiah 34, verses 12 through 22, we see how they neglected the Sabbath day, and the sabbatical year. Therefore, God sent them into captivity for 70 years, to reclaim the Sabbath that they had violated and give the land a rest. Folks, I hope you get the idea that God is serious about obedience, right? He's serious about obeying his law, his righteous standard.

And I also want to remind you of his Law, which can be understood as in terms of, frankly, the whole Old Testament scriptures. The law had three divisions. First, there was the moral law that regulated how Israel was to love the Lord their God with all their heart, and their neighbors as themselves, all of which was based upon the 10 commandments. But second, there was the judicial law that regulated Israel's theocracy as a nation. And then there was the ceremonial law that regulated Israel's worship. And we know that ultimately, the Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled each division of the law. That's why he said in Matthew, chapter five, verse 17, "'Do not think that I came to abolish the Law, or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.'" And he did that in various ways. We won't have time to get into right now. But dear friends, we should never forget that while the judicial and the ceremonial laws were fulfilled in Christ and are now obsolete, the moral law is still being fulfilled in the church, in the redeemed because we are united to Christ through faith. And when we violate the Word of God, God will chasten us. And when unbelievers violate the Word of God, God will judge them eternally so, lest they repent, and place their faith in Christ as their only hope of salvation. Now, sadly, most in ancient Judah, grievously violated God's law.

So again, back to the text, "Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem and besieged it." As we look at the historical evidence, even in Scripture, there is no evidence of any fighting. Babylon was such an overwhelming force; it would have been suicidal for Jerusalem to in any way resist. And we read here that, "The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand." This is such a great statement. We find such hope here, the Lord, Adonai, the Lord God, the owner, ruler, the supreme master, the mighty sovereign. He's the one that "gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand." In other words, Nebuchadnezzar, you did not do this, God did. Nebuchadnezzar was merely God's ape, although he didn't know it. This was the sovereign will of the Lord God, which, by the way, is the theme of Daniel. Folks, I want you to remember this. Rulers can only do what God allows them to do. They can never exceed the limits of divine providence, the boundaries of his decreed will.

So again, "The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand." It goes on to say, "along with some of the vessels of the house of God," referring to the sacred vessels of Solomon's temple. Imagine that, Solomon's temple, "and he brought them to the land of Shinar," which is an Old Testament reference to Babylonia that stretched across the lower, lower Mesopotamia. And it says that, he brought them to, "the house of his god and he brought the vessels into the treasury of his god." Now, this is most likely a reference to the Temple of Marduk, in Babylon, the capital of Babylon, which is on the Euphrates River. It's about 50 miles south of modern Baghdad, if you want to get a frame of reference. There were around 50 temples for different deities that existed in that day. But the Temple of Marduk was the most prominent temple located in the most sacred area. One scholar by the name of Woods says quote, "In this area, entered by the magnificent Ishtar Gate, was also a great ziggurat, a sacred tower crowned with a small shrine. The splendid Marduk Temple boasted numerous chapels to deities other than Marduk. But his was the principal one richly decorated with cedar wood paneling, gold, alabaster, and semi-precious stones." So you get an idea of what's going on here. It's also interesting to note that Nebuchadnezzar named his son, Amel Marduk, or could be translated "Evil-Merodach." How'd you like to name your son that? By the way, Nebuchadnezzar was named after another Babylonian deity by the name of Nebo. Now Marduk was sometimes referred to as "Bel", which means "lord." He was the fertility god, and all of their worship involves sexual orgies, things that I wouldn't want to even discuss in public. It also included human sacrifice, throwing babies into the fire, they would bury some of their young ones in the foundations of their homes, in public buildings. They had male and female prostitution; it was just completely vile.

Now for Nebuchadnezzar to come to Judah, and to take these items from the temple, to pillage the Temple of Yahweh, and place the booty in his temple, was a way of symbolizing the superiority of Marduk over YAWEH. It's fascinating that approximately 130 years before what I'm about to tell you actually happened, the prophet Isaiah exposed just how dead those idols in Babylon really were. When he predicted that Babylon would be defeated by Cyrus the Mede, which happened in 539 BCE, and how the middle Persians would come in and take their items and carry the Babylonian deities away in oxcarts. We read this in Isaiah 46 verses one and two. Let me read this to you. He says, "Bel has bowed down, Nebo stoops over; their images are consigned to the beasts and the cattle. The things that you carry are burdensome, a load for the very for the weary beast. They stooped over, they have bowed down together; they could not rescue the burden but have themselves gone into captivity." So, now we have a bit of an understanding of the reason behind God's judgment and what happened.

And secondly, we want to look at the prophetic significance and symbolism of Babylon. I want you to understand that over 100 years before Judah's fall, Isaiah predicted that this would happen. We read about this in Isaiah 39, beginning in verse six, "Behold," he says, "the days are coming when all that is in your house, and all that your father's have laid up in store to this day will be carried to Babylon, nothing will be left says the Lord. And some of your sons who will issue from you, whom you will beget, will be taken away, and they will become officials in the palace of the king of Babylon." Now, it's fair to ask the question, why Babylon? Why the land of Shinar? And again, I would submit to you that it's because the land of Shinar was the first place where Satan tried to establish his own earthly kingdom through his servant Nimrod at the Tower of Babel. Let me give you some Old Testament history. 1656 years after God created Adam, he judged man with a worldwide flood. And all except eight people who, according to the Scriptures, found favor in the eyes of the Lord, referring to Noah, his wife, three sons, and wives, all of them, everybody else was destroyed. And according to Genesis 10, eight through 10, one of the descendants of Ham was a character named Nimrod who tried to build, quote, "a kingdom called Babel Shinar." We read that in Genesis 10:10. By the way that would have been in modern day Iraq, the same region probably of the Garden of Eden, the land of Mesopotamia. And according to Genesis 11, and one, we read that, "the whole earth used the same language and same words." Interesting thought. They all spoke the same language as Noah. And then verse two, we read that they journeyed east to the land of Shinar, and they settled there. So keep this in mind. Now, some 100 years after the flood, Satan now tries to get his foothold on the earth through Nimrod, who was Noah's great grandson, who, as you will see is a foreshadow of the coming Antichrist. We learn more about their motivation in chapter 11, and verse four of Genesis and, "They said, 'Come, let us build for ourselves a city and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.'" And we know that they built this tower, a ziggurat, called the Tower of Babel; a tower that was erected ultimately, to facilitate idolatry. And history reveals that on the top of that tower, and many like them, was the sign of the zodiac where priests would chart the stars to somehow predict the future. By the way, it should be no surprise that we still have that satanic practice with us to this day, another ploy to distract man from worshipping the one true God who alone, not only predicts the future, but causes the future, to conform with his sovereign will.

Well, God was displeased with their rebellion and their idolatry, as you will recall, knowing that it was ultimately from Satan. So according to verse seven, here's what God says, "'Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.' So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. Therefore, its name was called Babel. Because there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth." So now the people are confused. And each people group begins to coalesce around their respective languages, and they all begin to move to find a region that would support them. And naturally, they took with them all of their idolatries all of their wickedness, much of which historians have discovered was what we would call ancient mother son fertility, cult worship. A combination of myth and legend in history, points to a woman by the name of Semiramis, who was believed to be the wife of Nimrod and if you read some of the story, she was impregnated by some sunbeam that came in through a window. She had this child named Tammuz, he was eventually killed, but came back to life. Basically, what you see is a counterfeit version of Mary and Jesus and so forth.

Well, regardless of the veracity of those names, as many as 180 shrines dedicated to the goddess Ishtar, had been documented in ancient Babylon. Now, the idolatrous mother-son fertility cult worship can be seen virtually in every pagan religious system around the world and Greece. She became Aphrodite, Artemis, Athena, Demeter and Gaya. In Rome she was Venus, Diana, Minerva and Terra. In India, she was the goddess Devaki with a son infant Krishna, Isi and infant Iswara. In Egypt, it was the goddess Isis and son Horus. In Asia they were known is Cybele and Deoius. The Scandinavians called her Disa she's always pictured with a child. Ancient Germans worshipped the Virgin Hertha with the child and in her arms and on and on it goes. And even Israel was later rebuked for worshipping, quote, The Queen of Heaven, the goddess Ishtar, we read about that, in Jeremiah 44, as well as worshipping her son Tammuz in Ezekiel eight and verse 14, which included idol worship that involves just the lowest and most abominable forms of immorality, idolatrous practices, that, unfortunately, God's covenant people refused to give up and so God judged them severely. By the way, as a footnote, it should be no surprise that the name Queen of Heaven or Mother of God is still being used by Roman Catholics today.

So, out of the Tower of Babel came all of the complex of pagan religions; they were spawned there, everything from Islam, to Hinduism, Shamanism to Buddhism. They were all birth there at the Tower of Babel in the land of Shinar. And this helps us understand what John has to say, in Revelation 17, in verse five, where he describes a coming mystery, "Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots, and of the abominations of the earth." Now, I might add that this is not a reference to the historical geographical city of Babylon, but rather to a future religious amalgam that will exist, that will be led by the false prophet that's described in Revelation 13:11 through 18, he will be a counterfeit Holy Spirit, remember, there will be a counterfeit trinity one day of Satan, the Antichrist and the False Prophet. So the false prophet will be a counterfeit Holy Spirit who will seek to exalt the Antichrist, and somehow reinforces efforts to thwart the purposes of God during the time of the tribulation, just prior to our Lord's return.

And as we read the prophetic literature we see that under the aegis of the false prophet and an ecclesiastical ecumenical one world counterfeit religion, will serve the Antichrist, and this religion will seduce the nations like a harlot seduces the fool. And we read in Scripture that the term "fornication" which refers to having sex outside of marriage, as well as harlotry, or prostitution; those terms are often used in Scripture to illustrate spiritual prostitution. In Revelation 14 and verse eight, we read, "she who has made all the nation's drink of the wine of the passion of her immorality." And indeed, we see that one day the nation's will become so intoxicated with her idolatrous pleasures that they will seek to destroy anyone that serves the one true God. Dr. Larson says quote, "Counterfeiting the Holy Spirit's faithful testimony and witness to Christ, the false prophet points unceasingly to the beast, performs mighty wonders and successfully imprints the mark of the beast, (666), the number of man. humanism with a vengeance." And then he goes on to say, "He will imprint that on the deceived," quote, "The inhabitants of the earth, without which they can neither buy nor sell, Revelation 13:16 and following." You know, given what we are witnessing in the world today, all of these things are not only plausible, they are inevitable. Larson goes on to say, "This Christ-less, wordless, but bloodless, and powerless, religious sham, will sweep the vulnerable inhabitants of the earth off their feet. And the greatest hoax of all history, as Jesus described it in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 10, 'At that time, many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people's love will grow cold, but the one who endures to the end will be saved.'" Larson goes on to say, "But God is never without a testimony. And even in this dark time, Israel will be his witness. Though sorely persecuted, martyred and hated," quote, "by all nations because of Christ, Israel will preach the gospel of the kingdom. Again, according to Matthew 24 and verse 14, preach the gospel of the kingdom 'in the whole world as a testimony to all nations.' And then Jesus says, 'the end will come.'"

So, the satanic idolatry that originated from Babel, from the original Babylon and the land of Shinar, will eventually culminate in an orgy of rebellion and hatred of the one true God, just prior to our Lord's return. Mystery, "a mystery" John says, "Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and of the abominations of the earth." Folks, history will come full circle. All of these false religious systems will have a family reunion, you might say, they're all going to come home to mama, they will be rolled into one world religion, designed to worship the beast, the Antichrist. And this one religion is personified as a harlot, and indeed, the world is being prepared for that great Babylonish horror, even today, one that will promise to bring all of the world's religions together, coexist, you see it all the time, right? You're gonna bring it all together under under a monolithic banner of ecumenism, a demonic system that will eventually lead to the sole worship of the beast himself. I must add that in Revelation 18 there is a description of a commercial Babylon that will collaborate with religious Babylon, we see that there's also going to be not just a one world religion, but a one world economy. In fact, the prophet Zechariah describes this as well in chapter five, verses five through 11. There he had, you might recall a vision of a woman in a basket, and according to verse eight, she was called wickedness and there we have a personification of religious and ecclesiastical apostasy that will also manifest itself in wanton materialism and secularism, Zechariah five verses 10 and 11. We read, "I said to the angel, who was speaking with me, 'Where are they taking the ephah?' this basket that this woman is in, "Then he said to me, 'To build a temple for her in the land of Shinar; and when it is prepared, she will be set there on her own pedestal.'" If we had time we could look into that text and all of the passages around it and see that a day is coming when the system of organized godlessness that has dominated the world since the time of Nimrod will be will be transported by demonic powers to the land of Shinar and there it's going to be placed on a pedestal, we believe probably in a temple as an idol to be worshipped in the final Babylon, the final world system of the Antichrist. But it will be destroyed and forever removed from the earth when the Lord returns.

I want to comfort you with these words in Revelation chapter 18, beginning in verse one. "After these things I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority and the earth was illumined with his glory, and he cried out with a mighty voice saying, 'Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place of demons and a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird. For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the passion of her immorality and the kings of the earth have committed acts of immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich by the wealth of her sensuality.' I heard another voice from heaven saying, 'Come out of her, my people, so that you will not participate in her sins and receive her plagues; for her sins have piled up as high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities.'" Then dropping down to verse 21, we read that, "A strong angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying, 'So will Babylon, the great city, be thrown down with violence, and will not be found any longer, and the sound of harps and musicians and flute players and trumpeters will not be heard in you any longer; and no craftsman of any craft will be found in you any longer, and the sound of a mill will not be heard you any longer; and the light of a lamp will not shine in you any longer; and the voice of the bridegroom and bride will not be heard in you any longer; for your merchants were the great men of the earth, because all the nations were deceived by your sorcery. And in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints and of all who have been slain on the earth.'" Merrill Unger says, quote, "Not until this evil system is removed from Palestine, will it become," quote, "The Holy Land. And not until it's rooted out of the whole earth in its entirety, will God's kingdom come and God's will be done in earth as it is in heaven."

Folks, my point with all of this is to make sure you understand that the original Babylonian captivity of Judah described in Daniel, and in other passages in the Old Testament, was not some kind of a random event without any purpose. But rather it points to, and it symbolizes, an entire worldwide political, economic and religious kingdom of antichrist, for which the world today is being prepared. We simply cannot, and we must not, read these passages in isolation, but see how they fit into the whole counsel of God revealed in Scripture.

Now, in closing this morning, I know many of you have already asked, "Where does the United States fit in to all of these things prophetically?" And I will deal with this more at length at another time. But the answer is nowhere specifically, okay? It may be part of the revived Roman Empire that will be ruled by the Antichrist. If it survives the removal of the church at the time of the rapture, it's going to be profoundly weakened. And certainly already we see serious cracks in the foundations of our country. The wrath of divine abandonment is having its effect on our country. Dear friends, the glory days of the United States of America, are quickly disappearing in the rearview mirror. Well, to be sure, America, to whatever degree it exists when the Lord returns, is going to join with all of the rest of the nations of the world. It too will fall under the spell of mystery Babylon, and under the power of the rule of the Antichrist and his false prophet. And like all nations, it too will come against Israel. We're already seeing that movement. And like all the nations, it will be destroyed.

Let me close by reading Zechariah's prophecy in Zechariah 12, beginning in verse three, "'It will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lifted will be severely injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it.'" And as I said, like all nations, it will be defeated. All these nations will be defeated, including the United States. And a remnant of Israel will come to repentant faith in the Messiah, that the one that they have so long rejected. And we read of this again, back to Zechariah 12, beginning in verse eight. "'In that day the Lord will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the one who is feeble among them in that day will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord before them. And in that day, I will set about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.'" There's the fate of the United States, and all of the nations. He goes on to say, '"I will pour out on the house of David, and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.'" Dear Christian, be encouraged our God reigns. And one day, the glory of the Lord will fill the earth as the waters cover the sea, as the prophet has promised. But dear friends, if you're here today, and you do not know Christ, my word to you is, be warned. But also be encouraged because there is a way of escape if you place your faith in Christ. But if you don't, you will perish in your sins. And you will pay for your sins in the torment of solitary confinement where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. And you will be in torment forever and ever, and ever. That's why the gospel is such good news, Amen? The Gospel provides a way for our sins to be forgiven, and for us to enjoy the imputed righteousness of Christ, who gave his life for all who would believe on him. So I challenge you, if you don't know Christ, today is the day that you need to do business with God. Let's pray together. Father, thank You for the eternal truths of your word. And even though we don't know all of the particulars, we see the grand themes in the grand direction, the trajectory of your plan of redemption, of your plan to bring glory to the king and establish your kingdom. We thank you therefore, for the hope that we find through your inspired, infallible Word. But Lord, we also thank you for your indwelling Spirit that causes our hearts to leap with joy, knowing what awaits us all because of your grace. Lord, give us an ardent zeal for evangelism, to share the good news of the gospel with others that they too might be saved, that they too might enjoy the hope that is ours in Christ. And finally, Lord, I must say please, come quickly, Lord Jesus, come quickly. For it's in your name that I pray, Amen.

We have a great privilege this morning to begin our study in the book of Daniel. So if you will turn there, I would like to offer an introduction this morning. I hope it won't be the most boring sermon you've ever heard, but it is necessary to build the right foundation. I might add that the fore view of human history that is revealed in Daniel's prophecies, not only shed light on the contemporary issues that we see in our world today, but they also animate our hope that the Lord's return could be real soon. So bear that in mind, and I trust your heart is prepared to receive the Word this morning. Let me just read the first six verses. Daniel one beginning in verse one. "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem and besieged it. The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, along with some of the vessels of the house of God; and he brought them to the land of Shinar to the house of his God, and he brought the vessels into the treasury of his God. Then the king ordered Ashpenaz, the chief of his officials, to bring in some of the sons of Israel, including some of the royal family and of the nobles, youths in whom was no defect, who were good-looking, showing intelligence and every branch of wisdom endowed with understanding and discerning knowledge and who had ability for serving in the king's court; and he ordered him to teach them the literature and language of the Chaldeans. The king appointed them a daily ration from the king's choice food and from the wine which he drank, and appointed that they should be educated three years, at the end of which they were to enter the king's personal service. Now among them from the sons of Judah were Daniel and Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah."

Do you ever wonder why the Jewish people have been and continue to be the most hated and persecuted people on the planet? Why does Satan have such a vendetta against the Jews? Have you ever thought about that? Have you ever wondered how the Jewish people could rise from the ashes of the Nazi Holocaust to become the most dominant military power in the Middle East, and one of the most powerful militaries and political states in all of the world? How could that happen? You ever wonder how such a little country about the size of New Jersey, 9000 square miles, with a population of only 9.8 million can survive against the overwhelming numbers of their enemies all around them? Is that not curious to you? You ever wonder how they could survive when they are surrounded by 22 Arab countries occupying 5 million square miles composed of 200 million people. And all of them aligned with all of the Muslim nations of the world, which consists of about 1.8 billion people. Nations that occupy lands that are 672 times the size of miniscule Israel. Dr. David Larsen said, quote, "Abraham purchased burial in Hebron 4000 years ago, and the Jews are still there." He went on to add, "How have the Jews, virtually alone, avoided genetic regression of IQ and achievement and been successful for 4000 years? The Hittites and the Canaanites are all gone. But the Jews are like Jonah, the stubborn Prophet, tossed out into the swirling and stormy seas, ostensibly consumed by the great fish, but ingested, then vomited upon the land once again." You ever wonder why, for 3000 years, Jerusalem, which means "the city of peace" has been a city of unparalleled war and bloodshed? One in which the Lord said in Zechariah 12, three, "a heavy stone for all the peoples," and he added, "all who lift it will be severely injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it." You ever wonder why the Temple Mount in Jerusalem is the most disputed piece of real estate in all of the world? You ever wonder what's going to happen to our country, to the great military powers of Russia and China and other nations? You ever wonder about the coming Antichrist of Bible prophecy? And how his rule fits into what we're seeing today with the rise of totalitarianism and globalism and ecumenism and apostate Christianity. You ever wonder what's going to happen on earth just prior to the Lord's return? Well, dear friends, these topics and many others will be addressed as we study the book of Daniel and other ancillary biblical passages. One of evangelicalism's most prominent 20th century theologians Dr. John Walfvoord, the former president of Dallas Theological Seminary, and a friend of our family, he used to come to our house and we used to play pool together and talk about Bible prophecy when I was a young man. He's gone home to be with the Lord now, but here's what he said, quote, "In many respects, the book of Daniel is the most comprehensive prophetic revelation of the Old Testament, giving the only total view of world history from Babylon to the Second Advent of Christ and inner relating Gentile history and prophecy, concerning Israel. Daniel provides the key to the overall interpretation of prophecy is a major element in Premillennialism and is essential to the interpretation of the book of Revelation. Its revelation of the sovereignty and power of God has brought assurance to Jew and Gentile alike, that God will fulfill His sovereign purposes in time and eternity."

Dear friends, today we embark upon a journey of the one of the most fascinating books in all of the Bible written under the inspiration of the Spirit. By one of God's choice servants, the prophet Daniel, whose name by the way, means "God is my judge." Jesus said in Matthew 24 and verse 15, "When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken up through Daniel, the prophet, standing in the holy place," and in parentheses he added, "(let the reader understand)," And I might say that's exactly what we are going to attempt to do; understand what Daniel and the other prophets have said concerning what is going to come upon the earth. You need to understand that Daniel is to the Old Testament, what the book of Revelation is to the New Testament. In fact, Daniel is the interpretive key in understanding Jesus' Olivet Discourse, in Matthew 24 and 25. And we will witness obvious parallels between Daniel's prophecies and other New Testament prophecies.

One of my favorite seminary professors, Dr. John C. Whitcomb wrote this, and I believe you have this in your bulletin, as he compares what we see in Daniel and other passages. He says, "No one who has reverently studied the book of Daniel, in the context of the completed scriptures, can deny the crucial contribution of this book to God's complete prophetic revelation. Our Lord spoke often of the Kingdom of Heaven, Matthew five, three, we also see it in Daniel 2:44, and of himself as the Son of Man, Matthew 26:64. Also in Daniel 7:13 through 14. Looking toward his second coming to the earth, he referred to "a great tribulation such has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now," Matthew 24:21. We see it as well in Daniel 12, one and two, "the abomination of desolation that will stand in the temple," Matthew 24:15, but also Daniel 9:27 and chapter 12, verse 11. The Apostle Paul also referred to this work of "the man of lawlessness," Second Thessalonians, two, three through four. We see it as well in Daniel 7:25, and chapter 11:36 through 39, but rejoice that someday the saints will judge the world. First Corinthians six, two, but also in Daniel 7:18, 22, and 27." Finally, Dr. Whitcomb says, "The chronological structure and much of the symbolism of Revelation six through 19 build upon the book of Daniel. We see this in Revelation 13, one through two, chapter 17, verses three and 12. And also in Daniel seven, three through 27, 9:27 11:36 through 39, and 12, one through seven."

Here, dear friends, we are going to marvel at the sovereignty and the power of our God. And as we look at the text, we will see how, through Daniel's prophecy, God reveals the successive stages of Gentile world domination through the ages, until the coming of Messiah, when the Lord our Savior, and King returns in power and great glory as King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, when he judges the nations and he defeats them, and he establishes His glorious Millennial Kingdom is universal reign over the earth. That day in which he fulfills his physical, as well as spiritual promises, to regenerated Israel. That day in which we too shall reign with Him.

Now, the book can be divided into very basic general parts. In chapters one through seven, the inspired prophet will reveal God's sovereign rule over history. His rule over all of the nations, even the ones that exist today. His rule over those who lead them. In fact, Daniel, two and seven reveal how God will one day unexpectedly and astonishingly establish his kingdom, after the ruin of four literal successive Gentile Empires, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. And just as these four kingdoms are literal kingdoms, so too, the coming, messianic kingdom that will destroy them, and replace them, will be a real geographical and political kingdom. And then in chapters eight through 12, we will see God's sovereign rule over Israel's future. There he will unveil his kingdom purposes both during and after Gentile domination in the world; what we read in Scripture as "the times of the Gentiles" that we are living in right now, and we will see how his kingdom promises apply also to Gentiles, like us, probably like most all of us. And I'm thankful that that is true, because, as the Apostle Paul said, in Ephesians 2:11, "we were strangers to God's covenants" we, according to Romans 11:24, are "the wild olive branches" that have been grafted into the spiritual tree of Abrahamic and Davidic and new covenant blessings. Today, ethnic Israel is experiencing a temporary and partial hardening as a consequence of God's judgment upon them. And today, the church has temporarily replaced Israel as the custodian of divine truth and many Gentiles are being saved. But as we will see a remnant of believing Israelites have been preserved; a preview of God's faithfulness to save the nation as a whole, as promised in Romans 11, beginning in verse 25, where the apostle Paul says, to the Gentiles, "For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery--so that you will not be wise in your own estimation--that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB. THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.' From the standpoint of the gospel, they're enemies for your sake. But from the standpoint of God's choice, they are beloved for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." In Daniel, we will find profound encouragement, as believers, to see God in control of his universe, and of all of history. And certainly it was a profound encouragement to the ancient Jews and in exile in Babylon, and frankly, throughout their weary sojourn. And here we will witness the miracle of divine providence, as God orchestrates all of the events, all of the contingencies of human history to ultimately accomplish his purposes in bringing glory to himself. Because God intends to do two primary things, one to exalt Christ as Savior and King, but also to redeem His people. And all through Scripture, we see Christ both as lion as well as lamb. And he will indeed redeem all that the Father who has given him according to Revelation seven, beginning of verse nine, "A great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches, were in their hands, and they cry out with a loud voice saying 'Salvation to our God, who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.'"

Oh, dear child of God, what a gift we have in His Word, in his prophetic word. What comfort we can gain as we look at Scripture, especially in light of all of the chaos we see all around us, knowing that there is absolutely nothing that escapes his notice, because there is nothing hidden from his site. Moreover, nothing thwarts his purposes because no power exists, apart from his authority, apart from his permission, and all that He has promised Israel, all that He has promised the church, all that He has promised to you and to me will come to pass. Today, we know that the world laughs at the gospel, laughs at Bible prophecy. People scoff at the idea of God's judgment because they have no fear of God. And they mock anyone who claims that Jesus is coming again. But our response must be like that of Peter's. As we read in Second Peter three, beginning in verse three, "Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, and saying, 'Where is the promise of His coming? For ever, since the fathers fell asleep all continues, just as it was from the beginning of creation.'" To which Peter responds, "For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God, the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. But by His word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, with the Lord one day is like 1000 years and 1000 years, like one day. the Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but as patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all, to come to repentance."

To be sure, as we examine the prophecies of Daniel, our faith will be fortified, and our souls will be blessed. Moreover, we must understand that that Bible prophecy is one of the greatest evidences of the inerrancy and inspiration of Scripture. In fact, we read in Second Peter one, verse nineteen that, "we have the prophetic word," referring to the entire Old Testament and by extension, all of Scripture, "made more sure," in that context, more sure than just personal experiences, "to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts." John MacArthur said quote, "It is said that future predictive prophecy occupies 1/5 of Scripture, not a small amount. Of that 1/5 of Scripture which is predictive prophecy, 1/3 of that speaks of the return of the Lord Jesus Christ, to judge sinners and to reward and reign with the righteous. So 1/3 of the 1/5 is focused on the second coming of Jesus Christ." He went on to add, "There are about 660 General prophecies in the Bible, half of them are about Jesus Christ. Of the 330 that are about Christ, 110 of them are about His first coming, and 220 of them are about His Second Coming. So there is a huge amount of Scripture that focuses on the second coming of Christ. Another sort of statistical way to look at the importance of this subject is out of the 46 Old Testament prophets, 10 of them spoke of matters related to His first coming, but 36 of them spoke of matters related to His second coming. Someone has estimated that over 1500 verses in the Old Testament look to the return of the Messiah in glory and judgment. One out of every 25 verses in the New Testament relates to Christ's return. For every time Christ mentions His first coming, he mentions His second coming eight times. That is, every time the New Testament mentions His first coming, it mentions His second coming eight times." And then he closes the section saying, "Our Lord referred to it 20 times, and there are over 50 times in the New Testament, we are warned that He is coming." Indeed dear friends, Jesus is coming as he has promised in His Word.

So with this introduction, let's establish a bit of the context of what God is going to reveal to us maybe a good way of doing that is imagine something that might not be too far-fetched. Imagine China coming to the United States and defeating the nation. And suddenly you and many of your family and friends have been killed. You've been taken from your homes. Calvary Bible Church, in terms of its building structure and facilities no longer exists. And some of you are taken away to China. You don't know the language, you don't know the culture, you don't know the people, and you are forced to submit to what they believe. That's basically what happened to Daniel with Babylon. We learn from Deuteronomy 28 that when God settled the tribes of Israel in the Promised Land, he promised to bless them if they were obedient and curse them if they rebelled against him. Well, we all know that, sadly, they were unfaithful. And as we look at the Old Testament, especially in the days of the judges, for example, in Judges three through chapter 16, we see a continuous cycle of apostasy, and then judgment, and then restoration and repentance, and then it would start over again. And while the rule of King David was characterized primarily by obedience and God's blessings, we know that Solomon eventually, quote, "turned away from the Lord," which triggered God's judgment once again. And this continued, despite all of the warnings of the prophets until the northern kingdom of Israel fell to the Assyrians in 722 BCE. Then a little over 100 years later, the same fate befell the southern kingdom of Judah at the hands of the Babylonians. And it's so sad for many years, the prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah warned Judah, of the coming judgment. If they refuse to repent of their idolatry and their immorality and their hypocrisy and their injustice and their greed, and on and on and on, but they scoffed at the prophets even though they knew what had happened to the northern kingdom in 722 BC. It's astounding. And gradually, we know historically that Assyria's power began to wane until it succumbed to the powerful and brutal forces of Babylonia. And then in the spring of 605 BC, we know that that Nebuchadnezzar and his Babylonian forces fought against the Egyptians and what was left of the Assyrian Empire at Carchemish. And the Babylonians defeated them and then just a few months later, they invaded Judah, and subdued them. And dear friends, it was at this time that Daniel and his friends were exiled to Babylon. And then later because of Judah's continued rebellion, eight years later in 597, Nebuchadnezzar once again came upon Judah, forced another 10,000 leading citizens to come to Babylon. You can read about that in Second Kings 24:11 through 16. That included by the way, the prophet Ezekiel, let me read you a little about that surrender in Second Kings 24, beginning in verse 12, "Jehoiachin, the king of Judah went out to the king of Babylon, he and his mother and his servants and his captains and his officials. So the king of Babylon took him captive in the eighth year of his reign. He carried out from there all the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king's house, and cut in pieces all the vessels of gold, which Solomon king of Israel had made in the temple of the Lord, just as the Lord had said. Then he led away into exile all Jerusalem and all the captains and all the mighty men of valor, 10,000 captives, and all the craftsmen and the smiths. None remained except the poorest people of the land. So he led Jehoiachin away into exile to Babylon, also the king's mother and the king's wives and his officials and the leading men of the land, he led away into exile from Jerusalem, to Babylon. All the men of valor, 7000 and the craftsman and the smiths, 1000, all strong and fit for war, and these, the king of Babylon brought into exile to Babylon."

And then there was a third coming of Nebuchadnezzar to Judah that happened in 586 BC when he once again, because of the rebellion, came back and he utterly destroyed Jerusalem and made them a province of Babylonia. And that destruction included the demolition of Solomon's temple, which many times we call the first temple. That magnificent structure that was 20 stories high, a structure that took 150,000 men, many years to build. And according to First Kings 10 in verse 14, we know that it's wall and floor were overlaid with pure gold amounting to 666 talents, that's 25 tons of gold. I had to get out my calculator, see what the price of gold is and get some idea of what that would be worth today, that would be worth approximately $1.2 billion. Folks, so you get the idea that God is serious about His holiness. He is serious about his word, he is serious about his will, and he will judge those who rebel against Him.

Dave Harrell

So in summary, in 605 BC, Nebuchadnezzar pillaged the temple and took the articles to Babylon where he placed them in the Babylonian temple at Shinar. You read about that in Second Chronicles 36, seven. And then again in 598 and seven BC, he returns and he further plunders the treasures of the temple. That's the Second Kings 24 and Second Chronicles 36 and seven, you read about that. And then finally, in 586 BCE, he invades Jerusalem a third time, and utterly destroys it and the temple. And later as we study the book, we will learn from Daniel chapter nine, how in 538 BC, Daniel prayed for Jerusalem, and prayed for the temple to be restored. And in that context, he received the prophecy of the 70 weeks concerning the Messiah's death in Jerusalem. That was fulfilled precisely to the day. He also prophesied in that context, the destruction of the Second Temple, which was the one built by Ezra and Nehemiah sometimes called Zerubbabel's temple, and the one that Herod expanded upon in the first century, and he also prophesied its future rebuilding and desecration under the rule of the coming Antichrist. In that context, he also revealed to him the defiling of that future second temple that would occur at the hands of Antiochus Epiphanes and the replacement, or I should say the placement of a statue of Zeus in the holy place in the temple. You read about that in Daniel 11:31.

Now, I want you to understand that when Daniel first came, he spent eight years in captivity before the first Judeans arrived in 597 BCE. And he spent 19 years before the final group came in 586 BC. And as we look at the whole book, we will see that Daniel bridges the entire 70 years of Babylonian captivity. Now, Daniel and his three close friends, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, were about 15 years old when they were taken captive. Daniel was from royal descent, as we read in Daniel one and verse three. And given the remarkable nature of his character, he must have been raised in a very godly home. We know nothing about really his parents or his home. And apart from his own book, Daniel is mentioned five times in Scripture. In Ezekiel 14 four and also verse 20, he's described as a righteous man along with Noah, and Job. It's good company to be in right? And in Ezekiel 28:33, we see how his wisdom is underscored. And this is especially noteworthy since Ezekial would have known Daniel very well because he was one of Daniel's contemporaries, who came to Babylon eight years after Daniel. And as mentioned earlier in Matthew 24, and verse 15, and Mark 13:14, Jesus points to Daniel's prophecy in Daniel 9:27 and chapter 12, and verse one, as the key to properly interpreting quote, "the abomination of desolation," end quote, that will take place during the great tribulation. Now, it's fair to ask, Why did Nebuchadnezzar take Daniel and his three friends? And the answer in a nutshell is because they were the brightest and the best and he needed to train young Jewish men in the ways of the Babylonians, so that they could come alongside him and help him govern the Jews. But we might also add that God had his own purposes, in all of this, to use Daniel as his mouthpiece, to encourage his covenant people in that day and down through the centuries as well as to encourage all of us today, and also to gain the adoration of the pagan rulers, demonstrating to them that YAWEH was the one true God. Yes, the God of Israel, but the God overall, the ruler of the heavens and the earth, and that his purposes cannot be thwarted.

Regarding Daniel's remarkable character and giftedness, Leon Wood writes, quote, "His three year education in Babylon, which no doubt followed good training before this in Jerusalem, equipped him well for his life's work. Along with this, he must have had a natural ability for administration, because once granted a high position at the court, he remained there. Later, he achieved a place even as one of the three top presidents in the Persian government of Darius. This honor was clearly the result of God's special blessing, but God regularly employs natural means to accomplish His will. Still another quality," Woods goes on to say, "was his admirable faith in God, while still a youth of about 17. He and his three friends had faith to believe that God would reveal to them the dream of King Nebuchadnezzar and the four held a prayer meeting to ask God to do so."

You know, as we approach this book, I must say, especially to you young people, and even especially to you young men, you need to take notice of Daniels godly character, be reminded of what God can do. And a young person who fears him and who trusts in Him who obeys him and worships him. We are told in Second Chronicles 69, "For the eyes of the Lord look to and fro throughout the world that He might strongly support those whose heart is completely His." Now, I must make brief mention of a few important aspects of this book. Here's where he gets a bit technical. And I hope I don't bore you out of your mind. But this is important for you to understand.

First of all, you must know that less than half of the book was written in Hebrew, the rest was written in Aramaic. In fact, the Aramaic part is from chapter two, verse four, all the way to chapter seven. And throughout the chapter, verse 28, I believe. Now why is this the case? Well, it's because Aramaic was the language of the Gentile world of that day. Moreover, as we will see, the subject matter pertain to the Gentiles rather than to Israel directly. I might also add that the shift from Hebrew to Aramaic and back and forth that we see is was found in the scrolls of Daniel discovered at Qumran, and this really underscores the legitimacy of this feature in the Masoretic text of the Jewish canon that's used in the English translation of the Bible. But a second important aspect of the book is this, there have always been and there will always be arguments between theological conservatives and liberals about the authorship and the date of Daniel, when it was written. Now I have deliberately not chosen to bore you with all of these technicalities, many of them are, are tedious, and frankly, unnecessary. I don't want to take away from the majestic flow of the book, if you have questions and you want more information, contact me. And believe me, I can give you places where you can read to your heart's delight, all of these obscure arguments. And furthermore, I must add that, because liberals deny the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, because they deny the supernatural nature of those things in Scripture, and because they deny the supernatural nature of predictive prophecy, they have no credibility, in my mind. In fact, liberalism, whether theological or political, is a deadly spiritual virus designed by Satan to deceive and to destroy. We've seen this throughout history, you can look at Europe today and see this, especially theologically, it's like a deadly virus spawned in the laboratories of demons. It makes COVID look like a common cold. But if you will indulge me I will make mention of at least one of these technical criticisms, I think you'll find it quite interesting and quite affirming.

Liberal critics insist that the prophecies of Daniel are so incredibly and undeniably and literally fulfilled, that they must have been written after the fact. Nobody could have possibly predicted all of that. It had to have been written by someone years later, who merely recorded historical facts in the guise of predictive prophecy. And I marvel at the blindness of the unregenerate. And I'm just thankful that, I'm thankful for God's grace, or I'd be right there with them, so would you. I mean, think about it, there are over 100 supernatural prophecies that have been fulfilled in chapter 11, alone, as we will see. Yet liberals deny the supernatural, especially biblical prophecy. Dr. Whitcomb is most helpful once again, one of my former professors, I'll read some of my notes that has been put in book form, or some of his notes that I have this is from him. He says, quote, "Theological liberals who deny the supernatural have maintained that predictive prophecy is a moral impossibility for God. Thus, the book must be a second century BC product of, quote, 'pious deception.' The supposed purpose of the book from their perspective, namely, the encouragement of Maccabean freedom fighters against the monster Antiochus Epiphanes, was somehow accomplished through the deception of a pseudonymous document pretending to be written by a legendary Daniel of four centuries earlier." But he goes on to argue saying, "Jews living in the intertestamental period, especially in Palestine, would never have accepted as canonical a book quote, 'hot off the press that claimed to be over 350 years old, and that was supposedly filled with historical blunders.' Jewish scholars of that period had access to numerous historical records of the Neo Babylonian, Medo-Persian and Hellenistic periods." He went on to add, "Even more important, intertestamental Jews were keenly aware of the identity and boundary lines of their own sacred canon of Scripture, and thus did not hesitate to exclude from their canon such books as Tobit, Judith, and even First Maccabees." And then he says this, "Would Jews, who were dying for their God given faith and their God given scriptures, have looked for encouragement to fictional characters, and events and a pseudo graph. The truth of the matter is that nothing but well-known material and material that was believed to be infallibly true and inspired by God could have kindled their spirits in the midst of that supreme hour of national crisis."

Beloved, please understand my perspective and the perspective of this church, what we have before us is the inspired, inerrant, infallible, authoritative, all sufficient Word of the living God. And what is said here is true, and what is promised will come to pass. We need to treasure it, we need to meditate upon it, we need to guard it, we need to memorize it, we need to obey it. And we need to be encouraged by it. Because it indeed is a lamp into our feet and light into our path.

Well, in conclusion, over the next few minutes, let me give you three outstanding themes that we will see as we journey through this book. And I might add, this is really hard because I saw a whole lot more. There's other themes that are going to come out, but let me just give you three here. Okay. First of all, we are going to be encouraged to see how God uses faithful servants who fear Him and love Him. We see this from the beginning in Daniel one in verse eight. We read, "Daniel" mind you now, a 15-year-old boy, "Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the king's choice food or with the wine which he drank; so he sought permission from the commander of officials that he might not defile himself." And you will see and you may recall that he got permission and, and the guys ate vegetables. By the way, this cannot be in any way, advocating vegetarianism. I would rather die than be a vegetarian. But they ate vegetables and verse 15 says, "At the end of 10 days, their appearance seemed better and they were fatter than all the youths who had been eating the king's choice food." By the way, later on, we will see that Daniel really enjoyed meat. Remember that.

And then in verses 17 and following, we see how God blessed them. "As for these four youths, God gave them knowledge and intelligence in every branch of literature and wisdom; Daniel even understood all kinds of visions and dreams. Then at the end of the days, which the king had specified for presenting them, the commander of the officials presented them before Nebuchadnezzar. The King talked with them, and out of them all, not one was found, like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah; so they entered the Kings personal service. As for every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king consulted them, he found them 10 times better than all the magicians and conjurers, who were in all his realm." And you will also recall that later on, Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold and demanded that everyone should bow down and worship that image or be thrown into a blazing furnace of fire. But Daniel and the guys said, not us, we will not bow to your God, chapter three, verse 17. We read of their response after Nebuchadnezzar warned them again in his fury. You know what's going to happen, don't you? And here's what they said in chapter three, verse 17, "'If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire, and He will deliver us out of your hand O king.' But,'" and I love this, '"even if He does not let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.'" Oh dear friends would we be so faithful, would that we refuse to bow down to the demands of our culture? The false narrative of critical race theory, the racist narrative of the Black Lives Matter terrorists, the abominations of the LGBTQ mafia and the delusions of these transgender lunatics. How sad. That we would not bow down to all of the COVID fear mongers and the global tech oligarchs, and all of this woke garbage, all of these deceptions that are being crammed down our throat. A friend of mine, talked with me this week. And he, we were writing back and forth on another matter, and he was telling me about the Cleveland Indians that changed their name. Did you hear about that to the Guardians? And he wrote to me sarcastically, well, frankly, I think the name smacks of masculine toxicity. I anticipate a lawsuit brought by the LGBTQ community against the team, and alas, poor Indians, how will they ever recover? Well, you get the idea. This is where we're at. It's just it's just insane. But dear friends, like Daniel, we must not bow to these things.

A second theme that we will see in Scripture is how Satan works. We will shudder at Satan's guerrilla warfare tactics to deceive the world and thwart the purposes of God. We know that He is the ruler of this world until the Lord cast him out according to John 12, and verse 31. He is the God of this world that blinds the minds of the unbelievers. According to Second Corinthians four, four. John tells us in first John 5:19, that "the whole world lies in the power of the evil one." Paul tells us in Ephesians, two two that he is "the prince and the power of the air of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience." And he is one, as Paul says in Second Corinthians 11:14, who disguises himself as "an angel of light."

And dear friends, as Daniel unfolds the wickedness of Gentile domination in the world, we are going to see how the devil and his minions work. And we will see how he has assigned certain demons to be rulers over certain nations and their rulers. We see this for example, in Daniel chapter 10. The context here is Daniel prays and Gabriel comes to answer his prayer. And then verse 12, Gabriel says, "I have come in response to your words. But the prince of the kingdom of Persia was withstanding me for 21 days. Then behold, Michael, one of the chief princes came to help me, for I had been left there with the kings of Persia." And then in verse 20, the angel Gabriel describes another demon assigned to influence the rulers of Greece. And he says, and now I must "return to fight with the prince of Persia. And when I have gone forth, indeed, the prince of Greece will come." Dear Christian, we must understand that even today, in times of fasting and prayer as we cry out to the living God to protect us and help us, and use us as instruments of righteousness, that behind the scenes, there is a great spiritual conflict occurring. There's an unseen struggle between angelic forces going on right now in the world. And this is going to escalate as the day of the Lord approaches. How else can you explain the sheer insanity and depravity that has so quickly gained power in our country. But I must add this, do not fear. The battle has already been won at the cross, Amen? The battle has been won. And Daniel's prophecies will reveal the utter destruction of Satan's kingdom that is currently being mediated upon the earth through the reign of wicked men and women and ultimately through the reign of his version of the incarnate Christ, and that will be the reign of the Antichrist. And here's what Daniel says, in chapter seven, beginning in verse 13. And be encouraged with these words. "'I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, One like a Son of Man was coming, and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away, and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed."

And finally, we're going to marvel at the miracle of divine providence as we witness His rule over all of the contingencies of history to accomplish his purpose. And indeed, he is continually right now exercising his rule, even though he's allowing Satan to do his thing, at least for a while. And even Nebuchadnezzar confessed in Daniel four beginning in verse 34, "'I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Him who lives forever, for His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation, all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but He does according to His will, in the host of heaven, and among the inhabitants of Earth, and no one can ward off His hand or say to Him, What have you done?'" Dear friends, what confidence we can have in the Word of God, and the prophecies of the book of Daniel and throughout Scripture. And to know that we are part of that plan. We're all part of that plan. We are all members of this one magnificent organism, the body of Christ, we all have a role to play, we've all been given a gift. And as we all work together, the purpose of that is to edify the saints so that all of us together, can exalt the one who is the head of the church, the Lord Jesus Christ.

So let's prepare our hearts as we look into this great text. I would encourage you to read it, it's not very long, I would encourage you to read it at least two or three times a week, become familiar with it. And you will be excited to see what the Spirit of God will reveal to you, in the coming months, perhaps years. We shall see.

Let's pray together. Father, we're so thankful for your word that truly gives us an overwhelming sense of your love, your faithfulness, your sovereign and providential rule over all of your creation. And to know that, by your grace, you have made us a part of your kingdom. And Lord how we long for your kingdom to come and your will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. But until that day comes, I would ask that You would help us to be faithful, even as Daniel and his three friends were faithful and many others. Even in that day, I pray that you will use us all in a mighty way for the sake of the kingdom, that others might see Christ in us, that they too might be saved by your grace and Your grace alone. And if there be one here today that knows nothing of what it is to truly be reconciled to the only God who can justify the ungodly. I pray that today you will overwhelm them with the guilt of their sin that they might come running to the cross and cry out for the mercy that you will so quickly give those who are truly coming to you and repentant faith. So we thank you, we give you praise and all things for Jesus sake and in His name. Amen.

This morning, we return to Mark's gospel. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 11; we're going to be examining verses one through 14 in a very general way this morning and then, in a few weeks when I'm back with you, we will look at it more closely. And I've entitled my discourse to you, "The Royal Entrance and False Coronation." This will be part one. Let me read the text to you. Mark 11, beginning in verse one. " As they approached Jerusalem at Bethpage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, He sent two of His disciples and said to them, 'Go into the village opposite you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find a colt there, on which no one yet has ever sat. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone says to you, 'Why are you doing this?' You say the Lord has need of it. And immediately he will send it back here.' They went away and found a colt tied at the door outside the street, and they untied it. Some of the bystanders were saying to them, 'What are you doing untying the colt?' They spoke to them, just as Jesus had told them, and they gave them permission. They brought the colt to Jesus and put their coats on it. And He sat on it. And many spread their coats in the road and others spread leafy branches, which they had cut from the fields. Those who went in front and those who followed were shouting: 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; blessed is the coming kingdom of our father, David; Hosanna! in the highest!' Jesus entered Jerusalem and came into the temple; and after looking around at everything, He left for Bethany with the 12, since it was already late."

This is a very familiar passage of scripture to most Christians. They have read it, they've heard it preached before probably many times. And yet, I have found that for most, they have a very shallow understanding of the historical and theological implications of this magnificent piece of scripture, this amazing event that speaks of God's Kingdom purposes, and how they relate to the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And my goal this morning, is to help deepen your understanding of these things, so that you will not only understand better this text but be more and more amazed at all that God is doing. So today will not be a typical verse by verse exposition. But rather, and that will happen the next time I'm with you, but rather, this will largely be a historical and theological introduction. And I trust that the truth you're about to hear will shed light upon this very dark and depraved world, which is a veritable Sodom and Gomorrah, awaiting divine judgment. And the more we contemplate the person and the work of Christ, especially as it relates to the kingdom of God, and our future in it, the more our hearts will long for his return.

Now, may I remind you from the outset that the kingdom of God is the dominant and unifying theme of Scripture. And it is the climactic fulfillment of God's redemptive purposes. And that, of course, is going to include Israel as well as the church. Now, spiritually we know that God is currently reigning in the hearts of the redeemed. We understand that. In fact, the apostle Paul says in Philippians, three, in verse 24, "Our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ." But we also know that the most glorious aspect of the kingdom is yet future, it's yet to come. For example, in Isaiah chapter nine in verse seven, we read, "There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore." And my how I long for that day, every moment of my life. And for this reason, you will recall that Jesus taught us to pray, in Matthew six, "Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name." In other words, make your name sanctified, make it holy, in my life and throughout the world. And then Jesus said, you're to go on and say, "Your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." And I might add that all three petitions regarding God's name, regarding the kingdom and his will, in the original language, all of those verbs are in the emphatic position, which attests to their profound importance. And each one of them, grammatically, is in what we call the aorist active imperative form, which indicates that this is going to be a single or instantaneous event, that there will be something that will explode upon the scene, namely, the hallowing of his name, the kingdom that's coming; his will being "done on earth as it is in heaven," all consistent with kingdom prophecy. So, in other words, this is not merely speaking of some spiritualized kingdom that already exists. That would cause those texts to beg for relevance. Moreover, it's not speaking of a kingdom that is going to gradually appear as the church brings it to fruition. But rather, we're asked to pray for God to suddenly and instantaneously burst forth in all of his glory, so that his name will be hallowed, so that his kingdom will come, and that his will be done.

Now, let me give you some more historical and theological background to this amazing scene of Jesus coming into Jerusalem. First of all, we know that God chose Israel to be his covenant people, to be a holy nation, to be a holy kingdom. They were chosen to represent God among the nations as we read in Deuteronomy four. We are told that they were ultimately to bring blessing to all of the nations consistent with the Abrahamic covenant in Genesis 12. And also, they are to demonstrate God's great love and God's great faithfulness. But they disobeyed God, and they were enslaved by the nations. And what we see throughout Scripture is Israel is basically depicted as a microcosm of God's redemptive purposes and all of his elect. For example, if you go to Romans chapter nine, you will see the apostle Paul speaking of Israel's election. In chapter 10, you will read about Israel's defection. In chapter 11, you will read about Israel's salvation and eventual restoration. But for now, because Israel rejected her Messiah, they are currently experiencing a period of temporary and partial hardening as God saves many Gentiles. We read about this in, for example, Romans 11 and verse 25. But because God is faithful to his covenant promises, Israel's unbelief will one day be reversed, during the time of the day of the Lord, the coming day of the Lord. And God will restore them, God will save them when Christ returns, consistent with Zechariah's prophecy in Zechariah, chapter 10 and verse 12. And at that point, the Messianic kingdom will be established when the Lord returns. And Israel will enjoy the blessings of the kingdom. They will assume their role of leadership and service among the nations and those blessings of course, will be extended to Gentiles as well.

Now you will recall and here's some big picture perspective. Remember when the angel came to Mary? When she was to conceive a son that would be king. In Luke chapter one, verse 32, we read this, "He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most and the Lord God will give Him the throne of his father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end." And certainly, throughout Jesus's life he proved himself to be the Son of God. From his miracles to his parables, he demonstrated that he indeed was the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy, who had come to officially and finally offer himself as the king of the Messianic Kingdom, an exact fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. An offer, however, that was conditioned upon Israel's national repentance. In fact, he was fully prepared to establish his earthly kingdom as the prophets predicted when he first came. We read about this, in Mark one and verse 15, Jesus said, "'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.'" So indeed, this announcement of the kingdom required Israel to make a decision, to repent, and to believe in who he was. Because we know that God's promises to Abraham had to be received by faith. But they refused, despite all of the miracles that they saw and experienced, and perhaps even benefited from; they rejected him. The rejection by the civil leaders and religious leaders was unmistakable. When they blaspheme the Holy Spirit, you will recall, in Mark 3:22, they said, that "'He is possessed by Beelzebul,' and 'He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons,'" and so forth. However, we know that, as in the realm of jurisprudence, a legal proffer, or in other words, an offer of proof, must be made. And so, an official offer had to be made to the nation of Israel as a whole, in order for them to determine their final decision of who he really was. This was Israel's time and her visitation to receive the king.

Now, many will argue that the kingdom of God that Jesus was offering was merely a spiritual kingdom, the rule of God in the hearts of men. And certainly, there's some merit to that. But such an announcement would have been silly to the people of that day because such a rule of God had always been recognized by them. That's not what the Old Testament prophets were prophesying. What Jesus was offering them, was God's mediatorial kingdom, on Earth, through the reign of the Messiah. But once again, while his promises cannot be abrogated, in other words, annulled, or rescinded, such a kingdom on earth was always conditioned upon regeneration, and repentance, resulting in faith and obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ.

So now Jesus comes to offer himself to Israel, as their promised Messiah, their promised king, who will establish the kingdom if they repent. And you will remember that prior to our Lord's entrance into Jerusalem, according to Luke 10, one, "The Lord appointed 70 others, and sent them in pairs ahead of Him to every city and place where He Himself was going to come." And as we read that passage, we see that their mission was very simple. "'Every city that receives you,'" he said, "'heal those who are sick and say to them, 'The kingdom of God has come near to you.'" we read that in verses eight and nine of Luke 10. And then he said in verses 10, and 11, if they don't receive you, "'Go out into the streets and say, 'even the dust of your city which clings to our feet, wipe off and protest against you; yet be sure of this, that the kingdom of God has come near.'" So, everything that is happening here, in Jesus' final journey to Jerusalem, all that's recorded in the Gospels, is part of God's deliberate, purposeful, precise plan, which by the way, took probably around five months. And his plan is to present himself to Israel as the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy. And he's conducting himself once again as the public claimant to the messianic title.

Now, as we look at this, what I would call a royal entrance and false coronation, there are a number of circumstances that are worthy of our investigation to help us see how Jesus regarded this event as a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies, especially pertaining to the mediatorial kingdom upon the earth and the future nation of Israel; very important consideration. So let me give some of them to you. Number one, we must look at Jesus stage setting encounters and miracles. Now, some of this will be review, but it's important to keep it all kind of in context. To be sure, the messianic expectations were running high at this time of year. This was the Passover season. It was the time when the Jews are celebrating God's deliverance from the Egyptians that took place some 1400 years earlier. But this Passover was different because of what they had seen in Jesus, they had never seen anything like this. All of the miracles, healing of the sick, the blind, the deaf, lepers, raising the dead, absolutely astounding. And certainly, the raising of Lazarus from the dead was on the lips of virtually every person in the region. 1000s of pilgrims now are with Jesus, as he goes first through Jericho, and then eventually, ascends up to Mount Zion to Jerusalem. And many of these people are wanting not only to see Jesus, but they want to see Lazarus. I mean, wouldn't you? I want to see this guy that was raised from the dead, I understand he's with Him. We read about this in John 12 beginning in verse nine, "The large crowd of the Jews then learned that Jesus was there, and they came not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might also see Lazarus, whom He had raised from the dead." Now catch this, "But the chief priests planned to put Lazarus to death also; because on account of him, many of the Jews were going away, and were believing in Jesus." So that gives you a sense of what's going on. We have reason to believe that there were approximately 2 million Jews that are awaiting Jesus' entry in Jerusalem to the utter consternation of the religious leaders. Moreover, as Jesus makes his way to Jerusalem, remember, he encounters this rich young ruler. He demonstrates how that that kind of a person who is in love with material things will never enter the kingdom of God apart from divine intervention, he said, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." Then he went on to say, "but with God, all things are possible." And then we read next that he gives sight to two blind men, also there and Jericho. proving once again his deity, but also demonstrating the power of regenerating grace where he gives sight to the spiritually blind, as well as the physically blind. And then next, we see this amazing scenario with Zacchaeus that is essentially a juxtaposition of the most salient themes of those first two encounters, because he gives spiritual sight to a spiritually blind man who was fabulously wealthy and corrupt. And there we have an example of the camel going through the eye of the needle. What an amazing testimony, especially to his disciples that he's trying to instruct in preparing them for what is to come. And in the context of Zacchaeus' conversion, we know that Jesus preaches a sermon on a most important theme that ran absolutely contrary to all of the Jewish hopes and dreams, contrary to even what the disciples were thinking.

What he wanted to demonstrate to them is that he was not coming to conquer, but to seek and to save. Luke 19 and verse 10, Jesus says, "'For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.'" And that was the theme of the sermon that he gave there with Zacchaeus and the others that were listening. So, all of these miracles now are setting the stage for his regal entry into Jerusalem.

A second observation is Jesus stage setting parable in Luke 19. Bear in mind during this final season of Jesus ministry, he's going to describe the mystery form of the kingdom and how that that will assume all that will happen during the interregnum. An interregnum is just an interval between two successive periods; a time period where a king is not reigning, a kingdom doesn't have a leader. In this case, the interregnum will intervene between Jesus's death and his second coming, when he comes again as King of kings and Lord of lords. And his parable in Luke 19 is designed to prepare them for this interregnum. You will recall that in Luke 19, Jesus gives this parable of a noble man, referring to Christ, he travels to a distant country referring to Heaven, to receive a kingdom that is to receive official authority to reign and then he returns to rule over that kingdom. And we read in that parable that Jesus is saying that he's wanting to correct the erroneous assumption that they had, that the kingdom was going to appear immediately. Instead of appearing later on at a future time, after the nobleman's departure, after him receiving the authority and then returning as King--an interval of time that was unspecified, causing every generation to live in anticipation, you will recall that he describes two groups. He describes, first of all slaves, those that profess allegiance to him, those that are loyal subjects. And that represents those who profess to be faithful servants of Christ. Some are, some aren't, regardless of what they profess. And also he describes citizens that hated him, especially representing Israel, but also all who reject the Lord Jesus Christ. In verse 14 of that passage we read, "'But his citizens hated him and sent a delegation after him saying, 'We do not want this man to reign over us.'" And I might add, that this is what will begin to play out in the final week of Jesus ministry on earth, often called his Passion Week. And sadly, the multitudes that are shouting "Hosanna to the Son of David!" are soon going to turn on him and demonstrate their final rejection. In a few days Israel will scream, according to John 19:15, "'Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify him!'" Pilate said to them, 'Shall I crucify your King?' The chief priests answered, 'We have no king but Caesar.'" And as we will see before the week is out, Israel will eventually be united in their repudiation of the nobleman's regal claim to be their king.

I might pause for a moment this is so typical of so many people that follow Christ today. The Jesus that they have concocted is not the true Jesus. Most people have come up with a Jesus, that's kind of the smiley face, God that winks at sin, that just kind of loves everybody, everybody is going to heaven. You can do anything you want. This is the Jesus of love. But they never understand that because of his holiness, he's also the Jesus of wrath, a Jesus of judgment. People don't want that. They want a false Messiah that came to make them happy, not holy. Kind of a genie in the bottle type of a thing that will do whatever they ask the genie to do. And certainly that's what the Jews wanted. They wanted a deliverer from Roman bondage. They wanted social justice, they wanted the end of poverty, the end of disease, they wanted the end of I don't know, poor self-esteem, they wanted no more unhappiness. They wanted, shall we say, a malleable Jesus, like the prosperity gospel Jesus, the one that you can manipulate, to give you stuff. Or they wanted, the leftist woke Jesus of the social justice gospel. And like the Jews, all of these people will reject the true Jesus.

Now to be sure, Jesus didn't meet the Jewish expectations. They wanted a conquering king; they did not want a suffering Savior. But Jesus, when he came, again said, "I came this time to seek and to save that which is lost," because only then can sinners enter the kingdom.

Now back to the parable. After receiving his kingdom authority from heaven, we know that the nobleman returns to earth over a realm of his subjects that are living in it, and the first regal action of the king now is to judges slaves who were entrusted with what he had given them in his absence. And he eventually executed judgment on both the disloyal slaves and the citizens that hated him. And of course, all of this parallels the eschatological prophecies that we read in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, especially as it relates to Israel's rejection of her Messiah, and the second coming of Christ. And I might also add that this is going to be a preview of all that will happen at the beginning of his Passion Week, because he's going to continue to expose Israel's hypocrisy. He's going to expose their apostasy by cleansing the temple, he is going to continue to do what he does so best and that is humiliate the Jewish leaders, embarrass them publicly, call them out. And in fact, what we're going to see is that for two days, he will rule in the temple precincts, answering the public charges and challenges against him. And he will pronounce the judgment of God on those who reject Him. The fickle crowd is going to turn against him, they will eventually be apoplectic with rage, and they will call for his crucifixion. I'm reminded of what Jesus said in John seven, seven, that "'The world hates Me because I testify of it, that it's deeds are evil.'" John one, verse 11, "He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him." And Jesus will later promise them of coming judgment in Luke 19:44, "because you did not recognize the time of your visitation." And because of the rebellion, we know that the kingdom was temporarily withdrawn and postponed on Earth awaiting a future day.

And this brings us to a third circumstance that helps us understand what was going on as it relates to Old Testament prophecy, and the kingdom of God. Number three, we must look at Jesus' lament over Jerusalem. Luke 19:41, "When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and wept over it." The term wept, in the original language carries the idea of crying aloud profusely. saying, "'If you had known in this day.'" Let me pause there. This, as we will see from other passages in a moment, this is Israel's day, a precise day of opportunity that was prophesied by the prophet Daniel, "If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will throw up a barricade against you and surround you and hem you in on every side, and they will level you to the ground, and your children within you. And they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.'" And of course, all of this came true in 70 AD with the Roman invasion. And tragically, Israel could not see as Jesus says, "'The things which make for peace.'" And because of that, God judged them. And now these things would be as he says, "hidden from your eyes." And the things that would make for peace, will be postponed until his second coming.

I'm always amazed when I read Bible prophecy. I'm just astounded at it. And there is no other religious book in the world that has prophecies because this is the only one written by God. Nobody else wants to write prophecies, and they don't come true and you look like an idiot, right? But this is so astounding. In fact, if you read Jesus' Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, and 25. And what we have here in Luke 19:41 through 44, we see that Jesus gives these incredibly detailed descriptions of what is going to happen. I mean, this isn't just vague things. This is a detailed description. And I was reading one scholar by the name of Pearson, he identified 25 distinct predictions in that context of Scripture. And he says, "And on the laws of compound probability, the chance of all meeting in one fulfilling event is one in 20 million." And my friend, David Larson, who has now gone home to be with the Lord, said this, "Comparing the predictions with the historical fulfillment, as described in Josephus, and an eyewitness, Antacitus, we cannot but agree with Eusebius. If anyone compares the words of our Savior with the accounts of the historian, how can anyone fail to wonder and to admit the foreknowledge and prophecy of our Savior were truly divine and marvelously strange." And then Larson concludes, "The words of Jesus spoken in another context come to mind." Then he quotes John 14:29. "I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen, you will believe."

Let me give you another fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, in the context of all that's happening in his regal entry. This has to do, number four, with Jesus perfectly timed arrival into Jerusalem. Now a little bit of background. Since according to John 12, Jesus was at Bethany quote, "six days before the Passover," which was probably on Saturday, on Shabbat. It was on the next day, which would be Sunday, the Jewish crowds came to see Jesus. And according to John 12, Jesus, quote, "and Lazarus whom he raised from the dead." So when we look at John 12, verse 12, we read, "On the next day, the great multitude who had come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, took the branches of the palm trees and went out to meet Him and began to cry out 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel.'" So when you look at this, you see that it is more likely that it was on Monday, not traditional Palm Sunday, after Jesus had been in Bethany with Lazarus, that he traveled through Bethpage making his way through the eastern gate of Jerusalem. And I might also add that a Monday triumphal entry is also very important. Because in Exodus chapter 12, verses two through six, we read that, according to the Mosaic Law, sacrificial lambs, for Passover had to be selected on the 10th day of the first month. They would select the lamb and then they would take the lamb into their home. And they would love the little lamb until the time for the sacrifice on the 14th. And only a Monday triumphal entry would fulfill this important symbolism. Because Jesus, the year Jesus was crucified, the 10th of Nissan was on Monday, of the Passover week. And this would allow, and I hope you see the symbolism, this would allow the Jewish people to nationally select Jesus as the Lamb, to take them unto themselves as the Passover lamb, to take them into their hearts, in their home symbolically, and to love Him. And yet, because of their sinfulness, to sacrifice him on Friday, the 14th of Nissan. Isn't it astonishing? I mean, think about this, the exact day of the king's presentation was not something random, but one determined, one that was decreed in eternity past by a sovereign God, who not only knows the end from the beginning, but has ordained the end from the beginning. In fact, 600 years before the Holy Spirit revealed to the prophet Daniel the precise date that this would happen, though he didn't fully understand what he was writing down. Daniel 9:25, "So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks." This is referring to weeks of years, "heptads." 69 weeks of prophetic years, consisting of 360 days each add up to 173,880 days. So when we do the math, which I'm not going to take time to go through all of it, what you have is 483 years after the Persian Artaxerxes' decree to rebuild Jerusalem, which happened in 445 BC, the first advent of Messiah would be fulfilled precisely, at the triumphal entry on the 10th of Nissan, AD 30. And it was precisely on that day that our Lord rode into Jerusalem as the messianic king of Israel. This is when the Jewish people took in their Passover lamb, and they loved him for a while, until the time of the sacrifice on the 14th, consistent with Mosaic Law. You get the idea that God is not capricious in what he does? I might add, as a footnote, as we look at these judgments that Daniel describes, 69 weeks of years have been fulfilled, but there are 70 total. So there's one more week of years yet to be fulfilled. We typically call that Daniel's 70th week, and it refers to the pre-kingdom tribulation judgments right before our Lord returns. And during that time, the Antichrist will rule and we're seeing that being, the way for all of that, being paved right now, in our culture and in our world. These are days pertaining to the days of the Antichrist, as Daniel will go on to prophesy in verse 27. He adds this, "And he will make a firm covenant," referring to the Antichrist, "with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week," in other words, after three and a half years, "he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations, will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate."

Let me give you a fifth fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies concerning the kingdom and the future of the nation Israel, in the context of what's happening here with Jesus regal entry into Jerusalem. And that has to do with Jesus prophecy, fulfilling mount. Now as a old horseman, this is always fascinating to me, and I'm not going to get into all of the details this time, I'll get into it at another time, but this is an miraculous thing. In Mark 11, two we read, Jesus, "said to them, 'Go into the village opposite you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, on which no one yet has ever sat; untie it and bring it here.'" Beginning of verse seven, he says that "They brought the colt to Jesus and put their coats on it; and He sat on it." By the way, those are details, if you understand anything about horses, you know that that's not going to happen, unless a miracle happens. And the details of that are very, very important for us to see. Because dear friends this is a preview of millennial blessing in the animal kingdom. And it says, "And many spread their coats in the road, and other spread leafy branches which they had cut from the fields. Those who went in front of those who followed were shouting: 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; blessed is the coming kingdom of our father, David; Hosanna, in the highest!'" And Matthew records this in chapter 21, verse four, "This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet." And here's the prophecy: "Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Behold, your King is coming to you, gentle and mounted on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of the beast of burden.'" Zechariah nine nine is where he got that. Isn't it amazing how Jesus was careful to fulfill every single detail of the predictions of his triumphal entry into Jerusalem as the king of Israel? And to know that about 550 years before this happened, the Holy Spirit inspired the prophet Zechariah to pen these words and Zechariah nine nine. A detailed description of the king's mount is foretold. And certainly this reveals the humility of the king and the honor that would mark the event. "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph," this is Zachariah nine nine, "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation, humble and mounted on a donkey, even on a colt the foal of a donkey."

I might also add that this is a messianic millennial prophecy that's also recorded in Genesis, chapter 49 and verse 11, spoken some 1859 years BC. You see the entire prophecy of all that Zechariah and all the prophets said, all of those things were fulfilled literally. In fact, I want to pause here. This is very important. It's a bit technical, but I find it very important to note. Matthew only quotes Zechariah nine, nine. He stops there. He doesn't quote verse 10. He only quotes verse nine, pertaining to the Messiah's entry into Jerusalem and his lowly mount. He mentions nothing about the next verse that speaks about the promises pertaining to the Messiah's rule and reign and bringing peace upon the earth. The very next verse says, "I will cut off," cut off by the way, in the original language carries the idea of a violent eradication of war, a termination of these things, "I will cut off," I will completely terminate, "the chariot from Ephraim," another word for Israel, "and the horse from Jerusalem; and the bow of war will be cut off. And he will speak peace to the nations; and His dominion will be from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth." Why didn't Matthew mention any of that? Well, the answer is simple. Because the king at that point, did not come to establish his kingdom and occupy his messianic throne and rule at that time. What verse 10 is speaking about is the peace that will exist during the kingdom age. Alva J. McClain says quote, "If the colt ridden by the king, upon his arrival had to be literal," and we know that it was, "so also," he goes on to say, "must the warfare be literal, which will be abolished when he reigns." All right? He goes on to say, "If Matthew had believed in a present Messianic reign, ushered in by the first coming of the King, here would have been the time and place to cite, in full, the details of Zechariah, nine, nine through 10." But he says, "Not a word about the wondrous things of verse 10." Well, of course, verse 10 is going to happen, but it didn't happen when Jesus came the first time, it will happen when he comes the second time. And I marvel at all this. Jesus' humble entry into Jerusalem, was really a precursor to his second coming when he will come riding on a white horse as its described in Revelation 19:11, when he will come to conquer his enemies, and usher in peace and prosperity, all consistent with his is Abrahamic and Davidic, and New Covenant promises.

Now notice what else Jesus did to demonstrate that he indeed was the messianic king of Israel, according to Old Testament prophecy. And this is my sixth point in this little outline. And here we look at Jesus permitting the public to proclaim his regal person, Jesus permitting the public to proclaim his regal person. This is really interesting. First of all, notice all four gospels describe how the people give full throated praise to Jesus as the Messiah. When he comes in, again, Mark 11, at the end of verse nine, "Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; blessed is the coming Kingdom of our David, of our father David; Hosanna, in the highest!" Matthew chapter 21, verse eight, "Most of the crowd spread their coats in the road, and others were cutting branches from the trees and spreading them in the road. The crowds were going ahead of Him, and those who followed were shouting, 'Hosanna, to the son of David;" By the way, the "Son of David” was a common messianic title. They knew exactly who he was and claimed to be. "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest!" And I might add that this was taken from Psalm 118 verse 26, "Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord." That by the way, Psalm 118, is the sixth and final psalm of the Egyptian Hallel sung before and after the Passover meal in the Jewish community. And it was also sung at the Last Supper by Jesus and his disciples. So you see how all of these intricacies fit together precisely, to accomplish God's plan. Luke 19 verse 38, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord; Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!" John 12, verse 12, "A large crowd who had come to the feast," goes on to say, "took the branches of the palm trees and went out to meet Him, and began to shout, 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel.'"

I might add that to the idea of spreading your garments in the road for a coming King was something that they would do. And it basically denoted your willingness to be in total submission to the king and let him just kind of march over you. So that's what they were doing here. And the waving of the palm branches was customary when welcoming an approaching monarch. Moreover, the waving of the palm branches was part of the Feast of Tabernacles. And this all fits in to the whole theme of what's happening here. That was a seven-day celebration commemorating the deliverance and the protection and the provision that God gave the Israelites during the wilderness wanderings of the Exodus. And it also was a testimony to God's blessing to them in the harvest time in the autumn, according to Leviticus 23:39 through 40. And I might also add that that will be celebrated during the Millennial Kingdom, according to Zechariah 14:16. So the people understood the Regal meaning of the Lord's entry into Jerusalem. But here's what's fascinating. Prior to this scenario, the Lord Jesus would not allow any public acclamation of his Messiahship.

Boy, there's a big shift here, what is going on? You remember Matthew 16:20, "Then He warned the disciples that they should tell no one that he was the Christ." Any public proclamation of Him as Messiah would really upset everything that he's trying to do, because then at that point, not only would they lose all attention to his gospel message, but also they're going to want to make him king right then and there. You see, people want free stuff. That's part of our human nature. I mean, be honest, we all want free stuff. And certainly, then they wanted free stuff. And that's what they saw with Jesus. You know, I'm not interested about this, you know, all this forgiveness of sin, I'm good. You know I keep the law. I mean, that's the idea. I'm a good person. I'm a child of Abraham, or whatever. People think that way today. I mean, people want reward without responsibility, right? And by the way, politicians have played this game for years, to get people reward without responsibility. This is how they stay in power. I mean, this has been the whole modus operandi of the Democratic Party for years and years and years; to offer people free stuff, reward without responsibility, so that they can stay in power. That's why we're $33 trillion in debt and we don't have a border; to let more and more people come in to vote them into office. So I mean, this is nothing new. And that's what was going on with those people.

You see if I can put it very clearly, man's lust for the fleeting pleasures of life will utterly eclipse any thought of needing to be reconciled to a holy God. Now bear in mind prior to this massive public ovation of his Messiah ship, Jesus just allowed his miraculous works and the prophetic scriptures and his teaching to give witness to him, but he would not allow public acclamation. You will recall in John six and verse 15, we read, "So Jesus, perceiving that they were intending to come and take Him by force to make Him king withdrew again to the mountain by Himself alone." He didn't want that. And this was also why Jesus removed himself from the large cities and went into the desert regions, especially removed himself from Jerusalem in order to conduct his ministry, but now--now is the perfect time. This is the time. Now he allows the multitudes to shout the truth of who he is, with all of their might. Luke 19:38, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord; Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!" But then notice what happens. "Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, 'Teacher, rebuke Your disciples!' But Jesus answered, 'I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!'"

I might also add that Jesus is allowing this for another reason. You see Israel's public acknowledgement and praise of his royal credentials would later be used against them when they rejected him. Isn't it amazing what began with praise very quickly deteriorated into condemnation. My dear friends, how quickly sinful men and women will turn against the true Christ, once they understand that he is not the idol that they have created him to be. So everything Jesus did, was orchestrated to reach the high point of this day of his triumphal entry, a day of Messianic presentation foretold by the Old Testament prophets, predicting the manner, the moment, the meaning of the king's final offer.

And following this, as we are going to see, he will speak a new series of parables, once he's in Jerusalem; parables about the kingdom. He will do battle with the religious elite one last time and humiliate them and then he is going to state his last lament, and judgment upon all, who reject Him. So dear friends, I hope with this overview, you can begin to see the amazing realities historically, theologically that's going on here, in this incredible scene. And I would challenge you to reflect upon this passage, because it encompasses all that Christ has done and will do. And remember this, that the one who came in humility, the lowly Messiah, the suffering servant, who offered Himself as the Lamb of God, is going to return again one day in power and great glory. And he will conquer his enemies. He will judge the nations, he will judge the wicked, all those that mock at him today--our King is coming again and he will establish his kingdom. My how I long for that day--how I long for that day, to think that he came first in obscurity, but he will come again in dazzling clarity. He said in Matthew 24:27, "'For just as the lightning comes from the east and flashes even to the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be.'" Nobody will miss it the next time he comes. He came the first time in humility, the second time, he's coming in glory. He came the first time to seek and to save--he will come again to judge the nations. He came the first time as a lamb, but he will come again as the Lion of Judah. He came the first time and he opened not his mouth, but he will return, as we read in Revelation 19:15, "and from His mouth comes a sharp sword ao that with it, He may strike down the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fear the wrath of God, the Almighty."

Dear friend, if you have trusted in Christ as your only hope of salvation, you don't have to fear any of this. But if you haven't, you need to be absolutely terrified. Because the day is coming, when you will have to face the Lord Jesus Christ. And you will either do so in triumph or in terror. The good news is the gospel--that God has provided a way for each one of us as sinful people to be reconciled to Him as a holy God by placing our faith in our substitute, who paid the penalty for our sin in his body on the cross. And if you reject that, and you mock at that, one day you will experience the wrath of the Lord Jesus Christ, for he is the judge of heaven and earth. So let's rejoice in all that is ours in Christ, amen? And celebrate what he has done, is doing and will do. Let's pray.

Father, thank you so much for the power of your word. It brings such clarity to our understanding of all that we've seen historically, and it gives us such hope in what is yet future. So I pray once again, that you will move upon the heart of anyone that does not know you as Savior. Especially religious people who have played a religious game but they're Christian in name only. Lord, I pray that you will save them by your grace. And when you cause all of us who know and love you to live in light of your coming glory and we ask it for Jesus sake. Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Luke's Gospel? Chapter 19; we will be looking at verses 11 through 27. In what will actually be a two-part series on the subject: Kingdom Delay and Future Rewards. May I remind you that we have been in Mark's gospel, but we're taking a little detour in order to maintain both the chronological and thematic flow of Jesus final journey to Jerusalem; his final journey. The leaders of Israel have already officially rejected Him, they are seeking to kill him but now he is going to present himself to basically all of Israel at the Passover feast in Jerusalem. And of course, all of this is leading up to what we call the triumphant entry into Jerusalem. So he's traveling with his disciples and with his pilgrims, and going to the Passover, where he will offer himself as the Lamb of God. And a couple of the incidences that occurred in that trip are not included in Mark's gospel so I wanted to jump over to Luke's gospel, so that you understand the flow.

Now, by way of review, remember that previously, he has encountered a rich, young synagogue ruler. And he has demonstrated through that man's rejection of Christ, that a rich man has a very difficult time entering into the kingdom apart from divine intervention. In fact, Jesus said, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. And they asked, well, who can be saved? And he basically said that, apart from me, nobody can but with God, all things are possible. And then next, we read that He gives sight to some blind men, not only proving his deity, and by the way, this also happened in the region of Jericho, the same region. But this also demonstrated the miracle of regeneration where God gives sight to the spiritually blind. And then, as we studied last week, there was really a juxtaposition between those two incidences when Jesus dealt with another rich man, a rich tax collector by the name of Zacchaeus, who was also spiritually blind. And there we have a picture of God not only giving spiritual sight, to a man that was spiritually blind, but there you might say, we see the camel going through the eye of the needle, by the power of God. And in the context of Zacchaeus' conversion where Jesus is over at his house, others are watching, and so forth, Jesus preaches a sermon that is very important, one that certainly ran contrary to the hopes of the Jewish people. They were hoping that the Messiah had come and he was about to destroy Rome and establish the kingdom that has been promised all through the Old Testament; that he would be the conquering Messiah. But instead, we read that Jesus in Luke 19 and verse 10, is speaking about "the Son of Man who has come to seek and to save that which was lost." And so that was a sermon. We don't have all of the details of all that he said, but it's in the context of that sermon, that we come to verse 11, in Luke 19. "While they were listening to these things, Jesus went on to tell a parable, because he was near Jerusalem, and they suppose that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately. So He said, 'A nobleman went to a distant country to receive a kingdom for himself and then return. And he called 10 of his slaves and gave them 10 minas and said to them, 'do business with us until I come back.' But his citizens hated him and sent a delegation after him saying, 'We do not want this man to reign over us.' When he returned, after receiving the kingdom, he ordered that the slaves to whom he had given the money, be called to him so that he might know what business they had done. The first appeared saying, 'Master, your mina has made 10 minas more.' And he said to him, 'Well done good slave. Because you have been faithful in a very little thing you were to be in authority over 10 cities.' The second came saying, 'Your mina, master, has made five minas.' And he said to him also, 'And you are to be over five cities.' Another came saying, 'Master, here is your mina, which I kept but put away in a handkerchief; for I was afraid of you, because you are an exacting man; you take up what you did not lay down and reap what you did not sow.' He said to him, By your own words, I will judge you, you worthless slave. Did you know that I am an exacting man taking up what I did not lay down and reaping what I did not sow? Then why did you not put my money in the bank and having come, I would have collected it with interest?' Then he said to the bystanders, 'Take the mina away from him, and give it to the one who has the 10 minas.' And they said to Him, 'Master, he has 10 minas already.' I tell you that to everyone who has, more shall be given, but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away. But these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slayed them in my presence.'"

Now there is much historical as well as theological understanding that we have to have in order to clearly see what Jesus is saying in this amazing parable and Lord willing, this parable will be something that will clarify perhaps some theological issues for you, certainly as it relates to eschatology, but it is one that can bring conviction and encouragement, and certainly instruction. And in a world that is rapidly descending into an abyss of evil things that are threatening our livelihoods, our families, even our church, isn't it wonderful to have the word of God, the truth, so that we know how to live? And we know how the story ends up, right? We know that in the end, Jesus will reign supreme. And certainly the goal of my exposition to you this morning, besides helping you just to understand the text, is to apply it in such a way that you will have a clearer understanding of eschatology, the study of end times. And also based upon that, be all the more excited about the fact that Jesus is coming again. I mean, we are a second coming church, we long to see the Lord come and we know according to First John three that, that when he comes, "we shall be like Him, we will be able to see Him as He is." And we are told that everyone who has this hope, fixed on him, purifies himself, even as He is pure. And so that's what we want as we examine this

Now, this idea of a nobleman receiving authority to rule a kingdom was not something foreign to them, it would be to us in our culture, but it was not to them. They were familiar with noblemen going to a far country to receive a kingdom. This happened, for example, with Herod the Great, who had to go to Rome to receive his kingdom from Caesar. At his death in his will he divided his kingdom into into three regions to be ruled by his three sons, and all of them had to make their way to Rome to claim and receive their kingly authority to reign. So they were they were accustomed with this, but Jesus' parable especially resembles the historical account of Herod Archelaus, a ruler despised by the Jews. His father, Herod the Great, along with the army, proclaimed him to be leader prior to receiving the right to reign from Caesar in Rome. And the Jewish historian, Josephus, describes the wickedness of this ruler. I won't go into the details, but he was an evil, evil man. In fact, he slew 3000 of his Jewish subjects at Passover. So the Jewish people hated him. And later when Archelaus traveled to Rome, a deputation of Jews who contested his promotion, followed after him. And they successfully persuaded Caesar to only allow him to rule over half of his father's kingdom, and only with the status of ethnarch, not the status of King. And ethnarch was another word for a governor. And he could become king if he lived up to the kingly traits that were necessary, but he never proved himself worthy. So that's the background here.

And also, it's, it's fascinating to me that the story of Archelaus, according to Josephus, all of that happened primarily in that region of Jericho, because Archelaus built a complex aqueduct system that brought water to that whole 14-mile valley right there in Jericho. And that's where this parable was told. And he also built a magnificent palace in Jericho, probably one of his summer homes. So you can see some of the parallels here between that situation, and the story that Jesus tells in his parable. However, I want to caution you, you don't ever want to press the allegory and a parable too far and try to make it fit some historical context. But there is a loose connection here. And it was, it's certainly important for us to see this because it will help us understand the lens through which the Jewish people would have heard what Jesus was saying.

Now I want to offer some broad observations about this parable. Number one, notice the timing. The Passover season was a reminder of God's deliverance of Israel from the hands of the Egyptians. And so messianic expectations would always run high during the Passover season, hoping that another deliverance would occur. And certainly they were really excited because of this man, Jesus of Nazareth. They had seen what he could do, they had witnessed his miracles, some of them had even been ones that experienced his miracles.

Secondly, no one, I want you to think about this, no one believed that the kingdom here was some kind of just merely a spiritual kingdom that already existed. Verse 11, "They suppose that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately." Obviously, this is reference to the kingdom of Old Testament prophecy. And also they had no understanding that Jesus came first to seek and to save; they wanted a Messiah that would search and destroy.

Thirdly, no one believed that Israel, as some people believe today, would be permanently disenfranchised and replaced by a new entity called the church. And to be sure, no one believed that the physical and the material blessings of the Abrahamic and Davidic and new covenants would somehow become nothing more than mere spiritual blessings to the church. Each of those covenants contain both spiritual as well as physical promises. And both of them coincided with one another, they existed together. In fact, if you go to Deuteronomy 30, verses one through 10, you will see that there are promises both for regeneration, which is the spiritual blessings that God would give to his people, and prosperity in the land, referring to the physical blessings.

Fourthly, the purpose of the parable, as we look at just a broad picture of what Jesus is saying, the purpose of the parable was to correct the erroneous supposition that the kingdom of God was going to appear immediately, instead of appearing at a future time; after the nobleman his departure to gain authority, and then to return as king. Now, going from kind of the macro to a little bit more of the micro, I want you to notice some other details of this parable. And again, this will be with limited commentary, we will take up more of that, the next time we are together in part two.

Number one, the nobleman in verse 12, represents Christ who is not reigning, but rather he is going to travel to a quote, "distant country," referring to Heaven, to, quote, "receive a kingdom," in other words, to receive official authority to reign. And then after that, he returns to rule over that kingdom.

Secondly, with respect to the distant country, it must refer to heaven because Jesus' authority is linked to his resurrection and his ascension as we look at the scriptures. For example, in Matthew 28, in verse 18, Jesus said, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven, and on earth." Let me give you some examples of this that we see in Scripture. You will recall the four beasts of Daniel seven, that pictures the Gentile kingdoms that will reign upon the earth, rule the earth, until they are destroyed, ultimately, by the Messiah who will come from heaven after receiving dominion, glory and a kingdom from God, the Father, let me read that to you, Daniel seven, beginning in verse 13, "I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, what like a son of man was coming. And he came up to the Ancient of Days, and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away, and his kingdom is one which will not be destroyed."

Now, we also see the distant city, referring to heaven or the distant country, referring to heaven, in the tribulation passages that we read in Matthew 24, Jesus describes his second coming in verse 30, and following, "'And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds from one end of the sky to the other.'"

Christ's earthly kingdom follows a heavenly scene, as well, after the Messiah has been at the right hand of God. We see that in Psalm 110 beginning in verse one, "The Lord says to my Lord: 'Sit at my right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.' The Lord will stretch forth Your strong scepter from Zion, saying, 'Rule in the midst of Your enemies.' Likewise, in Revelation five, verses four through eight, Jesus describes how he will receive a scroll from the right hand of the Father. And in that scrolls contain the title deed to the earth and the divine judgments that will be meted out upon the ungodly. Those pre kingdom judgments during the time of the tribulation, meted out upon those who reject Christ and in that heavenly scene, the saints and the angels will sing, Revelation five four, 'Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain and purchase for God with Your blood men, from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth," in verses nine and 10. Also in Acts three verse 21, we read, heaven must receive Jesus, "until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time." So there you get a clear understanding of the nobleman going into heaven. He's receiving authority to be able to come back and to reign.

A third detail as we look at the parable, will you notice that Jesus describes essentially two classes of people, slaves that profess allegiance to the nobleman. In other words, loyal subjects. They are even said to be, quote, "his," that is Christ, in verses 13 and 14. And these, of course, represent all who profess Christ, to profess to be faithful servants of Christ. And as we will see, some truly were, and others truly were not. And then the second group of people are the citizens that hated him. This is primarily a reference to Israel, but it extends to all who hate Christ. And we know that Israel was united and their repudiation of the nobleman’s regal claim to be their Messiah King. Verse 14 again, "But his citizens hated him, and sent a delegation after him saying, 'We do not want this man to reign over us.'" And we know that in a few days, they would scream, in John 19 verse 15, "'Away with Him, away with Him, crucify him!' Pilate said to them, 'Shall I crucify your King?' And the chief priests answered, 'We have no king, but Caesar.'"

Fourthly, another detail of the parable, will you notice, that he gives an equal amount of money, 10 minas, which will be about three months wages, to each of the 10 slaves. And he commands each of them to, quote, "do business with us until I come back." And of course, a good and faithful steward would manage an estate well, and they would do something with the funds that were entrusted to them, something that would be profitable, something that would be productive, to make a profit on behalf of the nobleman. Will you also notice that each one of them accepted the responsibility. And we know that some of them were loyal, some of them were not. But the loyal ones represent those faithful slaves of Christ, true believers, those who love Christ and want to serve Him, those faithful in proclaiming and living out the gospel of Christ, that they have received so freely. Those that are faithful, and fulfilling the Great Commission, to go and to make disciples and to baptize and to teach others all that Christ is commanded. And the implication is that when the nobleman returns as king, every slave will have to give an account for what he has done with what he was given and be rewarded or punished accordingly.

A fifth detail; after receiving his kingdom authority from heaven, we see that the nobleman returns to a realm. You really can't have a kingdom apart from a realm; apart from a territory, apart from a domain with subjects living in that domain. And this represents Christ's second coming when he returns again in power and great glory as King of kings and Lord of lords and establishes his millennial earthly kingdom that will last for 1000 years, as we're told in Revelation 20. I might add that the term "kingdom" in Hebrew, which is "malku", and "basileia," the word in Greek, includes three things if you look at their biblical usage, you will always see that there is a ruler that has power and authority. Secondly, there is a realm over which the ruler reigns. And then of course, there is rulership. The Kingdom involves the exercise of ruling. Now we get a sense of this in Revelation chapter one, at the very beginning of that magnificent book, beginning in verse four, "Grace to you and peace, from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth, to him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood, and he has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father, to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him. So it is to be. Amen." Once again, undeniable parallels of what Jesus is saying in this parable in Luke 19.

Another detail, will you notice, that the king's first regal action, when he comes to take his kingdom, is to judge his slaves who were entrusted with his money in his absence, and reward them according to their faithfulness or judge them. And of course, this represents the eternal rewards for believers, and of course, judgment for unbelievers. I'll talk more about that in a moment. But the application is that every believer should be faithful and making use of the gifts that God has given you; make full use of the opportunities that God has given you, and the resources that God has given you. And of course, those all vary. God doesn't expect us to be successful, he wants us to be faithful. And that's the point.

A seventh detail is that the reward for faithful stewardship of those gifts, those opportunities and resources given, focuses primarily on the authority to reign with the king over a specific region called cities. Later on, in Luke's gospel in chapter 22, beginning in verse 28, Jesus is speaking to his apostles here, he says, "'You are those who have stood by Me and My trials; and just as My father has granted Ma kingdom, I grant you that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel.'" Now, of course, this ruling and reigning with the king extends to all believers in his kingdom. First Corinthians six two Paul says, "Do you not know that the saints will judge the world?" And Second Timothy 2:12, "If we endure, we also will reign with Him." Revelation two beginning in verse 26, "He who overcomes and he who keeps My deeds until the end, to him, I will give authority over the nations; and he shall rule them with a rod of iron, as the vessels of the potter and brokens are broken to pieces, as I also have received authority from My father." Revelation five and verse 10, "You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God and they will reign upon the earth."

Number eight, as we look at the details, to give you this picture of what Jesus is saying; when the nobleman returns as king, he is also going to execute judgment on both his disloyal slaves, those that profess to be his loyal servants, but weren't, referring to phony Christians, as well as the citizens that hated him. So you have two groups represented here that he is going to judge, the phony pretend Christians who have no love for Christ; it's all show. They're all sizzle and no steak. Churches are filled with them. In fact, we have so called churches today that do nothing more than cater to them. They entertain the goats. They do not shepherd the sheep. And then that judgment will also extend to all of Israel, that will be Daniel's 70th week of judgment during the time of the tribulation, as well as all other unbelievers who reject his sovereign authority to reign over them.

And then number nine, the interval of time think about this, the interval of time between the nobleman's departure and return as king, is unspecified. We don't know how long that will be. And certainly the message is clear, this requires every generation to be watchful. So, there you have a general summary of our Lord's parable. And now I want to examine it more carefully, look into some of the great truths that are there. And we will do so under three headings, we're just going to do the first one here for a few more minutes. Since we have a baptism today, I'm abbreviating all of this, we're gonna look at what the Lord says under three headings, number one, enemies of the king, number two loyal subjects of the king, and number three, disloyal subjects of the king.

So number one, let's look at enemies of the king, verse 14, once again, "'But his citizens hated him, and sent a delegation after him saying, 'We do not want this man to reign over us.'" Likewise in verse 27, "But these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them in my presence.'" Now, unlike the historical drama of Archelaus, who was a wicked butcher, there is absolutely nothing about Jesus that indicates that the nobleman, that he's describing to be himself, that this nobleman did anything to anyone to warrant such hatred. And certainly this would apply to the Lord Jesus. The same was true of Israel's hatred of Jesus. I mean, he was compassionate, he was kind, they marveled at his teaching. He healed disease, everywhere he went, he fed them, he raised the dead. And we read in John 15, beginning of verse 24. Jesus saying, "They have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well. But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, 'They hated me, without a cause.'" And we read about this in Psalm 69. In that context, David is engulfed in the deep waters of despair and, and he's pleading with God to save him, to rescue him. And in that context, he portrays the reproach that he is experiencing from his enemies. And in verse four of Psalm 69, he says this, "Those who hate me without a cause, are more than the hairs of my head; those who would destroy me are powerful, being wrongfully my enemies. What I did not steal, I then have to restore." Which was probably a proverb depicting injustice that they used in that day. Similarly, in Psalm 35, verse 19, we read, "Do not let those who are wrongfully my enemies rejoice over me; nor let those who hate me without cause wink, maliciously." So the question comes up, and rightfully so, why would Israel hate Jesus so much? Moreover, let's extend it to the rest of the world. Why does the world hate Jesus like they do? Why do they hate Christ? Well, Jesus answers that in John seven and verse seven. There we read his words, "'The world hates me, because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil.'" That's why they hated Christ. That's why they hate him today. I mean, if we're all honest, nobody likes being told that your deeds are evil, right? We don't like to fess up to anything. And all we have to do is look at our culture. I mean, people hate being exposed. As I was reading the headlines, even this last last week, our government and so many other people, they just don't want to admit they're wrong about anything. I've been reading about from these Nobel winners and so many great scientists, they are absolutely disproving this whole manmade global warming thing. It's just embarrassing. I mean, the whole thing has been a hoax. But you're not going to hear anybody say, you know, boy, we were wrong. You know, Al Gore is not going to say yeah, you know what, we really blew it in that movie. I mean, we missed some things. Sorry, folks, and the trillions of dollars that we have spent to pull this thing off that we were wrong. We need to back off. You're not going to hear that, people don't like to be exposed. They've proven now that these COVID lockdowns and the masking and the vaccine safety and its ability to do...all of those things were grossly exaggerated. So much of it's wrong but you're not going to hear anybody saying boy, yeah, you know, we really blew it here. The data is overwhelming that we made a mistake, whether it's abortion, whether it's the LGBTQ perversions, whether it's any of the woke stuff, nobody is going to say, my as we look at this thing playing out, it is an absolute disaster, we are wrong. So naturally, when Jesus comes along, or any preacher of the gospel, and says, Thus saith the Lord, and people in their heart are saying, no, no, they're gonna hate that message. But we need to remember that because of Adam's sin, the entire human race was plunged into sin. Romans five and verse 12. Every individual is conceived in a state of sin, a state of depravity, they're spiritually blind, they're spiritually dead. And apart from regenerating grace, as we look at Scripture, all that man is and all that man does is fundamentally offensive to a holy God. We're in desperate need of something beyond ourselves, not just forgiveness, but a righteousness that is not our own. That can only come through faith in Christ. But people don't want to hear that. The unsaved have no fear of God. Scripture says that they resent God's authority. They're at enmity with God. They walk in the futility of their mind being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, and on and on it goes. You will recall what Jesus told the Pharisees, John 8:44, that "You serve your father, the devil." I mean, that's not exactly a seeker sensitive, opening, right? He said, "'You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.'" And we know according to First John, five 19, that "the whole world lies in the power of the evil one." And Second Corinthians four and verse four, we read that "The god of this world," referring to Satan, "has blinded the minds of the unbelieving." So unbelievers believe their own lies. They're hopelessly biased in their own favor. They don't want to hear from Jesus. They don't want to hear from the Word of God. So they conjure up their own phony religions create false gods. I was talking with some dear friends this last week who are familiar with what's going on in the military. And they told me that Odinism is really on the rise with a lot of military people. Odinism is a pre-Christian, pagan, polytheistic religion, involving the worship of the Norse and Germanic gods, especially Odin, who is the chief god. Folks, Satan doesn't care what you believe, as long as this is lie, right? And he's got a smorgasbord out there. You can choose whatever you want but people hate the truth. It's part of man's nature. And Jesus especially exposed all of that in apostate Judaism of the first century, where they had developed their own works righteousness system to somehow impress God, so that he would save them. Jesus exposed their hypocrisy. And moreover, he did not fit into their idea of what a Messiah should be. I mean, they, they basically wanted a, I don't know, a Barack Obama, they wanted somebody that was going to give them free stuff, right? And bring in some kind of a utopia, and of course, many other politicians, and, you know, they all kind of try to sell the same thing. And for the most part, we know that America hates biblical Christianity. In fact, I've written a book on that "Why America Hates Biblical Christianity." And fundamentally at the very core, it's because there are two evils in the world. Those evils are human depravity, and satanic deception. And they work together, so that when we hear the truth about who we are and what we need with respect to the Gospel, our immediate knee jerk response is one of disbelief and anger. So like the citizens in Jesus parable, Israel hated Jesus, and they were united in their rejection of his messianic claims. We do not want this man to reign over us. We have no king, but Caesar. And it's fascinating that despite their rejection of Jesus, both Israel and the whole world, you must understand, are ultimately under his sovereign authority. And for this reason, we are called citizens. You see, Jesus created the world. So many passages speak to that. Especially John one and verse three. So everyone is under his authority. And dear friends, please hear this. One day, each one of us will stand before Jesus, actually, we will bow before Jesus. And we will either do that in terror or we will do it in triumph. Philippians two, beginning in verse nine, the apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Scripture says, "God highly exalted Him," referring to Jesus, "and bestowed on him the name which is above every name so that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow of those who are in heaven and on the earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

Ah, but these enemies of mine in the parable, Jesus says those "who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here, and slay them in my presence." What a chilling prediction. Make no mistake, dear friends, Jesus has the authority to judge his subjects, as well as to slay them. With respect to his authority, to judge, may I remind you of what Jesus said in Matthew 25, beginning in verse 31, "But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne, all the nations will be gathered before Him and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And He will put the sheep on His right and the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.'" And in verse 41, he says, "'Then He will also say to those on his left, 'Depart from me accursed ones, into the eternal fire, which has been prepared for the devil and his angels.'" In verse 46, we read, "'These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.'" And I must also add, that when the King returns, He has promised to slay his enemies. Let me read this to you out of Revelation 19, beginning in verse 11, and with this, we will close this morning, "And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True. And in righteousness, He judges and wages war, His eyes are a flame of fire and on His head are many diadems; and he has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed and fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it, He may strike down the nations and He will rule them with a rod of iron. And He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God the Almighty, and on His robe and on His thigh, He has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.' Then I saw an angel standing in the sun and he cried out with a loud voice, saying to all the birds which fly in mid heaven, 'Come assemble for the great supper of God, so that you may eat the flesh of kings in the flesh of commanders in the flesh, of mighty man and the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them in the flesh of all men, both free men and slaves and small and great.' And I saw the beast and the kings of the earth, and their armies assembled to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army. And the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast, and those who worshipped his image; these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone. And the rest were killed with the sword, which came from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh." There we have a picture of the battle of Armageddon. And yet there will be another judgment, the great white throne judgment where the Lord will cast away all of those who have rejected him. Yes, dear friends, the earthly kingdom has been delayed, but it has not been forfeited. The Lord our God is going to return and he is going to reward those who love and serve Him. And He will judge and slay those who don't. You say, well, yeah, I mean, this is what some people believe. But I don't believe that. Well, I understand. Only the Spirit of God can soften your heart to the truth. But may I remind you that there are over 300 prophecies in the Bible that have been fulfilled precisely as they were predicted, in fact, 27 prophecies were fulfilled on the day that Jesus died. If you know anything about statistics, you know that there is a very high probability. In fact, on the basis of the Word of God, there is an absolute certainty that what God has promised, will come to pass. So I plead with you if you don't know Christ, oh, dear friend, today is the day of salvation, humble yourself before Him. Trust in him as the only hope of your salvation, and for those of us who know and love him, let's celebrate Amen? Our king is coming, I will be so glad to get away from all of this. I told you how much I hate heat, I hate the world way more than I hate the heat, right? And I know you do, too. We have so much to celebrate. And we're going to do that here in a few minutes as we celebrate what Christ has done in the lives of three young women. Let's bow our heads in prayer.

Father, we thank You for Your Word that brings such clarity to this chaotic world. Truly, it is a lamp unto our feet and a light into our path. I pray that you will bless each of us that know and love you. May we serve you all the more until that day, when we see you face to face. And Lord, for those that do not know you, especially those that pretend to know you, Oh, Lord, do your work of grace in their heart. Humble them that they might be saved. I ask in Jesus name and for his sake. Amen.

This morning, I invite you to take your Bibles and turn to Luke's gospel chapter 19. We've been going through Mark's gospel verse by verse, and we will return and finish that. But this morning, I want to examine the story of Zacchaeus that we find in Luke 19, verses one through 10. And the reason for this, that you will understand more as we go along, is primarily because chronologically, this is the next thing that happened in Jesus' trip to Jerusalem. Moreover, as we will see, the story of Zacchaeus is a way of merging some of the other great themes that Jesus has been dealing with in some of his other encounters.

Now, let me remind you before I read the text that Jesus is making his way to Jerusalem the final time, to present himself as the Messiah, of Old Testament prophecy. He is traveling with his disciples and there is a large group of pilgrims going with him; he has orchestrated all of this. And they are going to Jerusalem for the Passover feast, where he will present himself ultimately, as the Passover lamb, that will take away the sins of all who believe in Him. Now bear in mind, his focus in this last journey is not only to lay claim to the Messianic mantle, but also to instruct his disciples. They needed a lot of instruction. Remember, they are still bickering over who's going to be first in the kingdom, because they're convinced that he's going to do away with Rome and establish the kingdom. Now, you will remember that Jesus has previously encountered a rich young synagogue ruler, who loved himself more than Christ who would not part with his wealth, because his wealth afforded him the opportunity to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of power and prestige in his life. And for this reason, in Mark's gospel, we read that, "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." And after Jesus said that, we read the disciples saying, well, then who can be saved. And in verse 27, he looks at them and says, "with people, it is impossible, but not with God, for all things are possible with God." And then next, we see him in Jericho giving birth to the sight of a blind man by the name of Bartimaeus. Actually, there was another blind man with him, we studied that last week in Mark 10, verses 46 and following. And once again, there he not only proved his messianic claims, that he was indeed God, very God, but also he illustrated the miracle of regeneration, whereby God gives sight to those who are spiritually blind.

But next, chronologically, while in Jericho, Jesus seeks and saves another spiritually blind man, by the name of Zacchaeus. And like Bartimaeus, he is determined to see Jesus. Moreover, like the rich young ruler, he is a very wealthy man. So what we have in the account of Zacchaeus is really a juxtaposition of the striking themes in this previous story, where they all come together. And what we see now is Jesus, giving sight to another spiritually blind man by the name of Zacchaeus, but also a rich man and therefore, here we have an example of the camel going through the eye of the needle, if you will, because all things are possible to God. So this is profoundly instructive for Jesus disciples. I might also add that Luke is the only gospel writer that records the story. Also, this historical narrative really summarizes the very essence of the gospel message and the purpose of Jesus's ministry on earth. And as we will see in verse 10. His goal is to seek and to save that which was lost. And aren't you thankful that he continues to do that this very day.

So with that in mind, let me read the text Luke 19, beginning in verse one. "He entered Jericho and was passing through. And there was a man called by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector, and he was rich. Zacchaeus was trying to see who Jesus was, and was unable because of the crowd, for he was small in stature. So he ran ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree in order to see Him, for he was about to pass through that way. When Jesus came to the place, He looked up and said to him, 'Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for today, I must stay at your house.' And he hurried and came down and received Him gladly. When they saw it, they all began to grumble, saying, 'He has gone to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.' Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, 'Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much. And Jesus said to him, 'Today, salvation has come to this house, because he too, is the son of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.'"

I'd like to examine this text under two very simple headings. Number one, we will see the Savior seeking and number two, we will see the Savior saving. And I might add, dear friends, that there is no greater privilege in the Christian life, than contemplating the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. My how I long to see him face to face, and we would all do well, to learn from the angels who, quote, "long to look upon the mystery of the incarnation," as we read in first Peter 1:12. The glory of Christ, dear friends is, worthy of our bold and unfettered proclamation, and meditation, especially as it is revealed in Christ's inconceivable condescension to our lowly estate. And his infinite mercy, and his unassailable power as he goes to the cross, to render powerless, the effects of sin, Satan and death. And to be able to fix our gaze upon his grace, is a miraculous thing in and of itself. Because in so doing, the Spirit of God uses that to conform us evermore into the likeness of Christ. And he gives us peace and power and joy, even in the midst of our trials. And I know some of you, a number of you are going through very serious trials right now. What a wonderful thing it is to be able to behold the glory of Christ. And I might also add that if your life is a train wreck, and if your marriage and your family is a dumpster fire, there's a high probability that you know very little of Christ. If anything at all, you're probably not walking by the Spirit, you're probably ruled by your flesh. And my goal this morning, as it is every time I stand before you and open up the word, is to point you to Christ, even as Paul did when he came into Corinth, in First Corinthians two and verse two, he said, "For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified." My prayer is that we'll all be able to echo what the Apostle Paul said recorded in Philippians three beginning in verse seven. "But whatever things were gained to me those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of their surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord."

So let's look at the text; number one we are going to see the Savior seeking. Notice verse one, "He entered Jericho and was passing through." I want you to see Jericho as it was in the first century. It was a magnificent oasis city, at the edge of the Judean wilderness about six miles from the Dead Sea and the Jordan River. It's a heap of ruins today in the Palestinian territory, but it was beautiful back then. It's about 15 miles northeast of Jerusalem down in the Jordan Valley. In that day, it was a magnificent place with gardens that landscaped the entire area planted by Herod. In fact, Jericho means "the perfumed" and it was a perfumed city. There were streams and aqueducts and palm trees and Balsam plantations, sycamores, cypress flowers on and on, it went. All growing in a plain of about 14 miles. In fact, many called it the Eden of Palestine in its day. Josephus described it as the richest part of the country, a little paradise. Magnificent commercial, and military center. It was positioned on the major caravan route from Damascus, and Arabia.

So what we have now is Jesus leading this large group, his disciples with him and this massive crowd, as he makes his way through Jericho. Verse two, "And there was a man called by the name of Zacchaeus." Ironically, that name means "the just;" he wasn't very just until God justified him. But that was his name. And then we read that, "he was a chief tax collector, and he was rich." Now, you must understand that in those days, tax collecting was tantamount to a cross between the IRS and the mafia. That's basically how they functioned. In many ways, it was legalized extortion. Some things never change, right? I know that's what you're thinking. And these people associated with the criminal element that they hung around with, that protected them. Other corrupt businesspeople, other tax collectors, prostitutes, as we read. Even in the gospels, they're always kind of together in a group because they weren't allowed to associate with the Jewish people, because they were unclean. And they collected taxes for Rome, they had to meet a certain quota. But they also had the authority to levy taxes as they saw fit. So they had the power to enforce their own wishes. And in fact, we know that Herod even sold tax collecting franchises to the highest bidder, and then they would split the profits. It's a very lucrative business venture if you're a crook. And that's what Zacchaeus was, a crook. And as I said, they were considered unclean by the Jewish people. They were barred from the synagogue so they couldn't associate with others. Only thing they could associate with were other lowlifes. And they were even considered traitors, because they worked for Rome, and took money from their own kinsmen to be used against them. Not to mention they line their own pockets with money they stole from the Jewish people. And I have to laugh, we see that the Pharisees were especially resentful of the tax collectors, but not for the reason you might think not because they were so ungodly and so unclean, but because they cut into their profits. But we also know that some were saved right? Remember when Jesus called Matthew in Mark two? And Matthew was a tax collector and followed Jesus and other tax collectors and prostitutes and so forth that hung with them, repented and came to Christ. We see some of that in Luke three, for example. But what we see here with Zacchaeus, is he wasn't just your run of the mill tax collector, he was a chief tax collector. So he was kind of like a mafia boss. Kind of like, I don't know, a drug lord. So he got a cut on all of the others that worked underneath him. So this guy was a notorious crook. However, as we read the story, we see that the Holy Spirit is already at work in his heart, we see that he's bringing conviction, a sense of shame and guilt, disrupting his life, with difficult circumstances, arousing his curiosity about Jesus. And perhaps he was even aware of Jesus reputation that he was a friend of tax collectors. I mean, that information would have spread like wildfire, right?

Verse three, "Zacchaeus, was trying to see who Jesus was." This is in the imperfect tense in the original language. And so what it helps us understand is that, that he was busy seeking Jesus, he was a man on a mission. An old adage comes to mind, the Hound of Heaven was after him, right? And the text goes on to say, "and he was unable because of the crowd where he was small in stature." And of course, this makes sense. You've got a massive crowd of people, they're lining the roads, they're also traveling with Jesus. And if you're short, you're not going to be able to see him. But the indication here, and the implication is, that he wanted to do more than just lay his eyes on him. He perhaps wanted to engage him. Verse four, "So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree in order to see Him, for He was about to pass through that way." Here, we get the sense that Zacchaeus was both disturbed and determined. Now, when we think of a sycamore tree, we see something very different in Tennessee than what it would look like in the Middle East. It was really what was called a fig mulberry or a sycamore fig. It had fruits on it that kind of resembled figs and evergreen leaves that resemble the Mulberry. Its fruit was an insipid, kind of tasteless fruit that only the most poor would ever eat. But it had very low limbs, big limbs, easy to climb. And no doubt, Zacchaeus wanted to remain hidden from sight. After all, he was the most hated man in the whole country, right? That whole area at least. Moreover, it's not very dignified for a wealthy man to be climbing up in a tree like that. And as I meditate on, as I meditated on this scenario, I'm reminded of Jesus' words to the Syrophoenician woman. Remember before he saved her, recorded in Matthew 15, verse 24, Jesus said, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." And of course, that was, as you recall, a reference to his original ministry focus regarding the kingdom. But here now regarding Zacchaeus, we see the Great Shepherd of the sheep pursuing one of his last lambs up in a tree of all places. What happens next is truly remarkable. And here's where the plot thickens.

Verse five, "When Jesus came to the place, He looked up and said to him, 'Zacchaeus, hurry and come down for today. I must stay at your house.'" Oh, I wish I could have seen the look on Zacchaeus his face. The deer in the headlight look right? The mule staring at a new gate look. He is suddenly exposed. Now, Luke just records the most basics of the whole story, but you know Jesus had to have stopped and when Jesus stops, everybody stops. Things get quiet and they see Jesus looking up. All of a sudden they see Zaccheus. It was probably quiet enough that they heard what Jesus said. And there's Zaccheus, utterly exposed. I imagine he was saying to himself, "I can't believe this is happening. I'm the most hated man in Jericho. Everybody's looking at me, including Jesus." The sovereign, omniscient, omnipotent, creator of heaven and earth, the long-awaited Messiah of Old Testament prophecy is now calling his name. How did he know his name? Zacchaeus must have been scratching his head, how does he know who I am? Dear friends, of course, he knew his name. Because Zacchaeus was chosen in eternity past, to be part of our Lord's bridal church.

Dave Harrell

This is such a magnificent truth; I need to camp on it for a moment. We know according to Ephesians, one four that the father chose believers in Him, referring to Jesus Christ, "before the foundation of the world," in eternity past, we know according to Romans 8:29, that they were "predestined" for justification also for "adoption," Ephesians, one, five, and even for "a heavenly inheritance, “Ephesians five and verse 11. And Paul said, in his epistle to Timothy in Second Timothy one nine, that he, "has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works." In other words, it's not because he somehow looked down the annals of time and saw who would and who wouldn't believe in him; Oh, there's one. Yeah, Zacchaeus is going to believe so I'm going to elect him. Now that is blatantly unbiblical, and frankly, quite silly, but rather, "not according to our works, but according to His own purpose, and grace, which was granted us in Christ Jesus, from all eternity." Which literally, in the original language, means "before time began." Second, Thessalonians two and verse 13, we read that we are "beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth." Of course, he knew Zacchaeus' name. Jesus said in John six and verse 37, that "all that the Father gives Me, will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out." And in verse 44, of John six, he says, "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him." This reminds me as well of what Jesus said in his high priestly prayer, when he was in the garden, before he went to the cross, it's recorded in John 17. Jesus prays in verse one of that passage, "'Father, the hour has come, glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You.'" See, Jesus is about to go to the cross and redeem those whom the Father had chosen for him. And we read the phrase "all whom the Father has given Him," we read that repeatedly, verse two, verse six, verse nine, verse 24, says, "'Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world.'" And of course, Zacchaeus was one of those whom the Father had given the Son. Dear friends, let this sink in. You must understand this magnificent truth. In eternity past, the Father ordained a plan to demonstrate his infinite love for his Son. And he chose for him a bride made up of undeserving sinners, that would one day be transformed by the power of his grace. And he chose them by name. And he recorded their names in a book of life. And these names make up the Son's bride, an elect group of redeemed humanity. And he pledged to his Son a gift; a gift of the Father's love. And this gift was a pledge that was sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise. The Father would then intentionally draw unto himself, this great company of sinners through the convicting and regenerating work of the Holy Spirit of God. This is utterly astounding. And to be sure, God has to seek us, because we would never seek Him. Romans three, verse 11, says, "There is none who seeks for God." You see, sinful man will always hide from God, even as Adam and Eve hid from God in the Garden after they had sinned. Yet we see the scarlet thread of redemption being woven through every page of holy writ, as God in his infinite mercy pursues those that he has elected by his grace.

Moreover, Jesus knew who Zacchaeus was, because Jesus was about to bear his sin, in his body, on the cross. His atonement was a specific act of substitution for specific individuals. Remember, Jesus came to do the will of the Father, and what was the will of the Father? To purchase the redemption of all whom the Father had given him. His plan was predetermined. And it was personal. Acts 2:23, we read Peter saying, "This man," referring to Jesus, "was delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God." And what an amazing thing it is to know that we have been chosen by the Father, as a gift to the Son, who will one day give us back to the Father as a reciprocal expression of his love. This is the great plan of redemption, dear friends. And please hear this, we are merely incidental in that whole plan. He orchestrated our conception at our mother's womb, he superintended our development and our birth. We know from Scripture that he has even ordained the length of our life. Before we were born, he knew everything about us, because he created our DNA. Let that sink in for a moment. He even knew that we would rebel against him, that we would violate his law, that we would reject him. And despite all of this, because of his predetermined and personal plan of redemption, the apostle Paul says in Romans five eight, "that God demonstrated His own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Oh, dear friend, if you have trusted Christ, as your Savior, please know that you are not some insignificant number that is part of some vast, impersonal, divine plan. But know this, the Lord Jesus Christ is intimately and personally and powerfully and compassionately involved in your life. The Father who chose us, drew us unto Himself, the Spirit convicted us and transformed us, the Son purchased our redemption. And as we can see, in the story of Zacchaeus, God takes the initiative in all of this. Oh, yes, he's working in the heart of Zacchaeus, but Jesus is the one who was seeking and saving. He has to do that because we're spiritually blind, right? We read in Ephesians four, verse 17, and following that, we are alienated from God that we "walk in the futility of our mind." And this is what we see in the unredeemed. We're darkened in our understanding, were excluded from the very life of God because of the ignorance that is in us; because of the hardness of our heart. But then God comes along, he pursues us and he saves us. Even when we are in bondage to our sin; morally, socially, mentally, spiritually. When everything about us was in rebellion to God, worthy of his eternal judgment, because prior to salvation, we were just like Zacchaeus, we were in a dungeon of wickedness, and we loved it so.

Some men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. We were "dead in our sins" according to Ephesians two and verse one. Of course, we know that sin produces death, therefore we are in desperate need of a resurrection, a spiritual resurrection, that only occurs when we are born again. Paul went on to say, in Ephesians, two beginning in verse five, and six, But God... even when we were dead in our transgressions made us alive together with Christ, (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him." And Paul adds in Romans six and verse four, that we have been, buried with Christ "through baptism and to death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead... we too might walk in newness of life." We must remember that the natural man, the unsaved, man, indeed is dead in his sin. And thus he is unable to even understand or accept the things of the Spirit of God, as we read in First Corinthians 2:14. Therefore, repentant faith cannot occur apart from the new birth. And that is a work that is entirely passive for the sinners. Because in John one, verse 13, Jesus said that we "were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God." So of course, Jesus knew Zacchaeus' name; he knew everything about him. He created him, the father chose him to be part of his bridal church. And soon Jesus is about to bear his sin in his body. And what we see here, as Jesus seeks after Zacchaeus, perched up in that sycamore tree, is a beautiful example of how the spirit convicts and draws and calls and, and regenerates an unbeliever. Jesus spoke of this in John three and verse eight, "The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from, and where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit." I remember when I was a little boy, when the wind of the Spirit blew my way. Do you remember when it blew your way? And now it's blowing Zacchaeus' way, as he's perched up in a sycamore tree. "'Zacchaeus hurry, come down, for today, I must stay at your house.'"

Now bear in mind in these great narratives, there's probably much more that was said. So we're getting the bare minimum. But can't you imagine? Not only what Zacchaeus is thinking, but what everybody else is thinking, including the disciples. It's like, "You're surely not going to save that guy. I mean, after all, we're aligned to be first in the kingdom, what's going on here?" Notice the response and Zacchaeus, verse six, "hurried and came down and received Him gladly." Dear friends, here's a marvelous example of the supernatural, efficacious call of God at work in the heart of a sinner. A work that would fill volumes were we able to read all of it in Zacchaeus' his life. I wonder, when we see him someday, if he will be able to tell us his story of all of the things that transpired in his life that caused him to come to that place where he's feeling more and more of the guilt and the shame of his sin. And how he's crying out for God to do something that he cannot do on his own. Perhaps you remember when the Lord drew you unto himself, and you began to see the holiness of God when your conscience was set a flame with guilt when he just upset your world; when he caused circumstances to converge in such a way, as to make you even more miserable in your life. So you begin to examine your heart. The gospel of God began to keep you up at night, you began to realize that you were lost. You must understand that for the elect of God, this call is irresistible. God is not a contingent God, he is a sovereign God and he will accomplish his good pleasure, come what may. Nothing can thwart his eternal purposes. We will see this summarized well in Romans eight beginning in verse 29. Where the apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Spirit says, "For those whom He foreknew," literally for ordained or for loved, "He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son," he went on to say, "and these whom He predestined, He also called and those whom He called, He also justified and these whom He justified, He also glorified."

But I want you to notice the mysterious convergence of God's sovereignty and man's responsibility in this scenario. And here we witness the compatibility between God's uninfluenced, sovereign grace to save, and man's responsibility to believe. God takes the initiative in calling sinners to repentance, but man must choose to believe. Indeed, human will and divine determination are complementary, therefore compatible in the purposes of God. And we see that here. The end of verse five, we read, "'Zacchaeus, hurry and come down for today I must stay at your house.'" And verse six, "and he hurried, and came down and received Him gladly." Here we see that God did not violate Zacchaeus, his will. He did not coerce him, but rather, he transformed his will, so that he would freely and voluntarily believe and be saved. What a magnificent truth. This is, it's inscrutable in our mind; perfectly clear in God's mind. A magnificent demonstration of how God works in the life of a sinner.

So first, we see the Savior seeking. The Savior taking the initiative. And secondly, we see the Savior saving. Zacchaeus, we can see from the story, received Jesus into his home. And we're not told anything about that home, or what happened inside that home. But certainly, he would have heard the gospel from the lips of the Savior Himself. Can you imagine that? And we know that he comes to genuine saving faith, as the text goes on to tell us. I was meditating upon what might have been said in that scenario. And again, this is conjecture, but I think it's has some merit because of other things that we know, biblically. Jesus would have told him who he really was, he would have exposed his sin. I know all about you. I know when you did this, I know when you did that. I know what you think here and what you do there. But I want you to know that I love you. And that I want to pay the penalty for your sin. But you must trust in me is the only hope of your salvation. Aren't you thankful that the good news of the gospel is proclaimed to outcasts, even the worst of sinners and how they will respond in repentant faith. When I was saved, when I was nine, I wasn't some great sinner, even though I was a sinner, and I knew it. But I had a depraved heart like everybody else, and left unto myself, no telling where I would have ended up. But God sees our sin, no matter how dark it might be. And of course, the Jews were convinced that only the righteous were recipients of divine blessing. So we see that the crowd is horrified at all of this.

Verse seven, "When they saw it, they all began to grumble, saying, "He has gone to be the guest of a man who is a sinner." It's interesting, when it says, "when they saw it." It carries the idea that they're watching here. It's not like they just kind of dispersed and went their way. They're watching this whole thing. They're probably following at a distance. And certainly Zacchaeus would have had some magnificent estate, and they're watching all of this. And they're grumbling; I don't need to explain that word. We all know what it is. Because we're all guilty of it. "He has gone to be the guest;” “kataylo" in the original language. It means "to lodge, to unpack one's pack animal or backpack or suitcase." Even carries the idea of losing one's garments to prepare to stay overnight. So they're watching all of this. He's going in to the house of a sinner. Well, obviously they saw themselves as far more righteous than Zaccheus. Aren't we all hopelessly biased in our own favor when we compare ourselves to other people?

Verse eight, we read, "Zacchaeus stopped," the term means that he stood respectfully and stated a position. Now mind you this, what he's about to state would have happened after much conversation, and after he had truly come to faith in Christ. And he says to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much." My what a beautiful picture of what Paul describes in Second Corinthians seven, as a godly sorrow versus a worldly sorrow. In that text, we read how a godly sorrow is one that longs for reconciliation. It mourns over sin. It has an earnest desire for righteousness for a vindication of one's reputation, and indignation towards evil and avenging of wrong, a seeking of justice. And all of that was wrought within his heart by the power of the Spirit of God when he was suddenly made a new creature in Christ. And won't you notice that he obeys the law of the theocratic kingdom of Israel, as recorded for example, in Exodus 22, and verse one, and he restores fourfold all that he had stolen. Friends, this is such powerful evidence of what happens when someone is genuinely born again. This is evidence of the fruit of repentance, the miracle of regeneration, there's a radical change in a person's heart, in their nature and their disposition. Second Corinthians 5:17, that I alluded to a moment ago, "if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature, the old things passed away, behold, new things have come." The adjective "new," "kainos," means unseen of a kind, not seen before, new in quality, not in sequence. This is the miracle of the new birth, and regeneration, which is that instantaneous, supernatural impartation of spiritual life to a spiritual cadaver, where they are raised to walk in newness of life. This is the stuff of genuine Christianity, a radical departure a dramatic change takes place. A restructuring of one's life. Jesus said, "You will know them by their fruits," and boy, you see it right here, don't you? At the moment of our new birth we are made new creatures and God sets into motion this process of sanctification that will ultimately culminate in Christ's likeness.

Again, as Jesus said, in John three, six, "'For that which is born of the flesh is flesh, but which is born of the Spirit is spirit.'" The life of the newborn saint is characterized by overcoming the wicked influences of Satan's world. There's a radical hatred that begins to occur towards those things that we once loved. The Spirit plants within us new desires, new loves, new passions, a new direction in life, new values, new beliefs, so that we begin to manifest the fruit of the Spirit, as described in Galatians five. And with the disposition of the soul, so radically changed, God's desires become our desires, as we read in Psalm 37 in verse four. Then he causes us according to Romans 6:17, "to become obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which we were committed." For indeed, as we read in First John 2:29, "If you know that He," Jesus, "is righteous, you know that everyone also who practices righteousness is born of Him." This is what we see with Zacchaeus. Is this what people see in your life, my friends? Do people see Christ in you? When they spend time around you are they drawn to Christ? I grieve over the self-deception that characterizes so many Christians today, at least ostensibly, Christian people. You look at so many; they claim to be followers of Christ, but there's nothing about their life that shows that they love Christ, that they have a desire to obey him. They are basically Christian in name only; part of cultural Christianity. There's no personal pursuit of holiness, no separation from the world. There's no mourning over sin. There's no hungering and thirsting after righteousness. There is no appetite for the Word of God. There is no desire to submit to the authority of God, so they just make stuff up. They have no spiritual discernment. No humility, no sacrifice, no burden for the lost, no real love for other believers. No desire to understand what biblical worship truly is. Both privately as well as corporately, and frankly, there's nothing to distinguish them from the world. And my friend, if that is you, you have no basis to claim genuine saving faith. And I would plead with you to examine your heart. Illustrations of this kind of hypocrisy are myriad. We see it in our friends, we see it in families, see it in apostate churches. As I said earlier, they claim to know Christ, but their life is a train wreck. And their marriage and their family is a dumpster fire.

In Luke six and verse 46, Jesus asked those who claimed to be His disciples, but had no desire to obey Him, saying, "'Why do you call Me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I say?'" And he went on to answer the question by saying that they are basically unregenerate. You're operating according to your fallen nature. You do not have the indwelling Spirit to help restrain your flesh. You've never been born again. He went on to say in verse 49, "'The one who has heard and has not acted accordingly, is like a man who built his house on the ground without any foundation, and the torrent burst against it. And immediately it collapsed and the ruin of that house was great.'" Friends, you must understand that saving faith is obedient faith. That will always be the fruit of a spiritual resurrection, of a spiritual transformation. Indeed, we've been raised to walk in newness of life. This is why Jesus said in Matthew seven in verse 21, "'Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven. But he who does the will of my Father, who is in heaven will enter.'" John three and verse 36, he says, "'He who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.'" And in James one and verse 22, we read "But prove yourselves doers of the word and not merely hearers who delude themselves." And my what an amazing miracle it is, to see someone radically changed when they come to faith in Christ. Sometimes, it takes a while for you to see it. With other people, it's like the next day, almost the next minute, and that's practically what you have here with Zaccheus. I remember one woman who came to the church a number of years ago and, and she was a godless woman, dressed very immodestly, and she became convicted of her sin and over the course of several months, she was saved, radically in her living room, on her face in front of her couch. And I remember when the day, I remember the day when I first met her husband, who was a godless man. And I remember he contacted me, and he came up to me and he said, I'll never forget this, "I want to know what has happened to my wife." And at first I thought it was going to be a confrontation. But then I realized, and he went on to say, "Look, I'm not mad, I just don't understand. I don't know who this is." And he went on to describe that, and by the way, about six months later, he came to faith in Christ. I heard him cry out in the midst of a communion service here in this church. That's the stuff of genuine saving faith dear friends.

"Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much. And Jesus said to him, 'Today, salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham, for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.'" Can you imagine the look on the disciple’s face when they heard all of this? "Oh, my goodness, he's one of us now. Wonder if he's gonna get a spot in the kingdom, you know, boy, the race is on here." And of course, the crowd hated him. At least for a while, until they realized that he was going to give back the money had taken from them. Then don't you know, they all lined up saying "hey, Zacko, buddy, I believed in you all along, never doubted, yeah, you know, put it right here."

By the way, according to a third century AD collection of ecclesiastical law, thought to have been written by the apostles, possibly. It's called the Apostolic Constitutions. We read that later on Zacchaeus became the first bishop of Caesarea in Palestine. And if that is true, God not only called him to saving faith, but called him to be a pastor. Let me read that to you. I just copied and pasted it. The Apostolic Constitutions, volume seven, chapter 46. Quote, "Now concerning those bishops who have been ordained in our lifetime, we make known to you that they are these of Jerusalem, James, the brother of Our Lord upon whose death the second was Simeon, the son of Cleopas, after whom Judas, the son of James," then he says this, "of Caesarea in Palestine, the first was Zacchaeus, who was once a publican."

It's interesting, isn't it, Jesus called him a son of Abraham. Now, he's not merely saying that you are a physical descendant of the patriarch Abraham, but rather a spiritual descendant in the inward sense of believing Jew. For example, in Romans two verse 28, "For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew, who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter, and his praise is not for men, but from God." We see something similar in Galatians, three, beginning in verse six, "Even so Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who were sons of Abraham. The Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, 'all the nations will be blessed in you'. So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer." I remember in Israel one time, going to meet a congregation that was worshiping in secret to avoid persecution from the Jews. And the pastor said something that I wrote down, he said, "By God's grace, I am a true son of Abraham, part of the Israel of God." And then he said, "we're all part of the Israel of God." There were probably 60 or 70 people there in the forest, meeting on those little white chairs like you get at Walmart. By the way, the Israel of God is, is taken out of Galatians six and verse 16, is a reference to ethnic Jewish Christians because they had been circumcised in their hearts and not just physically, they were the true Israelites. It's not a reference to the church. And the church is never called Israel in Scripture. The Israel of God is the same group Paul described in Romans 9:6, "For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel; nor are they all children because they are Abraham's descendants, but 'through Isaac your descendants will be named.' That is it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants." And of course, Isaac is the perfect illustration of sovereign election. Remember, that long before he was conceived, he was chosen from among the descendants of Abraham to be the heir of promise. He was preordained, not only to become a physical child of Abraham, but a spiritual Child of God, made effective through faith, as with everyone who believes; so too was Zacchaeus.

Well got a picture dear friends, of what Peter said in First Peter two nine, that "He called us out of darkness into His marvelous light." As we close, my friend, if you reject Christ, if you reject his claims, if you have never trusted in Him as Savior, I plead that you will do so before it's too late. And I will tell you very boldly, but in love, that I will pray that you will be absolutely miserable until you come to repentant faith in our precious Savior. And for those of us who know and love him, let's use this historical account of Zacchaeus to cause us to celebrate. The Savior sought us and saved us.

Let's pray. Father, thank you for the magnificent truths of your word. May they bear much fruit in every heart. I ask in the precious name of Jesus, and for his sake. Amen.

What a joy it is to be able to minister the word of God to you once again on this Lord's day morning. Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark's gospel chapter 10. As we continue to make our way, verse by verse through it, I've been titled my discourse to you this morning "Jesus Gives Sight to the Blind," beginning in verse 46, of Mark 10. "Then they game they came to Jericho. And as He was leaving Jericho with His disciples, and a large crowd, a blind beggar named Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the road. When He heard that it was Jesus, the Nazarene, he began to cry out and say, 'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!' Many were sternly telling him to be quiet. But he kept crying out all the more, 'Son of David, have mercy on me!' And Jesus stopped and said, 'Call him here.' So they called the blind man saying to him, 'Take courage stand up! He is calling for you.' Throwing aside his cloak, he jumped up and came to Jesus. And answering him, Jesus said, 'What do you want me to do for you?' And the blind man said to Him, Rabbioni, I want to regain my sight!' And Jesus said to him, 'Go, your faith has made you well.' Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him on the road."

One of the clearest proofs of human depravity is man's inability to see the depths of his sin, in contrast to the holiness of God. They are spiritually blind apart from Christ. You ask any believer, are you ever troubled over the ways that you have offended a holy God? And their answer will typically be something like, oh, I never even think about that. I don't believe in that stuff. They would only be ashamed of their private sins, if they were made public. But they have no shame in sin itself. If you were to ask them, Have you no fear of God's judgment when you die? And again, the response is typically, oh, I never think about that. I really don't worry about that type of thing. After all, I'm a good person, if there is a God, whoever he or she might be. I'm sure that I'll make the cut. And so people live as if there is no God. People trifle with death and with judgment. And they use all of the anesthetizes that the world offers them. Drugs, alcohol, entertainment. The Football season is getting started up in colleges, and you'll see hundreds of 1000s of people going to worship in the stadiums. And by the way, I like college football. But the point is, for many people were it not for entertainment on television, and in their sports, they would have no life. They pursue the fleeting pleasures of this world. And consistent with what Peter warned in Second Peter three, three, "In the last days, mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts." And this is what we see in the world today. People go merrily along their way with no thought of God, no thought of judgment, no thought of their own sinfulness, just living their life as if there is no God because for them, there really isn't. And they will continue to do that until that fateful day when they are confronted with their own mortality, and they will die and then be confronted with the God they have ignored and mocked. Dear friends, this is the consequence of spiritual blindness. In first Corinthians 2:14, we're told by the apostle Paul, that "a natural man," and unsaved man, "does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because he is spiritually appraised." In other words, he has no capacity to discern spiritual truth, when the evidence is right in front of him. He's spiritually blind. Moreover, in Ephesians, chapter four, we read an excellent summary of where people are, that are apart from Christ, beginning in verse 17. "The Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them because of the hardness of their heart; and they having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." Oh dear friends, the horror of spiritual blindness; to be spiritually incarcerated in a dungeon of deception and ignorance and arrogance; unable to see your hard hearted rebellion against the Most High God, blind to the reality that you are walking inexorably toward, and abyss of everlasting woes, what Jesus called in Matthew 22, "the outer darkness" that place there "will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." And of course, there's that passage in Second Corinthians four and verse four, where we read that "the god of this world," small g, referring to Satan, "has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ."

But dear friends, when God gives spiritual sight, a miracle takes place that we should never, ever underestimate. Man has suddenly awakened to his own sin, he suddenly sees it for what it is. And like the sting of 1000 Hornets, he remembers his sin down through his life. And he shutters to know that he will one day stand in the presence of a holy God. Guilty unless he cries out for mercy. Unless he says, as blind Bartimaeus said, "Oh, God, have mercy on me." Indeed, "the word of the cross is foolishness," according to First Corinthians 1:18. It "is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God." And how I rejoice in that. And I might say from the outset, if you're here today, or you're hearing my voice, please know that if you trifle with your sin, if you dismiss God's indictment against you, and you refuse to trust in Christ as your Savior, your arrogance proves that you are spiritually blind. And you simply must cry out to God for mercy. Sadly, this was the perfect description of Israel in the first century. And of course, the Gentile world as well. But as we see in this text, Jesus gives sight to the blind.

And let me remind you of the context, the setting here, so that you get the flow of what's happening. Jesus is coming to the end of His earthly ministry, his final days on earth and he's on his way to Jerusalem to suffer and to die and to rise again from the dead. And from his miracles to his parables, what he has been demonstrating to everyone, primarily Israel, is that he is who he claimed to be, the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy, the one who had come to offer himself officially and finally, as the king of the Messianic Kingdom, in exact fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. An offer conditioned upon national repentance. He has ministered in Galilee in the region of his homeland, and he's experienced enormous opposition. He ministered around the regions of the Galilee and the Gentile area, then journeyed to Jerusalem, and to Judea, constantly teaching, exposing the hypocrisy of the scribes and the Pharisees, performing many miracles; many, many more than what we have recorded in the scriptures. He's made a brief tour through Samaria and Galilee. Then he was in and around Perea, the Gentile region, on the east side of the Jordan. And now he has crossed back over the Jordan, right there north of the Dead Sea. And he's now around the city of Jericho, which is about 15 miles from Jerusalem, and about 3300 feet below Jerusalem. So it will now be a steep climb to get up to Jerusalem. You must picture that there are massive crowds following Jesus. They have witnessed His miracles. A lot of them are merely thrill seekers, but others are really wondering what is going on here. Some of them undoubtedly were those whom he fed in the feeding of many 1000s earlier in his ministry. They've witnessed him cast out demons, give sight to the blind, give hearing to the deaf. They've seen mutilated bodies of lepers, completely healed, limbs appearing on people. They've even witnessed Lazarus coming out of the grave, the raising of the dead. And they're amazed at his teaching. They're amazed at his authority. In fact, in Luke 12, and verse one, we read about the massive crowds it says, so many 1000s of people had gathered together, that they were "stepping on one another."

And by the way, in the context of that massive crowd, it says that he began preaching, "'Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.'" He was fearless in the face of all of the crowd. You must understand that everything that Jesus is doing, is moving inexorably towards a high point, which is namely his triumphant entry into Jerusalem. That will be a day of Messianic presentation foretold by the Old Testament prophets. In fact, as we've studied before, the Old Testament prophets predicted the manner, the moment and the meaning of the King's final offer to Israel. The rejection by the civil and religious leaders has been unmistakable. But now an official offer needed to be made to the nation as a whole. Even in the realm of jurisprudence, even in the days of the Old Testament, in the realm of the theocracy, a legal proffer, or an offer of proof, must be made. And that's what he is about to do. This was Israel's time of her visitation to receive her King. But Jesus will later promise them of coming judgment in Luke 19:44. He says, "'because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.'" So Jesus is now making his way to Jerusalem to present himself as the Messiah.

But I want you to know that prior to this, according to Luke 10, and verse one, "the Lord had appointed 70 others and sent them in pairs ahead of Him to every city and place where He Himself was going to come." And their mission, we know from reading the text, is very simple. "'Every city that receives you,'" he says in verses eight, and following, "'heal those who are sick and say to them, 'the kingdom of God has come near to you.' And if they don't receive you,' according to verse 10, and 11, 'go out into its streets and say, 'even the dust of your city, which clings to our feet, we wipe off and protest against you, yet be sure of this, that the kingdom of God has come near.'" But the two words "to you" are not there, a frightening omission.

So, everything that is happening here, everything recorded in the gospels, is part of God's deliberate, precise plan to accomplish his purposes. Now, mind you, all of this is extended over the course of about five months. And what Jesus is ultimately doing is presenting himself to Israel as the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy. And please understand that everything that we see in the gospels points to this. We see it in our text this morning, when Jesus gives sight to this blind man and what did the blind man call him, he called him "Son of David," in verse 47, the ultimate Son of David, the one who would fulfill the Davidic covenant promises of Second Samuel seven, which were really a reaffirmation of the regal terms of the original Abrahamic covenant. And this is yet another miracle, connected with the arrival of the Messiah that was prophesied, for example, in Isaiah 35 five, "Then the eyes of the blind will be opened," when the Messiah comes.

Next chronologically, we're going to see that Jesus will meet a dishonest tax collector named Zacchaeus. Mark doesn't record that, Luke does. And I'll take you to Luke, to see this. And we see Zacchaeus is saved by his grace in Luke 19, a man who Jesus called, quote, "a son of Abraham." And because he was the son of Abraham, he therefore obeyed the law of the theocratic kingdom of Israel, like we would see in Exodus 22 one, "and he restored fourfold all that he had stolen." This is yet another reminder of Old Testament prophecy concerning the kingdom when, as the King James puts it in Isaiah 40, in verse three, "the crooked will be made straight." He's then going to heal 10 lepers in Luke 17. We know according to Micah four and verse two that he's going to come or that when he would come, he would "come with healing in His wings," other passages, speak to this as well. And then in Luke 19:11, and following, he will give that amazing parable concerning a nobleman who went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, and then he would return, and this, of course, portrayed his rejection, and an interval of delay that will exist until his future arrival a second time.

Dave Harrell

And as Jesus travels with this band of pilgrims, he is conducting himself once again, as the public claimant, to the Messianic mantle. And soon the multitudes are going to see him come into the city, and they're going to cry out "Hosanna!" to the son of David. And then that same crowd, will a few days later demand his crucifixion, demonstrating their final rejection. Well, there are many other events that are recorded and many others that we will examine in the days ahead, hat all fit into the same pattern going forward. There is a purpose in all that is happening here; these aren't just random stories, random events, but rather, Jesus is presenting himself as the Messiah of Israel, the king of the messianic kingdom, but it was conditioned upon Israel's repentance, national repentance.

By the way, whenever I think of these things, I find myself overwhelmed with the miracle of divine providence. Isn't it amazing that God can orchestrate all of these things in ways that we can't even imagine, to fulfill his prophetic word, and all that he has ordained in eternity past, to ultimately bring glory to himself. And to think that somehow in ways that we can't even imagine, we are a part of that. You know, only a fool would deny the infallibility and the inspiration of Scripture. Now, back to our text. Jericho if you go there today, as I've been on a number of occasions, it's not a very pretty place. It's in the Palestinian area. In fact, it's very dangerous to even go in there. They tried to destroy all of the ruins because it really proves that the Israelites were there and that it came down just exactly as Scriptures teach. But in Jesus day, Jericho was a magnificent oasis in a desert wilderness. It had a beautiful theater amphitheater, villas, baths. In fact, in 35 BC, the Roman politician Mark Anthony gave Jericho as a gift to his lover Cleopatra of Egypt. But Jericho was also a mecca for the blind. Because of the balsam bush that grew in that area they were able to extract certain elements of that bush to treat a salve for blindness. Ophthalmic diseases were a common problem in that day, a condition called ophthalmia. I need to get my words right here. We're not familiar with that as much, but it was common in those days. Its a severe form of conjunctivitis that would affect the inner eye highly contagious. It was transmitted by flies, aggravated by sun and the dust in that region. And it was very common in childbirth. They had a disease called trachoma, which was a virulent form of conjunctivitis, an infection that would blind infants, and also in pagan societies in that day, and even in this day, due to sexual promiscuity, venereal disease was common, and many women were infected by various kinds of bacteria, especially gonorrhea, or some other septic condition. And children would contact that at birth, and they would soon be blind. But the people in those days had no understanding as to what was really going on with this blindness, with eye disease. They didn't know how to treat it. And many believe that it was a result of sin, that only really sinful people go blind. You will recall in John nine, Jesus passed by a blind man and the disciples asked "Rabbi, who sinned this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" And of course, Jesus answered "neither."

Now, at times, we know in the Bible, blindness was a form of judgment. Blindness was a consequence of disobedience, in Deuteronomy 28 with the covenant people. We also know that he blinded the Syrians in Second Kings six. We know that he blinded the homosexuals of Sodom in Genesis 19. He blinded Saul on the road to Damascus to get his attention, that he might save him and he temporarily is blinding Israel even to this day, according to second Corinthians three and Romans 11. But here, and in many other passages, blindness is used to illustrate the condition of men's spiritual sight. You will recall, Jesus used blindness to illustrate man's utter inability to see the light of truth. For example, He said in Matthew 6:22, "'The lamp of the body is the eye if therefore your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!'" And certainly the vast majority of the people in Jesus day, as in our day, were filled with darkness. They were spiritually blind. And for this reason, Jesus said in Luke four and verse 18, that he was sent "'to preach the gospel to the poor'" and "'recovery of sight to the blind.'"

So, with many hundreds of blind beggars lining the road from Jericho to Jerusalem, Jesus is orchestrating all of these things to demonstrate not only his compassion, but also the terms of salvation necessary to come to him in repentant faith. And this would also be a lesson to the self-absorbed bickering disciples, who are still jockeying with one another to figure out who's going to be the greatest in the kingdom. Now, as we look at this, there are four essential components of genuine conversion that I see being manifested out of this text. Let me give them to you and expand upon them. First of all, we must recognize who Jesus is. Secondly, we must recognize the severity of our situation. Thirdly, we must recognize, we must cry out for undeserved mercy. And finally, we must believe Jesus alone can deliver us. So let's pick up the text in verse 46. "Then they came to Jericho. And as He was leaving Jericho with his disciples in a large crowd, a blind beggar named Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the road." "Bar" means son, so he was the "son of Timaeus." Now, it's interesting, by the way, in Matthew's account in Matthew 20, verse 30, it says, "And behold, two blind men sitting by the road," but we see here that Mark only focuses on one of them, but there are actually two. And if we read all of the texts, we see that he too, was given sight and was saved by God's grace. Now, the road from Jericho to Jerusalem was prime real estate for begging because you have, especially around Passover, because you have 1000s of people going that way up to Jerusalem, for the Passover feast. So we have a blind beggar, named Bartimaeus.

So, he begins to cry out. To "cry out" literally could be translated, scream or shout at the top of his lungs; "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" Friends, you must understand that no one will ever be saved from their sins and reconciled to a holy God unless they understand who Jesus is. He was not merely some great teacher, as many claim he was, not a manipulative type of God that could be, I should say, maybe a malleable type of God, that could be manipulated, to hand out the goodies to make you healthy, wealthy and successful. Nor was he some political revolutionary, as many say that he was in our day, one that came to tear down the established authority of Roman rule. Certainly, he was not some social justice warrior promoting the contemporary Marxist ideologies of liberation theology, particularly critical race theory, as many teach today. And as many ostensibly evangelicals have bought into, what a lie, he did not carry a sign that said, "Jews lives matter." He did not carry a sign that said, "down with Rome." No dear friends, the truth of who Jesus was, and is, can be seen in Peter's confession, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." And we must understand that he is therefore the only acceptable object of saving faith. Jesus said in John 14 six "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father, but through me."

In verse 47, we read, "When he heard that it was Jesus, the Nazarene, he began to cry out and say, 'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" And this brings us to the first point that I would like for us to examine. And that is, if we're going to be saved, we must recognize who Jesus is. Most of the world today, do not. Everyone knew Jesus was a famous miracle worker. But not many believed that he was, quote, "The Son of David," another name for the Messiah that was promised in the Davidic Covenant in Second Samuel seven. The long-awaited Messiah, of that unconditional and irrevocable covenant, where God promised David a dynasty in a kingdom that would never end. And again, that is a covenant that parallels the Abrahamic Covenant in Genesis 12, one through three. A covenant that will ultimately bless the Gentiles, the Gentile nations as well as Israel. In fact, in Acts two, Peter makes it clear that David, quote, "looked ahead." David looked ahead as a prophet and spoke of Jesus Christ as the fulfillment of the covenant he made to David. Let me read that text, Acts two beginning in verse 29, "Brethren, I may confidently say to you regarding the patriarch David, that he both died and was buried and his tomb is with us to this day. And so because he was a prophet, and knew that God had sworn to him with an oath, to seek one of his descendants on his throne, he looked ahead and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ." So in the miracle of regeneration, God now reaches down into the heart of this blind beggar and causes him to see the light of his sin and the light of who Jesus really is; the Messiah, the King, the Savior of sinners. No doubt he recognized Jesus to be the one of whom the angel spoke to Mary in Luke one verse 32, "He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father David; and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and his kingdom will have no end." I believe that it's very possible that he along with many 1000s of others, were aware that this was the one of whom the angel described to Joseph and even the shepherds. Remember, the angel said to Joseph in Matthew 1:22, that "Mary will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which translated means God with us." It's fair to say that he would have also been aware of the testimony of the shepherds, because we know that they spread the word to everyone, as to what they saw. It's recorded into Luke 10, beginning of verse Luke to beginning of verse 10, "But the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid for behold, I bring you good news of great joy, which will be for all the people for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.'"

And I must ask you, do you know who Jesus is? Because one day you will face him. You will either face him and triumph or in terror. He's not only the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy, but he is the judge of the living and the dead. You remember what Paul said to the men of Athens in Acts 17. God is now declaring to men that all, everywhere should repent, "because he has fixed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness through a man whom he has appointed, having furnished proof to all men, by raising Him from the dead." So we must not only recognize who Jesus is, but we, like Bartimaeus, must recognize the severity of our situation. And oh to be blind in those days was a horrible thing. It's hard today, terribly hard. But blind beggars were social outcasts. They were scorned. They were ridiculed, they were rejected. Because again, many people thought that their blindness was because of their sin. They were utterly helpless to care for themselves. Imagine what that would be like, dependent upon other people to do virtually everything for you. But you know the same is true spiritually. When we are blind spiritually, we are utterly helpless. We're walking in darkness; we can't see the truth. Two plus two is five theologically. We are spiritually "dead in our trespasses and sins," according to Ephesians two. Paul went on in Ephesians four to say that, "apart from Christ man is darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them because of the hardness of their heart." In Ephesians five it speaks of how that the unsaved "walk in darkness, and they participate in the deeds of darkness." And Paul said in Titus one and verse 15, "to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure, but both their mind and their conscience are defiled." In other words, man's depravity, dear friends, is pervasive. Sin's corruption and pollution has made man both unable and unwilling to glorify God, and there is no hope of recovery in himself. He's utterly dependent upon God to do something. And so this dear man is begging Jesus not only for physical healing, but also for the forgiveness of sins and eternal life. You say, Well, how would you know that? Well, in verse 52, we read, "And Jesus said to him, 'Go, your faith has made you well.'" The term that he uses there, for "well" is "sozo,"it's a term a Greek term, used frequently in the New Testament for salvation. And if being "made well" only referred to physical healing, he would have used the common word "iaomai," which means "to heal." Moreover, we immediately see the fruit of genuine saving faith being manifested in these men, verse 52, "Immediately he regained his sight, and began following him on the road." Matthew and Luke both record "following him glorifying God." So this indicates that they were not only physically healed, but also they were given the gift of saving faith, validated by their desire to submit to the Lordship of Christ in their life.

So, Bartimaeus recognizes his sinful condition. He recognizes his guilt and in desperation, he cries out to the Lord. And again, the foremost attitude necessary for spiritual sight is this one of desperation, where we see the reality of our sin. I think of the Canaanite woman with a daughter that was demon possessed in Matthew 15. Remember, she sought the Lord in humble persistence, and she said, "Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David." And the tax gatherer in Luke 18, "Unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, he beat upon his breast, saying, 'God be merciful to me the sinner.'" You see friends, divine mercy, always responds to spiritual desperation. This is the prayer of the penitent. This is the cry of the contrite; those broken over their sin. Jesus said in Matthew five, verse three, "'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.'" In other words, blessed are those who are collapsing under the weight of their sin; those who acknowledged the impoverished nature of their state, they recognize that they're alienated from God, that they are helpless, that they are corrupt, they are hopeless and apart from mercy, they will perish for eternity in their sins. So, they're longing for God to act on their behalf. That's the one God blesses. And I must ask you have you come to that place in your life where you realize who you really are before a holy God? Or are you still blind to the ways that you have violated his law and offended his holiness and therefore continued to live in spiritual darkness? We must recognize who Jesus is; we must recognize the severity of our situation and thirdly, we must cry out for undeserved mercy and that's what he did.

Verse 47, "'Jesus son of David, have mercy on me!'" Verse 48, "And many were sternly telling him to be quiet." But he kept crying out again screaming at the top of his lungs. "He kept crying out all the more, 'Son of David, have mercy on me!'" And can't you see it? People saying, 'shut up, you blind beggar, he doesn't have time for you. In fact, you're probably getting what you deserved. He doesn't have time to deal with you. Plus, we were here first.' I bet some of that was going on. In fact, Luke hints at that and Luke 18:39, "Those who led the way were sternly telling him to be quiet." That was probably the disciples, "He doesn’t have time for you, he's dealing with us right now, we're in the in crowd here."

Dear friends when the Spirit of God is at work in the heart of a man or a woman, there is absolutely nothing that can stop them from screaming. God is merciful. But he will only save those who recognize their need for his saving grace, and who will cry out for it. This is the response that God demands from us. And here I might also add that we recognize the irresistible power of regenerating grace. Jesus said in John 6:44, that "'no one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him.'" The idea of drawing means. in the original language. means to cease, or to grab hold of. There's an irresistible, supernatural, compelling at work. And this is what happens when the Father suddenly activates what was decreed in eternity passed; when the Holy Spirit breathes life into a spiritual cadaver and gives them sight to see the glory of the cross. And when God does that work, there is absolutely no force on earth, that can stop a sinner who, in desperation, begs for saving mercy. A sinner will not be silenced by any opposition, when in their spiritual desperation, they're seeking forgiveness and help. Sadly, most people today have a very superficial understanding of regeneration, what it means to be born again, that's what the term literally means. They talk about asking Jesus into their heart. But for many people, they really don't have much of an understanding of who Jesus is. Worse yet, they're clueless about the depths of their depravity, their spiritual condition; they have no sense of desperation. So they really don't cry out. This is why so many people today, and for many years, have used manipulative techniques to get people to get saved, to get them to walk in aisle, to get them to repeat a prayer.

If I can digress for a moment, they use Charles Finney's method, the altar call method. Charles Finney was a New York lawyer turned evangelist back in the early 1900s. And he believed that man was sovereign over salvation, not God. And so he devised some mechanical methods to manipulate the human will. And he created mainly what was called the anxious bench. And the key to this was a sequence of things that had to happen in in a meeting or a church service, in order to get people to make a decision for Christ. The first step was to create the mood with music, because we know that emotions tend to bypass reasoning. So the music had to be just right, to establish the mood. And then secondly, to offer something easy, like, you know, "won't you bow your head, and if God is moving in your heart, why don't you raise your hand." So let's make it easy at first, kind of prime the pump, and then prime it even more with a third step; have certain people begin to walk the aisle. If you remember the Billy Graham crusade, they would have hundreds of people who would begin to walk the aisles so that others would kind of decide that they would go as well. Kind of a herd instinct to go with the flow. And then fourthly, make it easy to believe. Repeat some prayer and bam, you're in the kingdom. There's no real crying out. In fact, In the famous Purpose Driven Life, bestselling book, you can read how people are invited to come to Jesus quote, "The author invites people to quietly whisper the prayer that will change your eternity." Here it is, "Jesus, I believe in you and I receive you." Oh, that's easy. And then Pastor Warren goes on to say, "if you sincerely meant that prayer, congratulations, welcome to the family of God, you are now ready to discover and start living God's purpose for your life." Beloved, this is the danger of easy believeism, of cheap grace. Where's the desperation there? Do these people really understand the alienation that is going on between them and a holy God because of their sin? It's fascinating just before this event in Jericho, in Luke 13, an unnamed enquirer noticed all the multitudes. You may remember the story and realize that these people really aren't seeking salvation. They're, they're wanting you to do something for them. So in verse 23, he asks, "Lord, are there just a few who are being saved?" And of course, numbers aren't the issue. Jesus ignored the question and he answered it this way in the very next verse. He said, "'Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you will seek to enter and will not be able.'" You see, Bartimaeus was striving. Now some will say, "Well, wait, I thought it was easy, I thought you just quietly whisper the prayer that will change your eternity, Jesus, I believe in you. And I receive you." I mean, where's the striving in that? You know, the term "strive" comes from a Greek word "agonizomai." It means to fight, it means to engage in hand-to-hand combat, to engage even in an athletic contest that requires great intensity, exhausting effort. So where's the fighting in this easy believeism? And what's this stuff of "many I tell you will seek and will not be able," again, people will say I thought the road was easy. Well, yeah, you know, Satan has offered a wide gate and a wide way, but not Jesus.

My friends, please understand salvation is far more than just kind of reaching out and accepting a free gift and whispering a prayer. There's a sense of desperation. There's a sense of striving, Matthew seven, verse 13, Jesus said, "'Enter through the narrow gate,'" narrow comes from the Greek word "stenos," which means the restrictive compressed gate, and it comes from a root word that means to groan. You don't enter this gate with ease. There will be intense pressure, you're going to fight your own flesh, you're going to be conscious of your own pride. There are going to be other people that are in your mind that you know are going to ridicule you and mock you, may even try to kill you. So when you come to Christ, there has to be a determined effort to seal out all of the crowd that's telling you to shut up. And to say, "I am going to focus exclusively on the Lord my God, I am desperate for mercy. I don't care what anybody says, I don't care what my flesh says, I see the horror of my sin." In Luke 16:16. We read how quote "the gospel of the kingdom of God, when it's preached, everyone is forcing his way into it." The idea of vigorously, forcefully pressing into the kingdom. You will remember in Matthew seven, Jesus said there are two ways to enter the kingdom, the narrow and the broad. There are two gates, the narrow and the wide. There are two destinations life and destruction. There are two groups, the few and the many. There are two trees, the good and the bad, producing two kinds of fruit, the good and the bad, two kinds of people who profess faith in Christ, the sincere and the false. There are two builders, the wise and the foolish. There are two foundations, rock and sand. And they build two houses, either one that is secure or insecure. And I would challenge you to ask yourself to which group do you belong? And once you sort through all of the deceptions of "this way to heaven, this is the real Jesus," once you sort through all of that, and you go into battle with yourself, then you begin to deal with your self-righteousness, your pride, your unwillingness to deny yourself and take up your cross daily and follow Christ.

Well, without any need for manipulation, with no mood, music, or anything else, Bartimaeus, despite all that's going on, cries out for the Lord, to heal him. "Son of David, have mercy on me!" Then I love this verse. In verse 49, it says, "And Jesus stopped." I mean, folks, put yourself out there. I mean, when Jesus stopped, everybody stopped, because everybody was watching Jesus, he actually stopped. Now, it doesn't say this in the text. But I think it's fair to assume that suddenly, a hush comes over the crowd, perhaps 1000s of people. And all they can hear is a blind beggar crying out "Son of David, have mercy on me!" In fact, two of them doing this. You see, I don't believe Jesus wanted anyone to miss what they were saying, but for all to hear, and for all to see. And then it says, "And Jesus stopped and said, 'Call him here.'" Oh, what a blessed invitation. Here again, beloved, here, we witnessed the miracle of irresistible grace and regeneration. When God overcomes a man's natural resistance to the Gospel, when he gives man spiritual eyes to see the glory of Christ, when God frees man's rebellious will, so he will come freely and willingly and embrace the irresistible Christ, man's will is not violated, it is transformed. This is what's happening.

I remember it well, when I was a little boy of nine years old, when he moved upon my heart, and I must ask you, have you heard that call? Have you come to him? And if the answer is no, then you simply must recognize who Jesus is. You simply must recognize the severity of your situation and cry out for undeserved mercy.

And finally, as we see in this text, you must believe that Jesus alone can deliver you. "So they called the blind man, saying to him, 'Take courage, stand up! He is calling for you." In verse 50, this is really interesting when I thought about it, "Throwing aside his cloak, he jumped up and came to Jesus." Okay, now imagine being blind. There's all this going on, and you kind of know who he is, and you throw your cloak away, and you get up. Probably some people are helping him, but you get up and you move towards Christ. And I was thinking about this whole issue of the cloak. You know, a cloak in those days was a matter of life and death. The average temperature around Jericho, especially in the spring, goes from 54 degrees at night to 85 in the day. If you know anything about sleeping in the desert, being in that type of an environment, it is cool at night. And so he throws aside the cloak. It's like all of a sudden, that cloak doesn't matter anymore. And why would he think that? Because he had absolute faith that God was going to give him sight, and he could come back and find his cloak if he needed it. I mean, there's faith at work. But we must understand that there will be no hesitancy when a man or a woman responds earnest to the irresistible grace of regeneration, because God has sovereignly ordained in eternity past, the salvation of all of his elect, and there is nothing that can thwart his eternal purposes.

Verse 51, "And answering him, Jesus said, 'What do you want Me to do for you?' The blind man said to Him, 'Rabboni, I want to regain my sight!' And Jesus said to him, 'Go; your faith has made you well.' Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him on the road." Matthew's statement regarding this is in chapter 20, verse 33, "They said to Him, 'Lord, we want our eyes to be opened,' and it says and "moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes, and immediately they regained their sight and followed Him." I'm reminded of Jesus words, "My sheep hear My voice and they follow Me." Luke 18:43, "Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him, glorifying God; and when all the people saw it they gave praise to God."

What a beautiful picture of our compassionate savior. And what a magnificent illustration of his saving grace. I want to challenge you. Do you recognize who Jesus is? Do you recognize the severity of your situation? Have you ever come to a place where you cry out for undeserved mercy, believing that Jesus can and will deliver you? Those of us who have been given spiritual sight can appreciate this closing illustration. This reminds me of the great hymnists of the 1800s, who though she was physically blind, had perfect spiritual vision. Her name was Fanny Crosby. And once a well-intentioned Scottish minister, remarked to her quote, "I think it is a great pity that the Master, when he showered so many gifts upon you, did not give you sight." She was quick to respond and say to him, quote, "Do you know that, if at birth, I had been able to make one petition to my Creator, it would have been that I should have been born blind." He was surprised. He wanted her to explain and here's what she said. "Because when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight, will be that of my Savior." And out of that testimony, she wrote that great hymn that we've sung many times, "When my life work is ended, and I crossed the swelling tide, when the bright and glorious morning I shall see, I shall know my redeemer when I reached the other side, and his smile will be the first to welcome me." And the chorus goes, "I shall know him, I shall know him, and redeemed by his side I shall stand. I shall know him, I shall know him by the print of the nails in his hand." One day we will meet Fanny Crosby and we will meet the man who was once blind by the name of Bartimaeus, and his buddy, and many others, amen? What a glorious hope we have in Christ. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the magnificent truths of your word that speak so clearly to each of our hearts. I pray if there be one here today that knows nothing of what it what it really means to be in fellowship with the lover of their soul, I pray that they will cry out to Christ this very day. Beg him for the mercy that he will so get so rich and freely give. And thank you, that the rest of us who know and love you solely by your grace, can celebrate these magnificent truths in our lives. May we live them out in such a way that others will see Christ in us. For it's in his name that I pray. Amen.

As many of you know, we are making our way through Mark's gospel and this morning we find ourselves once again in Mark chapter 10. If you will take your Bibles and turn there and we will be looking at verses 35 through 45. Under the heading "Greatness in the Eyes of God." Let me read the text to you. Mark chapter 10, beginning with verse 35. "James and John, the two sons of Zebedee came up to Jesus saying, Teacher, we want You to do for us, whatever we ask of You.' And He said to them, 'What do you want Me to do for you?' They said to Him, 'Grant that we may sit, one on Your right, and one on Your left in Your glory.' But Jesus said to them, 'You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?' They said to Him, 'We are able.' And Jesus said to them, 'The cup that I drink, you shall drink; and you shall be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized. But to sit on My right or on My left, this is not mine to give, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.' Hearing this, the ten began to feel indignant, with James and John. Calling them to Himself Jesus said to them, 'You know that those who are recognized as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them; and their great men exercise authority over them. But it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you, shall be your servant; and whoever wishes to be first among you, shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many.'"

We read in Proverbs 18, in verse 12, "Before destruction the heart of man is haughty. But humility goes before honor." This is a lesson that the disciples needed to learn, as we all do. We live in a narcissistic culture, do we not? A culture that is dominated by attitudes of self love, self importance, "me first." All you have to do is drive on the interstates and you'll get a little sample of that. All you have to do is look on Facebook and you will see the ways people try to promote themselves and gain applause. People are self absorbed. They're filled with self love and they demand that everybody else love them too. And if you have any kind of a problem these days, it seems like it's always because you don't love yourself enough, right? You've got poor self esteem. But we're told that we're never to really feel guilt, or to feel shame, that's bad. Instead, you need to be who you want to be, do what you want to do. Even if it means changing your gender, even if it means going through hormone therapy, chemical and surgical castration. Double mastectomies for young girls. If that makes you happy, you need to do that. The Center for Disease Control says that suicides in the US are skyrocketing. They've been going up like 5% every year in 2020 to 49,500. I read an article, I believe it was this morning in the daily wire, it caught my attention. The headline was "Physician groups beg for help, with emergency rooms flooded by children in psychiatric crisis, anxiety, depression and suicide attempts are common causes. Folks, this is where all of this leads when pride is not restrained. And human pride cannot be restrained apart from the indwelling work of the Spirit of God who humbles us. The serpent of pride dwells in each of our hearts and it's deadly venom seeks to poison our heart. It's a venom that will spew forth from our tongue often when we speak. It's a venom that will animate haughty eyes to look down on other people. It's what produces the swagger that we see in our culture. The psalmist says in Psalm 75 and verse five, "Do not speak with insolent pride." And yet that is the very opposite of what we see in our culture. Rather, as Peter tells us and he had to learn this the hard way, in First Peter five, beginning in verse five, he says, "clothe yourselves with humility toward one another for God as opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble. Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time." Beloved, you must understand that God hates pride above all other sins. In fact, haughty eyes is the first example of the seven evils that God hates that are listed in Proverbs six, verses 16 through 17. In Proverbs 16 verse five states quote, "Everyone who was proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord. Assuredly, he will not be unpunished." The same pride that ruled Lucifer and caused him to be cast out of heaven was passed on to Adam and Eve in the garden. We know that it came in the shape of what was probably a magnificent looking lizard, and tempted them to be like God by merely eating the forbidden fruit. And as a result, that lizard was cursed to slither on its belly and eat dust all of the days of its life; a common figure for personal humiliation that's used elsewhere in Scripture, and ultimately, he would be destroyed by the seed of the woman. And we also know that our first parents were also cursed as well as all creation.

Dear friends, as we look at this passage, may I humbly, but forthrightly ask you to examine your own heart. The deceptive nature of pride is so powerful. It is pride that fuels the lusts of our heart. It is pride that separates friends and families. It is pride that destroys marriages. It is pride that enters into a church and disrupts it and breaks fellowship. And it is pride that turns to rage and violence when it is wounded. And frankly, it is pride that is ultimately destroying our country. Because we live in a country that will not humble itself before the one true God. Nevertheless, self-seeking, self-serving pride is truly the hallmark of our society. We see it in the LGBTQ pride parades where the most depraved amongst us celebrate the grossest kinds of immorality. They flaunt it, in God's face. That which God considers an abomination. We see it in the whole woke movement, the Black Lives Matter movement, Antifa, the social justice warriors that are so proud they're quite confident that they know how to produce utopia in the world today. If you will only succumb to their demands, so they alone are the self-appointed social redeemers. We certainly see this kind of pride in our corrupt, narcissistic, immoral political leaders who demand that we bow to their every wish. We see it in many pulpits were predatory preachers are so arrogant that they will distort the Word of God and add their own touch on things to somehow attract the masses and then demand to be praised and obeyed and lavishly compensated.

And dear friends, we see it in ourselves. The tendency towards self-love, self-worship, self-promotion, self-interest. It lies dormant within our hearts. And if we're not careful, it will demand obedience. And it will bring misery and destruction into our life. And the world in which we live offers every imaginable form of temptation to allow the full expression of our pride. I always go back to the two dominant ways of tempting us to manifest our pride, our Facebook and pocketbooks. Endless opportunities to sound off and show off. And for this reason, we're warned in first John two beginning in verse 15, "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life is not from the Father but is from the world." And sadly, the unregenerate laugh at all of this, they scoff at us in their unrestrained egotism, in their self-righteousness they oppose God who poses them and their pride. In Isaiah chapter two, God warned the people of the horrific and unparallel judgments that he's going to pour out upon the nations of the world during the time of the tribulation, the pre-kingdom judgments that we are now awaiting, just before His return. We read in Isaiah two beginning in verse 11, "The proud look of man will be abased and the loftiness of man will be humbled, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. For the Lord of hosts will have a day of reckoning against everyone who was proud and lofty, and against everyone who is lifted up, that he may be abased." And then in verse 17, he says this, "The pride of man will be humbled, and the loftiness of men will be abased." Now, of all people, Christ's disciples should have learned this lesson well. They should have learned the importance of conquering their pride, and putting on the garments of humility, but at this stage in their life, in their ministries, we see that they had a long way to go. And what they must learn is that greatness in the eyes of God does not come through self-advancement, or through self-promotion. But it comes through self-sacrifice, and servanthood. Principles, the world rejects and many Christians as well. Like the disciples in our text, we will all do well to examine our life under the penetrating truths of Scripture, for indeed the Word of God is a living word. It's active and sharper than any two-edged sword, it pierces through the very core of who we are and exposes us.

Now, let me remind you of the historical context once again. From his miracles to his parables, Jesus has demonstrated that he is who he said he was, that is the Messiah of Old Testament prophecy, who had come to offer himself officially and finally as the king of the Messianic Kingdom, in exact fulfillment of all of those prophecies. But this offer was conditioned upon national repentance. As we studied some last week, as indicated in passages like Leviticus 26:40 through 42, and Luke 9:19, 41, through 44. But tragically, the Pharisees, representing all of Israel, rejected the fullest possible revelation of the Messiah. Now after accusing Jesus of casting out demons, by the power of Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons, as we read in Matthew 12, the unpardonable sin, as it's often caused, Jesus announced the building of a new ecclesia, which he called "my church," in Matthew 16 verse 15. And throughout this season of his ministry, he will describe the mystery form, which the kingdom will assume, during the interregnum; an interval when a kingdom does not have a ruler. In this case, the interregnum would intervene between His death and His Second Coming as King of kings. We live in it now, in the church age. But it was only after the Pharisees rejection, and on the heels of that, Peter's confession, that Jesus was indeed, the Son of God, the Lord, the Messiah. It was only after that, that Jesus began to clearly describe his suffering, and death and resurrection. Matthew 16, verse 21, "From that time, Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day." And as we look at the flow of the Gospel accounts, we see that it was immediately on the heels of all of this, to assure the disciples that he would return and fulfill his promises regarding a coming kingdom, he transfigured himself on a mountain, before Peter, James and John. He allowed the effulgence of His glory to beam forth in a way that was absolutely astounding, so that they could see His glory, because that was a preview of the glory that He would display at His second coming. It portended the glory that Jesus described in Matthew 24 and verse 30, the glory of "'the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.'" So now Jesus is making his final journey to Jerusalem.

We pick it up in verse 32, of Mark 10, "They were on the road going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking on ahead of them; and they were amazed and those who followed were fearful." Again, they know that he is heading into the lion's den in Jerusalem. Verse 33, he says to them, "'Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles. They will mock Him and spit on Him, and scourge Him and kill Him. And three days later, he will rise again.'" And remember, during this final journey, Jesus gave them the parable of the pounds in Luke chapter 19, a parable that describes a nobleman who went away to a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and then return. And this would not only correct the disciples misunderstanding that the kingdom would come immediately, but it would also make it clear that there would be an interregnum, there would be an interval of delay, followed by a future arrival. And it was also on this final journey that Jesus promised that those disciples would even share in the rule of His coming Kingdom. We read about this in Matthew 19:28, "'Truly I say to you, that you who have followed Me in the regeneration,'" referring to the millennial kingdom, '"when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.'"

But, Christ's ministry in preparation for the interregnum also included ethical instructions regarding how they were to function, how they were to behave, how they were to live for His glory until he returned, especially emphasizing the need for this self-denial and servanthood. Matthew 16:24 He said, "'If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me for whoever wishes to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for My sake shall find it.'" And Mark chapter nine, verse 35, we read, Sitting down, he called the twelve, and said to them, 'If anyone wants to be first he shall be last of all, and servant of all.'" And then we see in Mark chapter 10, with Jesus encounter with the rich young ruler consumed with self-worship. There we see a living illustration of this very thing; a man who used his wealth to somehow promote himself, to empower himself, to gratify his flesh. A man who refused to embrace the true cost of discipleship and the self-surrender it involved. However, even with all of these instructions, all of these parables, all of these warnings and even though they were amazed, the text says, as he's walking ahead of them towards Jerusalem, even though they were afraid, as they witnessed him resolutely doing his father's will, going to his death, they could not free themselves from their self-serving pride. And Jesus knew it. And in his great love, he is going to do something about it, as he continues to do in my life, and in yours. As we look at this text, I wish to draw your attention to three overlapping principles of pride that will serve as a vivid contrast to the selfless humility that the Lord requires. Because it is through selfless humility that we become great in the eyes of God. Not in the eyes of the world, but in the eyes of God.

Now notice again, what happens, verse 35, of Mark 10, "James and John, the two sons of Zebedee," and they come, "up to Jesus saying, 'Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask of You.' And He said to them, 'What do you want Me to do for you?' And they said to Him, 'Grant that we may sit, one on Your right hand and one on Your left in Your glory.' But Jesus said to them, 'You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?' They said to Him, 'We are able.' And Jesus said to them, 'The cup that I drink you shall drink; and you shall be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized.'"

The first principle that we see, dear friends, is number one: pride is always fueled by selective hearing. Jesus had repeatedly warned them about the need for self- denial and cross-bearing. Anyone who wishes to follow after me needs to step down off of the throne of his life. And follow me as the sovereign of his or her life; renounce your former self, break away from your former way of life that's dishonoring to God, surrender your plans and ambitions and your will and submit yourself wholly to my plan and my purposes, all of which I am revealing to you through my spirit and through His Word. If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last and servant of all. And think about this. He has just told them about his betrayal, his arrest, his trial, his crucifixion, his death, and His resurrection. And you can almost hear Jesus say, "and you're obsessed about your own personal status in the kingdom? Are you kidding me?" That's a paraphrase, by the way. No, dear friends, pride only hears what it wants to hear. How many times do you all sit in this audience and you hear things you don't want to hear? And so you no longer hear it? How many times have we been warned and instructed about spiritual realities, about God's plan of salvation, about God's sovereignty and salvation?....I don't want to hear that. God's principles for male and female role relationships....I don't want to hear that. How to enjoy the fullness of God's blessing in your life, the things that we need to avoid, the things we need to do, the things we need to put off and put on? But no, we only hear what we want to hear. We only believe what we want to believe. And there is this pervasive attitude in each of our hearts that basically says, "Don't confuse me with the facts, my way or the highway."

Paul warned about this in Second Timothy four beginning in verse three. And this certainly summarizes what we see in apostate evangelicalism today. He says, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves, teachers in accordance to their own desires. And they will turn away their ears from the truth and they will turn aside unto myths." You see, all the disciples could hear was this, "Jesus is the Messiah, and he's going to bring in the kingdom." And that's all they could hear. Therefore, I better put my name in the hat so I can be selected. So I can have a high place in the kingdom. That's what was driving them. Remember, Peter, James and John had witnessed the manifestation of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration, something that would, would have been exhilarating, beyond words to have a little glimpse of the Shekinah glory of the living God. But almost immediately thereafter, we read this in Mark 9:31, "He was teaching His disciples and telling them, 'The Son of Man has to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him; and when He has been killed, He will rise three days later.'" And then we have this remarkable statement, "But they did not understand the statement, and they were afraid to ask Him." You see, we tend to suppress those things we fear. We tend to suppress those things we don't want to hear. As we read in Romans one and verse 18, how sinners "suppress the truth of God, in unrighteousness." A dying Messiah would dash all of their hopes and all of their dreams, they didn't want to hear that.

In Luke nine, beginning of verse 44, Luke puts it this way, "'Let these words sink into your ears,'" this is Jesus speaking now, '"For the Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men.' But they did not understand this statement, and it was concealed from them, so that they would not perceive it; and they were afraid to ask Him about the statement." I mean, what's going on there? Well, I believe it is this, out of our Lord's great love, Jesus withheld from them the full meaning and implications of this revelation. Although his death was a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, Jesus knew they couldn't handle it, because of their pride. He knew their sinful proclivity to hear only what they wanted to hear. He understood the self-serving, self-seeking power of pride in their hearts that would soon be manifested in their jealousy towards one another, as they enter into a competition to see who's going to be first in the kingdom. So he would need to soften the blow of his coming departure, by "concealing," the word is; concealing the full impact of it from them all at once. You know, as I was thinking about this, I am so thankful that the Lord doesn't reveal all of my sin at one time, aren't you? I couldn't handle it. But rather he patiently and gently exposes it, in his own timing and in his own way.

But as we see in our text, the self-serving pride of the disciples was still too strong to fully embrace the truth of Jesus death, and the self-denying, cross-bearing sacrifices that that would require of them. You know, many people come to the gospel, they come to Jesus with the same type of attitude. They don't count the cost of discipleship, all they hear is a get out of hell free card, right? That's all they want. Man, where do I sign up for this deal? And yet Jesus said in Luke 14 beginning of verse 28, "'which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it?'" verse 31, he says, "'Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand?'" You see, the disciples believe the road to self-fulfillment was through self-advancement, and not self-sacrifice.

So first of all, we see that pride is fueled by selective hearing. Secondly, pride ignores the needs of others. Jesus has just told him that he must suffer and die. Again, in verse 33, he predicts is betrayal, his arrest, the phony trials that would come, the crucifixion, his death, his resurrection; they're afraid, they're amazed. But rather than showing sympathy to the Lord, rather than trying to comfort and encourage him, they're preoccupied with their own self-interest. "Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask of You." Yeah, yeah, I know, you're, you're going to Jerusalem, you're going to be tortured and killed, we don't want to deal with that...we want you to hear us and do something for us. Are we not the same way at times? When we approach the Lord? "Grant that we may sit, one on Your right hand and one on Your left, in Your glory." Why on earth would they possibly say that? Here's why. Because the priority of pride is always personal ambition, and self-fulfillment. The needs of others simply get in the way. Serving Christ is an unwelcomed intrusion. We see this all the time, in our culture, men and women who are so preoccupied, for example, with their careers that they have no time, for their marriage, for their family. I had a conversation with a doctor friend of mine and an attorney friend of mine, both at the same time. And we were chatting about some of the difficulties of their careers and other careers. And the one attorney says, I don't know an attorney that hasn't been divorced at least once. I'm not saying that is true, by the way, but the point is, the enormous amount of hours that many people put into things that are eternally inconsequential eventually destroys marriages and families.

Think of how pride can even work in our own heart, where we just don't see the needs of others in the church. The husband who never offers to help his wife, the mother who never has time to really sit down and instruct her children. Those that will never stay to help clean up after meals. Let somebody else do it. Those who won't volunteer to come and help when the church needs cleaning or work. Those who will never help others to move or bring meals. Yeah, we're too busy. No, you're not, you're too proud. You're too lazy. You're too selfish. You're too self-absorbed. Because the priority of pride is always personal ambition and self-fulfillment, the opposite of humility, the key to greatness in the eyes of God. Beloved, humility is a virtue that God honors and God blesses. And it's so hard for us, I admit it's easier for me to preach it than to live it.

In Micah chapter six, beginning in verse eight, "He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?" Now as a footnote, James and John's mother was, Solome, the sister of Mary, Jesus mother. Therefore, James, and John are Jesus first cousins. Jesus named them Sons of Thunder, probably because of their intense fiery personalities. And I find it interesting as you think about it, Mark, who's writing this was not there to see these things. But we know that Peter was discipling him. And Peter knew these things full well. And so he's helping by the power of the Spirit to instruct John to write what we are studying. And later on, we know that both of these dear brothers in Christ, learned the lessons of humility the hard way. We know for example, that James was the first apostle to die. He was beheaded by Herod Agrippa, around 44 AD in Palestine, not far from where he was a local missionary to the Jewish people in Judea. And John later on became the author of five books, the Gospel of John for second, third John and the book of Revelation. And what's interesting is when you read his accounts, he always referred to himself in the third person and described himself as the one, "the disciple whom Jesus loved." We also know of his humility that came later on while on the cross. We know that Jesus entrusted John with the care of his mother. And historians believe that Mary eventually died in Ephesus, under the direct care of John and after suffering on the Isle of Patmos, John would be the last of the apostles to die, the only one to die, we believe, of natural causes. We believe that happened at Ephesus, sometime around AD 98, during the reign of Trajan.

But prior to the humbling trials, in their sanctification, both James and John and others, were ruled by pride, by selfish ambition, self-fulfillment, they had not yet learned what the Apostle Paul would describe later on and Ephesians chapter four, you're familiar with the passage beginning in verse one. He says, "I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you, to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love." And he said, In Philippians, two, beginning in verse three, "Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another is more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard a quality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bondservant and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in the appearance as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." There is the humbling.

But then notice the exaltation. He goes on to say, “For this reason, also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on him the name which is above every name so that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Dear Christian, the pathway to greatness, in the eyes of God, will always be a steep, a narrow, a windy, a treacherous trail of self-sacrifice and servanthood. But at the summit, there will be eternal glory beyond your wildest imagination. This is what we long for. You want to ask yourself, Is this the path that I have chosen? Is this the trail that I pursue? Or am I a legend in my own mind?

Pride is fueled by selective hearing. Pride ignores the needs of others and then thirdly, pride uses God for self-advancement. Notice again, verse 35, James and John. They come "up to Jesus saying, 'Teacher, we want You to do for us, whatever we ask of You." That's one of the most arrogant statements in all of Scripture. Notice the demanding nature that is inherent in the request. But is this not also the way we are prone to use God for our own ends? As if Jesus is somehow our servant, the means to accomplish our good pleasure; that somehow God exists for me? Is this not at the very heart of evangelical pragmatism, that essentially is a man centered theology, that somehow God is there to orbit around my needs. And certainly, this is at the heart of the heretical social justice gospel, prosperity gospel as well. The gospel is all about man and his needs, rather than God and his glory. Jesus becomes nothing more for many people, than a genie in a bottle, that you can somehow rub and he'll pop out and do whatever you want him to do. Or a Santa Claus that you can manipulate in certain ways, so that he will hand out the goodies. Or a divine social justice warrior that wants to redeem the planet, from white, patriarchal, Christian men and produce some preconceived utopia. Dear friends, please hear me. God will never use you or bless you, if you use him to somehow accomplish your own ends. That's just not how it works, even though our flesh would say otherwise.

So indeed, out of pride, they use God to advance themselves, "Teacher, we want You to do for us, whatever we ask of You." Rather than saying, "Teacher we want to do for you, whatever you ask, for our good and your glory." Bit of a difference, right? But is this not a deep-seated propensity in each of our hearts? Is this not the manipulative theme very often in our prayers? It's interesting, according to Matthew's account, the mother of James and John was with them when they approached Jesus. So there was somehow a little collaborative effort going on, they were probably playing the family card, you know how that would work. You know, the self-serving arrogance of parental pride is often manifested in the brazen attempts parents will go to, to exalt their children. All you have to do is go to these youth games and see how parents act and see that. I remember when our kids were little and we took them to the youth basketball teams, you'd watch parents make fools out of themselves. It was so bad that, I'm not making this up, they literally had sheriff's deputies escort the refs out of the games at the end of the game to protect them from the parents. This was the power of pride.

Back to the text, Jesus says to them, "'What do you want Me to do?'" And they said, "Grant that we may set on Your right and one on Your left in Your glory." See, again beloved, this is the deceptive power of self-advancement in the human heart, even among those who love Christ. These men weren't some pagan nut jobs. I mean, these people love Christ, they're trying to follow Christ. In other words, we want you to glorify us because somehow we believe we deserve it. I mean, that's literally what they're saying. Our glory is ultimately the end of our aspirations. And we want you to help us accomplish that. Rather than realizing, as they did later, that nothing about them deserved his grace. Nothing deserved his mercy. Beloved, we must remember that God is under no obligation to make us great, but rather, God rewards those who can sincerely sing, as we often do, in this worship center, "Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy cross I cling. Naked, come I to thee for dress, bless helpless look to the for grace. Foul, eye to the fountain fly, wash me Savior, or I die." We must understand that God's purpose in saving us is not to somehow make us happy, although that is a byproduct of it. And certainly we will be happy beyond our wildest imagination in glory. But his primary purpose in saving us, is to bring glory to himself. We are only incidental to his plan to bring glory to himself. We are not the center of God's universe. Christ was our example with this. John 17 says he's praying to the Father before he goes to the cross. In the garden, he says in verse four, "'I have glorified You on the earth, I have finished the work which You have given me to do.'" That's what drove him, that was at the heart of all that he did, to do the will of his Father. The apostle Paul speaks of this as well in First Corinthians 10, verse 31. "Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." You see, the great purpose in our sanctification is to conform us into the likeness of Christ, not somehow satisfy our every desire here on Earth. In Second Corinthians three, verse 18, the Spirit of God speaks to us through the Apostle Paul and says that "We all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, are being transformed." There's a metamorphosis that's going on here, as a work of the Spirit of God, as we behold the glory of the Lord. We're being transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit. And this process of sanctification is indeed a very painful process because it includes the ratification of that self-serving pride that deceives us into believing that we're worthy of some kind of special treatment from the Lord our God, and therefore we demand it, and we learn how to manipulate it. And then we forfeit blessing in our life.

Now, notwithstanding the solemn truths, James and John, beseech Jesus; Jesus says to them, "'You do not know,'" verse 38, "'what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink?'" In this context, by the way, that is an Old Testament idiom, referring to the experiencing God's judgment. In other words, are you able to experience God's judgment as I'm about to do? He goes on to say, "'or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?'" The term here has nothing to do with water baptism, but rather the immersion into his sufferings. Are you willing to do that? Can you handle that? Humility would say, "No way." But pride says "we're able." Two empty naive ignorant words, right? We're able, we can handle it. Yeah, what happened when the soldiers came to arrest Jesus in the garden? They all ran like scalded dogs right? Oh, how hollow the boast of an overconfident fool. But of course, pride only hears what it wants to hear. It only believes what it wants to believe. Because the priority of pride is always personal ambition and self-fulfillment.

"Jesus said to them, 'The cup that I drink, you shall drink; and you shall be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized.'" And we know, as we've already discussed, their lives were a mixture of joy and sorrow, all for the glory of Christ. Then he says in verse 40, "'But to sit on My right or on My left, this is not Mine to give, but it is for those whom it has been prepared.'" In other words, these matters belong to the secret counsel and purposes of God the Father. And in his incarnation, Jesus was totally submissive to His Father's will.

And then what happens next is both sad and a bit comical. Verse41, "Hearing this, the ten began to feel indignant with James and John." So in other words, they're hearing this whole thing, and we see that they feel indignant. Now, this indignation was not because "Oh, our brothers are so ruled by self-serving pride, I can't believe they said that." No, they were indignant because they beat them to the punch. They were filled with the same selfish ambition. Just because you're his cousin's? Yeah, you can you can see how that works. You know, again, this has been an ongoing problem back in nine, Mark nine, verse 33, "They came to Capernaum; and when Jesus was in the house, He began to question them, 'What were you discussing on the way?' But they kept silent, for on the way they had discussed with one another, which of them was the greatest." And folks, this problem went all the way into the Last Supper, Luke 22, verse 24, "There arose also a dispute among them as to which one of them was regarded to be greatest." But notice what Jesus does. Verse 42, I love this phrase, "Calling them to Himself." By implication, they're spread out; they're murmuring, they're grumbling, they're whining. Wherever there's jealousy in Scripture, we also see another word right next to it. It's called strife. So they're divided. They're huffing and puffing. And you can just see Jesus saying, Hey, guys, I want all of you to come here. I want you to gather round where you will come to me right now. "Calling them to Himself, Jesus said to them, 'You know that those who are recognized as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them; and their great men exercise authority over them.'" Certainly, they knew that, we're all familiar with that. I mean, you give people political power, and they turn into, you know, Barney Fife. You know, they've got a bullet and a badge. Everybody's in jail. You know, they're throwing their weight around. They become control freaks, omniscient, domineering autocrats. When you look at some of our leaders today, I mean, we got barmaids drag queens, every kind of pervert imaginable, but they've all got the answers and we're all supposed to bow to them.

Verse 43, "'But it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant.'" "Diakonos," in the original language, we got our word "deacon" from there. It literally referred to one who waits on tables. Guys, are you willing to be that kind of person. And by the way, you will remember Jesus put a apron on himself and washed their feet. He went on to say in verse 44, "and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be a slave of all.'" "Doulos." Not just a servant, but a slave. You see, true leadership, and true greatness in the eyes of God, is characterized by a humble willingness to not only serve, but catch this, to place yourself under the authority, as it were, of others, like a slave. There's no place for self-worship. There's no place for self-love. There's no place for self-promotion or self-fulfillment. Those are the marks of pride which God hates.

And then Jesus uses himself as the supreme example, verse 45, "'For even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many.'" And of course, washing his disciples feet in the upper room was an illustration of that. But the greatest illustration of all is when he offered his life as a ransom, for each one of us. You're ransomed, because somehow you're imprisoned. And you might say he's paying the bail for those who needs to be released from the bondage of their self-serving pride and all of the rest of the sins.

And the key to what Jesus is saying is summarized best by the two verbs that we see here, that he uses "to serve" and "to give." When we do this, we manifest the essence of God, and bring glory to the one who deserves our utmost. Folks, this is true greatness in the eyes of God; when we serve and we give. So I challenge you to examine your life under the great truths of God's righteous standard, be brutally honest with yourself. Beware, it's easy to tout your humility, which is pride. I've known many who project the image of perpetual sackcloth and ashes. But you get to know them and you see there's something else going on there. I've known many men, whose prayers drip with a sweet honey of self-abasement. But in private, they have no prayer life. Those who know them best, know that they are arrogant, demanding, demeaning men. May we all learn to humble ourselves for the glory of God to serve and to give and to know that the Lord will prosper us in time? The Lord will exalt us at the proper time. Because again, this is how we become great in the eyes of God, amen? Amen. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word that so clearly expose the realities of our heart. I pray that you will help us all as we battled the flesh. And we know that we can only do this by walking by the Spirit, which means to surrender to the Spirit of God holy completely, as he has revealed himself in his Word. May we be that kind of person, that you may be honored in our life and that we might enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ. And finally, Lord, if there'll be one here today that knows nothing of what it means to truly be in relationship with Christ, having been reconciled to God through faith in their Savior, the only hope of their salvation. I pray that you will bring such overwhelming conviction that today they will bow the knee to Christ and be saved. We ask this in Jesus name, and for His glory. Amen.

For those of you that have not been with us, we are currently going through Mark's gospel verse by verse. And this morning we find ourselves in verses 32 and 34 of Mark 10. So, if you will take your Bibles and turn there. And this morning, I've been titled my discourse to you "Christ's Ministry of Prophetic Preparation." As we watch our country collapse under the weight of its own depravity, it's important for we, as Christians, to have a biblical worldview. We are told in First John 5:19, that "the whole world lies in the power of the evil one" and we see that manifested every single day. We see his nefarious deceptions being implemented primarily through theological and political liberalism that has brought on a very virulent stream of Cultural Marxism. In fact, the woke cult is now the official religion of our culture. And we are all supposed to bow to it. Its demonic priests are among the most immoral and ungodly in our country, including transgenders and drag queens that are nothing more than painted up pedophile perverts trying to seduce our children and many apostate churches have embraced this insanity. Our responsibility, in light of all this, is to have a biblical worldview and live it out. And at the very heart of that, we must not only understand the gospel, but we must proclaim it and all of its power, with all of its clarity, and even with its offense. Moreover, we must live the gospel. And my responsibility before the Lord is to make sure I am equipping you to do just that, to make sure you have a biblical worldview. And our text this morning, along with a number of associated passages will help us see the big picture of God's Kingdom purposes, it's easy to come to a passage like we're going to look at and just kind of read it and grasp some great truths that emerge from it, and not see how it fits into not only the immediate historical context, but into the overall context of God's redemptive purposes. In our violent world of deception and perversion, and corruption the truth concerning what God has done, is doing and will do, is certainly a treasure of inestimable worth. In fact, the eternal destiny of men's souls depends upon it. And what we are going to see is that our God reigns in absolute sovereignty, and we can rest assured that he will accomplish his good purposes in his time. With that, let me read our text Mark, chapter 10, verse 32, "They were on the road going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking on ahead of them; and they were amazed and those who followed were fearful. And again, He took the 12 aside and He began to tell them what was going to happen to Him, saying, 'Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes and they will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles. They will mock Him and spit on Him and scourge Him and kill Him. And three days later, He will rise again."

Now I wish to explain this passage under two headings that I hope will be helpful to you. The first heading is we want to look at the historical and theological contexts of Jesus prophecy in this particular passage. And secondly, we want to look at the specifics and fulfillments of Jesus prophecy. So let me begin, first of all, giving you the big picture of the historical and theological context of what Jesus is saying. There is a historical flow to the biblical storyline, as we see it unfold throughout Scripture and throughout history. It can be divided into four categories, we see that there is a creation, then there is a fall, there's redemption, and there's restoration. At creation, God made a magnificent and a perfect universe. At the fall, Satan deceived his image bearers, and they sinned. And as a result, God cursed them and all creation, and death enters into the world. Through redemption, God implements a plan, through His promises, and through his covenants, whereby he will restore his creation, through the person and the work of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And then the final big category is one of restoration that we all are longing for. This plan includes the descendants of Abraham, the Israelites, as a means of blessing to all of the nations, they would become the vessels through whom the Savior, the King, the Messiah would eventually come. He would be the rightful descendant of Abraham and David, thus fulfilling the Abrahamic and the Davidic covenants. And Jesus came as a literal fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies predicting a Messiah that would come and would one day rule over a worldwide kingdom. As we read, for example, in Zechariah, 14 in verse nine when "the LORD will be king over all the earth," but he would also suffer for the sins of the people, as we have read and Isaiah 53 earlier. And as we look at the big picture, we see that these purposes will be accomplished through two distinct arrivals, two "comings", a truth not clearly revealed in the Old Testament, but made abundantly clear in the New Testament. Scripture reveals that his suffering for sin on the cross was fulfilled in his first coming consistent with Old Testament prophecy. But the Old Testament prophets, concerning his worldwide reign, have yet to occur. For example, the prophecies related to the pre kingdom judgments of Daniel's 70th week as we would read in Daniel 9:27, the day of the Lord, the salvation and restoration of Israel, the reign and the defeat of the Antichrist, the millennial kingdom, all of these events are awaiting a second coming. And we can anticipate a literal fulfillment of all of the Old Testament prophecies and promises. Jesus made this abundantly clear. In Matthew five beginning in verse 17, he said, "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets," that's a reference to the Hebrew Scriptures as a whole, including all of its prophecies. "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished."

Jesus illustrated a literal fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies in his prophetic discourse, for example, in Matthew 24 and 25. To give you one example, in Matthew 24, beginning in verse 15, Jesus declared, "Therefore, when you see the abomination of desolation," now catch this, "which was spoken up through Daniel the prophet," when you see that "standing in the holy place, (let the reader understand) then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains," and so on. And we also know that Jesus prophecy, in the text that we have before us, concerning his betrayal, his arrest, his trials, his crucifixion, his death, and resurrection, were all fulfilled literally. And it's fascinating that all of these details and many more, were promised, were prophesied in the Old Testament. In fact, Luke records Jesus speaking to His disciples, and Luke 18:31, about quote, "all things which are written through the prophets about the Son of Man, that would be accomplished." And for this reason, I am committed to the consistent use of a grammatical, historical hermeneutic principle of interpretation in all areas of Scripture, including the prophetic sections, I am only concerned with the original, authorial intent of every passage. I'm only concerned with what the original readers would have understood through the normal meaning of language.

And I might add, by doing this, it avoids the theological confusion, especially in the realm of eschatology, where many Christians look for hidden or allegorical meanings in the prophetic literature. Spiritualizing the prophetic literature has led to the errant belief, for example, that the church is the new Israel, that despite all of God's promises, to the contrary, he has permanently disenfranchised his covenant people Israel from his redemptive program, and he has replaced them with his church, that somehow all of the material and physical blessings of the kingdom promises that he made to Old Testament Israel are really nothing more than spiritual blessings that belong to the church. And I believe that these claims run contrary to the revocable nature of divine election. For example, in Romans 11 in verse one, Paul says, "I say then God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be!" He goes on to say in verse 25, "For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery--so that you will not be wise in your own estimation, that a partial hardening has happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved, just as it is written, 'THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB, THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS.'" And then he says in verse 29, "for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable." All of this is important for us to understand, as we approach Jesus prophecy here in Mark 10, especially as it relates to the chronology of Jesus's ministry. And I hope you will bear with me here. Sometimes as I put together my thoughts for the sermons I get finished and think, "Oh, my goodness, they're going to be so lost with all of this Lord, only you can illumine them, and help them to endure this." But dear friends, I believe that this is very important, you may not understand it all now; you may have to go back and listen to it, but this is absolutely foundational to a biblical worldview.

Now, the immediate context; the chronological flow of these historical narratives that we've been studying in the gospels can easily get lost when you just study one gospel at a time. For example, Matthew, Mark and Luke do not record the raising of Lazarus from the dead, and the subsequent decision of the Sanhedrin to put Jesus to death. And how, after that Jesus and his disciples took refuge for a few quiet weeks in a small village of Ephraim, awaiting the time when quote, "All things should be fulfilled." Yet you need to understand that this took place before the texts before us, before what Jesus prophesied. And this is really important. You see, no one knew where Jesus was after the raising of Lazarus. Although everyone was looking for him, and the question that was on everyone's mind is recorded in John 11, verses 55 and six, Do you think this Jesus of Nazareth will have the courage to come up to the feast, referring to the Feast of Passover?

Now, during the Passover season, great throngs of pilgrims, Jewish pilgrims, would leave the northern region of Israel, the region of Galilee, and travel south, down to the east side of the Jordan River in the region of Perea. They would do this to avoid Samaria, they would not set foot in Samaria. But Jesus was in Ephraim, on the southern boundary of Samaria. So, as Passover grew near, what we see is Jesus and his disciples leave the village of Ephraim, and travel north through Samaria. They could have just gone south, just a little ways to Jerusalem, but instead they go north through Samaria, because there's no Jews there. Therefore, he could avoid arrest. And he goes to the south edge of the Galilee, as we read in Luke 17, and verse 11. And then he crosses over the Jordan Rift, the little town basically of Pella. They cross over, and he joins one of the large pilgrim bands going south through Perea. Eventually, then, they will go south, and they will turn back west, they will cross the Jordan River at Jericho, a number of you have been with me, we've been on this trail before. And they will start to make about a 20 mile climb of 3500 feet up to Jerusalem. Now we know that Jesus and the disciples then stop at the village of Bethany, just outside of Jerusalem, stay with Mary and Martha and Lazarus, and the ecstatic pilgrims continue on to find lodging. And there's many things that they heard and saw, miracles that Jesus did during that journey. Many parables that he spoke, but they're going to go on into Jerusalem, where they are going to announce that the king is coming. And they're going to describe the miracles that they saw that they witnessed on the way.

Now it's an also important for us to understand that Jesus is orchestrating all of this. He's moving it towards a high point, a climax on the day of His triumphal entry, by traveling with the Jewish pilgrims. By working these miracles, by rebuking the Pharisees during that journey, and then by stopping in Bethany and allowing the pilgrims to proceed on before him into Jerusalem, he really accomplished three objectives. The first objective that he accomplishes is that somebody is going to spread the word that he is going to appear in Jerusalem. Secondly, he fueled the fires of messianic expectation that would pave the way for his triumphal entry into Jerusalem. And then thirdly, he frustrated the murderous plans of the Sanhedrin, making them afraid to arrest him because of his enormous popularity. Albeit it was a superficial and self-serving popularity that would soon turn to rejection of their king; and the same people would call for his crucifixion. His triumphal entry, you must understand, was a day of Messianic presentation foretold by the Old Testament prophets, predicting the manner, the moment and even the meaning of the King's presentation. In Zechariah nine verse nine, we have the prediction of the manner of the King's presentation, it's foretold. The prophet says "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph O, daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just endowed with salvation, humble, and mounted on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey." In Daniel nine and verse 25, we even have the moment of the king's presentation being foretold. There we read "So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks." This is a reference to weeks of years. Without getting into all of the details, suffice it to say, that this is speaking of 483 years, after the Persian king, Artaxerxes, decreed to allow the Jews to rebuild Jerusalem in 445 BC. The first advent of Messiah would then be fulfilled at his triumphal entry that occurred on Nissan nine AD 30, precisely as it was predicted. As a prophetic footnote, 69 weeks of those years have been fulfilled. There is one more seven-year period yet to be fulfilled. It's known as Daniel's 70th week that corresponds with the pre kingdom tribulation judgments, just prior to our Lord's Second Coming.

And Psalm 118, beginning in verse 21, even tells us of the meaning of the king's presentation, There we read, "I shall give thanks to You, for You have answered me, and You have become my salvation. The stone which the builders rejected, has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day which the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad." Furthermore, both Mark and Luke state that he will, quote, "Be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. And after three days rise again." That's Mark 8:31, and Luke 9:22. In fact, in Mark 8:32, Mark expresses how Jesus is now quote, "stating the matter plainly." Now there's no more ambiguity. And you will recall when he states the matter, plainly, what does Peter do? Peter said, no, no, no, no, you can't do that. Jesus says, "Get behind Me, Satan." Now, the question that stands before us is simply this. Why would Jesus avoid stating these matters clearly, in the early stages of his ministry? After all, the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, are absolutely central to the gospel, and the history of the church. Moreover, if the church and the kingdom of heaven are essentially indistinguishable, one in the same, as some will argue, and if the kingdom and quote "the gospel of the kingdom," Mark 1:14, is merely a spiritual entity, as many claim, then why didn't Jesus and his disciples emphasize the cross from the outside of their ministry? Why would Jesus begin his public preaching, recorded in Matthew 4:17, by saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand?" Why didn't he say, "Repent, For the kingdom of heaven, is at hand and it is a spiritual kingdom, that I am going to offer you through my death and my burial and my resurrection." Why did he not do that? And the answer is this, dear friends, is because Jesus first offered himself as the promised king of the messianic kingdom in exact fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. You will remember, originally, the good news of the kingdom was announced only to Israel. John one in verse 11, "He came to His own," referring to the people of Israel, "and those who were His own did not receive Him." In fact, prior to Israel's rejection, Jesus would not even allow His disciples to go into the region of the Gentiles and the Samaritans. But he said, Go only quote "to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as you go, preach, saying, 'The kingdom of heaven is at hand,'" Matthew 10, verses five and six.

But the promised kingdom to Israel, God's chosen covenant people, demanded a decision and we see this when we read the imperatives that Jesus uses in calling them to repentance. We read verbs like repent, believe, receive, confess, follow, yet at every turn, despite all of his miraculous signs, they rejected him. Now, to be sure, Jesus atoning work on the cross, as predicted in the Old Testament, was necessary for both cosmic and human reconciliation to occur. We know that Jesus according to Acts 2:23, was "delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God." We know according to Revelation 13, in verse eight that the Lamb was slain prior to the foundation of the world, all of this was set into motion in eternity past. So, Jesus's death was going to happen, it was not a plan B, as some would claim. But to emphasize his betrayal, and his arrest and his phony trials, and his crucifixion and death and resurrection, at the outset of his messianic presentation, would have been horribly confusing to them. They could not imagine a suffering and dying Messiah. Emil Schurer, a 19th century German Protestant theologian, wrote an elaborate four volume history of the Jews around the time of Jesus ministry. And I might add that all of you who are serious Bible students, and want to be teachers, you absolutely must have this in your library, and you must become familiar with it. It's absolutely fascinating and it will enlighten you as to how the people thought in those days. But in these volumes, especially in one volume, he provides a systematic statement of Messianic doctrinal theology regarding the eschatological expectations of the Jewish people in the days of Jesus. In other words, this is how they thought, and I've summarized this very briefly, first of all, they believe the Messiah's appearance of redemption must be preceded by a special period of trouble and affliction, what he called the last tribulation and perplexity. Secondly, they believe that Elijah will return as the forerunner to prepare the way of the Messiah. Thirdly, they believed that Messiah will appear and overthrow the...(inaudible in transcription)... correct the disciples misunderstanding that the kingdom would come immediately. Because remember, I mean, even in the upper room, right around that time, what are they fighting over? Who's going to be first in the kingdom. You know, they're thinking even with all that Jesus is saying, the kingdom is coming now. That parable refutes that. But it also makes it clear that there is going to be an interregnum, there is going to be an interval of delay, followed by a future arrival. So, there you have a very hurried historical and theological context of Jesus prophecy that we have here in Mark 10.

Let's look finally at the specifics and fulfillments of Jesus prophecy. Notice verse 32. "They were on the road going up to Jerusalem. And Jesus was walking ahead of them. And they were amazed. And those who followed were fearful." Can't you see the scene? They know that Jesus is walking into a death trap. They're terrified. They don't know what's going to happen. The disciples are terrified. And Jesus is on up ahead of them, in that steep 3500 foot climb over 20 miles. He was resolute was he not? In his determination to accomplish the will of his Father. He was unflinchingly committed to finishing his atoning work on the cross. To bear my sins, your sins in his body, as our substitute.

We read this in the Messiah soliloquy about being perfected through his obedience and his suffering recorded by Isaiah the prophet. Some years before in Isaiah 50 beginning in verse five we read this "The Lord God has opened My ear; and I was not disobedient, nor did I turn back. I gave My back to those who strike Me and My cheeks to those who pluck out the beard; I did not cover My face from humiliation and spitting. For the Lord God helps Me, Therefore, I am not disgraced; Therefore, I have set My face like flint, And I know that I will not be ashamed. He who vindicates Me is near; Who will contend with Me?" And what's amazing is that these specifics recorded 800 years prior are the same specific that Jesus gives here in Mark 10.

Now notice them, verse 32, "And again He took the 12 aside and He began to tell them what was going to happen to Him." And what we're going to see is that Jesus makes eight very specific predictions concerning his suffering, his death and his resurrection in verses 33 and 34. A real quick, important digression, just so you know, this is all setting up the Passion Week of Christ. On Sunday, Jesus is going to enter the city of Jerusalem on a colt and be welcomed as king on Monday and Tuesday. He is going to enter the temple, he is going to cleanse it and for two days he is going to rule its precincts as the Messiah King, and he is going to answer the charges leveled against him, denounce the scribes and the Pharisees in a series of woes, and pronounce judgment on all who reject Him. And then he will leave the temple, he will go up to the Mount of Olives where he will answer the disciple's questions concerning his appearance, his coming, known as the Olivet Discourse. We read about it in Matthew 24 and 25, Mark 13, Luke 12:21. And there he predicts, as well, the destruction of Jerusalem and his own second coming. And then on Wednesday, there's really nothing recorded, but we believe that he's probably in Bethany with the 12, worshipping and fellowshipping with Lazarus, preparing for the feast on the following day. And then on Thursday afternoon and evening, he will wash the disciples feet, he will enjoy his last supper Passover meal with his disciples. Judas will leave and go to betray him and then on Friday morning, well before dawn, he will be betrayed, he will be arrested, and He will even be forsaken by the 11. He will suffer three mock trials by the Jews and the Sanhedrin. And sometime after dawn, he will be formally condemned, and then he will endure three more Roman interrogations, Pilate will then surrender to the demands of the Sanhedrin, Jesus will be scourged and executed by crucifixion. And then on Sunday, early in the day he will rise from the dead.

Now, the eight predictions, number one, verse 33, "'Behold, we're going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes.'" This was fulfilled beginning with Judas betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane, John 18 three, when the Roman cohort and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees came there with lanterns and torches and weapons. And likewise, Mark records this in chapter 14, verse 53, they lead Jesus away to the high priest, and all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes gathered together.

The second prediction, "and they will condemn Him to death." This was fulfilled for example, in Mark 14:64, we read, "You have heard the blasphemy; how does it seem to you? And they all condemned him to be deserving of death." John 19, verse 14, "Now it was the day of preparation for the Passover, it was about the sixth hour. And he," referring to Pilate, "said to the Jews, 'Behold your King! So they cried out, "Away with Him, Away with Him, crucify Him!' Pilate said to them, 'Shall I crucify your King?' The chief priests answered, 'We have no king but Caesar.' So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified."

A third prediction, and they "will hand him over to the Gentiles." Mark 15 verse one, "Early in the morning the chief priests with the elders and scribes and the whole Council, immediately held a consultation; and binding Jesus, they led Him away and delivered Him to Pilate." The reason they had to do this is, they did not have the authority to kill anyone. So they had to let the Romans decide that. And "Pilate questioned Him, 'Are You the King of the Jews?' And He answered him, 'It is as you say.'"

And then the fourth and fifth prediction, "'They will mock Him,'" in verse 34, "'and spit on Him.'" We see this fulfilled later in Mark 15, beginning in verse 17. "They dressed him up in purple, and after twisting a crown of thorns, they put it on Him and they began to acclaim Him, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' They kept beating His head with a reed and spitting on Him, and kneeling and bowing before Him. After they had mocked Him, they took the purple robe off Him and put His own garments on Him. And they led Him out to crucify Him."

Number six, Jesus predicted that they will scourge me. Mark 15, verse 15, "Wishing to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas for them, and after having Jesus scourged he handed Him over to be crucified." Let me back up. Remember the soldiers have put a purple robe on him mocking his kingship. They put a crown of thorns on his head, they gave him a scepter to mock him as a king and then they took the reed and they beat the thorns into his head, driving them deep into a skull. This beating, combined with the previous beating that he received from the high priests, rendered him at this point, completely unrecognizable as a human being, as predicted in Isaiah 52, verse 14, that we read earlier, that "His appearance was marred more than any man." And in this condition, Pilate brings Jesus out to the Jewish mob hoping that they would see this bloody form and be appeased, but they would not. According to Matthew's account, it would appear then that Jesus was scourged the second time with with a severe "verberatio" flogging it's called, the worst kind. Because Matthew indicates that Jesus was scourged after Barabbas was released, this kind of flogging was the most severe kind. Most men would not recover. In fact, it was once reserved for those that were about to be crucified. It was one that would literally rip the hide off of one's back right down to the ribcage most would bleed to death. It was designed to be so brutal that it would hasten the criminal’s death. May I remind you, dear friends, that he endured the suffering that we deserved.

The sixth prediction was that they would kill him. We know this happened, there was a cry of victory in John 19:30, when he said "'It is finished.'" There was a cry of commitment in Luke 23:46, "'Father into thy hands, I commend my spirit," Mark 15, verse 37, "And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed his last."

Then an eighth prediction, "'And three days later, He will rise again.'" Mark 16, verse six, we read that an angel said to the women that had come to the tomb, "'Do not be amazed; you are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who has been crucified. He has risen; He is not here; behold, here is the place where they laid Him.'" The resurrection of Jesus Christ is substantiated by the biblical record of five appearances just on the day of His resurrection, and then five more appearances during his subsequent 40 day ministry. And yet, dear friends, our Lord, our Savior and our King, marched forward to do all of this for us. A resolute determination to accomplish the will of the Father to suffer and die on our behalf. My what a model for us, Amen? Would that we be so resolute in our commitment to do the Father's will?

I challenge you. If you're here today, and you have never really understood the good news of the gospel, that God has provided a way for your sins to be forgiven, for you to be reconciled to a holy God through faith in a suffering Savior who is also our King, today, you have been told. I plead with you to repent, to place your faith in Him, the only hope of your salvation. And for those of us who know and love Christ, o, how we need to rejoice with joy inexpressible as we think of all that God has done and is doing and will do. To know that God is saving and preparing, in the ecclesia, the members of the royal family, destined to rule with the king, when He returns in all of his glory to establish His kingdom, an earthly kingdom, that will be the consummating bridge between human history and the eternal state. And to think that we are part of that nucleus of a future kingdom. May we all be diligent. May we be obedient to pray as Jesus has asked us to pray, "'Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.'" Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for the magnificent truths of your word that give us a biblical worldview. Truly, your word is a lamp unto our feet and a light into our path, especially in the dark days in which we live. We give you praise for all that you have decreed in eternity past. And we relax in your promises knowing that you will never leave us nor forsake us and that you will accomplish your purposes to bring glory to yourself. What amazing truths and for them we give you thanks. In Jesus name, Amen.

Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark's gospel? We are now in Mark chapter 10 in our verse-by-verse examination of this wonderful gospel that the Spirit of God has given to us through his servant Mark. We will be looking at verses 17 through 31, under the heading "Exposing the Idolatry of Self Worship." Let me read the text to you, Mark chapter 10, beginning in verse 17. "And as He was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to Him and knelt before Him and asked Him, 'Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?' And Jesus said to him, 'Why do you call Me good? No one is good, except God alone. You know the commandments, do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.' And he said to Him, 'Teacher, I have kept all these things from my youth up.' Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him. And said to him, 'One thing you lack, go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come follow Me.' But at these words, he was saddened, and he went away, grieving, for he was one who owned much property. And Jesus looking around, said to His disciples, 'How hard it will be, for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of God!' The disciples were amazed at His words. But Jesus answered again, and said to them, 'Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.' They were even more astonished and said to Him, 'Then who can be saved?' Looking at them, Jesus said, 'With people it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God.' Peter began to say to Him, 'Behold, we have left everything and followed You.'' Jesus said, Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters, or mother or father or children or farms, for My sake, and for the gospel's sake, but that he will receive 100 times as much now in the present age, houses, and brothers and sisters, and mothers, and children's and farms, along with persecutions and in the age to come, eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last, first.'"

Here Jesus exposes the idolatry of self-worship. This is a clever and clandestine idol that is often propped up by material wealth, and the power and the pleasure and the prestige it affords. And I might say, in comparison to the rest of the world, we all fall into the category of the wealthy. Before God called me into pastoral ministry, I spent almost 10 years counseling very affluent people, a lot of them were artists, especially in the Christian music industry. Many well-known Christian leaders. Most were very religious, most claim to be Christian, but by their lifestyles, and their secret reputations, you can see that they really had no basis to claim genuine saving faith. When you seemingly have all that the world has to offer, denying yourself and taking up a cross and following Christ is simply not all that appealing. The rich young ruler, as he's often called, in this text, was probably a leader of the synagogue. He would have been a fastidious keeper of the law and we see here that he was wealthy. And of course, in that culture, wealth was an indication of divine blessing. You were a very special person if you were wealthy. And if you were poor, that's an indication that you got some problems going on, and God's just not as impressed with you. All his externals were in place. But what's fascinating is he obviously knew something was missing. So he comes to Jesus, as we're going to see and says, "Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" And as we look at this text, we can see Jesus' answer to him, and they really fall under four categories that I hope will be helpful for you. He is going to essentially say, number one, you need to know that Jesus is God. Number two, you need to acknowledge violating the law of God. Number three, you need to cast yourself on the mercy of God and finally, joyfully follow Christ in humble obedience. No one can inherit eternal life any other way. And I might add that, we're going to see some very key principles here for evangelism. And sadly, like so many proud people today, this proud young man could not part with his wealth, because it offered him the fleeting pleasures of power, and prestige, the gratification of his lusts; he loved himself more than God.

Now, may I remind you of the context here, having completed His Galilean ministry, Jesus and his disciples are traveling on the eastern side of the Jordan River, the region of Perea and he's making his way to Jerusalem, and ultimately to the cross. And his priority in this particular season of his ministry is to instruct his disciples. And what we're going to see in this particular scenario is one of great instruction for his disciples. And by extension for all of us. You will recall in Mark eight in verse 34, we read, "And he summoned to the crowd with His disciples and said to them, 'If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what will a man give in exchange for his soul?'" And dear friends, this particular historical narrative, with this rich young synagogue ruler, is a living illustration of these truths. And I would humbly ask you to examine your heart, as we go through this very carefully. You want to ask yourself, what are those things in my life that prevent me from truly loving Christ? Truly following him? What are those things that I love more than Christ? What are those things that I absolutely will not give up because they exalt me more than Christ? What are those things that promote me rather than Christ that gratify me more than Christ, so that I find my greatest joy and my greatest delight in these things of the world rather than in Christ? Those things that you cannot live without, that prevents you from honoring Christ, will cause you to forfeit his blessing in your life.

Now this man ultimately worshipped himself, not God, which was manifested before him in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. But as we will see, he didn't really recognize that. And the issue here is not so much, in my humble opinion, his love for money, but rather his love for self. Because his wealth was the primary means by which he could exalt himself, promote himself, gratify his flesh. And what we're going to see here is Jesus is about to expose his self-worship, his idol, verse 17, "As He," referring to Jesus, "was setting out on a journey a man ran up to Him and knelt down before Him." Now, obviously, this man is passionate, right? I mean, he's sincere. And one of the things we must bear in mind is prominent Middle Eastern men do not run up to anybody, and they do not kneel to anybody. To run would require binding up your robes and girding them with some type of a belt. And what you see, even to this day is Middle Eastern men do not run they calmly glide. They kind of float with an air of unruffled dignity, and demeanor of nobility. But this guy runs and he's running through a crowd. Moreover, he kneels before Jesus, this guy that a lot of his buddies hate. "And he asked Him, 'Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?'" Obviously, he had no assurance of his salvation. Although he was a careful keeper of the law, he was afraid that he might not be good enough to make the kingdom cut. And I might add that this is true for all unbelievers. They have a nagging guilt, that just maybe what they believe, maybe what they've done, just isn't good enough. And of course, they're right. Now, according to the standards of evangelical pragmatism today, this guy is the quintessential seeker, right? I mean, this is what everybody dreams of. This is what you want in a church service. You want some guy to run up into kneel down, and what must I do to inherit the kingdom, to inherit eternal life? Wow. He's desperate. And so what we read in verse 18, And Jesus said to him, Well, you must make a decision for Christ. That's what you must do. You must repeat the sinner’s prayer. No, no, you must be baptized. No, you must also keep more rules and regulations, and do more rituals. That's what you must do. Or you must do more acts of penance, then you will make the cut. But Jesus saw the man's arrogance, he saw his ignorance. And he knew that first, this man needed to be humbled. He needed to be humbled to the point of planting his face in the dust. He needed to come to the same place where Thomas finally came, as you will recall, when he was able to plant his fingers in the Lord's side and see the nail prints of the hand, and ultimately, say, of Jesus, "My Lord, and my God." This guy was nowhere near that. "'Why do you call Me good?'" Jesus said, Here's his answer. "'Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?' Jesus says, 'Why do you call Me good? No one is good, except God alone.'"

And so this brings us to our first point. Jesus makes this real clear. If you want to inherit eternal life, you must number one, know that Jesus is God. You must understand the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, Jesus is going to make it infinitely clear to him that I'm more than a good teacher. I am God very God. You know, this reminds me of Isaiah. When in Isaiah six, Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted with the train of his robe filling the temple. And what did he say? He said, "Woe is me, for I am ruined because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips form. My eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts." This is where this guy needed to come. He was nowhere near that. He had no idea that he was in the presence of the King, the LORD of hosts. And this young man, like every sinner, needed a soul terrifying and a sin destroying vision of the Most High, thrice Holy God. If you're going to come to saving faith in Christ, you must come to a place where the reality of who Jesus is, is so overwhelming. And His Holiness is so transcendent and so terrible, in comparison to your sinfulness, that the only rational and reasonable response would be to prostrate yourself in abject terror and plead for undeserved mercy. This is what this guy needed to hear. Dear friend, you must understand that our ability to see our sin and therefore see our need for saving grace will always be proportionate to our ability to see the holiness and the majesty and the sovereignty and the omnipotence of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's who Isaiah saw sitting on the throne, the pre-Incarnate Christ, John 12:41, helps us understand that. This man was clueless, "Good Teacher", are you kidding me? This is the Creator, the Sustainer, the Redeemer, the consummator of all things. This is the ineffable tetragrammaton, the too wondrous to utter from the lips, four letters of YHWH. This is the Lord our God, the Lord of Glory, and he will tolerate no rivals. And this explains Jesus response. ''Why do you call Me good? No one is good, except God alone.'" I mean, after all, this guy thought he was good, right? Hey, you and I are good, right? Give me a little bit of advice, good teacher. All of the Pharisees thought they were good. This man needed to know who he was speaking to. And only then will a sinner bow, in humble obedience, and in brokenness, and cry out for the mercy that the Lord will give so freely. And again, this whole scenario, is a vivid illustration of every man's need to personally surrender to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. This is reminiscent of Jesus conversation, remember what the Samaritan woman that he encountered at the well? In John four verse nine, she said, "'Why would You, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I'm a Samaritan woman?' Jesus answered and said to her, 'If you knew the gift of God, and who it is, who says to you, 'Give Me a drink,' you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.'" And later on in verse 19, John four, she says, "'Sir, I perceive that you were a prophet.'" I mean, she's closer, right? She's not there yet, but "I perceive that you're a prophet." And she went on to say, "'I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called the Christ)." And then later Jesus said to her, "'I who speak to you, am He.'" This is what this rich young ruler needed to understand, that he was seeking advice about gaining eternal life from the very source of life, the only one that can grant eternal life.

"'Why do you call Me good? No one is good, except God alone.'" Now, what's fascinating is what Jesus goes on to do from here. Jesus begins to expose his self-righteous assessment of himself by applying the law to his life, to his conscience. He wants him to feel the full weight of the law that he is violated, bearing down upon his conscience, to expose his guilt and the condemnation he deserves. You will recall in Galatians 3:24 that "The Law," the Apostle Paul says is "our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith." So one cannot receive eternal life unless first of all, they know that Jesus is God.

And secondly, they must acknowledge violating the law of God. Now, let me remind you of something here. The Law of God, sometimes referred to as the mosaic code was the codification of God's holiness, the divine standard of righteousness. And we can see it divided, first of all, and in a two-fold summary of the Law, which is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and secondly, to love your neighbor as yourself. And then there is a 10-fold summarization of the Law. It's called the Decalogue or the 10 commandments, also called the tablets of stone. It was the Mosaic law given to Moses on Mount Sinai, you read it, about it in Exodus 19, and 20, also called the Old Covenant. And there we see that if you keep the covenant, you're blessed, if you violate it, you're cursed. And the Decalogue can be divided into two very broad categories. You have a vertical and a horizontal category. The first half is the vertical, how to love the Lord your God perfectly. The second half is the horizontal, and that is to how to love your neighbor. And then I might also add, there's what's called the manifold part of the law. It's called the words of the covenant. You read about that in Exodus 24:7. And the entire book of Leviticus, for example, is an expansion of the law. And all of it was written down and placed in a receptacle on the side of the Ark of the Covenant, which inside held the tablets of stone that we have violated. And according to Deuteronomy 31, in verse 26, God said, "Take this book of the law and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God. And here's why, that it may remain there as a witness against you." You see, dear friends, the purpose of the law is to expose our sin, to see God's standard of righteousness and compare it to ours. And we know that any breach, any violation means that you've broken the whole law and the consequence, of course, is death. So it's an extremely oppressive thing. In fact, the apostle Paul said this in Romans seven, in verse seven, "I would not have come to know sin except through the Law." Again, it is a witness against you. He went on to say in verse nine, "I was once alive, apart from the Law, but when the commandment came, sin became alive and I died." Dear friends, whenever we are brutally, brutally honest, and we measure our innermost person against God's standard of righteousness. We all see that we fail miserably. In fact, Paul likened his righteousness, and all of his law keeping as a Pharisee, all of his religiosity, he called it rubbish in Philippians, three. In fact, Philippians three, beginning in verse six, he said, "As to the righteousness which is in the Law, was found blameless. But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish, so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith." And we know as well in Galatians two and verse 16, that "a man is not justified by the works of the Law, but through faith in Christ Jesus." And of course, this is central to evangelism. We must preach the law before we preach the gospel. Yes, people must understand the deity of Christ, but they must also understand the severity of their rebellion against the Most High God. They must see their high treason against God and then they can understand the condemnation that is upon them. In fact, the old divines used to speak of quote, "the law work before the gospel work." People must see that they stand guilty before God's bar of justice, that they are condemned, unable to save themselves certainly unable to save themselves by keeping the law. The only way you can be saved is by trusting in Christ who has come, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us. And then when we come to saving faith when we are born again, he then produces in us his very character, through the work of the indwelling Spirit. Therefore, regeneration and justification and sanctification are all inseparable doctrines. Samuel Bolton, who was a 17th century English clergymen and scholar, a master of the master of Christ's College in Cambridge, said this, "The law sends us to the gospel, that we may be justified and the gospel sends us to the law again, to inquire what is our duty as those who are justified." In other words, the law sends us to the Gospel for salvation. And then the gospel sends us back to the law for sanctification.

Now, this young man believed he had a perfect score when it came to keeping the second half of the commandments, the horizontal division, and externally, he looked really good. But not so in his heart. There he failed miserably. We see, for example, in Matthew five, where Jesus said that even if you have anger in your heart, you've committed murder. Even if you have lusted after a woman, you have committed adultery in your heart. But Jesus is not only going to expose these things, he's going to expose his miserable failure in the vertical category of the law, the first half of the law, which prohibited having any other gods before the one true God. And Jesus is going to demonstrate to this young man that he actually worship not so much money, but himself, using his wealth again to promote his status, his power, his prestige, to gratify his flesh.

So first focusing on the second half of the 10 commandments, Jesus gave him a little sampling. He said in verse 19, "'You know the commandments, do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'" And the young man said to him in verse 20, "'Teacher, I have kept all these things from my youth up.'" You know, his response proved Jesus point, and that was that he was absolutely clueless of his own sinfulness. He measured himself based upon his externals, not his internals. So he thought, you know, I'm good to go. I'm good to go. In his heart, however, he was a habitual violator of the law. Paul described the power of indwelling sin, even in a believer. In the end of his confessional lament, there recorded in Romans seven, he said, "Wretched man that I am! Who will free me from the body of this death?" And then he says, "Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then on the one hand, I myself with my mind, I'm serving the law of God, but on the other with my flesh, the law of sin." And obviously, this is more pronounced, infinitely more pronounced, in an unbeliever because they do not have the indwelling Spirit to restrain the flesh. Paul went on to rejoice. However, in Romans eight and verse one, "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death, For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." "Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" Know that Jesus is God. Acknowledge violating the law of God, and then number three, cast yourself on the mercy of God.

Notice verse 21. "Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him." Such a precious statement. Jesus felt the love for him. Certainly there were some very good things about this young man. But we must all see, in this situation, the importance of having a burden for and a love for the lost. They're slaves to Satan, they're slaves to indwelling sin, they're blind, they're at enmity of God. Their heart is darkened. And notice, Jesus loved this man, who was blinded by his own sin, loved him so much that he would tell him exactly what he needed to hear, but certainly not what he wanted to hear. Beloved, just because we love sinners, does not mean we somehow conceal the truth from them. So that they will appreciate us and like us. So in love, what we see here is Jesus goes right for the juggler, the idolatry of self-worship, he didn't come right out and say it. Instead, he asked him to give up, what this man used to exalt himself, namely, his wealth. So Jesus said to him, "'One thing you lack'", and again, notice, he doesn't say you're not keeping this commandment, or you're not praying this prayer, you're not being baptized, you're not any of those types of things. By the way, isn't that typically what people do in churches? Oh, my goodness, look at this. I mean, this guy is down here on his knees, he wants to be saved, man, let's sign him up. Instead, Jesus says, "'Go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.'" I can only imagine the look on that young man's face. And I'm sure in his heart, he's saying, You don't know what you're asking. My very identity depends upon my wealth. I am defined by my wealth. Who would I be without my vast earthly possessions? I would be a nobody. Now you might ask, and appropriately so, didn't he also worship his wealth and his possessions? I mean, after all, Matthew 6:24 Didn't Jesus say "'No one can serve two masters,'" Jesus said, "'for either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.'" Well, certainly this would apply here to this young man. But I believe wealth worship was secondary to self-worship. And here's why I would say that. Ever since Jesus revealed to his disciples that he was going to go to the cross, that he was going to be a sacrifice of sin, something they could not grasp; ever since that time, he has been emphasizing the implications of the cross on discipleship, what it means to follow him. Again, back to Mark eight in verse 34, "'If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.'" In other words, be willing to give up everything, even your life if that's what it takes to follow me. So if anyone wishes to come after me; he's been stressing to them that you've got to step down from the throne of your life. You've got to submit to me as the one and only sovereign. You've got to renounce your former self, you got to break away from the old habits, and the old ways of thinking that dishonor God. You've got to refuse to recognize or acknowledge those things in your life that are contrary to the Word and the will of Christ. You must surrender your personal plans and your ambitions and your will and submit wholly and solely and fully to the plan and purposes of Christ.

James Brooks, a 19th century Presbyterian pastor, author and leader, by the way he was born down in Pulaski, he said this, "To deny oneself is not to do without something or even many things, it is not asceticism, not self-rejection or self-hatred, nor is it even the disowning of particular sins. But it is to renounce the self as the dominant element in life. It is to replace the self with God in Christ as the object of affections. It is to place the Divine Will, before self-will," End quote. See, again, this man's wealth was merely secondary, it was an external idol that propped up the most important idol. And that was the love of self. We must all ask ourselves, again, what do we love more than Christ? What must we never be without? What is more important to us than life itself, even eternal life? My career, my body, my looks, my wealth, my titles, my reputation, my family, and on and on it goes. All you have to do is look no further than Facebook, where many who are desperate for attention and affirmation will go to try to gain those things. Because they're not finding it in Christ. Their identity and greatest treasures are all of those things that are a part of the world, things used to exalt themselves rather than Christ. So again, remember the context of which all of this is happening, and how Jesus is trying to instruct his disciples.

Dave Harrell

Mark eight again, verse 35, "Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what will a man give in exchange for his soul?'" So here in this account with the rich young ruler, Mark is not warning his disciples about the worship of money, they had none, they really didn't want any. They've given up everything to follow Christ, but rather, he's warning them about the worship of self. The refusal to renounce yourself. He speaking to them about the cost of discipleship and the self-surrender it involves. A willingness to sacrifice that which is most important to your pride, to your prominence, to your pleasure.

So here Jesus is challenging this proud young man regarding those things. And all of those things, of course, were enabled by, defined by, his wealth, and his phony self-righteousness. So Jesus is saying, if you want to know what you must do to inherit eternal life, you need to love me, the Lord your God. More than you love yourself. If anyone wishes to come after Me, in other words, if you want to be my disciple, you got to deny yourself take up your cross and follow Me. So Jesus is challenging here on the cost of discipleship. Something we must all hear. It’s as if he's saying to them, Hey, look, by examining all of your externals you think you look pretty good, but when it comes to obeying the horizontal, division of the law, how you treat other people, really, you fail miserably. Worse yet, when it comes to the vertical division of the law, how you love me, the Lord your God, with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, you fail even worse. In fact, I have told you, you are to have no other gods before me and yet you worship yourself. You really want to know what you must do to inherit eternal life? Go and sell all you possess and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me. In other words, jettison all of those things that fuel your pride, renounce those things that you secretly desire and use so others will exalt you and praise you. Come and follow me. Now to be sure God will not share his throne with anyone. God delights in His glory and he will not share it with another, he alone is the one that must reign supreme in a worshiping heart. I'm reminded of Exodus 34, verse 14, "for you shall not worship any other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous is a jealous God." Deuteronomy 4:24, "For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God." Indeed, God is jealous for his bridal church, as I am jealous for my wife, and my children, and my family, and my church family. And his jealousy is therefore the glorious expression of his zeal for our joy in him, our greatest treasure. He alone must be trusted, he alone must be worshipped, he alone must be obeyed, and we receive the kingdom on his terms, not ours. We inherit eternal life on his terms, not ours. To deny yourself and follow Christ is to make God's glory the center of gravity around which your life orbits. Everything else is secondary or tertiary. It exchanges self-reliance for a total dependence upon Christ. It spells the end of self-exultation and a commitment to the exaltation of Christ alone. And this is what Jesus is asking him to do. By being willing to give up, sell all you possess, give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me.

But notice his response in verse 22. "But at these words, he was saddened, and he went away grieving for he was one who owned much property." He could not part with his worldly possessions. Not so much that Jesus would make that a requirement before you can be saved, I hope you understand that, but a willingness to put Christ over these things. He could not part with these things because they defined him, they elevated him and they dignified him. His wealth made him somebody in the eyes of the world; being prominent, being powerful, able to satisfy the desires of your heart. Those were the priorities of his life. You see, his wealth was his security. The secret to fulfilling the longings of his heart, longings to be affirmed, to be applauded and to be deliriously happy. And he believed that his wealth was a sign of God's blessings. So indeed, he wanted to be worshipped. And Jesus knew this. And he's basically saying, Will you deny yourself and take up a cross if necessary to follow me? Oh, dear friends, the damning and deceptive power of pride. The many ways it can erect idols in our heart, I think of how God exposed the insincere leaders of Israel, who came to Ezekiel to seek counsel when in fact, they had no desire to obey the Lord, Ezekiel chapter 14, verses three and six, he says, "Son of man, these, these men have setup their idols in their hearts and have put right before their faces the stumbling block of their iniquity," then in verse six, "Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'Thus says the Lord God, 'Repent and turn away from your idols and turn your faces away from all your abominations.'" We read something similar in Colossians, chapter three and verse five. The apostle Paul says, "Therefore, consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil, desire and greed, which amounts to idolatry." And John says in First John 5:21, "Little children, guard yourself from idols." Which includes anything that prevents us from worshiping and serving and loving the Lord our God. Anything that we cherish more than him. You say, Well, Pastor, how will I know? Let me give you a few things that will help you know. First of all, your idol will be something that you will obsess about all the time. It's always on your mind. It takes priority over everything else in your life. Also you will go to any length to attain it, any length to keep it and you will resent anyone who dares confront you about it. Moreover, you will consider it your greatest treasure, your greatest source of joy. And you will use it to exalt yourself and promote yourself and pleasure yourself. This, of course, is the very opposite of Romans 12 in verse one, where the apostle Paul says, "Therefore," in other words, based upon the mercies of God and His grace in you, "I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship." This man would rather forfeit eternal life, than give up his idol of self-worship. I've seen this many times in evangelism. People that will cling to anything they believe will make them happy, especially the rich and the famous. I can tell you many stories, I've worked with a lot of fabulously wealthy people, and only a few have come to faith in Christ. So you see, the rich think that Jesus wants to take everything from them, rather than give everything to them. And so we see in verse 23, "Jesus looking around said to His disciples, 'How hard it will be, for those who are wealthy to enter the kingdom of God!' The disciples were amazed at His words. But Jesus answered again and said to them, 'Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.'" In other words, he's using hyperbole to basically say that it is absolutely impossible to inherit eternal life by your own means; this is something that God must do. "They were astonished and said to Him, 'Then who can be saved?' Looking at them, Jesus said, 'With people it is impossible, but with God, all things are possible. For all things are possible with God.'"

Beloved evangelism is a work of God, not a work of man. We give them the gospel, but only God can change the heart. And all sinners, including the most wealthy, must humbly bow to the sovereignty of the Lord Jesus Christ and plead for mercy, as did the tax collector, in Luke 18, who pounded on his chest and said, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner." I had a friend who was literally one of the most wealthy men in America, but he was a vulgar man, a godless man. He used horrible language, intimidated people terribly. But somehow, for some reason, this guy would never curse around me. And he really liked me. And he would bring me into his home. Long story, but eventually, he had a terminal disease and I spent several hours, probably five or six hours over a course of time in hospice. And he was used to kind of buying his way into heaven as a Roman Catholic. And I remember very clearly telling him, my friend, you are going to die and go to Hell, unless you trust in Christ as your only hope of salvation. You cannot buy your way into the kingdom. And I remember in his broken state, this big guy that had shriveled up to nothing, I remember him telling me with tears, how he understood, and I believe he gave his heart to Christ. I believe God saved him. I believe we'll see him in the kingdom someday. But that is very rare. Most of the wealthy people I've worked with will not acknowledge Jesus as Lord, see how they violated his law, cast themselves on his mercy. And as we see finally in closing, joyfully follow Christ in humble obedience.

Notice verse 28. "Peter began to say to Him," and I'm sure he was speaking on behalf of the rest of the guys, "Behold, we've left everything and followed You." In fact, Matthew adds something else that Peter said, in Matthew 19:27 "Behold, we have left everything and followed You. What then will there be for us?" Verse 29, "Jesus said, 'Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms for my sake and for the gospel sake, but that he will receive 100 times as much now in the present age, houses and brothers and sisters, and mothers and children and farms, along with persecutions and in the age to come, eternal life.'" The cost of self-surrender is necessary for discipleship and this cost can be costly, very costly. But the reward is beyond anything that we can imagine. It is eternal life. And Jesus finally says, "'But many who are first will be last, and the last, first.'" This young man idolized himself, he worshipped himself, he insisted on being first, no place for self-denial, no place for taking up a cross and following Christ, the price was too high. And his wealth, like Samson's hair, was the secret to his success and joy. And he could not part with it, not even in exchange for his soul. Oh, dear friend, ask yourself what is more precious to me than Christ? What do I refuse to give up so that I can gain Christ? Because unless you come to that place, you will never inherit eternal life? God cannot save you. If you love yourself and the things of this world more than him, for what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? What will a man give in exchange for his soul? Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for the clarity of your word and its penetrating power in each of our hearts. I pray that you will cause us to pensively reflect upon these magnificent truths and certainly apply them according to every need, that people might be saved. And that saints might be sanctified all the more. For we ask it in Jesus name, and for his sake. Amen.

This morning, we return once again to our study of Mark's gospel. So if you will take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 10, we will be looking specifically at verses 13 through 16. Before I read the text, may I say that as a pastor, there are a number of things that are very painful to deal with. And as I come to this text, some of those things emerge. One of the most difficult things is having to deal with a family that has lost an infant or a young child. We all know how heartbreaking that is. And many times, families will ask, did my child go to heaven? Or did my child go to hell? What happens to a child when he or she dies? Something else that brings great grief to my heart is the pain of seeing parents that really have no desire to bring their children to Christ. They have no desire to really seek the Lord's blessing in their child's life, they just kind of let them grow up on their own. And then a third thing that is very difficult, is to see sinners who need to come to Jesus on his terms, but they prefer to come on their own terms, and therefore they will never enter into the kingdom of heaven. Each of these difficult issues are addressed in the passage that we have before us, as well as the parallel passages in Matthew 19, and Luke 18. So let me read this passage to you. Mark chapter 10, beginning in verse 13. "And they were bringing children to Him so that He might touch them. But the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw this, He was indignant and said to them, 'Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God, like a child will not enter it at all.' And He took them in His arms, and began blessing them, laying His hands on them."

I would like to examine this passage under four categories that I hope will be helpful to you. First of all, we will see the priority of seeking the Lord's blessing on our children. Secondly, we will look at the obstacles of seeking the Lord's blessing on our children. And thirdly, we're going to examine the nature of the Lord's blessing on our children. And finally, the Kingdom promise for all who come in childlike faith alone. I trust you will all humble yourselves before the teaching of the Word of God.

Now, let me give you the context here. It's very important. Jesus is on the eastern side of the Jordan River Valley, in the region of Perea. He's with his disciples, he is gradually making his way towards Jerusalem. And he has just finished another round of conflict with the self-righteous Pharisees that have tried to embarrass him, tried to humiliate him and turn people against him. And they have tried to do this over the issue of marriage and divorce and remarriage and so forth. And of course, he constantly exposes their hypocrisy, and they are furious with him; they want to see him dead. And now in this next scenario that occurs, with parents bringing infants and little children to Jesus, Mark is really striking a very stark contrast with the Pharisees that believe they can earn their way into the Kingdom versus these children that have nothing to offer, and such as these can enter the kingdom. In fact, the next recorded scenario is one where the Lord encounters a rich young synagogue ruler, convinced he would inherit eternal life because of his religious law keeping and so forth. And so that will be yet another contrast. So that's what's going on here. Also, according to verse 10 of this chapter, we see that Jesus is still probably in a house with his disciples, meeting together with them. And this brings us to what happens here in verse 13. And this is under our first heading, the priority of seeking the Lord's blessing on our children. Verse 13, says, "And they were bringing children to Him, so that He might touch them." The grammar of the passage indicates that this was kind of an ongoing thing. They must have been lining up to bring their children to him. Now, the text doesn't tell us if these people were believing in Jesus, perhaps some did, they certainly knew his reputation. But it was customary among, especially the Jews, in the first century, to bring their children to a prominent rabbi to seek his blessing upon them. And throughout the gospel, we also see accounts of Jesus, laying his hands on those who are sick, those who are needy and so forth. His personal touch was not just an act of blessing, but it was it was a tangible expression of his unconditional love for people without any distinction, because he did this to the clean and the unclean, something the Pharisees would never do. Now, mind you, Jesus is really focusing on teaching his disciples. And so they're watching all this. And they still have much to learn, as we all do. They're watching, they're listening, and they're learning. So verse 13, says, "And they," referring to these parents, "we're bringing children to Him." The term "children," "paidion", in the original language is just a general term for a young child. It can include an infant all the way up to a preteen child, and they are bringing them to him so that he might touch them. And Luke's account adds a little bit more information. He uses the word "brephos", which means infant, they were also bringing infants, little babies, and that term includes an unborn child, even an unborn child in the womb. One that has not yet weaned; in Luke 18:15, we read, "And they were bringing even the babies to Him, so that He would touch them." So we have a steady stream of parents here, probably coming up to this house. Imagine the scene, they're seeking a blessing from this famous rabbi.

And I might pause here for a moment. What a great lesson for each of us as parents, especially those of us who obviously know who Jesus is, to do everything we can to bring our children to Jesus. That should be the supreme calling of every parent, the highest calling, a priority, that will yield the greatest joy in life, not only for the parents, but certainly for the child. And I want to ask you, parents, do you long for Jesus to bless your child? And if so, what are you doing about that? I hope you do. I hope you long for his touch, his loving embrace, his tender stroke, a stroke from the omnipotent hands that healed the sick, that gave sight to the blind. That even raised the dead. And we read later in verse 16, "And He took them in His arms and began blessing them, laying His hands on them." Dear friends, I hope you yearn for the Lord's blessing on your children.

I remember my grandparents, on both my mom and my dad's side, they love the Lord. And whenever I spent time with him with them, which was quite a bit, they made sure that I was in Sunday school. They made sure that I was in church. We had devotions, and certainly, we had that with my family, with my mom and my dad. And I praise God for that. I remember when a man came to our house and he was selling this, it looked like a set of encyclopedias, it was called the Book of Life. And dad bought that because it was all these Bible stories. And they got increasingly more theological, shall we say, you know, with every volume so that you could start with someone that didn't know much at all, a little child, and then it would go on from there. And I remember many, many, many times, my parents sitting down with me, and we would look at those pictures and they would read that story. I remember parents that made sure we never missed a church service. Not that it was legalistic, but they wanted to expose me and my sister to every opportunity to know who Christ is. Whatever a man or a woman sews, that's what they're going to reap. And I know way too many parents who have sown the wind and now they have they are reaping the whirlwind. I can tell you hundreds of stories. Over the past several months, I've had the opportunity to speak with several public-school teachers, and those that are substituting and they tell stories, especially of the middle school children who are so depressed, well, they're angry. So naturally, they are very vulnerable to the satanic deceptions of the whole woke ideology, the LGBTQ insanity, the transgender nonsense, how sad? How different would it have been for these kids and how different would it be if their parents would have exhausted themselves to make sure they brought their children to Jesus?

So we first see the priority of seeking the Lord's blessing. Secondly, I want you to look at the obstacles of seeking the Lord's blessing on our children. In verse 13, we read "but the disciples rebuked them." And again, the grammar of the text indicates that this was an ongoing thing. It's like as you can almost see it, it's like go on, no, Jesus doesn't have time for this. Go, go. No, no, no, no, he doesn't have time for this. Now, we don't know that's what they said, but it had to be something like that. Now why did they do that? It doesn't say, perhaps they thought, well, Jesus has more important things to do than mess with little kids, you know, parents of little kids. Or maybe they were thinking to themselves, you know, we just kind of want Jesus to ourselves here. You know, "us four no more, bar the door," even though there were 12 all right? We don't know. But beloved may I say very clearly, we want to be careful to never prevent anyone from coming to Christ. We want to have a burden for the lost, we don't want to tell people to get lost. And so, especially with parents in the church, or people that need help with their children, we want to do all that we can to help in that. So, this is what we going on here.

And what's also interesting in verse 14, is what Jesus does. He says, here in verse 14, "But when Jesus saw this, He was indignant." The term carries the idea of being aroused to righteous indignation, to righteous anger. He is indignant and said to them, "'Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them.'" Again, a present tense verb, it's the idea of, "stop preventing them, let them come, I want these parents, I want these children to have full access to me." And by the way, that needs to be the priority of every single person in ministry, you need to be accessible to your people. That must be a priority. Every Shepherd needs to smell like sheep. Let them come. Full Access. He says, "'For the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.'" Luke adds another dimension here, he says in Luke 18, in verse 16, "Jesus called for them." So, can't you see it? He said, Hey, you guys knock it off, let them come. Hey, you, come on, come on in. That's what we see happening here. So, the Lord encourages parents to bring their children to him, that he might bless them. And if that is his priority, beloved, should it not also be yours? Sadly, many professing Christian parents see no real need to invest themselves in such a way; invest themselves through prayer and through example, through discipline, through instruction. And then a lot of parents give up with the obstacles. And boy, don't we all know what the obstacles are today. We might not have the disciples out there saying don't come in, but we've got our own obstacles, many times the ones that we create ourselves, I'm too busy, I'm too tired. Too tired to go to Sunday school. I've got too many responsibilities. There's too many distractions in my life. I don't have time to sit down with my children and read them Bible stories and help them understand who Jesus is. After all, that's what the Sunday school teachers are for right? So many obstacles. I think of so many parents that I've seen over the years, that will exhaust themselves physically and financially, so their child can do something with a ball. But they have absolutely no time, or energy or finance, to help them understand who Jesus is. Talk about misplaced priorities, talk about obstacles. Well, whatever the obstacle, Jesus knows this, and Jesus wants you to press forward. He's inviting you to come. So, we need to take advantage of every opportunity that we have to expose ourselves to Christ.

By the way, this requires spiritual discipline. We live in a very undisciplined society today, we tend to just do whatever feels good. And there's no real priority to do the right things at the right time. But this requires spiritual discipline, I think of Psalm 16, verse eight, where the psalmist says, "I have set the Lord always before me." "I have set the Lord always before me," which would translate into therefore as a father or as a mother, I'm gonna set my children in front of me and the Lord and I'm gonna set the Lord before them. And he went on to say in that passage, "Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken."

So we see the priority and the obstacles of seeking the Lord's blessing on our children. And then this moves into some deeply theological issues that I want to address briefly, but hopefully, it'll be enough to help you understand what I believe the Scriptures teach. And this is under the heading of the nature of the Lord's blessing on our children. What was he really doing there? Spiritually speaking? I mean, why would he bless them knowing they had a sin nature? What is the nature of that blessing? Now, obviously, Jesus knew these infants and the small children, perhaps even some that are still in the womb. He knew that they were sinners by nature. Every child has inherited the imputed sinfulness of Adam. In Romans 5:12, other passages, in fact, and I know this is hard for us to hear, that precious little baby that smiles at us is capable of the most heinous sins, because that little child has a sinful nature.

God said in Genesis eight, verse 21, "The intent of man's heart is evil from his youth." David wrote in Psalm 51 Five, "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin my mother conceived me." In Psalm 58, three we read, "The wicked are estranged from the womb, those who speak lies go astray from birth." And any of us who have raised children know exactly what that looks like. You don't have to teach your child to lie and to be naughty, it comes natural. Romans three, verse 10, and following, "There is none righteous, not even one, there is none who understands There is none who seeks for God, all of turned aside, together, they have become useless. There is none who does good, there is not even one." So Jesus understood their depravity, obviously. But beloved, he also understood that they had no moral awareness. They were unable to understand the gospel, to understand sin and the cross and who Jesus is, what he would do for them, et cetera. They also had no ability to exercise saving faith, or to even reject Christ. Now, the text makes it clear that there was no dispensing of saving grace here in his blessing or in his laying on of hands. So why did he want them to have access to him? Well, I believe primarily it is because they were innocent in his sight, as we will see, and simply because he loved them. In verse 14, we read "The kingdom of God belongs to such as these." The kingdom of God here, in this context, refers to the sphere of the redeemed where Christ reigns in the hearts of those who have trusted in him. But it says that this kingdom "belongs to such as these", it doesn't say merely "to these." He did not say the kingdom of God belongs to children, but to "such as these", which is a very precise way of indicating that he was referring to everyone just like them. And I believe there's two categories that we can see here, as we look at these children, the first category, they are those who are utterly helpless, to save themselves. They come to him with unassuming humility. They have no credit. They have no clout. They're utterly dependent upon his mercy and wholly trust in his grace alone. But I think the second category is that innocent children have no moral awareness. That's what we have here with these children. They have not yet reached an age of personal accountability. Let me address that issue first.

Prior to the age of accountability, infants and children are temporarily protected by God's grace until such a time as they are old enough to know the difference between right and wrong, good and evil. As we look at Scripture, nowhere in Scripture does God bless unbelievers. He would never bless those incarcerated in the domain of darkness, Colossians 1:13. In fact, he speaks of them in John 8:44 is those who "are of their father the devil and want to do the desires of their father." So practically speaking, as it relates to the death of an unborn infant, or a child or a mentally disabled person that has no moral awareness, because of God's gracious protection, if that person dies in that condition, despite their sin nature that deserves the wages of sin, which is eternal death, because they are unable to savingly believe, I believe the Scripture teaches they go straight to heaven. Once they reach an age of accountability, then they lose that innocence. But they don't lose their salvation. And I'll address that more in a moment. At that point they become culpable for their sin and God holds them responsible if they fail to repent and trust in Christ. But nowhere in Scripture do we read of anyone going into eternal judgment, because of their sin nature. We see that no place. Judgment is always pronounced upon those who rebelled against God who violate his law, which would include the sin of unbelief. God never condemned sinners for sins that they had not committed. Phil Johnson says this quote, "Whenever Scripture describes the inhabitants of hell, it always does so with lists of sins, and abominations they have deliberately committed." End quote. Obviously, that can't be the case with these children. Infants and little children have no moral consciousness and therefore they have no culpability of deliberate willful sin. Yes, they have a sin nature, but they have not committed sinful deeds. Nowhere in Scripture do we read of an infant child being damned for anything. Imagine the utter enigma, the unfathomable mystery in the mind of an innocent child, suffering in the torments of hell, when they had absolutely no knowledge of what they had done, or of the holiness of God. Incomprehensible. In his book, "The Theology of Infant Salvation," which was written in 1907, a great Presbyterian pastor and theologian Dr. R.A Webb, addressed this issue, he said this, quote, "If a dead infant were sent to hell, on no other account than that of original sin, there would be good reason to the divine mind for the judgment, because sin is a reality. But the child's mind would be a perfect blank as to the reason of its suffering. Under such circumstances, it would know suffering, but it would have no understanding of the reason for its suffering. It could not tell itself why it was so awfully smitten and consequently, the whole meaning and significance of its sufferings, being to it a conscious enigma, the very essence of the penalty would be absent and justice would be disappointed, cheated of its validation." End quote. Again, these little ones were unable to savingly believe because they had no moral consciousness, no moral awareness, and therefore no culpability for acts of rebellion. And again, this would include those that are mentally disabled. Yet the kingdom of God belongs to such as these, the helpless, the meritless, the humble, the dependent, the trusting. So one might ask, so okay, do they lose their salvation? Once they reach the age of accountability? And I believe the answer is not at all. And here I stand on the shoulders of other eminent theologians like John Calvin and BB Warfield, Charles Hodge, R.A Webb, John MacArthur, etc. The innocent child does not lose his or her salvation after reaching the age of, of accountability, but rather, it would appear that God temporarily protects them in his protective custody of his grace until they reach that age. Practically speaking, they remain innocent until they develop into a stage of moral consciousness. Let me give you an example or two of this in Scripture.

We see this for example, in Deuteronomy, chapter one and verse 39. In that context, God exempted the infants and little children in Israel from his sentence upon the entire generation of Israelites, because of the rebellion against them or against him in the wilderness, they wouldn't, they would not be allowed to enter the land, but their children would be able to enter and why the exemption? We're going to see in this text it was because they had no knowledge of good and evil. They were not in a conscious, willful state of rebellion against God and they had committed no acts of disbelief. Let me read the text to you Deuteronomy 139. We read "your little ones who you said would become a prey, and your sons, who this day have no knowledge of good or evil shall enter there," referring to the promised land, "and I will give it to them and they shall possess it." Again, to be sure little children and infants are incapable of making conscious, willful, rational, intentional choices.

Jeremiah chapter 19, verses four through five God speaks of the, quote, "innocent" children that were sacrificed to Baal. Ezekiel chapter 16, beginning in verse 20, "you took your sons and daughters whom you had born to Me and sacrifice them to idols to be devoured... You slaughtered," and then he says, "My children", they were his possession, "You slaughtered My children and offered them up to idols by causing them to pass through the fire." Jonah chapter four and verse 11, "Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand", I believe in reference to the children that were there. And again, I believe God's gracious, protective custody would apply to miscarried children as we're going to see. Stillborn children, I believe they go to heaven when they die. Job contrasted the blessing of eternal life, for the stillborn in heaven with the sorrows, the miseries, the wickedness, the weariness of life. In fact, he wished he had been miscarried or stillborn, rather than alive in the misery that he was dealing with; Job chapter three beginning in verse 11, "Why did I not die at birth? Come forth from the womb and expire? Why did the knees receive me? And why the breasts that I should suck? For now I would have lain down and been quiet, I would have slept then I would have been at rest." He goes on to say in verse 16, and following. "or like a miscarriage, which is discarded," In other words, why couldn't I have been like that? "I would not be as infants that never saw light." There, referring to heaven, "the wicked cease from raging and there the weary are at rest," and so forth. King Solomon, another example, made the same assertions pertaining to the preferred blessings in heaven for the stillborn child or the miscarriage child in Ecclesiastes six beginning in verse three, "If a man fathers 100, children and lives many years, however many they may be, but his soul is not satisfied with good things and he does not even have a proper burial. Then I say, better the miscarriage then he, for it comes in futility and goes into obscurity and its name is covered in obscurity. It never sees the sun, and it never knows anything, it is better off than he." We see this as well in the story of David and Bathsheba. In Second Samuel 12. Remember as part of God's judgment upon David and Bathsheba because of their sin, because of the sin of adultery, and the murder of Uriah, God said that his son with Bathsheba would die. And you will recall the story; the child was born, it was very ill, David fasted and prayed. Even the text says that he even was laying on the ground all night long. He did this for seven days, and then the child died. And we read this in Second Samuel 12, beginning in verse 20, "So David arose from the ground, washed, anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he came into the house of the Lord and worship. Then he came to his own house, and when he requested, they set food before him and he ate. Then his servant said to him, 'What is this thing that you have done? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but when the child died, you arose and ate food?' He said, 'While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept, for I said, 'who knows. the Lord may be gracious to me, that the child may live', but now he has died, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again?" Then he says this, "I will go to him, but he will not return to me." The text indicates that God had forgiven David. He was heaven bound. And he also knew that that's where his son was, and that's where he would one day be reunited with him. I know there's a number of you that I've dealt with over the years that have lost a child through miscarriage, through stillbirth, and some even after the child was born. And I know what a heartbreak it is, but I hope this brings comfort to you. Because I believe that if you know and love Christ, you will be reunited with that child. One day, though we sorrow greatly, what a blessing it is even to know that they escaped the miseries of this world, amen? Regarding this scenario, in Mark 10, John Calvin also offers some insights, helping us see that this has been the teaching of Orthodox Christianity, all the way back. He said this, "Those little children have not yet any understanding to desire His blessing," referring to the texts we're talking about, "but then they are presented to him, he gently and kindly receives them and dedicates them to the Father by a solemn act of blessing." He went on to say, "To exclude from the grace of redemption, those who are of that age, would be too cruel. It is presumption and sacrilege to drive far from the fold of Christ, those whom he cherishes in his bosom, and to shut the door and exclude as strangers, those whom he does not wish to be forbidden, to come to him."

So, again, when Jesus says, "For the kingdom of God, belongs to such as these", can we not also even assume and I don't think this is too far of a stretch, that he also intends to indicate that the majority of the inhabitants of heaven are those that were aborted and miscarried and stillborn. Little children, like those that he held, even in his arms and blessed and justified by his grace. What an amazing picture of God's love. Again, notice verse 16, "He took them in His arms and began blessing them, laying His hands on them." The phrase in the original language, "took them in His arms", means to take something into the crux of one's arms as to hold it, or to enfold one's arms tenderly around a child. And we all know what that looks like, we take a child and we, we hold them like that. That's what Jesus was doing with them, with little ones. And while doing so, he blessed them. He laid his hands on them. Oh dear Christian, can we not see the tender loving compassion of the Lord Jesus Christ as he caresses these little children? What an amazing picture and oh to have the Savior's embrace and blessing. Dear friends, this is a matter of eternal life and eternal death. No wonder the Lord Jesus so strongly rebuked his disciples for preventing these parents from bringing their children and their little toddlers to him. May we never be such an obstacle. And again, I would plead with you parents ask yourself, does this apply to me? Am I a help, or am I a hindrance to my child, coming to a place of understanding the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ? Do I lead the way or do I get in the way by my example? The eminent 19th century, Princeton theologian BB Warfield, also affirmed from Scripture, the salvation of infants, especially as it relates to God's sovereign purposes in election, which I might also add for you theologians that, as you look at it from the perspective that he gives in that I'm addressing here, you will see that this is just one more reason to thoroughly refute the Armenians system of soteriology. In fact, I might also add that the Palladian, semi-Palladian, Armenian claim that individuals are born morally neutral, rather than having a sin nature is disproved by the simple fact that babies die. The wages of sin is death. Here's what Warfield said concerning the salvation of infants, quote, "Their destiny is determined irrespective of their choice by an unconditional decree of God, suspended for its execution on no act of their own. And their salvation is wrought by an unconditional application of the grace of Christ to their souls through the immediate and irresistible operation of the Holy Spirit, prior to and apart from, any action of their own proper wills." He went on to add, "And if death in infancy does depend on God's providence, Providence," which I might add, it certainly does, "It is assuredly God in His providence, who selects this vast multitude, to be made participants of His unconditional salvation. This is but to say that they are unconditionally predestined to salvation from the foundation of the world. If only a single infant dying in infancy be saved, the whole Arminian principle is traversed. If all infants dying, such are saved, not only the majority of the saved, but that was the majority of the human race, hitherto entered into life by a non-Arminian pathway." End quote. And of course, he's referring there, to the grace of God in unconditional, sovereign election.

So this was the nature of the Lord's blessing upon these innocent babes, he loved them as one of his own. For the kingdom of God belongs to the helpless, to the humble. And that's what we have here now. I pondered the thought of what the Lord must have prayed in this blessing. And certainly the text does not tell us. What is the nature of this dedication? What were the words we don't know? But I will say that given the providence of God, in his elective purposes, for every image bearer, each individual image bearer that he blessed, he prayed for them in ways that we could never comprehend. These are things beyond us. But the Lord knew. No doubt some of those children grew up to come to faith in Christ, and others did not. But what an unforgettable experience for each parent, right? Again, many of them were probably, in fact, probably most of them weren't believers. Even though they knew something about Jesus, they knew he was this incredible miracle working rabbi. But to think one by one, Jesus calls you in and he takes your child, and he speaks to that child, and he holds that child and he blesses that child and those parents, one by one, he holds them in the omnipotent hands, that would soon be pierced. Later, I'm sure many of those parents would remind their children as the children grew up, remind them of that momentous occasion. Son, Daughter, let me tell you about the day when...and they would describe what happened. And undoubtedly, some of those children grew up to come to faith in Christ. And they would be able to tell their children, let me tell you what my mom and dad did when I was a little baby. They took me to see Jesus in this house. I don't remember it, but he called them and he took me in his arms and my mother and my father pressed their way through the crowds through all of the obstacles, so that I might receive a blessing from the lover of my soul that I now serve. No doubt, dear friends, we will see some of those people one day, won't that be an amazing thing?

So we've seen the priority and the obstacles of seeking the Lord's blessing on our children. We've seen a little bit of the nature of the Lord's blessing on our children. And finally, we want to look at the kingdom promise for all who come in childlike faith alone. He says in verse 15, "'Truly'", which could be translated, I tell you the truth, "'Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.'" Beloved, can there be any greater proof that salvation is solely by grace alone than in this statement? In this scenario? I think not. May I remind you again of verse 14, he says, "'Permit the children to come to me, do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these,'" not to these, but to "such as these", again, a very precise way of indicating that you come like these children. Not only was he referring to, obviously the innocent children with no moral awareness that had not yet reached the age of accountability, but also to anyone that has the same characteristics as these children. And may I remind you, once again, what these characteristics are, because this is how you come to the kingdom. If you come any other way, you will not enter the kingdom. These children were utterly helpless to save themselves. When we truly come to faith in Christ, we have nothing to offer but our sin. They come to him with unassuming humility, with no credits or no or clout, utterly dependent solely upon His mercy. And you know how trusting a child is. I mean, they will basically believe anything, right? And when you come to Christ, we have to trust in what he has said. I think of what Jesus said in Matthew five and verse three, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." The poor in spirit refers to those who are so burdened by their impoverished spiritual state, that all they can do is cry out for what they know they do not deserve, what they know they cannot accomplish on their own. Broken and contrite in spirit, like a cowering beggar; Lord, I am desperate, please be merciful to me, a sinner. Again, verse 15, "'Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God, like a child will not enter it at all.'" Won't you notice the word receive; we receive the kingdom as a gift. We don't earn it through some meritorious acts, we don't earn it through some spiritual act. Now, let me get more specific. We do not come into the kingdom through infant baptism. You do not come into the kingdom through the sacrament of christening a baby. You do not enter the kingdom through water baptism, through some ritual, through confirmation, through church membership, through denomination affiliation. Nor do you come into the kingdom, on the coattails of your parents. We receive the kingdom like a child, otherwise, we will not enter it at all. You can only receive it as a gift of God's grace, when you humbly trust in him as a dependent and helpless child.

I remember when the Lord saved me by His grace when I was nine years old. I remember a lot of the specifics of that time very, very clearly. One of the things that I remember is that I knew very, very, very little theology. But I did know this, that I was a great sinner, and Christ was a greater Savior. I feared hell. I understood the basics, so that I could cry out to Him and in repented faith trust in Him to save me. I didn't need someone to explain to me the creation of the universe. I didn't need someone to explain to me that the Bible was truly the infallible word of God. I didn't need a lot of apologetics. I didn't need a lot of theology to understand how there is relationship between and a harmony between man's responsibility and God's sovereignty. I didn't need all that stuff. I was a child and I came to him as a child. And every adult that comes to Christ must come the same way. And then you know what? When you come to saving faith in Christ, there is a miracle called regeneration that takes place. There is that supernatural, instantaneous impartation of spiritual life to the spiritually dead. The spirit comes into your heart and you begin to understand scripture in ways that you never did before. Oh you still have to study, you still have to learn, but the Spirit of God illumines your mind, and all of the magnificent truths of his Word begin to build upon one another. And you begin to put the pieces together by God's grace. But you don't have to have them all put together to receive the kingdom. That's the point.

I want to close with a quote from Charles Spurgeon that I think is a great summary here. He said this, "A little child believes with an unquestioning faith, which makes everything vivid and real. Believe just so, “he says, "the child believes in all humility, looking up to its teacher and receiving its teacher's word as decisive. Believe in Jesus, just so. Say Lord, I am a know nothing. I come to you to be taught, I am nothing be you, my all in all. A child when it comes to Christ comes very sincerely and with all its heart. It knows nothing of sinister motives or of formality. It's repentance and faith are genuine. I wish you would come to Christ this morning," he says. "You pour guilty ones in real earnest just as you are. Do not play at religion anymore. Do not look for fine words with which to trim yourselves and make your prayers look neat and pretty. Become as a child does in all simplicity, not ashamed to talk, because your heart feels when a child believes in Jesus, it cares nothing for critical points. That is the way you must come to Christ. You that have always been inventing religious conundrums, you that for many years have been readers of the last new novels and modern theology. For they are mere novels, and nothing better. You that have added your brains with the vain thoughts of vain men, come to Jesus as you are. And believe what Jesus says, Because Jesus says it. Take Christ at His word and trust Him. That is the way to be saved."

Dear friends, I hope you've all come to a place of saving faith in Christ. And you have heard today the characteristics of that kind of a person, and how you receive the kingdom. May it never be said in this life or the next, that you were never warned, that you were never explained the gospel of Christ. For today, you have been told, today you have been warned. And I plead with you as a minister of the gospel to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved. And for you parents, may I one more time, plead with you. Do everything you possibly can to bring your children to Jesus. Pray for his blessing, pray for his touch, that your children might be saved. And we will all rejoice together in this life and in the life to come. Let's pray together. Father, thank you for the truth of your word that brings such clarity to the various issues of life that we all struggle with. I pray that your spirit will find accessible hearts and that we would apply the things that we have heard that we might not just know them intellectually, but live them out practically, that you might be exalted in our life. That we might enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ and that he might be glorified, both now and forevermore. Amen.

This morning we find ourselves in Mark's gospel once again in Mark chapter 10. We will be looking at the first 12 verses under the heading "God's Original Design for Humanity." This is a very instructive, very practical, very encouraging passage. And I might also add, as you will see, it's a very timely passage given the culture in which we live. Let me read the passage to you, Mark chapter 10, beginning in verse one. "Getting up He went from there to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan; crowds gathered around Him again, and, according to His custom, He once more began to teach them. Some Pharisees came up to Jesus testing Him and began to question Him whether it was lawful for a man to divorce a wife. And He answered and said to them, 'What did Moses command you?' They said, 'Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.' But Jesus said to them, 'Because of your hardness of heart, he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made the male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore, God has joined together, let no man separate.' In the house, the disciples began questioning Him about this again. And He said to them, 'Whoever divorces his wife, and marries another woman commits adultery against her. And if she herself divorces her husband, and marries another man, she is committing adultery.'"

Let me begin by framing this text, in the context of where we all live. Surely we all understand what the Scriptures teach regarding our sinful nature, that we all have one. In fact, Scripture makes it clear that all that we do and all the we are is fundamentally offensive to Holy God, therefore, we are in desperate need of forgiveness and reconciliation, and a new nature. We are rebels by nature, we rebel against God's character that's reflected in his law. Even as believers we struggle with this. And our rebellion is especially manifested in the realm of God's magnificent design for male and female relationships. We were created in His image, to put his glory on display. But because of our sin, we tend to have other ideas as to how we need to function as men and women. For example, God's design for marriage is that it be an institution that illustrates and reflects the relationship God has with his people. But the world in which we live says that marriage is really an unnecessary societal institution, resulting in a deplorable infringement upon freedom and an unlawful burden of inequality. So we need to get rid of marriage. God says that sexual intercourse has to be restricted within the bounds of the marriage covenant, but our culture says no, sexual intercourse is fine anytime, anywhere, with anyone. In fact, unlimited sexual activity is now considered an entitlement. This, by the way, is what fuels the abortion debate. God says that marriage should be permanent for life, but our culture says no, no, no, no, you can divorce for any reason. God says marriage should be between one man And one woman. But our culture says no, no, it can include many partners, even same sex partners. God says that marriage is God's design for procreation. But our culture says, no. Marriage is no longer the only socially acceptable outlet for sexual activity, or for the rearing of children. In fact, women and men are entitled to have as many children as they want, and in any context. Worse yet, our culture would say that there is more than one gender, that there are multiple genders that have nothing to do with biology but have everything to do with one's subjective identification. And their social, background and environment. And of course, as a result of all of this, we see the systematic destruction of the family, the bedrock of society. And this is resulting in social and economic chaos, untold human misery, violence and even suicide. In fact, the testimonies of young adults who have undergone puberty blockers and hormone replacement and, and chemical and surgical castration, are absolutely heart wrenching. Thinking that somehow they can transition to the opposite side. These people are filled with physical and emotional pain, many of them now or are furious at those that allowed this to happen. You're seeing more and more lawsuits. And I might say, as a pastor, I'm very concerned for each of you, within the sphere of my influence, some of you may be struggling with these issues. Some of you young people, in fact, I know that some of you are, because I've heard about it. Some of you are confused, you're deceived. Some of you are burdened. And I trust that the passage that we look at here this morning, and the application of it will bring clarity as well as conviction and encouragement. Because, dear friends, when we do things, God's way there is enormous blessing. Repeatedly in Scripture, we read the phrase, "do not be deceived." And the amazing thing about self-deception is that we don't see that we're being deceived, right? But Satan deceives people by distorting His Word, especially concerning God's plan and purpose, for humanity. So the passage before us, will give us great insight into God's plan. His design, his purpose for marriage, as well as for human sexuality. And my goal is to help you understand this because I want you to enjoy the fullness of God's goodness and grace in your life.

Now, the context here in Mark chapter 10, verses one through 12 and the parallel passage that we will see in Matthew 19, the Pharisees are laying a trap for Jesus as they did quite often. They're trying to discredit him in the eyes of the public, because they hated him with an utmost hatred. And it's fascinating as we read Jesus’ response to them, that there is a response that absolutely transcends issues, merely pertaining to divorce and remarriage, which frankly, requires a much broader study of Scripture that speak to those issues, but he goes beyond just a narrow focus of whether divorce and remarriage are lawful. Instead, he focuses on God's will for humanity in his creation. That's why we read for example, in verse six, "But from the beginning of creation", I mean he goes all the way back to the very beginning. "From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female." And as we will see, what God is doing is pointing them to the one flesh covenantal pre-fall union between Adam and Eve, a God ordained union between one man and one woman. A marital union that was utterly bereft of sin, and functioned perfectly as God had designed it, until the fall.

The implications of Jesus' answer reaches far beyond just a narrow focus of marriage but reaches into the very heart of God's will for every image bearer that he has created. It even helps us understand the male and female gender is binary. It is not non-binary and fluid as our culture would have us believe, as the transgender activists argue. There is a God designed biological basis for sex and for gender. One's maleness and once femaleness is not a socially constructed, self-determined reality. It's not at all what we see in Scripture. God never made a female man or a male woman. From the beginning of God of creation, God made them male and female. Indeed, the male, female binary is something God affirms as being very good, as he did with all of his creation. So Jesus' answer has enormous implications, even beyond the issues of marriage and divorce, but also pertaining to God's designed for human sexuality and gender. And when his will is violated, when it is ignored, when it is distorted, when it is mocked, the result is chaos, and misery and judgment will be inevitable.

I've given you a very complicated outline, it's just two points. We're going to see the baited question number one and the beautiful answer, number two. Very, very simple. So let's look at the text. Now let me remind you that Jesus’ ministry in Galilee is now over. He along with his disciples, are headed for Judea and so we read in verse one, Getting up He went from there to the region of Judea, and beyond the Jordan; crowds gathered around Him again and according to His custom, He once more began to teach them." Now it was in the context of this crowd, that the Pharisees come along, trying to trick him. And so we come first to the baited question. Notice verse two, "Some Pharisees came up to Jesus, testing Him, and began to question Him whether it was lawful for a man to divorce a wife." Now, the Pharisees knew full well God's position on divorce. For example, in Malachi chapter two in the Old Testament, verse 16, we read "'For I hate divorce,' says the Lord, the God of Israel." And by the way, we should hate it as well. Moreover, the Pharisees were aware of Jesus' previous rebuke concerning this whole idea of divorce for any reason, which they held to a position that the Pharisees were ultimately pushing. Because they knew what was recorded in Matthew five, verse 31, "'It was said whoever sends his wife away, let him give her a certificate of divorce. But I say to you, that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.'"

Now more on the cultural context of that statement in a moment. So their line of questioning was to ensnare and embarrass Jesus. They knew that he would have to answer in one of two ways, which would be at odds with the two prominent rabbis of that day and their disciples. They also knew that perhaps his views would even compete with what Moses had to say. And so they bait him now to contradict the Old Testament. Also, you want to bear in mind that Jesus is now in the region of Perea. That's the land of Herod Antipas. Remember, he was the one that had John the Baptist beheaded because he confronted Herod about his unlawful marriage with his brother Phillip's wife, Herodias. So they knew that they had a question here, they could get Jesus in a lot of hot water. Now, the text in question that the Pharisees were thinking of found in Deuteronomy 24, let me just read verse one, "When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes, because he has found some indecency in her and he writes her certificate of divorce of divorce, and puts it in her hand and sends her out from his house." Now, the key phrase here is "some indecency". What does that mean in the Hebrew? Well, it can mean something polluted, it can mean something shameful, or indecent. In fact, if you study the Hebrew lexicons, you will see a wide range of definitions, the exact meaning is a bit elusive. We see the phrase used, for example, in the purity ordinances, where it refers to some kind of inappropriate sexual behavior. The term "ervah", is commonly depicted as nakedness or genitals, particularly of a woman, for example, in Lamentations one in verse eight. Jerusalem is personified as an unclean woman who has exposed her nakedness. And there we see the Hebrew phrase. Now, here's what was going on, one school of thought was presented by Rabbi Shammai and his followers and they believe that you translate the phrase "some indecency", as "unchastity, or adultery", very narrow. But Rabbi Hillel and his disciples had a much broader understanding. And that was anchored in the statement that "she finds no favor in his eyes". And so they believe that the phrase refer to something the husband found offensive, or distasteful in his wife, even beyond adultery. So as a result, they had a philosophy that basically said, you can divorce for any reason at all, if you no longer found her attractive; she burned your food, if she exposed her ankles to some man even accidentally, criticized his mother, you name it. You can write her a certificate of divorce. Now here's what's going on. If Jesus took the narrow interpretation, that it means only for unchastity and adultery, the Pharisees knew that that would offend all of the followers of Hillel, making them all out to be adulterers and adulteresses. Moreover, they would say that he was inconsistent because after all, he consorted with tax collectors and prostitutes. Remember, the ones that were interested in the Gospel? The ones that were convicted of their sin. But if he took the more liberal view, then the disciples of Shammai would accuse him of moral laxity. And certainly all of the women would hate him.

So you have the baited question, and now you have Secondly, the beautiful answer. By the way, as we look at this, it's almost laughable to think that these clowns are actually trying to trick the creator of the universe. That is never a wise thing to do. So verse three, Jesus "answered and said to them, 'What did Moses command you?'" I find it interesting that Jesus completely ignores the rabbinic positions, he doesn't even touch any of that. And frankly, he stuns them with his unanticipated and I might even add, sarcastic response by pointing them to the ultimate authority, which would be the Old Testament scriptures in this context.

Matthew gives us a little further insight into what happened. Matthew chapter 19, beginning of verse three, "Some Pharisees came to Jesus, testing Him and asking Him, 'Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason at all?' And He answered and said, 'Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female.'" By the way, in the Hebrew, it's in the emphatic position, emphasizing one man and one female. Verse five, "and He said, 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife." "Joined" could even be translated, "glued", or "cemented" or "bonded" to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. "'So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.'" And of course, in our text, Mark records the same thing a little bit differently. Mark 10, verse six, "'But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.'" So in other words, what Jesus is saying to them is, how could any rational, unbiased person believe that it is lawful for a man to divorce his wife, for any reason, any cause at all, considering God's design for marriage that is demonstrated in the relationship of the first union, between Adam and Eve? The two became one flesh. This is what happens when we marry, the two become one flesh. There is an indissoluble union that occurs before Almighty God and indissoluble oneness. Where a man and a woman are joined together in a permanent union by God himself, with children being the perfect expression of the supernatural symbiosis. "'What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.'" And if you think about it, Jesus is reasoning now out of the Pentateuch, and that was really hard for these guys to swallow because they were supposed to be the experts on all of this. His position was not rooted in their rabbinical teachings, not rooted in tradition, not even in the Law of Moses, but rather, he goes right back to the creative order that was ordained by God Himself. And folks, the implication of this is absolutely staggering.

Now back to Mark, chapter 10, verse three, he answered and said to them, "'What did Moses command you?' They said, 'Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.'" Which, by the way, is only a little smidgen of what's really in that whole passage, a very selective biased answer. He just said, Hey, write her a certificate of divorce, and send her away. That's Moses said. Really? If you examine what Moses said, In Deuteronomy, one through verse four, we see that it is a passage that emphasizes how an illegitimate divorce, where a husband puts his wife out, for whatever reason, and she marries another, that breeds adultery. But it does not command or commend or condone divorce. That's not what the text is about. As in all Old Testament passages, there's no specific permission for divorce given. It only states that if a man legally divorces his wife for something other than adultery, and then she marries another man, if that man dies or divorces her, she would not be allowed to return to her first husband. Why? Because she was defiled in the remarriage because there was no legitimate grounds for divorce, That's what the text is talking about. But the Pharisees response, as I say, was very selective, it was very biased in their favor.

So verse three, "'What did Moses command you?'... 'Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.'" So in other words, all they're focusing on is the legal paperwork for sending her away, not on the adulterous implications of divorcing her for something other than adultery. So again, the Mosaic law had nothing to do with his idea of permitting a divorce, for any reason whatsoever, as long as the legal documents were filled out. I might add, however, that a certificate of divorce was very important. Especially in ancient Israel. Eugene Merrill says this, quote, "Divorce proceedings consisted of his writing with respect to his wife, a certificate of divorce. In Hebrew, literally a writing of cutting off, placing it in her hand as a public symbolic witness to the disillusion of the relationship and sending her," quote, "from his house." That is from the family circle and all that that entails. She had thus been cut off and driven away from home and family. A punishment laden with indescribable shame and incalculable economic and social loss in the ancient Israelite world."

So, a certificate of divorce was legal proof that this woman no longer belong to this man, the man no longer had a claim on her, otherwise, a woman in a patriarchal society such as that, would have no hope of survival, being unattached to a husband for protection and provision and so forth. And think about it what man would want a woman who, whose husband still had a claim on her, and therefore she still had a duty to Him. So again, the Pharisees emphasized this issue of a certificate of divorce for any reason they wanted, based upon the phrase, "some indecency", rather than acknowledging that the text merely regulated the reality of divorce that God hates, without condoning or condemning it.

So we come to verse four. "They said, 'Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.' But Jesus said to them, 'Because of your hardness of heart, he wrote you this commandment.'" In other words, what we see is that divorce was a concession that God made because of man's hard-hearted pursuit of sexual immorality. It was not something that that God ordained. In fact, in Matthew 19, verse eight, Jesus "said to them, 'Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning, it has not been this way.'" The point is this while there was no specific permission for divorce, in the Mosaic law, because of his grace, God permitted that which he hated. And I might also add because of His grace, we see that he allowed those that committed adultery to avoid the death penalty many times. Israel history is filled with those that God spared for that; David and Bathsheba is one example, Hosea and Gomer. Interestingly enough, we read in Ezra chapter 10, that God even commanded the Jewish exiles, returning to their land under Ezra's leadership, to divorce their pagan wives on the grounds of spiritual adultery. Probably physical adultery was a part of that; part of their pagan practices involved gross immorality. And certainly God hates divorce, but he hates idolatry even more. In fact, John MacArthur says this quote, "Though God hates divorce, there are times when it is the lesser of the evils and would prevent and would prevent a future and even greater spiritual catastrophe." So indeed, God hates divorce, but he graciously permits it under certain circumstances.

We will also see that this can happen when the marital bond is broken by an unbelieving spouse who no longer wants to be in a covenantal relationship with her. First Corinthians 7:15. More on that later. So again, Jesus says in Matthew 19, in verse eight, "'Because of your hardness of heart, Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it was it has not been this way.'" And then Jesus goes on in Matthew to suggest a condition where divorce would be permitted. He gives an example here in verse nine, "'And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.'" In other words, an illegitimate divorce followed by remarriage constitutes adultery. The term immorality "porneia" in the original language, we get pornography from that, here translated, "adultery," is a very broad term, encompassing just any form of illicit sexual activity, adultery being one of them. So if a person is living in persistent, unrepentant adultery; homosexuality, lesbianism, transvestism, voyeurism, which would include habitual obsession with pornography, or any other form of sexual immorality, then there is biblical grounds for divorce. Later in our text in Mark 10, Mark records the same statement, notice verse 10. "In the house, the disciples began questioning Him about this again. And He said to them, 'Whoever divorces his wife and remarries, another woman commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery.'" Again, an illegitimate divorce followed by remarriage just constitutes adultery, they're still married in God's eyes. And I might also add that this was a not-so-subtle indictment against the Pharisees where many of them had divorced many wives for virtually any reason. This was part of the culture. As I stated earlier in First Corinthians 7:15, if I can digress for a moment, I believe Paul offers another exception that's illustrative of the kind of behavior that violates the covenant of marriage in verse 15. First Corinthians seven we read, "Yet if the unbelieving one leaves," the term in the original language of "leave" means to separate, it's in the present tense, indicating a continuing process; in the process of separating, of dissolving the marriage. Then there's a command that says, "let him leave; the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace." And here we have a gracious provision, I believe for spouses that are languishing in a prison, not a marriage, where an unbelieving spouse wants nothing to do with a loving covenantal marriage relationship with his spouse, there is no covenantal faithfulness, there is no love. There is no peace, just bondage, and war and abuse and hatred. It results in desertion, disillusion of the marriage, and God grants a concession or a provision releasing the believing spouse from that bondage. They are not forced to stay, rather the command is to let him go or let her go. God has called us to peace. By the way, this is this is much more than just an unbeliever filing divorce papers, which was utterly foreign in the Greco Roman world. This speaks of an unbelieving spouse that has so violated the covenantal relationship that a desertion has taken place and abandonment of separation.

Now, I want to remind you that Christ's teaching, if we look throughout Scripture, Christ's teaching on adultery, and divorce, as well as Paul's instructions, on the desertion, and divorce, always reflect God's covenantal design for marriage. Biblically, the marriage covenant has essentially six purposes, I just want to give them to you without a lot of comment. The six purposes are these, first of all for procreation, secondly, for pleasure, thirdly, for provision or you might even add protection. Fourthly, partnership, which is both physical and spiritual, that should result in the mutual edification of a husband and wife, pursuing the will of the Lord. And then number five, purity, in that it protects against fornication and adultery. And finally, it's a picture of Christ's sacrificial covenant of love for his bridal church. The covenant of marriage is designed to accomplish these purposes. And I would humbly ask you, to those of you that are married, maybe even those of you that are thinking about getting married, are these prominent in your thinking, are these dominant in your heart? But when a spouse violates those covenantal purposes, through unrepentant adultery, or desertion, which is essentially the irreparable violations of covenantal faithfulness and love, God graciously offers the provision of divorce but that's not what the Pharisees wanted to hear. For these reasons God is merciful.

I might also add as a footnote whenever there are biblical grounds for divorce. In other words, whenever a legitimate divorce is permitted, I believe remarriage is assumed. Not everyone agrees with that. Just a couple of points, to that end. Romans seven verse three permission is given for a widow or a widower to remarry because they are no longer quote, "joined" or bound to their deceased partner, and by implication, the same is true in First Corinthians 7:15, the innocent spouse is no longer bound, no longer under the bondage of that marital union. First Timothy five, we see Paul addressing widows, those that have suffered loss or quote "left alone." And that term includes younger women who have lost their husbands, which would include losing their husbands through death, through desertion, through divorce, through imprisonment. And he encourages them to remarry. And basically, because of two reasons, number one, because of their, quote, "sensual desires", and number two, due to their immaturity to avoid being idle and going around from house to house gossiping and acting like busy bodies, talking about things not proper to mention. And so I would humbly argue that the Bible permits divorce, but not remarriage in such cases, or to say that Bible permits divorce but not remarriage, in such cases poses enormous problems. I mean, think about it, what are these women supposed to do? If they are forbidden to pursue their God ordained roles as wives and mothers? Are they to assume that they all have the gift of celibacy? Obviously, not. Paul tells these young women to remarry rather than become eligible for church benevolence, I mean, how could the church possibly care for all of these people? So again, whenever there are biblical grounds for divorce, whenever there is a legitimate divorce, when that's permitted, remarriage is assumed.

Now, let's go back to Mark 10. Some further insights, beginning of verse six, "'From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.'" Now, what I want you to notice here is that in this passage, Mark connects Genesis 1:17, with Genesis 2:24. I'll try not to get too technical, but what I want you to see is that this linkage is profound. And it reveals six very important characteristics of marriage, and also has implications into this whole LGBTQ w x, y, z, H, I, J, K, whatever stuff, that we read out there today. First of all, by connecting these passages, we see that marriage number one, has to be between one man and one woman again, Genesis 1:27, "God created man, in his own men image and the image of God, He created him, male and female, He created them." And so here God reveals his glorious purpose in creating the man and the woman. From the beginning of creation, he has a specific design, and that design is marriage. And then in Genesis 2:24, we have the paradigm. "For this reason, a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh." So marriage very clearly is between one man and one woman. That was God's original design, and he has not changed it.

Secondly, marriage has to be complementary. Males and females were created different. I think we all can see that. We all understand that. But we were also created in ways that are complimentary. Sexual differentiation is a part of God's design for marriage. To put it in the cultural context of our day, gender binary is rooted in the order of creation. That makes sense. It is not fluid. God's created order where he makes man in his image and woman in His image, helps us understand human sexuality. One writer said this quote "Men have external genitalia women, internal. Women can bear children if reproductively healthy. Men cannot. Men can sire children, women cannot. Men give give either an X or Y gene in procreation. Women can only give an X. The way we are designed, which is by God's design should inform our purpose and function. Without the complimentary design and function of male and female, the human race would cease to exist, as we would no longer procreate." End quote, Oh, that makes perfect sense to me. And we see this in the creation mandate. Going back to Genesis one, if we look at the next verse, verse 28, we read that God blessed them. And God said to them, "Be fruitful, and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." So again, sexual differentiation is part of God's designed for marriage. And this rules out same sex marriage that God calls an abomination. So, as we look at this linkage between Genesis 1:17, and Genesis 2:24, we see that marriage has to be between one man and one woman, it has to be complimentary.

Thirdly, it has to be restricted. In other words, it's to be exclusive, it has to be limited. It has to be between a man and a woman who become one flesh. There's a sexual union between a husband and a wife. In other words, what happens in marriage is an intimate, sacred bond is formed. And this bond requires a determined devotion for both the husband and the wife, to safeguard that union between them. We must guard our hearts to that end. In fact, Jesus said in Matthew 5:28, "I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." So, marriage is to be restricted between the two that have become one flesh.

Number four, it has to be permanent. And we see this again in this linkage. It's a lifelong union between one man and one woman. This is why Jesus states in Mark 10, verse nine, "What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate." And this brings us to point number five, it has to be sacred. By combining these passage, Jesus also proves the sacred nature of the marriage covenant, a permanent agreement that is made by both the husband and the wife, along with God Himself, affirmed in the very presence of God, for it is God, who joins them together. So it's a sacred union. Beloved, please understand marriage is not as our culture would have us believe, an unnecessary societal institution, resulting in a deplorable infringement upon freedom and an unlawful burden of inequality. I mean, that's what Satan would have you believe, that is not what God has revealed to us. And we must be faithful to His word. Marriage is the measure. It is the standard, it is the North Star, if you will, for sexual morality. Marriage is to be a heterosexual union, monogamous, lifelong union. It is the foundation of the family. And the family is the pillar of upon which society is built and maintained. And when all of that crumbles, you have what you see today in our culture, and it's going to get worse.

And finally, number six, marriage is illustrative. Meaning marriage pictures Christ's sacrificial love for His church. This is such a beautiful thing. In Ephesians, five verse 25, we read "Husbands love your wives, just as Christ also loved that church and gave Himself up for her." In verse 28, we read "So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself for no one ever hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and she'll be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great. But I am speaking with reference to Christ, and the church." Those of you that are married, may I humbly ask you, does your marriage illustrate to a watching world, Christ's covenantal love for his bridal church? Can people see that and the way you relate to one another? When we become one flesh, by God's grace, we begin to grow together. In Christ, we experience the emotional joys of oneness, the physical joys of oneness. Better yet, our relationship reflects the oneness and the mutual submission and love of the triune Godhead, which is an astounding reality. And, therefore, when we combine all of these characteristics of Christian marriage that we see inherit in this passage, we are left with no other choice than to reject the LGBTQ agenda, which is a mockery of God's glory revealed in his created order. It is a distortion of his image that is to be manifested in his image bearers. It is a violation of his design and His purpose for human sexuality and marriage and it undermines his proclamation of the gospel. And that's what Satan is all about. As Christians, we must never contradict God's design.

I'm reminded of what Paul said to Timothy in First Timothy one and verse eight, "But we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully, realizing the fact that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious for the ungodly, and centers for the unholy and profane, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, and immoral men and homosexuals, and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching, according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted." So again, friends, this is why we must totally reject homosexuality, same sex, marriage. All of those things are a distortion of God's original design and purpose in creation. In fact, as we look at it, marriage provides the perfect context for godly masculinity and femininity to be manifested. Any other kind of union, God calls an abomination because it is a base inversion of his created order and a violation of his moral order. Furthermore, God's created order, along with his creation mandate, is why we would reject transgenderism, people who perceive their gender identity to be contrary to their biological sex. This is a hot button issue in our culture today. Again, Genesis 1:26, God said, Let Us make." "Us" by the way, the Triune God, "Let Us make man in Our own image according to Our likeness." And then we read, "God created man in His own image and the image of God He created him male and female, He created them." This refutes the idea that there are more than two genders. Here we see that gender is determined by God. And by the way, we call that biology. It's not determined by one's self identification, by one's feelings. Genomic chromosomes come in two forms "x x" or "x y". At least that's what I was taught in biology many years ago, I do remember that. God is therefore the one who determines a person's sex or gender in God's created order. It inextricably connects biological sex with gender identity, which are necessary for men and women to fulfill their God given roles and when you disregard these realities, the result is insanity; non-binary or gender fluid fantasies. I noticed on one LGBTQ website it's called sexualdiversity.org. They have 107 gender identities. And they will tell you that gender identity, it has nothing to do with your biological sex, your genitalia, it has everything to do with your feelings, and how you describe yourself and present yourself. And of course, if you read the names of these things, it's just, it's just bizarre. Beloved, I would say, as lovingly but as on the authority of the Word of God, transgenderism is pure fiction. It is fiction. It is a satanic deception that appeals to self-deceived people. Often young people, who sadly have been marginalized, many of them are hurting, they're disturbed, and they're in desperate need of our love and the Gospel. There's a big controversy today on misgendering people. The LGBT Q advocates insist that we refer to those who identify as transgender by their chosen name and pronouns, instead of their given name and pronouns that match their biological sex. And I was reading in one article, the Christian Post that some 44% of millennials believe that quote "referring to someone by the wrong gender pronoun, 'he/him, she/he'r should be a criminal offense" per poll by Redfield and Wilton strategies on behalf of Newsweek. So, in other words, unless you embrace their delusion, you're committing a crime. But dear friends, I would submit to you based on the authority of the Word of God, we cannot do this. God did not create them this way. First Timothy four beginning of verse four, "For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with gratitude for it is sanctified by means of the word of God and prayer." Dear friends, please do not use the ridiculous pronouns and thereby endorse and embrace their delusions. In fact, Paul says in Ephesians, five and verse 11, and following "Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them; for it is disgraceful to even speak of these things which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light, for everything becomes visible is light." Ephesians 4:15 tells us we're to "speak the truth in love".

So may I close by challenging any of you who struggle with homosexual desires or gender dysphoria, which is really mental distress, because you perceive your gender as somehow out of sync with your biological sex, please, please don't embrace the fictional identity that the culture offers you and go contrary to God's revealed design and his purpose in creation. Don't exchange the truth of God for a lie. Please come and see me come and see others that we have in the church. We will help you, we will bring you to Christ. And there you will find true identity, true joy and true blessing. And if you're struggling with marital issues, with marriage, divorce, family issues, please come talk with us. I would plead with you. If you're struggling with these things, get on your knees with your spouse before God, hold hands and pour out your heart to him and prayer and beg him for help and he will answer. Moreover, search the Scriptures and see how God addresses your unique situation. And then humble yourself to what God has said. And watch what he will do. And if you're confused on that, come see me, come see the other elders, come see other people we have in the church. The answers are in Christ and in His word, not in the lies of the devil. And may we all celebrate the fact that God has made us in his image, male and female, to fulfill His glorious purposes.

And I just want to close with a profound word of encouragement that comes out of Revelation 19 verses six through nine is speaks of a future day when Christ's marriage to his bridal church which we were a part of, will be consummated, at the marriage supper of the Lamb, and we will enjoy him forever. And here's what the Spirit of God has revealed. "Then I heard something like the voice of a great multitude, and like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, saying, 'Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him. For the marriage of the lamb is common. His bride has made herself ready.' It was given to her to clothe herself and find linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Then he said to me, "Write, 'Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.'" And he said to me, 'These are true words of God.'" Let's pray together. Father, we are so thankful for every expression of your grace, for the clarity of your word on these issues that are so relevant to each of us. Thank you for your faithfulness, your love, your compassion. And I pray that you will bless us all to the praise of your glory, that we might enjoy the fullness of all that is ours in Christ Jesus. And for those that are struggling, those that are confused, I pray that you will bring clarity, that you will bring conviction as well as comfort. So we commit all of this to you. In Jesus name and for his sake. Amen.

As you all are aware, we are at war with the enemy of our souls with Satan and his minions, and the world system that he controls, ultimately, under the sovereignty of God who allows it to occur. We read in Scripture that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one and we experience that every day. As I just read a few minutes ago, we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against powers, and principalities so we need to be good soldiers of the cross. We need to be prepared; every good soldier will be prepared. And it is the great burden of my heart to make sure that I do all that I can to help prepare you for not only the battles that we are currently experiencing, but the ones that I believe will be far worse, worse that are yet to come. So, this morning, I want to speak with you about fearless discipleship. And frankly, this will be a follow up of where we were last week in Mark chapter nine, you will remember, Jesus was calling his disciples to this kind of fearless discipleship. And using the language of sacrifice required in that kind of discipleship in Mark chapter nine, and verse 50. He said, "Salt is good, but if the salt becomes unsalty, with what will you make it salty again?" And Jesus said in Luke 14, beginning in verse 33, "None of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions." In other words, if you're going to be a disciple of mine, you must be willing and ready to sacrifice everything you have to follow me. He went on to say, "Therefore salt is good, but if even salt has become tasteless with what will it be seasoned? It is useless either for the soil or for the manure pile; it is thrown out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear." So it is the great burden of my heart that we be fearless disciples of Christ. In fact, the last book that I wrote is entitled "Warrior Preachers, A Spiritual Call to Arms in an Age of Militant Unbelief." We need to be sober, we need to be on red alert and we need to be prepared.

So for this reason, I'd like to spend the bulk of our time this morning in Matthew chapter 10, moving away from Mark. At least for this Sunday morning. Jesus called 12 ordinary men to be his apostles to send them out as sheep amongst the wolves. Don't you feel like that at times today? We're sheep amongst the wolves. And here in Matthew 10, Jesus offers some very straightforward words, describing what I would call fearless discipleship. Much needed reminder for our shallow, superficial, sentimental, evangelical culture that tends to cower in compromise. In verses 24 through 42, we see Jesus giving six characteristics of a fearless disciple. Let me give them to you and then we will elaborate upon them. Fearless discipleship: number one submits to the Lordship of Christ, secondly, fears God more than man, thirdly, publicly confessed as Christ. Fourthly, values Christ more than family, fifthly, values Christ more than life and six, values eternal, not temporal reward. And it is certainly my prayer that these virtues will be manifested in each of our lives.

I want you to notice the first characteristic of a fearless disciple that is one who submits to the Lordship of Christ. Notice what our Lord says in verse 24 of Matthew 10. "'A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a slave above his master. It is enough for the disciple that he become like his teacher, and the slave like his master. If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign the members of his household?'" Now, Jesus is reminding them again, that he is indeed their Messiah, they're their teacher, their master, and therefore, he deserves their absolute obedience, their unwavering submission. In Luke chapter six and verse 40, Jesus said, "'Everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.'" And certainly a true disciple of Christ will gradually become more like Christ, we all understand that. And in First John chapter two and verse six, we read, "The one who says he abides in Christ ought himself to walk in the same manner as he walked." And I would ask you, dear Christian, is this true of you? Is this true of your life? If yes, how's your progress? Are you noticeably more like Christ today than you were two years ago? As a footnote, if you have no appetite for the Word of God, if you have no private, personal pursuit of holiness, no desire to spend time with the Lord in prayer, no burden for the lost, don't kid yourself, you know very little of what it is to be in subjection to the Lordship of Christ. The internal metamorphosis that produces Christ's likeness only comes through the renewing of your mind, as we read in Romans 12 and verse two. You will recall in the Great Commission, Jesus said that we are to "make disciples and teach them to observe all that I commanded you". Are you observing those things? Are you teaching others? First Peter two in verse two, we "are to be like newborn babes." We are to long for the pure milk of the word that by it you may grow in respect to salvation. Those who claim to be disciples of Christ yet have no desire to know what the master would have them know or do, are frankly, merely withering vines that produce no fruit. We don't want to be that way. They are soldiers that are unprepared, that are vulnerable. And if that is you, as a father or as a wife, your vulnerability will make your children even more vulnerable. In verse 24, he says, "the disciple is not above his teacher." We understand that a learner doesn't know as much as his teacher, we don't have the spiritual wisdom of Christ. And certainly those apathetic and indifferent toward the Word of God, insult their teacher, right? Yeah, what he teaches is boring, unimportant, I have all that I need to know, you really have nothing to teach me, I'm good. Verse 24, he also says, "nor a slave above his master." And certainly a slave serves his master. In this case, our Master is our Creator, the sovereign ruler of the universe, that shed his blood, to reconcile us unto himself. The would-be disciple who has no desire to sit at the feet of the master to learn and to obey what He says, is no disciple at all. Beloved, Jesus is asking for our full allegiance. And when we give it we will grow in Christ's likeness, we will become more like Christ. You want to ask yourself, Am I passionately committed to these ends? Is this really the priority of my life? Or do I just kind of play along with the cultural Christianity of our day? Just kind of show up at Calvary Bible Church because that's what you do on Sundays in the South. Or am I here because I love the Lord. And I want to know Him and serve Him.

Next, Jesus adds another figure to help us grasp his point, not only are we disciples, that is learners, learning from our teacher and slaves that lovingly submit to our sovereign master, but he goes on and he talks about being family members who should not expect to be treated any better than the head of the family. He says something interesting here in verse 25, "'If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, how much more the members of his household!'" Interesting statement. Beelzebul was a reference to the Canaanite deity Bael, the prime antagonist of Yahweh. In fact, the god of Akron was called Beelzebub, Second Kings chapter one, a term that means lord of the flies, a Hebrew pun on the name of that Philistine God, but the Jews may have further corrupted this into Beelzebul, which means lord of dung, which would be an even greater insult to that pagan deity. So Jesus uses this term because it was a well-known epithet amongst the Jews, for Satan. And because also the Pharisees had accused Jesus in Matthew 9:34, of casting out demons by the ruler of the demons. You will even recall in our study of Mark in Mark chapter three and verse 22, we read and, the scribes who came down from Jerusalem, were saying, 'He is possessed by Beelzebul', and 'He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons.'" So Jesus point here and verse 25, is this, if they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, how much more the members of his household? In other words, if the religious elite would slander and malign me by calling me Satan, expect them to treat you in the same way? You know, it's fascinating, Islam considers all non-Muslims to be infidels, part of the great Satan. We've seen this down through history, where true Christians have been demonized by, frankly, demonic heretics, and their false religious system. And we see this as well for example, in John 16. And here Jesus is warning his disciples about the enormous hostility of the world and, and as they oppose the gospel, and those who preach it and beginning in verse one of John 16, he says, "'These things I have spoken to you that you may be kept from stumbling. They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God.'" By the way, Paul, pre conversion, was one of those guys, right? He thought he was serving God by getting rid of Christians. Jesus went on to say, "'These things they will do because they have not known the Father or Me.'" And even earlier, in that same section of Scripture, beginning in John chapter 15, beginning of verse 18, Jesus says, "'If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, a slave is not greater than his master. If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do to you for My namesake, because they do not know the One who sent Me.'" Dear Christian, the more you become like Christ, the more the world is going to hate you, just how it works. The question is, are you up to that? The answer is, on your own, no, you're not, but in Christ, you are. Young people, are you willing to obey the Lord? Submit to His rule in your life, even if it costs you popularity amongst your friends? Men, women, are you willing to obey to the point where it may mean giving up some life dominating sin, some debilitating habit, something that might bring reproach upon the name of Christ. But the point here is such a willing submission to the Lordship of Christ is the first mark of a fearless disciple that Jesus gives in this text.