Wayside Community Pastor: July 2015

Friday, July 24, 2015

A Heart for God

(To download an mp3 file of this message, click on the title above. To listen now, click on the play button of the audio player shown.)

This is the third sermon in a series of messages on the topic of sanctification. In the previous message we had been describing the character of God as revealed in the Mosaic Covenant. This message takes a look at what the covenant reveals about human nature or human character.

Written Excerpts:

Ezekiel 36:24-29 (NKJV)

24 For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. 25 Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them. 28 Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God. 29 I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. I will call for the grain and multiply it, and bring no famine upon you.

Introduction:

It has been two weeks since our last message in the series we have been doing on the topic of sanctification. I just would like to summarize some of the things we have already covered before I go on.

We mentioned that by God’s marvelous grace He chose specific individuals with whom to establish a binding covenant. And, He also entered into a covenant with an entire nation, purely because of His grace. None of them had done anything to earn or deserve being chosen by God to participate in the covenant with Him.

By choosing to use a covenant, God utilized a practice that was very common to the people of the ancient near eastern culture. So the familiar tenets of the covenant could be used to teach the people vital truth concerning the nature and character of God.

We have learned that He is completely separate from the world that He created and He stands apart from any other being. Since He is the creator of the material world, He cannot be represented by a material object that is part of the creation He made.

We have learned that He is sovereign and has the rightful authority to require strict allegiance and to stipulate how humans who want to live in covenant with Him should conduct their lives in order to exhibit His own character.

We have learned that the covenant exhibits His grace and His faithfulness. The Israelites did not deserve His offer or His choosing of them. He rescued them and delivered them purely by His grace and His faithfulness to the promises made to their forefathers.

Even after the covenant was established, God repeatedly maintained His faithfulness and offered them forgiveness when He had every “right,” according to the terms of the covenant, to completely destroy them.

We learned that the covenant was not a mechanism for entering into a relationship with God, but it was for those who were already in a relationship by the grace of God and needed to know how to maintain that relationship, or how to demonstrate that they belonged to the Lord.

The last time, we finished the sermon by stating that there was one more important truth that was revealed to the people through the use of the covenant.

That truth is going to be our focus for the message today.

The purpose of the covenant was not only to reveal the character of God and His intention for human life, but it also was intended to reveal true human character.

With the help of God’s Spirit, I want to point out the human problem that the covenant revealed, and use various Bible texts to emphasize God’s remedy.

Proposition:

The covenant revealed that human beings by nature are incompatible with God’s nature and God’s plan for living our lives.

I want to focus on the nature of our problem, some examples of the problem and a brief glimpse at God’s solution.

I. The nature of the human problem revealed by the covenant.

We have mentioned already that the covenant was never intended to be a means whereby people could enter into a relationship with God.

When the covenant was offered, God had already initiated the relationship and called them to be His own purely because of His grace. This was true for Abraham, and it was true for the nation of Israel.

The covenant was not meant to be a means for us to make ourselves acceptable to God.

Dr. Oswalt explains that the covenant was also not intended to be used like a ladder to achieve greater levels of sainthood. The Apostle Paul in Romans 7 shows how that scheme can actually turn out to be a curse instead of a blessing.

The covenant defined how life would work if they lived the way they were supposed to live.

When Moses asked the people if they were willing to obey the Lord and if they were willing to enter into this binding covenant, they eagerly responded in the affirmative.

I read to you the other week where they said to Moses, “You go speak with the Lord and all that the Lord has spoken we will do.” (Ex. 19 & 20)

God had graciously delivered them from slavery, so they would do all that God instructed Moses for them to do. In fact, they willingly called death down upon themselves if they failed to live up to the terms of the covenant.

However, when they made such drastic promises they apparently didn’t realize they had a problem that they inherited from Adam and Eve.

Even though they had bound themselves to obey God’s will in the strongest terms possible, they very soon and very often violated the terms of the covenant that they promised to live by.

The covenant was the means for revealing to them that they couldn’t live up to God’s requirements, nor had any deep inward desire to do so.

They discovered again and again that they wanted their own way and were constantly drawn to the very things God forbade.

II. Some examples of the human problem.

Ps. 51:5 – Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time that my mother conceived me. (NIV)

Jer. 17:9 – The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? (NIV)

The Bible indicates that when we commit acts of sin we are just doing what comes natural to us because our nature is corrupt.

You’ve heard me say frequently that we were born with a nature that is inclined against God and bent toward evil.

Even today, when we hear the message of God’s gracious salvation and respond to the invitation to become a child of God and enter into a relationship with God, there is a joy and happiness to know that our sins are forgiven and we have been accepted by God on the benefits of Christ’s death on the cross.

We are happy and thrilled with the hope of eternal life.

If we are asked whether we intend to live for God and fully obey Him after all He has done for us, we respond with an immediate “yes.”

However, in a short time we discover that there is still a spirit or motivation or desire within us that works against our best intentions to live the life of God, even though we have trusted Christ and know that we have received a new life.

Usually Satan tries to convince us that nothing really happened and there is nothing to this life of faith and salvation, after all. Everything is just like it was before.

But, new converts need to be reminded that something did indeed happen when they believed the gospel, but they haven’t yet received all that God has provided for them.

(Oswalt) The Israelites apparently thought it would be easy to serve God in the ways He ordered so they blithely entered the covenant with its oaths to be faithful or die.

But, they soon broke the covenant, but it was not just a one-time freak incident. No, they broke the covenant again and again. In fact the entire history of Israel is an ongoing cycle of faithful obedience then rebellion and waywardness.

Finally, at a point when the nation had been punished repeatedly for their unfaithfulness to the covenant, God reveals through His prophets what He intends to do for His people.

III. God’s solution for the problem.

This brings us to the passage of scripture that was read earlier in the service, as well as the similar passage in Ez. 36:24-29 (see above).

Who Is the Lord?

(To download an mp3 file of this message, click on the title above. To listen now, click on the play button of the audio player shown.)

This is the second sermon in a series of messages regarding the subject of sanctification. This message focuses on the character of God as revealed through the Mosaic Covenant. Most of the ideas expressed in this sermon are adapted from the writings of Dr. John N. Oswalt in his book, Called to Be Holy.

Written Excerpts:

Exodus 5:2 (NKJV) And Pharaoh said, "Who is the LORD, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I do not know the LORD, nor will I let Israel go."

Introduction:

I stated last Sunday that we were going to be doing a study on sanctification for several weeks.

Last week we chose the topic, “God’s very own possession” as our emphasis for the first sermon in the series. We tried to present the truth that is emphasized in 1 Peter 2:9, which indicates that God not only chose us before we ever cared anything about Him, but He chose us to be in an exclusive relationship with Him – a relationship that does not tolerate any competition, a relationship that is characterized as a holy relationship.

The next theme we want to explore in this progression of revelation is the question, “What kind of God is this One who chose us and wants an exclusive relationship with us?”

The verse that I read a moment ago, quoting the words of Pharaoh, makes a good beginning point for our discussion today. You might recognize the context of this verse – it was the occasion when Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and told him that the God of the Hebrews was calling His people to go out into the wilderness to hold a feast to the Lord.

Pharaoh responds to them by asking, “Who is the Lord?” He had no prior knowledge of God, and he wasn’t about to obey just because Moses said so. This question posed by Pharaoh expresses the same question that was present in the minds of the Hebrews themselves, and it is the same question that plagues most people – even until the present day. “Who is God?” “What is He like?”

I mentioned last week that I would be using a good bit of material from OT scholar and author, Dr. John Oswalt. Dr. Oswalt shares that when God chooses to reveal His own character, His intentions for His people, as well as the nature of the people whom He has called, He uses a commonly used mechanism called a covenant.

In the OT and even in the pagan world of the ancient Near East, the covenant was a “solemn agreement between two parties. Each one accepted certain obligations to the other and in return received certain benefits from the other.”

The people who had been chosen by God had been surrounded by and immersed in a pagan religion that was utterly wrong on every important point. (i.e., the nature of God [the gods], the origin and purpose of the world, the origin and purpose of humanity, etc., etc.)

If God was going to succeed in teaching His chosen people the truth about Himself, He would need to go outside of the well-known religious forms and use something that the people would still be familiar with but would be separated from the religious corruption and misconceptions that existed.

The covenant was ideal for this purpose. It was primarily legal rather than religious in nature, but it would serve as a vehicle to teach important truths about this God who had called them to be exclusively His.

For example, the ancient covenants contained several aspects that closely corresponded with the truths the people needed to understand about God.

· The concept of monotheism over polytheism could be easily explained through the common knowledge that any emperor who entered into covenant demanded that the subjects recognize no other king than himself.

· A covenant between a great king and the people began with a brief historical prologue that reviewed the historical circumstances that led up to the covenant. This feature aligned with the history of the patriarchs and God’s involvement with them. (I am the God who brought you up out of Egypt…)

· After the stipulations had been enumerated and other details finished, there commonly were a list of gods called upon to witness the agreement, but in Israel’s case this was substituted by the erection of stone pillars or memorials as a witness and to remind the people of the covenant.

· In an ancient covenant the bulk of the content had to do with the stipulations the people agreed to follow, but there was also a designated part where the king made promises or commitments to do certain things for the people. This also was parallel to the fact that the Creator God was obligating Himself to His people – something that was totally unheard of in those times.

· Finally, the additional benefit of a covenant was the part where the king could stipulate absolute ethics, (i.e. require certain kinds of behavior and prohibit other behavior) as long as they were in covenant with him. (This would be totally impossible in a polytheistic “world” because the gods have too many competing desires.) But, since God is the only God, then He can require ethical behavior from his subjects. (Ten Commandments)

We read in the OT that God entered into a covenant with various individuals such as Abraham. We also learn that God entered into a covenant with a nation of people – Israel. Moses is the primary figure in the formation of this covenant, but the nation of Israel is involved.

So with the Lord’s help today I want to share with you some of the truths that God taught His people about Himself through the use of the covenant that was instituted at Sinai and the giving of the commandments.

I. The covenant teaches us that God is holy.

A. Holiness means “otherness.”

The term “holy” was used among the pagans and for them it primarily distinguished anything that pertained to the gods from everything else that did not pertain to the gods. In this sense, the word did not imply any moral behavior because the gods had no higher morals and ethics than humans did.

However, in the establishment of the covenant, God begins to show the people that He is the only One that the term may be justly used.

Unlike the pagans who believed that the gods were part of the creation (world order, cosmos), the Hebrews were to understand that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was wholly other than this world; completely separate from this created order and in control of it.

And God demonstrated this fact by completely over-ruling virtually all of the Egyptian gods in the plagues that He sent upon the land. Each and every plague was an affront to a particular god that was worshiped by the Egyptians. While those gods were not holy (other than the created world), the God of the Hebrews was, as demonstrated before their very eyes in Egypt.

This is the point of the 2^nd commandment re: graven/ crafted images. God cannot be represented by anything of this world, because He is completely and wholly separate and above this world order. Cf. the same emphasis in the prophets (Is. & Jer.): a piece of wood that is used to cook your meal and also carved to make an idol cannot rightly be called “holy.”

The tragedy of the golden calf incident was the people created an idol out of “this world” material and claimed it represented the God that is totally and completely apart from this world.

B. Holiness means ethical righteousness.

God’s ethical character is revealed in the parts of the covenant that are contained from Exodus 19-Numbers 10, and Dr. Oswalt summarizes the content as pertaining to “Exodus, Covenant, Tabernacle, Sacrifices and Priesthood.

After defining the divisions, Dr. Oswalt asks, “What is the significance of this organization?” [i.e. record of Exodus followed by, covenant, then sacrifices and priesthood.] “First of all, it tells us that the reason God gave the people the covenant was so that he might live in their midst.”

By His grace and grace alone he delivered them from slavery in Egypt, but now there must be some way for God to live among the people he has delivered. The author argues that the sacrificial system is not designed for those who want to enter into a relationship with God or those who intentionally sin and then later repent. Instead, it is for those who are already in a relationship with God and are committed to living a life like his.

But this relationship is not possible without a continuous atonement. “Without it, the purity of his perfection would melt us as the noonday sun melts butter.” The covenant was not the “way to God; it was the means of walking with God.” “Holy living is the intended consequence of gracious salvation.”

By living according to the stipulations of the covenant the people will learn that their God is not at all like the gods of the pagans. They must treat one another with love and honesty and faithfulness because that is what He is like. Those who belong to God must act in these ways because that is the kind of God he is.

To live in defiance of these stipulations while insisting that one is forgiven is to do the very thing which the Hebrews did and it eventually brought destruction.

II. The covenant teaches us that God is gracious.

The covenant further reveals the holiness of God by showing the grace of God. As I stated earlier, God entered into covenants with specific individuals before He entered into covenant with Israel. Noah was chosen; Abraham was chosen; Isaac was chosen; & Jacob (Israel) was chosen.

None of these did anything to merit or earn the favor of God. He chose them and bound Himself to them without any initiation on their part.

At the burning bush incident God reveals Himself to Moses by saying three things about His character.

A. He identifies Himself as One who made gracious promises and undeserved blessings to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

B. He reveals that He is sensitive to the suffering of His people.

C. He announces that He intends to deliver His people through Moses in spite of their fear and unbelief in order to fulfill the promises He made to the patriarchs.

III. The covenant teaches us that God is faithful.

The covenant emphasizes over and over that God is choosing them because of His promises to their fathers. God makes promises to them of His ongoing faithfulness to them even in times of apostasy and departure from His covenant.

The covenant was sealed with serious oaths where both parties “called down death upon themselves” if they should ever break it. (This was typical language used in any covenant between two parties.) Then a short time later the people of Israel violated the covenant.

God was entirely just in threatening to destroy them, but Moses, “reminds” God of his own nature and unfailing promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Moses knows that God is not that sort of God. Moses knows that God is the kind of God that shows love to a thousand generations who love him and keep his commandments.

The word for “love” is the Hebrew word “hesed” for which there is no one English word that captures the full meaning. The word connotes the earnest, undeserved, and unexpected generosity of one who does not have to give it. (loving kindness)

Oswalt – “When we ask the Israelite people what their God is like, they do not, as some Christians would expect, speak of him as a God of wrath. Instead they tell us of a God of incredible patience, who extends undeserved generosity to thousands of those who love him and keep his commandments. It is as though they say to us, “It is not surprising that God got angry at us. We broke our covenant, the one in which we called down death on ourselves a thousand times. What is surprising is that God would not give up on us. He continued to hold us, to believe in us, to hope for us, it invite us to start over again. He kept his side of the covenant when there was no earthly reason whatsoever to do so.”

“So the covenant, which revealed the holy character of God, revealed that his otherness was not merely in grace, nor in ethical uprightness, but also in undeserved and unexpected faithfulness."

Conclusion:

There is at least one more truth that was revealed to the Israelites through the use of the covenant, and we will get into that in our next sermon.

I just would like to summarize our emphasis today by saying that God graciously chose specific individuals, and eventually an entire nation, with whom He would enter into a binding covenant.

The use of the covenant answers the question posed by Pharaoh, “Who is the Lord?”

We have learned that He is wholly and completely separate from the world that He created and He stands apart from any other being.

We have learned that He is sovereign and has the rightful authority to stipulate how humans who want to live in covenant with Him should conduct their lives in order to exhibit His own character.

This same God still desires to have relationships with whosoever will today. He will save us and deliver us from sin, then give us the presence of His Spirit to enable us to live up to His character.

Let us close the service by singing:

# 552 – I Am Thine, O Lord

Do you know that you belong to the Lord?

Have you been forgiven of your sins and transgressions, and have you been living in covenant with Him in a way that exhibits God’s character to the world around you?

If not, you certainly can. God is constantly inviting everyone to know Him and bind themselves to Him in a commitment of love and service.

Friday, July 3, 2015

God's Very Own Possession

(To download an mp3 file of this message, click on the title above, to listen now, click on the play button of the audio player shown.)

This is the first message in a series of messages on sanctification. A significant portion of the ideas and material used in these messages are adapted from the book, Called to Be Holy by Dr. John N. Oswalt.

Written Excerpts:

I want to read several verses of Scripture to complement the passage that was read earlier in the service. The earlier passage from Hebrews spoke specifically about the new covenant that God has established with His people.

This next passage is 1 Peter 2:1-9 and it describes the character and behavior of those who are in covenant with God.

I’m going to read from a newer translation of the Bible because it seems to clarify the real meaning of some of the words that are used. Upon reading this passage I discovered that verse 9 includes a phrase that I had chosen as the title for this message.

1 Peter 2:1-9 (NLT) But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light.

Introduction:

Dr. Oswalt’s book that I mentioned a moment ago, Called to Be Holy, is a book that explains the biblical call to holiness for the people of God. I am deeply indebted to his book for much of the content in this sermon today and in the upcoming sermons to follow.

I remember making a statement a few years ago during a sermon that went something like this, “In spite of everything that is now possible in our world because of science and technology, there is one thing that is increasingly considered impossible – that is, living a pure and holy life that is issuing from a holy heart.”

Dr. Oswalt makes some similar statements in the introductory chapter of his book that I feel are worthy of quoting, so I trust that you will grant me tolerance as I read about 5 paragraphs from his introduction.

Oswalt – “… the importance of the Bible’s teaching on holiness is not comparable to its [secondary] teachings on [church structure] or [end time events].

“If a person constantly reads the NT in light of the Old, which the Church Fathers clearly intended by their joining of the two in one [collection], then it becomes unmistakably clear what the purpose of the Gospel is. It is the same purpose that God has had from Genesis 4 onwards: the transformation of human behavior in this world with the consequent possibility of living with God through all eternity. The OT show us what that transformation is, and the NT shows us what God has done to make the transformation possible.

“This means that unless Christians are truly transformed into the character of God, the whole purpose of the Church’s existence becomes blurred and confused. The world looks upon hateful, self-serving, undisciplined, greedy, impure people who nevertheless claim to be the people of God, and says, ‘You lie!’”

After speaking about the problem in today’s church of minimizing the concept of God’s grace, he continues by saying, “The problem with ‘cheap grace’ is that it does not go far enough. It fails to understand that the goal of God’s grace is nothing less than Christlikeness. We want to believe God to escape the consequences of our sin, but we do not want to believe Christ to deliver us from our sinning. We want to enjoy the pleasure of sin while escaping its bitter consequences. But the Scriptures call us to a life which is radically Christlike….

“The Church which has lost sight of the biblical doctrine of holiness tries to market the gospel as a solution for life’s difficulties, a source for personal fulfillment, a means of achieving one’s desires for significance and status and power. In other words, it is not a means of escaping the [control] of [our] desires, it is a means for fulfilling that [control]…. It is a Church that expects to go down the aisle to meet its Bridegroom in a dress as filthy as the one in which He first found her in the gutters of life….”

These challenging words by Dr. Oswalt point to the real need for a revival of understanding and experiencing the grace of God that produces a life of holiness which reflects the true character of our heavenly Father.

As a beginning point in this series, I want to draw your attention to the thoughts expressed in verse 9 of 1 Peter 2.

1 Peter 2:9 (KJV) But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light:

There are three brief observations that I wish to focus on from this verse.

God chooses us.

God chooses us for Himself.
God chooses us to be holy.

I. God chooses us.

“… a chosen generation…”

One of the most precious truths of the Bible is the fact that God has chosen us! Jesus said, “You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit.”

God is the one who has done the choosing. The message of the Bible from Gen. to Rev. is that we had no inherent ability to choose God and suddenly decide to be like Him; like “turning over a new leaf.” Yes, we do have to “make a choice,” but the very capacity to choose is a gift of grace from the God of heaven who has come searching for us, and He bridged the gap to bring us to Him.

“When I could not come to where He was, He came to me!” – Squire Parsons

I have nothing in myself, outside of His grace, to make me want Him and to make me choose Him. All I wanted was to satisfy my own selfish desires and inclinations. But while my mind and heart were set on finding satisfaction for physical and sensual desires, God’s Holy Spirit penetrated my heart and created a yearning to know Him and to live for Him.

Hallelujah! I’m so thankful for “the love that drew salvation’s plan,” “the grace that brought it down to man” and “the mighty gulf that God did span at Calvary!”

I know I would be lost in hell this morning if it wasn’t for the marvelous fact that God chose me.

And, the Bible makes it clear that God didn’t just arbitrarily and capriciously choose some of us to be saved and then condemn everyone else to an eternal hell; lost forever. No, God chooses all of us, then He wonderfully gives us the grace as well as the freedom to choose whether we accept.

“God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”

II. God chooses us for Himself.

“… a peculiar people…”

This second point builds on the first one. God not only was the One who did the choosing, but He chose us for a specific reason – to be in an exclusive relationship with Himself.

The KJV uses the phrase, “a peculiar people.” This does not mean that all God’s children are supposed to be weird! The NLT uses the phrase that I had chosen as a title for this message: “God’s very own possession.”

God never intended to share our devotion and affection with any other deity. He expects to be the only object of our love and worship. He expects us to be committed only to Him, and not allow any other object or person to divide our affection.

This theme is illustrated so beautifully in the OT through the use of the covenants that God had with individuals, as well as an entire nation. As we quoted from Dr. Oswalt earlier, the NT was meant to be understood in light of the OT. So, the whole idea of holiness and what it involves is beautifully illustrated in the use of OT covenants.

God enters into covenant with Abraham, for example, and chooses him purely by grace, then commits Himself to Abraham and requires Abraham and his descendants to be committed to God.

In the book of Exodus God enters into covenant with the nation of Israel through Moses and the law. God made specific commitments to Israel because of His previous promises to the fathers, and He requires Israel to make specific commitments back to Him.

These glimpses of covenants provide insights into the character and nature of God. We won’t go into details today, but through the use of covenants, God reveals to humans what His holiness is all about and why He requires them to be holy. But for right now, we want to use the OT covenants as an example of the truth that God desires and planned for exclusive relationships with mankind and He truly want us for His own special possession.

That is an awesome truth to contemplate: that the God of the universe; the Creator; the sovereign ruler of nature desires an exclusive relationship with each and every one of us!

III. God chooses us to be holy.

“… an holy nation…”

1 Peter 1:15 (KJV) But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation;

We’ve already mentioned the fact that God wants us to be in an exclusive relationship with Him; just like He did with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, etc. However, there is a grave problem. How can evil, selfish, sensual, and polluted human beings be in an intimate and meaningful relationship with God?

God is holy!

We don’t have the time today to explore all the meanings of this fact. We will probably start with this the next time, but for now we only need to understand that God’s holiness is what separates Him from us.

God’s purpose all along has been to transform us into His likeness and provide the means whereby we can enter into this exclusive relationship and survive. For, without the intervention of His grace, we would be consumed by the awesome holiness of an almighty God.

Conclusion:

God has chosen us to be His very own possession. God has completed the necessary provision for us to share in His nature and character. It is an affront to the very nature of God for us to refuse His ultimate purposes and essentially say, “I’m okay God, I prefer to remain in my bondage to self-centered motivations and sensual desires.”

I believe it truly is the natural and normal response for every child of God that has really been born again and has become a new creature in Christ Jesus, to desire to have all that God’s grace has provided, not only for our salvation, but for our transformation.

Let us close the service today by singing the song:

Take Time to Be Holy # 656

Who Is Your Father?

(To download an mp3 file of this message, click on the title above. To listen now, click on the play button of the audio player shown.)

This is a message that was preached for Father's Day 2015 and it explores the need to model our lives after our heavenly Father.

Written Excerpts:

Introduction:

How many of us have ever heard these words: “You act just like your dad!” or “You sure got that from your father!”

Most of you know that we have two sons. One of them, Andy, looks more like me, and in some ways acts more like me, than our other son Wesley.

Now, there have been times when that has made me very proud, but there have also been times when it hasn’t!

Today I want to talk a little while about this common characteristic we all have that makes us look and act like our parents, and I want to apply it to our spiritual identity.

A little earlier we heard the Scripture reading from 1 John. I want to add another reading, which is found in…

John 8:37-47

Imagine the courage exhibited here for Jesus to look these Jewish religious leaders in the eye and tell them, “You are of your father the devil…”!

In direct contrast to this passage is the Scripture that was read earlier in the service…

1 John 3:1-3

Transition: For the next several minutes I want to identify some of the traits of these two “fathers” we’ve already read about (God and the Devil) and use them to help us identify which we most resemble.

I. Some of the traits of the Devil (There’s many we do not have time to describe today.)

A. He is a liar

John 8:44 … When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.

This passage does not mean that the devil never tells the truth. Sometimes he does tell the truth. However, it is teaching us that the basic character motivation of Satan is to deceive and mislead. If Satan ever does tell the truth it is because for the moment, the truth serves his overall motive of deception.

For Satan, telling the truth is merely utilitarian; that is, only used if it “works” for his ultimate devious purposes.

I imagine I speak for most of us when I say that I have met people that exhibit this same character trait. There are people who rarely tell the truth for the truth’s sake. We’ve learned by experience through hard lessons, that every statement out of their mouths is suspect and we know we can never rely on their words unless we verify them from some other more reliable source.

However, I know other folks who would not fit this description completely, but they will “bend the truth” and “fib a little” when it is deemed necessary to “save their hide.”

I am one who happens to believe that God is the father of truth and the devil is the father of lies, and our own practices in truth or deception will determine which one we more closely resemble.

I want to especially challenge all of the men and fathers here today. Let us all live in such a way that those who know us will absolutely know that we are men of the truth. This is especially necessary for our children and families. May every one of us be known of men of truth and men of integrity!

B. He is a lawless rebel

1 John 3:4, 8 (KJV) ⁴ Whosoever commits sin transgresses also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law. ⁸ He that commits sin is of the devil; for the devil sins from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.

In this passage, the Apostle John defines the word “sin” as anything (action or spirit) that opposes the law of God. If it is an action, it is a deed that violates God’s moral code of goodness and righteousness.

If it is an attitude or spirit, it is an attitude of self-rule, self-will, and direct opposition to the divine authority of God and His will.

The Bible tells us that Satan was originally lifted up with pride, which led him to oppose the authority of God and engage in direct opposition through rebellion.

What about you and me? Are we truly submitted to the will of God and His standards of righteousness and goodness, or do we demand and insist on having our own way?

The Bible says we are all born with a sin nature that naturally, left to itself, will lead us against God in rebellion to His authority. But, thank God, through the cleansing of the blood of Jesus, we can become completely yielded and submitted to Him.

Let us seek the transforming grace of God until we have been changed from lawless rebels into submissive servants of the Lord Jesus Christ.

C. He is a thief and a murderer

You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning,

This verse and others describe Satan as one who loves to steal and destroy anything and anyone he possibly can.

When any person refuses to let Jesus Christ come into their life and heart and transform them into His own image, then they leave themselves open for Satan to mold them more and more into his likeness.

Hatred (which Jesus said is the same as murder), gossip and evil speaking (assassinating someone’s reputation), and a host of other sinful behaviors fit right into these descriptions of Satan. When anyone yields to these impulses and gives themselves over to practicing them, they may not realize it or like to admit it, but they are identifying with the Devil as their father.

The Jews certainly didn’t like it when Jesus accused them of having the devil for a father (first phrase in verse 44), but Jesus was telling them like it was.

Who is your father?

II. Some of the traits of God

I suppose we could make it real simple by saying, “God is the opposite of everything we’ve said about the Devil.”

But, let’s be a little more specific.

Love, Purity and Truth

These three traits are only “scratching the surface” of what all could be said to describe our heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ.

These three characteristics are clearly taught in the two passages we have been referring to all along this morning, so we’ll mention them and acknowledge that the Bible presents many, many more traits about God that we don’t have time to mention now.

A. Love:

In direct contrast to the Devil who hurts and destroys, God is filled with love and compassion.

1 John 3 – God has lavished His great love upon us by making it possible for us to become His children, and by making us (loving) like Him.

There is no way to humanly and adequately describe the love of God. His love was demonstrated at the cross in the sacrificial death of His Son for the sins of the whole world. “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son…”

His love was demonstrated in the self-sacrificing and humble service Jesus portrayed to the weak, hurting and sorrowing people He met during His earthly ministry.

Dear friends, when we allow God’s love to flow through us to a hurting, dying world around us, we are identifying with our Father in heaven.

When we demonstrate that same kind of sacrificial love to our families and love ones, we show them how to imitate the model Father in heaven.

B. Purity

1 John 3:3 … everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.

While Satan is filled with evil and darkness, God is even more the fulfillment of all that is light and goodness and moral excellence. God is holy. God is righteous. God cannot tolerate even the slightest deviation from absolute purity and holiness.

God’s holiness is the standard and grounds for the requirement for His children to be holy as well. “Be ye holy, for I am holy.”

Let us not forget that the more we seek after holiness and purity, the more we resemble our Father in heaven. The more we turn away from righteousness and holiness, the more we make it appear as though God isn’t truly our Father.

C. Truth

John 8 – In this same passage where Jesus declares that the Devil is a liar and the father of lies, He clearly sets Himself distinctly apart from the Devil and claims to be a conveyor of truth.

Later in John’s Gospel Jesus makes a direct claim to be the embodiment of truth (14:6).

Truth, integrity, honesty, genuineness and authenticity are all words that describe the character and qualities of God Himself. Those words also describe the character of the child of God. It ought to be just as unthinkable for a Christian to be a conveyor of deception as it is for us to think that God could lie. (Tit. 1:2 …God, that cannot lie…; Heb. 6:18 …impossible for God to lie…)

Conclusion:

There’s so much more that could be said about the nature of God and how we as His children should emulate Him and model our lives and our behavior after Him.

We all have a background of living or being like the Devil. We were born with the nature of sin, and if we haven’t been to the cross for the remedy, then we certainly have continued to follow his example.

But, if we have been to Calvary, then the blood of Jesus cleanses from sin and transforms us into the likeness of God’s Son.

Who is your father today?

If you’ve been reminded today that your life and testimony does not reflect the image of God, but you’re more like the those whom Jesus said were children of the Devil, I’m glad I can tell you today that it is always appropriate to “change families!”

We’ve heard in the news at times about young people who wish to “divorce their parents.” Well, spiritually speaking, you can “divorce” your father the Devil, if you’ve discovered that you belong to him, and God is always ready to adopt a new son/daughter into His great family! Praise God!

Christ Is Building His Church

(To download an mp3 file of this message, click on the title above. To listen now, click on the play button of the audio player shown.)

This is a sermon based on Matthew 16:18 and explores some of the characteristics of the church that Jesus is building.

Written Excerpts:

Introduction:

What kind of church is Jesus building?

I. The Foundation

There has been a lot of debate about what Jesus meant when he said, “Upon this rock I will build my church.” Roman Catholicism has promoted the idea that He was talking about Peter being the first “pope” or ecclesiastical authority. Others have proposed the thought that Jesus meant that Peter’s confession was the rock upon which the church would be built.

One writer (R.C.H. Lenski) says, “Nor does "this rock" signify Peter's confession. The church is not built on the confession her members make, which would change the effect into the cause. By her confession the church shows on what she is built. She rests on the reality which Peter confessed, namely on Jesus, "the Christ, the Son of the living God."

1 Corinthians 3:10-11 (KJV) According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Ephesians 2:20 (NKJV) having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone,

What these verses teach us is that Jesus Christ is the foundation and the chief cornerstone but the apostles and prophets have laid down the foundation in the sense that they have proclaimed the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. They have proclaimed the reconciliation provided by Jesus. They have proclaimed the authority, the deity, and the saving power of Jesus.

Jesus Christ is building His church and its foundation is Jesus Himself. He is the center focus, He is the support, He is the root source of life, and He is One that guides it and brings it to its full potential.

Wayside Community Church is one small part of the Church of Jesus Christ and we stand solidly and unapologetically on the fact that Jesus Christ is the reason we exist. We stand on the fact of His full divinity, His sinless life, His sacrificial death, His victorious bodily resurrection, and His soon return in power and glory. Hallelujah!

II. The Structure

When we talk about the structure of the church that Jesus is building, I want to refer back to the passage recorded in Ephesians 2.

Ephesians 2:19-22 (KJV) Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; ²⁰And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; ²¹ In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: ²² In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

Paul said to the Ephesians, “The whole building is fitly framed together.”

Another translation reads like this, “In Him the whole structure is joined together.” (NRSV)

The context of this statement indicates that the building or the structure of the church is made up of the saints and fellow citizens in the household of God, or the redeemed.

There are various analogies that are used in the Bible to indicate our status when we are born again and become believers in Jesus. Family of God (sons, children, adopted…); Fellow citizens rather than foreigners; etc.

You and I and everyone who has bowed in humble repentance and confession of sin and asked Christ to come into our lives to transform us by His Spirit are all a part of this “building” we call the church. We are a part of the framework and structure that is carrying out the mission and purposes of Christ in our generation just like millions of others have done in their generations.

III. The Character

When we speak of the character of the church that Jesus is building, we mean that it is a holy church.

Holiness is the quality of deity. Those who are members of this “building” are growing into a holy sanctuary for the Spirit of God to live in. There doesn’t seem to be nearly as much emphasis on holiness in American churches as there used to be, but that is one of the truly biblical qualities of the church that Jesus is building.

It is a cooperating church. Every member is supplying his/her share of the overall composition. Each one is doing his/her part to effectively accomplish the mission of Christ for the transformation of every purpose into the image of Christ.

Ephesians 4:16 (NKJV) from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.

No one is a spectator. No one merely sits on the sidelines and watches. Everyone uses their God-given gifts and abilities to advance the kingdom of God on earth.

It is a developing and growing church. Spiritually and numerically.

The language and grammatical structure indicates that this is not a static structure that never changes, but it is dynamic and is growing and changing as God works with each part of the building. It is growing numerically as the “Lord adds to the church daily such as should be saved.” (Acts 2:47)

It is growing in spiritual maturity as the Holy Spirit leads every member into a deeper relationship with Christ and a deeper understanding of the life of a disciple.

It is a victorious church.

Matthew 16:18 (NKJV) And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.

(A.T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament.) We have here the figure of two buildings, the Church of Christ on the Rock, [and] the House of Death (Hades). "In the Old Testament the 'gates of Hades' (Sheol) never bears any other meaning … than death," McNeile claims... It is not the picture of Hades attacking Christ's church, but of death's possible victory over the church.

See Acts 2:22-32

The gates of hell (or gates of death) were not able to confine the Son of God and He rose victorious over death and the grave. Neither will the gates of death be able to confine or overcome the church.

The individual members of the church may die of old age, disease, accidents or tragedy, but every one of them will be resurrected just like our Rock and Foundation, Jesus Christ, was raised. Individual members of the church may die and leave this world, but the church will go on living and conquering and fulfilling God’s purpose.

The spirit of death and culture of death may spread and overtake more and more territory, but there will always be a living remnant. The true church will always be alive and thriving even in the midst of death all around it.

(A.T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament.) The wealth of imagery in Matthew 16:18 makes it difficult to decide each detail, but the main point is clear. The ekklēsia which consists of those confessing Christ as Peter has just done will not cease. The gates of Hades or bars of Sheol will not close down on it. Christ will rise and will keep his church alive.

We sang a chorus in prayer meeting recently that was written by H. Robb French, There’s more with us than be with them, we’re on the winning side.

Conclusion:

By being a part of the church of Jesus Christ, we are a part of the greatest thing in this world.

We’re a part of the biggest thing that will continue to live and flourish all through the unending ages of eternity.

We’re not all of the church, but we’re a part of it and we will enjoy every benefit that Jesus died to provide for His body – the church.