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Gospels and Acts Scripture

By Whose Authority (Luke 20:1-8)

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20 One day, as Jesus was teaching the people in the temple and preaching the gospel, the chief priests and the scribes with the elders came up 2 and said to him, “Tell us by what authority you do these things, or who it is that gave you this authority.” 3 He answered them, “I also will ask you a question. Now tell me, 4 was the baptism of John from heaven or from man?” 5 And they discussed it with one another, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say, ‘Why did you not believe him?’ 6 But if we say, ‘From man,’ all the people will stone us to death, for they are convinced that John was a prophet.” 7 So they answered that they did not know where it came from. 8 And Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

The first thing we need to notice is that Christ was preaching the Gospel.

A delegation from the chief priests and scribes interrupted him and asked him by what authority he did “these things”.

These men represented the Sanhedrin, the head of the “Church” for all intents and purposes.

Christ was preaching the Gospel of salvation and the authorities were only interested in Christ’s credentials to do “these things”.

They could have cared less about the Gospel message.

What they really want to know about was how Jesus thought He had the authority to overturn money tables and tell them how Temple operations should be handled.

The way Temple sacrifices worked at the time of Christ…

This delegation weren’t interested in learning anything from Christ.

They were two-faced in their questioning because they already had their answer.

Think of the political dialogue we’re all familiar with on TV shows today.

Questions are not asked so much to receive answers so much as to trap opponents.

Let me explain a bit about “authority” at the time of Christ.

It was universally accepted among Rabbis at the time that authoritative teaching required previous authorization.

All teaching had to be authoritative because it was approved by authority and handed down from teacher (rabbi) to student (disciple).

The ultimate appeal in any discussion was to some great authority, either an individual Teacher or a Decree by the Sanhedrin.

To teach or to decide contrary to established authority was either a sign of gross ignorance or a sign of rebellion.

In either case, you were to be visited with ‘the ban’ for putting out a shingle and teaching contrary to authority.

This is at least one aspect of the controversy here.

Nobody would have thought of haggling with what they called a Haggadist – a popular expositor, preacher, or teller of legends

But authoritatively to teach, required some sort of warrant.

There was regular ordination, called Semikhah, to the office of Rabbi, Elder, and Judge.

In Christ’s time these were not three offices but were combined into one.

A Rabbi was an Elder was a Judge.

There was no ordination outside of what the Sanhedrin conferred.

The presence of at least three ordained persons from the Sanhedrin was required to ordain a man and then, and only then, could He teach.

The bottom line is this:  at the time of Christ, no one would have thought to teach authoritatively without proper Rabinnic authorization from the Sanhedrin.

Think about it then.

Did the Sanhedrin know whether or not they had conferred Rabinnical authority on Christ?

Of course they knew they had not.

In their mind, Christ was coloring way outside the lines.

It explains, in great part, why they would not listen to a word He said because He had never been granted the right to teach by them.

Everybody knew that Christ had no authority to knock over tables or to teach unless the Sanhedrin granted it.

The question, therefore, was deceptive.

They were merely trying to get Christ to admit that no Commission of the Sanhedrin ordained Him.

Everyone present would then conclude, with them, that Christ was not a Rabbi and had no authority and should be ignored.

Their question was intended to expose Christ as a poser.

But Christ was not just any man.

He knew exactly what they were up to.

How did Christ respond?

He responded with a pointed question back to the delegation.

By what authority did John baptize?

Remember that, during John’s ministry a delegation had been sent by the Sanhedrin asking him about the authority he had to baptize.

J.C. Ryle notes this:

It may reasonably be doubted whether the importance of John the Baptist’s ministry is generally understood by Christians. The brightness of our Lord’s history overshadows the history of His forerunner, and the result is that John’s baptism and preaching do not receive the attention which they deserve. Yet it should never be forgotten, that the ministry of the Baptist was the only New Testament ministry foretold in the Old Testament, excepting that of Christ. It was a ministry which produced an immense effect on the Jewish mind, and aroused the expectation of Israel from one end of Palestine to the other. Above all, it was a ministry which made the Jews without excuse in their rejection of Christ, when Christ appeared. They could not say that they were taken by surprise when our Lord began to preach. Their minds had been thoroughly prepared for His appearing. To see the full sinfulness of the Jews, and the entire justice of the judgments which came on them after crucifying our Lord, we must remember the ministry of John the Baptist.Christ spoke of John and testified of him that he was the greatest prophet that Israel had in its history.

 

The greatest prophet of the Old Covenant had been in their midst.

Instead of coming to John to be baptized and to repent they had haggled with him as to why he was baptizing.

The greatest prophet in the Old Covenant had been in their midst and so Christ asked them plainly:  By what authority did John baptize?

The question was meant to expose a flaw in their thinking about the reality of authority.

They clearly did not believe John had the authority to baptize.

Why?

Because John hadn’t received his authority from them.

Uneducated men might have flocked to John but they knew better.

John was not acting according to the way they perceived reality and so he was ignored by them as an imposter.

They could stop their ears to everything John said without ever hearing him.

They were convinced that John, too, was an imposter.

But they knew the people held John to be a prophet.

And so they chickened out and said they didn’t know by what authority he baptized.

The doctors of the Church didn’t know?

They were the ultimate authority and they were ignorant of authority?

Men like these did not, therefore, deserve an answer from the Incarnate Son of God.

These men had hardened their hearts to the baptism of John.

These men had continually hardened their hearts to the ministry of Christ.

The rays of the sun were in blazing glory all around them but they clamped their eyes shut.

They said:  “We see nothing except what we authorize.  We see nothing except that what has been passed to us by our standards.  We know best.”

They could hear no voice but their own and so Christ refused to give them an answer.

They had forfeited the right to an explanation from the Son of God because they did not desire to be taught.

Some of you know that I grew up Roman Catholic.

A number of years ago, after my conversion to Christ through the writings of R.C. Sproul, I was in a conversation with a man from my former Church.

He was extolling the traditions of the Roman Catholic Church to me.

He noted that the Roman Catholic Church’s view of tradition was much like the Jews.

He thought, therefore, that Rome was in the strand of a grand tradition of how authority operates.

I thought with amazement that he could not see that his was precisely the problem the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin had in Christ’s day.

The similarities between the way in which the Scriptures can become obscured behind men’s traditions are strikingly similar.

Truth began to drift as doctrine was built not on the foundation of God’s Word but upon centuries of commentary on the Word.

Eventually men stopped looking to the Scriptures and the entire structure was built upon commentary.

The Scriptures must then be interpreted according to tradition instead of tradition giving way to Scripture.

Eventually the magisterium convinced itself that people should stay away from the Scriptures because it led them to error where error is defined as a departure from Church law.

Eventually the Church began to believe that its own pronouncements stood on equal footing with God’s own Word.

Indeed, the Word really fell under Church authority because it could only be used in support of what Church law had concluded.

Such a Church can hear no voice but its own.

But let us not pretend that we are immune from such error.

An even cursory reading of the Scriptures teaches us how prone our hearts are to wandering.

Within the life of Paul, he was concerned that the Church at Galatia had left a foundation he had laid for them in the Gospel.

Men quickly become conceited in their pride when they forsake the living Word for idols of their imagination.

Idolatry is not merely things we make with our hands but the ideas about God that we conceive in our minds..

We are foolish if we think it cannot happen to us.

Men who are entrusted to teach others are doubly damned if they teach others this same idolatry.

They are doubly damned when they replace the authority of God’s Word with their own.

We think too highly of ourselves if we imagine that the Sanhedrin and the Pharisees are some other species.

Surely I could never do such a thing.

I’m not a bad guy, I’m a good guy.

I love God.

I seek to obey His commandments.

This could never happen to me or my Church.

*Whenever you read a story in the Bible don’t look to see how you’re like the good guy but search your heart as to how you are just like those who oppose Christ.

In our time, we pray much for provision, for our success, and for an overthrow of the wicked around us.

But hear the prophet Amos as he testified to a prosperous nation:

 

Amos 4:6-12 (ESV)

Israel Has Not Returned to the Lord

6           “I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities,

and lack of bread in all your places,

yet you did not return to me,”

declares the Lord.

7           “I also withheld the rain from you

when there were yet three months to the harvest;

I would send rain on one city,

and send no rain on another city;

one field would have rain,

and the field on which it did not rain would wither;

8           so two or three cities would wander to another city

to drink water, and would not be satisfied;

yet you did not return to me,”

declares the Lord.

9           “I struck you with blight and mildew;

your many gardens and your vineyards,

your fig trees and your olive trees the locust devoured;

yet you did not return to me,”

declares the Lord.

10         “I sent among you a pestilence after the manner of Egypt;

I killed your young men with the sword,

and carried away your horses,

and I made the stench of your camp go up into your nostrils;

yet you did not return to me,”

declares the Lord.

11         “I overthrew some of you,

as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah,

and you were as a brand plucked out of the burning;

yet you did not return to me,”

declares the Lord.

12         “Therefore thus I will do to you, O Israel;

because I will do this to you,

prepare to meet your God, O Israel!”

 

We suppose that the worst thing that can happen to us is the loss of everything good around us.

Loss of home.

Loss of employment.

Loss of an economy.

Loss of a nation.

But God testifies in His Word that He often sends these things to turn us from our idolatry.

These are not even remotely close to the worst thing that can happen to us.

The worst that can happen is prophesied later in Amos.

Amos 8:11 (ESV)

11         “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord God,

“when I will send a famine on the land—

not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water,

but of hearing the words of the Lord.

 

Do you understand what Amos was prophesying?

The final judgment is not a loss of life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness.

The final judgment of God is an inability to hear the Lord when He speaks in His Word!

This is like a punch in the gut for me.

That God would speak to us and we would be unable to hear.

That the living Word would be read in our midst and we could not hear what they speak to us.

That light would shine around us and we would be unable to see.

That the aroma of the Gospel would be around us and we would only smell the stench of death.

What good is it, beloved, if we gain the whole world and lose the ability to hear the living God?

Christ, save us all!

I don’t want you to walk out of here thinking that it’s because the Sanhedrin were learned men.

We’re called to study the Scriptures diligently.

We’re called to become mature in these things.

I also don’t want you to be deceived into thinking that one escapes this by rejecting the Church.

Christ Himself calls us into His Church.

Ephesians 4 makes clear that He gives us pastors and teachers that we may attain to the unity of the faith.

But we can so easily start to assume that we see clearly in our own hearts.

Perhaps some of you are bored right now.

Perhaps some of you know exactly what you wanted to hear.

Enough about sin and repentance already.

I’ve heard that before.

I’ve already got that filed away and understand it.

Enough of this stuff about hearing the Word.

I hear it every Sunday.

I’ve got more important things on my mind.

Beloved, we need to shake off this kind of thinking.

The living Word is penetrating us to our core and we need to come to attention before it.

We must fall again at the Savior’s feet and pray that He opens our ears.

We must never, never, never forget that it is Christ Who keeps us.

We begin by faith.

We begin by laying hold of Christ because we see our sin.

We see the sin that we rightly understand leads to our condemnation.

And so we turn way from our sin and look up to Christ and put our sin to death on a Cross.

We cling to Christ and believe that He has been resurrected from the dead.

We worship Christ because He has been testified to as the Son of God.

But this is not a self-generated effort.

This is not a mental exercise where we simply file away facts about Christ.

We must lay hold of Christ daily.

We must turn in faith daily.

We must pursue Christ and pray that He opens the Word to us.

Trust not your heart in your own strength.

Do not assume that your heart cannot lead you astray.

Do not assume that because, yesterday, you were excited about Christ that today is not a day to hear him anew.

Do not be satisfied with your zeal for Church attendance.

Do not be satisfied that you have been brought to Church by your parents.

Christ is placarded before you in His Word.

Do not walk away from here confident in your own strength.

Look up afresh at the Cross because Christ has given us eyes to see.

We are not secure because we belong to the right Church.

We are not secure because we believed once upon a time.

We are secure because all those who turn in faith to Christ are held tightly in His grip.

He knows His sheep and not one of them will be lost by the Good shepherd.

Christ has prayed for you even as He prayed in thanksgiving to His Father for the disciples of His day:

Matthew 11:25-28 (ESV)

25  “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; 26 yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. 27 All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. 28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

 

Let us pray.

Categories
Gospels and Acts Scripture

John 17

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John 17

Some of you might wonder why we’re jumping to one of the final episodes of Jesus’ walk on this Earth.  I hope, by the end, you’ll understand how this prayer of Christ’s fully captures why Christ came into the world, where He came from, and the hope that He left us.
I was talking to James the other night about the movie Talladega Nights:  The Legend of Ricky Bobby.  If you haven’t seen the movie, I don’t recommend seeing it.  It has little redeeming value.
In one of the scenes, Ricky is leading his family in grace and keeps addressing Christ as “Baby Jesus” during his prayer.  His good friend, Cal Naughton Jr., interrupts him and reminds him that Jesus was a grown man.  Ricky responds by stating that he likes the “Christmas Jesus” the best and likes to picture Jesus as a little baby.
Although the scene is blasphemous in many ways, it places a finger on how many people like to picture Jesus during the Christmas Season and why He is so popular this time of the year.  Baby Jesus, wrapped in swaddling clothes, is cute and cuddly.  He’s not the Savior, the King of Kings, the Lion of Judah.  He’s safe because He’s a small baby.
Although Presbyterians have not historically celebrated religious seasons, today would actually be the Feast of Epiphany.  It was, traditionally, the date that celebrates the Incarnation of Christ, which is another way of saying that the Son of God took on human flesh.  At one point in Church history, today would have been the day in the Church calendar that Christ’s birth was celebrated but Christmas was added as a distinct celebration.  I bring this up because I want to make sure we understand that what just passed was not a birthday celebration but a celebration of God becoming flesh for us.
I received an email from my brother on December 18th reminding us all that Jesus’ birthday was in one week.  I gently reminded him of a few things:
1.  It is very unlikely that Jesus was born in December.  Shepherds were not out on clear nights in December in Israel any more than you and I were outside under last night’s stars.
2.  Nobody knows the calendar day that Christ was born.  The date was chosen for celebration but not because it was Christ’s birthday.  There is a 1 in 365 chance that it is correct.
3.  Christmas is a historical celebration that Christ came into the world to save men who were dead in their sins and trespasses.  Jesus doesn’t need a birthday cake every year but we very much needed Him to come and save us.
I believe it is fitting, then, that we consider John 17 to hear Jesus’ prayer for His disciples on the night He was betrayed.  It reveals profound truths about the person and work of Christ as well as how much we need the Son of God.
1 When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, 2 since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. 3 And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. 4 I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do.
I’m moved to worship at how caring a Shepherd Christ was for His disciples.  He had just finished the Lord’s Supper with them, had washed their feet, and told them He was going to depart from them.  Christ was going to the place of physical and spiritual torment and understood that His own could not follow Him where He must go alone for their sake.  He did not want them to be discouraged and so He not only promised that He would send the Spirit but here, in a most tender way, He prayed for them in their hearing.
We’re promised by God that, when we ask according to His will, our prayers will be answered.  Here, does anyone doubt that Jesus’ prayer was answered?  We need to treat each of these requests as truths that we can stand within.  They are not wishful thinking but requests to a Father by the Son of God.
Jesus begins by noting that the hour had come for the Son of God to be glorified and giving eternal life to all that the Father had given Him.  This is not a command to the disciples but a fact.  Christ gives eternal life because His obedient life and death on a Cross secured eternal life for His people.  Eternal life is knowing this Christ.  Eternal life is coming to a knowledge of the Son of God made flesh who died for sinners under the wrath and curse of God for their disobedience.  Eternal life is eternal because it is born from above and no one that the Father gives the Son is lost.  Christ had not left any work to be done for His own to be accomplished to secure this inheritance.  He states, clearly, that He accomplished all the work that He was given to do.
5 And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.
We can spend years meditating on this verse.  We’ll be in glory ten thousand years contemplating the wonder of this Truth.  In the fullness of time, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.  During our responsive reading this morning we read from Philippians 2 where the Apostle exhorts us:  Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
There is a heresy known as the kenosis theory that states that when the Son of God became flesh that He gave up some of His divine attributes.  That which is unchangeable changed.  We don’t have time to unpack all the theology around this and much is beyond human comprehension.  It is a wonderful Truth testified by the Scripture that the Person of Christ took on a human nature without ceasing to be God.  Christ is one Person with two natures.  He is fully God and fully Man without mixture or confusion.
But the Person of Christ did give something up.
The year 1991 seems like ancient history to the young people here but I remember, like it was yesterday, sitting in my Bachelor Officer Quarters watching the confirmation hearings for Clarence Thomas.  During the first portion of the hearings, chaired by then Senator Joseph Biden, Justice Thomas was reserved and answered every question in a measured manner.
And then accusations by a subordinate, by the name of Anita Hill, surfaced.  Whether you believe her allegations were true or not, the hearings took on a tremendous intensity.  Justice Thomas, when he returned, was no longer measured and reserved.  His opening statement following these allegations was in part:
“I think that this today is a travesty. I think that it is disgusting. I think that this hearing should never occur in America. This is a case in which this sleaze, this dirt, was searched for by staffers of members of this committee, was then leaked to the media, and this committee and this body validated it and displayed it at prime time over our entire nation. How would any member on this committee, any person in this room, or any person in this country, would like sleaze said about him or her in this fashion? Or this dirt dredged up and this gossip and these lies displayed in this manner? How would any person like it?
The Supreme Court is not worth it. No job is worth it. I’m not here for that. I’m here for my name, my family, my life and my integrity. I think something is dreadfully wrong with this country when any person, any person in this free country would be subjected to this.”
Justice Thomas didn’t care about the appointment to the Supreme Court anymore.  Take away the job and he did not care but he did care about this:  They had taken his name.  They had stolen his integrity.
Men work their entire lives making a name for themselves.  They guard their reputation and their name to the point that some cultures used to permit gentlemen to duel to the death over an insult to one’s name.
But here’s the thing.
Nobody had to ask the Son of God to lay aside His Name when He came to this Earth.  He laid it aside willingly.
Do you realize how many times Christ’s name was sullied while He walked this Earth?  Do you realize how many times He could have called down the fire from Heaven that everyone deserved?
He gave up His name.  He was despised and rejected of men.  There was not even anything of His appearance that would commend Himself to men.  He was born in a poor household and a manger was His birthplace.
We’ve been studying the glory of God as a theme in the redemptive plan of God for His people and one of the things that strikes you is what that glory does to men throughout redemptive history.  Every time the glory of the Lord came near the Tabernacle or the Temple, everyone had to leave.  It was too much.  God reminds Moses that nobody can look upon the face of the Lord and live.
And yet, the most amazing thing we have in Christ.  We could not approach God’s holiness and so God placed a veil of human flesh around His glory and came very near to sinful men.  Such things are too wonderful for me.
When Christ walked into a room nobody could tell that God was right there.  An unclean woman with a discharge of blood for 15 years touches Christ and His power heals her.  Lepers cried out:  “Master, have mercy on us” and He would walk right up to them and make them clean.  A sinful woman crawled up to Christ’s feet and wept on them and the Son of God did not recoil but reached out and forgave sin.
You see, beloved, Christ had to give up His glory because we needed Him to.  We couldn’t approach God without Him making it safe to do so.  God forgive me that I sometimes come into the presence of God and do not realize what an amazing privilege it is that I can enter boldly into the presence of God because Christ came in flesh and through the veil of His flesh I have access into the courts of the most High.
6 “I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. 7 Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. 8 For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. 9 I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours.
Do you understand what a privilege it is to belong to Christ?  Do not listen when the world tells you that there are many paths that lead to the top of the mountain.  Have some loyalty to your Savior.  Have some respect for what He had to go through to secure redemption for you.  The Cross makes no sense if men only needed to be reminded of timeless moral Truths.
Christ’s disciples needed Christ’s prayers.  Peter had promised Christ that, even if everyone else should forsake Him, that He would stand with Him to the bitter end.  Christ rebuked Peter and told Him that Satan had requested Peter and that, if permitted, could handle Peter as easily as throwing up dust in the wind.  Peter would betray but, Jesus reminded Him, that Peter would turn back again.  Why?  Because Christ had prayed for Him and Christ’s prayers are answered.  Christ’s intercession was the reason that His disciples had received the Word when so many others had left Christ.  Christ would hang alone between heaven and earth and none would be with Him but His prayers ensured that His disciples would cling to that work and, by believing His Word, have everlasting life.
10 All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. 11 And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. 12 While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. 13 But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. 14 I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 15 I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. 19 And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
There is a common misperception by the world about those who claim what Scriptures teach about the preservation of God’s people.  It is sometimes called the perseverance of the Saints and some have the wrong notion that believers can somehow be proud that they can never lose their salvation.
But, you need to understand, the reason why the disciples would persevere was not something within their character.  If left to themselves, they would have all scattered.  If left to themselves, they would have remained enemies of God.  They would have hated God just as the Pharisees did.
What made the disciples remarkable was their Savior.  He kept them for His sake.  He had called and not lost a single one because nobody is strong enough to take from His hand.  He had even chosen Judas with the knowledge that He was not His own so that Judas could betray, of his own hateful will, the Son of God.
I don’t know what it is within the sinful human heart that hates the idea that God would glorify Himself by saving His own to the uttermost.  Even some that name Christ bristle at the idea that they’re privileged to have Christ intercede for them powerfully.  Where they ought to read these Words of Christ with joy that He saves His own to the uttermost, they want Him to simply leave men with the power to come and go as they desire.  There is nothing of the sheep tending themselves here but only the Shepherd powerfully interceding to secure His sheep.
Understanding that Christ calls us and keeps us close to His bosom ought to be the source of the greatest humility and comfort.  It ought to humble us for we realize that we are no more worthy of redemption than another.  It ought to comfort us to know that the Son of God, through Whom the universe was created, keeps us and promises that nothing can separate us from His Love.
Christ, after all, came not to gather seekers around Him.  Christ came to pursue men.  Christ came to seek and save the lost who were wandering in darkness.  Christ is the Seeker, we were the lost.  Christ calls us into His Kingdom through the power of His Word and we are comforted by the Truth that we have been made alive to be kept by Him and to glorify Him as He redeems a people to Himself.
Nothing breaks my heart more than witnessing how impoverished many in the Evangelical tradition are today.  They do not hear the Truth of the Gospel that ought to minister to them and remind them not only that Christ begins their salvation but is their salvation.  Many preachers operate according to something that is illegal in business called the “Bait and Switch”.  The bait and switch is where a salesman will lure you into a transaction with the promise of one price only to find out that the terms are switched once you commit to the offer.
Many Christians today have been told that once they believe upon Christ that they will be saved.  They embrace that Truth with joy and unload the burden of their sin to come to the Savior.  But then they are told that holiness is up to them.  They are no longer fed the Gospel but are given Sermons were they are reminded that they need to be sold out for Jesus and that they need to reform their lives.  Obedience, they are told, is the mark of a true Christian.
Indeed, obedience follows faith in Christ but that obedience comes from Christ.  It’s right here in the passage where Christ asks that the Father would sanctify the disciples.  It is not only the one time act of belief that Christ ensures but Christ is the power for the believer’s daily belief  and walk.
I’ve known men who believed the Gospel and then thought sanctification was up to them.  They are weighed down by their battle with Sin and losing daily and, before long, they’re crying out:  “How can a sinner like me be loved by a Holy God?”  Ministers of moralism can only point to the Law.  Be more serious.  Be more sold out.  Tell others about Jesus so they can enter your struggle.
Beloved, Christ is the indestructible life.  Christ is holiness and the fountainhead of salvation.  Be reminded again, Christian, that God saved you when you were His enemy.  Christ came to seek you out when you were walking in sin and darkness.  He has you in the palm of His hand and reminds you that none can take you out.  You will battle sin but Christ does not leave you.  He doesn’t simply come around when you’ve run out of the resources to battle sin by yourself.  His Gospel is the power every day.  His Gospel reminds you that you are His and that Sin has no power over you.  You will be sanctified in the Truth because Christ is your Life and He does not cast out His own.  Cling to Him.
20 “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one, just 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 have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. 24 Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. 25 O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. 26 I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”
Did you know that Christ prayed for you?  You are mentioned right here in the Scriptures.  Christ prayed not only for those present at the time of His prayer but prayed for those that would believe their report.  You are the object of Christ’s prayer.
Some of you might have noticed the vanity license plate on our Suburban.  It’s Hebrews 9.  I love that Chapter as it speaks so powerfully of the High Priesthood of Christ as He lives to make perfect intercession for His own.  It’s not as if Christ retreated to a faraway place to discover who might believe upon His name but He continually makes intercession for us.  He knows who believes upon Him because He prays for those that will believe.
Every event in your life has been the subject of His intercession.  That you heard the Gospel and responded to it:  thank Christ for His intercession.  That you are becoming sanctified:  thank Christ for His intercession.  That all things work together for your good:  thank Christ for His intercession.
One day, Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead.  You will walk up to the bar of His judgment and the Judge will ask by what right do you have to be acquitted of your sins, which are many.  But then, the Judge of all the Earth will come down from His seat and stand next to you as your Defense Attorney and say:  “This is one of my own.  I have paid the full penalty for His sin.  My righteousness is his possession.”
And as Leonard reminded us last week, a crown will be given to you and your Savior will say:  “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”
And what will be able to do except weep for joy and say:  “Lord Jesus, it was all you.  You prayed for me.  You held me in the palm of your hand.  What good did I ever do that was not by Your gracious Hand?”  And we will lay our crown at Jesus’ feet because He gets all the glory.
But you also see in this prayer that this is not only about the world to come but about the unity that Christ’s Church will have in history.  Christ prays that we would love one another.  Christ prays that we would be united in the Truth.
You see, our salvation is personal but it is not to be thought of as merely personal.  Christ is saving a people that we are privileged to be around.  We not only ought to love one another but we will love one another because Christ has secured it.  The Apostle John reminds us that nobody can even say that He loves Christ if He does not love His brother because love of the Brethren has been secured in Christ.
But this Love is not a Love that has no content.  It is grounded in the Truth that we have been sanctified unto.  God has revealed His Truth in His Word and, as Ephesians 4 testified to us today in our meditation, Christ gave us Pastors and Teachers that we might be united in Truth.
Leonard will be starting a series next week on the Officers of Christ’s Church.  We live such individual and compartmented lives in modernity that we tend to think of Church as a gathering of people who share notions of Truth that have been arrived at independently.  Each of us, we reason, studied the Scriptures and came to fairly common views, and so we worship at a Church with people who share our view of Truth.
But Truth is not an object that gets shaped by the organ of the human mind.  Truth is not something that we arrive at by our own power or by our own sentiment.  Truth is what corresponds to reality the way God sees it and it has been revealed by His Word.  The Gospel comes to us outside of ourselves and announces our salvation and sanctification and then challenges us that our minds need to be renewed by God’s Word.  Leonard and our Session are not merely independent travelers with us on a journey to apprehend that Truth but have been commissioned by God to lead us into the unity of Truth.
In the end, Christ’s prayer is a reminder of the amazing nature of Grace.  It’s the kind of Truth that the prophets of old longed to understand.  This great Truth that the Messiah would be a man but also God.
If left to ourselves we would have willingly remained enemies of God and justly perished for our Sins.  But the Son of God came down to Earth to come near to sinful men and lived a life of perfect righteousness.  When men could no longer stand the holiness of God in their midst, they hung the Son of God between heaven and earth and He took the full weight of the wrath of God for Sin for those who believe upon the Son and look up to the place of Curse.  Because death could not hold Him, He rose again on the third day and ever lives so that we might have eternal life.
Believe upon Christ Jesus.  Know the Son Who Knows you by name.  If you hear His voice it is because He has long sought you and loves you with an everlasting love.  Believe upon Christ because He knows you by name and your faith is a result of His loving intercession.  Live in Him, not because you have the power within you, but because His life secures power over sin.  Love the Brethren because they are united with you in mystic sweet communion in the Son of God.  We are His body.  Be united in the Truth because Christ is Truth.
And because Christ has prayed for His Church, may we all look forward to the day when we are presented spotless and blameless as His Bride and enter the wedding feast of the Lamb.
Categories
Epistles Scripture

Abraham Believed the Gospel (Galatians 3)

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Galatians 3

1 O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. 2Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? 3Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? 4 Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? 5Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith— 6just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”?

7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.

10 For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 12But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— 14so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.

15 To give a human example, brothers: even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it once it has been ratified. 16Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. 17This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. 18For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.

19 Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made, and it was put in place through angels by an intermediary. 20Now an intermediary implies more than one, but God is one.

21Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law. 22But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

23Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. 24So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. 25But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, 26for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. 27For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.

As we continue in our series through the Book of Galatians we come to Chapter 3. Paul is defending the Gospel of God’s Grace against Jews who have infiltrated the Church and are teaching the Gentiles in Galatia that one must not only believe in Jesus Christ to be saved but must also become circumcised and obey the Law of Moses.

I wonder, these days, if many have become so unconcerned about the Gospel that they don’t really understand why Paul is so upset about this. He’s beside himself wondering why someone would ever be attracted to the teaching of these false brothers when they started out being taught the true Gospel. He asks, in verse 1, “…who bewitched you…?” He doesn’t literally think that there is magic that is compelling the Galatians to believe this but it’s meant to shock them to realize that their turning away from the true Gospel is completely out of character for a Christian.

It struck me yesterday at men’s Bible Study that many of us take for granted that sin and hard-heartedness is always happening to the other guy. We let our guard down to false teaching because we never really think that we’re in danger. It’s really important that we hear what Paul tells the Galatians here: “ 2Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? 3Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?”

It seems so obvious, doesn’t it? How could they possibly do this? What would attract them into thinking that their salvation would depend upon and be perfected by works of the Law? Paul points out, clearly, that their salvation (and our salvation) began with the Spirit of God announcing the Good News to our hearts. We heard in the Gospel a message that said to us that we deserve nothing out of the hand of God but condemnation but that the benefits of Christ are held out to us if we simply believe upon what Christ has done for sinners. So, very simply, with nothing to offer God, we fell at the feet of Christ and called out for Him to save us.

But we began this way. The Galatians did too. But then they started hearing these Jewish Christians who were really serious about their Christian walk (or so it seemed to them). These Jewish Christians had it together. They were blessed. They had a purpose. They not only believed in Jesus but they were committed to the Law of Moses to show God that they were really serious about honoring Christ.

It’s not as if the Galatians woke up one day and forgot where they began but, over time they lost sight of where they began. We’re just like them. Our hearts are prone to forget the Gospel. We are prone to forget that God offered salvation freely on the basis of our clinging to Christ and His righteousness. How often, after you’ve sinned, do you return to the Cross of Christ and remind yourself that, in the beginning, God justified you because you trusted in the Cross of Christ? Or, instead, do you tell yourself that God is angry with you right now and that you’ll do better next time and show God that you are really serious about obeying Him? Stop it! God didn’t save you because you’re serious about obeying Him. You are not capable of being serious enough. Only Christ is. Remember where you started. Stay there. Don’t leave the hope you had in Christ then. Yes, Christ matures you. Yes, He is conforming you to His image. But this is all because, just like at the beginning, you are clinging to the Cross. You will never be perfected by any deeds and, when we forget that, we are forgetting the Gospel we heard in the first place. We are forgetting our first love.

We might be tempted to tell ourselves this though: “Well, I guess that must be true for me because I’m so weak. But there were people like Abraham who were strong enough to obey God. I’ll have to just be happy that God saved poor old sinful me but I wish I could have been more like Abraham.” In fact, the Galatians not only wanted to be just like Abraham but they were envious of the Judaizers because they were physical descendants and heirs of Abraham. “Poor old me, I’m just a Gentile Christian. Boo hoo!”

Are you ready for a shock. I’m going to read something that some of you might notice for the first time in your Christian lives. Make sure you have your Bibles ready so you don’t think that I’m making this stuff up. Verse 6 completes a thought that began before about the fact that we are perfected by the Spirit just as at the first. Guess what verse 6 says? Abraham was saved the exact same way as we are! “— 6just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”? 7Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.”

Why was Abraham accounted as righteous? Because of his faith and not his works. Who are the real sons of Abraham? Those who have faith just like Abraham did. Hold on to your seats for this next bit. What did Abraham believe in? The Gospel! That’s right the Scripture foresaw that God would justify us by faith and preached the Gospel beforehand to Abraham. Abraham believed the Gospel! Christ stated that Abraham saw His day and rejoiced and the Pharisees wanted to stone Him. I wonder, though, if some of you are still doubting that Abraham was saved by Christ. How can that be? Christ hadn’t even been born yet. True, but God had promised Christ and God’s promises are yes and amen. Abraham believed the Gospel because God had promised the work of Christ to Him. Abraham believed afar off but we have the blessing of living on the other side of the Cross and the revelation of the Christ. And, to make it even sweeter, Paul proclaims to the Galatians: “YOU are Abraham’s heir because you believe just like he did. Take THAT you Judaizers! You’re not even an heir. Real heirs believe in Jesus and it doesn’t matter whose father is on their birth certificate!”

Furthermore, Paul adds: “ 10For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” Do you remember this? Why do the Galatians and why do we keep going to the Law and telling God that we’re going to perform for Him so that He’ll accept us? The Law tells us that a person is cursed if a man does not keep it completely and perfectly. There is no hope there. There is no good news. This is the good news found in Christ: “ 13Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree” He who knew know sin actually became Sin for us. He took the curse for all of our lawbreaking and sacrificed Himself to take away the curse that separated us from God. The curse was taken away in verse 14: “ 14so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.”

This idea of promise is very important here. It keeps being said over and over that we receive the promise or that we inherit the promise or to believe the promise. This is so important because the promise that was made to Abraham was made by God to Him and it was not made by God with any conditions of obedience on Abraham’s part. In other words, God told Abraham He would bless Him and Abraham believed it but no additional conditions were added to that promise. It was a gracious promise of blessing. Paul points out an important truth. Please try to listen very carefully because Paul is going to basically say that God cannot break His word to Abraham: “ 15 To give a human example, brothers: even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it once it has been ratified. 16Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. 17This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. 18For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.”

What Paul is saying is that if you and I make an agreement together and sign a piece of paper, we’re bound to that agreement. I can’t take that paper later on and add something to it and hold you to that promise. You didn’t sign for that promise. I also can’t take away something I don’t like. You didn’t sign that promise. Paul is saying that God promised to bless Abraham and his seed and the seed was Christ. He was giving Abraham a promise of salvation by Christ and His righteousness. The Law came hundreds of years after this promise was made to Abraham’s descendants. The Law could not be added to the promise or God would be breaking His word. In other words, the Law could not possibly be for salvation the way the Judaizers are teaching the Galatians because that would mean that God broke His word and, beloved, you might break your word and I might break my word but God never, ever, ever breaks His word. He sword to Abraham that He would be torn asunder before He ever broke the promise to bless Abraham and the world with salvation by faith in Christ.

It’s sort of an obvious question then: why would God add all these rules and regulations if they are not meant to save us? It seems to me like God is saying to keep them in order to be saved. If He never intended to save men and women by them then why did He punish them for not obeying them? It almost seems like the Law is against the Gospel itself. Paul anticipates this: “ 21Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law. 22But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. 23Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. 24So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.”

The Law was actually added for a gracious purpose. It was given to hold forth and demonstrate the perfect righteousness of God. By doing this it was meant to show how Holy God is and how sinful we are. We were supposed to come to the Law and see in it our very real need for Christ. It was a guardian to conduct us to Christ, a sign to point us to Christ, a schoolmaster to teach us of our need for Christ. We were meant to feel imprisoned by it, caught up by it, bogged down by it so that we would cry out: “Who will deliver me from this body of death?!” Paul even notes that if a law could be given that would lead to righteousness then righteousness would be by the Law but the Law itself proves that righteousness by the Law is impossible – except through Christ.

Right before you believed the Gospel, did you not feel the prison of the Law? Did you not sense its judgment? Did you not feel the need to escape the wrath that you knew you needed to escape? Praise God! Do you remember as the Gospel burst forth and said to you that Christ took that curse away, that Christ had fulfilled its righteous demand? Were not our hearts burning within us as we said: “Thank you Jesus! I believe. What Good News! I believe because I have no other hope. You alone have words of eternal life.”

Verse 25: “ 25But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, 26for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. 27For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” The time of immaturity is over. The time for our guardian is past. The time of the judgment of the Law is over for those of us in Christ. Why would anyone ever want to go back into the prison of the Law? Why would anyone go back into the curse of the Law? Do you understand why Paul is asking if they’ve been bewitched? What utter foolishness to turn away from Christ and back into the deeds of the Law.

What could ever possess someone to think this is a good idea? So he can be a Jew? So he can be a better Christian because he’s a Jew? There’s no distinction. Jews are saved by Christ just like Gentiles. So are all men. So are all women. So are all slaves and so are all free men. All are saved by the same Lord. All are saved by the same perfect work. All are united to Christ in the same way: by faith, by laying hold of His feet and trusting in His righteousness and not our own.

As Paul stated, so he reminds them again: “ 29And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.”

Christian, you have everything you could possibly ever ask for from God’s hand and it has been given to you freely. You’ve been given an inheritance you didn’t deserve. You lay hold of it simply by trusting in Christ and what He has done. You begin that way and you will finish to the end that way. You don’t begin by trusting in Christ and then change to a new stage where you begin to trust in the works and actions that you’re doing to please God so that He’ll bless you.

Stop believing the illusion that your dedication to God is what saves you. You are not saved by the purity of your works or even the perfection of your faith but your salvation rests on your trust in Christ’s work alone. Whoever bewitched you into looking within and convincing yourself that God is saving you on the basis of your behavior lied to you. The Gospel tells you to stop looking within for your salvation and to look to the Cross. That’s where your righteousness is, that’s where the curse of the Law was nailed. That is what will transform your thoughts and renew your minds. That is what will provide the fruit of love toward your neighbor. That, beloved, is the only hope you must have now and forevermore.

Let us pray.

Categories
Wisdom and Psalms

Blessing or Guilted?

“Are you blessing mommy when you do that?”
“That is not blessing mommy when you do that!”

Those are statements that I have been hearing lately. They bothered me for some reason. But the wise woman keeps her mouth shut…for now. I decided to put more thought into it the other day to try to figure why it was pricking my conscience. What was it that just didn’t seemed right? Turn to the scriptures.

Pr 31:28 “Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.”

That can’t be it, can it? I believe this is the verse that is being used…or rather misused. Look at the verses that precede it.

Pr 31:10-27 “Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies.
The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil.
She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life.
She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands.
She is like the merchants’ ships; she bringeth her food from afar.
She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens.
She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard.
She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms.
She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: her candle goeth not out by night.
She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff.
She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy.
She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet.
She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.
Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land.
She maketh fine linen, and selleth it; and delivereth girdles unto the merchant.
Strength and honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come.
She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness.
She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.

See anything here? She doesn’t demand that her children or husband bless and praise her. She earns it. It is something that comes after the fact.

Should we expect proper behaviour from our children? Absolutely…but we are to teach them to it, not guilt them into it. Yep, that is exactly what it is. Don’t do anything that makes mommy look bad. But the scriptures don’t say anything about a child being there to make the parents look good. We are dealing with little ones with a natural bent towards sin. We have to teach them…and pray that the Lord does a work in their hearts. When children are little we start by training them…showing them that actions have consequences, both positive and negative. As they get older we move from training to teaching. This is where we explain things to them and they continue to make choices…most times based on the condition of their heart. You can have a child that is trained to behave perfectly and yet have a rebellious heart and behave for the most selfish of reasons…this is not what we are called to produce with our efforts, but it is what we will get if we are guilting or strongarming our children into it. Let’s teach them to desire Godly things by our own responses.

Yes, we can teach our children to bless others with their actions. But that needs to be motivated by the child’s heart and never direct by oneself for the benefit on oneself.