February 10, 2013 AD, by Pastor Ben Willis

Matthew 10:16-31 [NLTse]

16 “Look, I am sending you out as sheep among wolves. So be as shrewd as snakes and harmless as doves. 17 But beware! For you will be handed over to the courts and will be flogged with whips in the synagogues. 18 You will stand trial before governors and kings because you are My followers. But this will be your opportunity to tell the rulers and other unbelievers about me. 19 When you are arrested, don’t worry about how to respond or what to say. God will give you the right words at the right time.20 For it is not you who will be speaking—it will be the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.

21 “A brother will betray his brother to death, a father will betray his own child, and children will rebel against their parents and cause them to be killed. 22 And all nations will hate you because you are my followers. But everyone who endures to the end will be saved. 23 When you are persecuted in one town, flee to the next. I tell you the truth, the Son of Man will return before you have reached all the towns of Israel.

24 “Students are not greater than their teacher, and slaves are not greater than their master.25 Students are to be like their teacher, and slaves are to be like their master. And since I, the Master of the Household, have been called the prince of demons, the members of My Household will be called by even worse names!

26 “But don’t be afraid of those who threaten you. For the time is coming when everything that is covered will be revealed, and all that is secret will be made known to all. 27 What I tell you now in the darkness, shout abroad when daybreak comes. What I whisper in your ear, shout from the housetops for all to hear!

28 “Don’t be afraid of those who want to kill your body; they cannot touch your soul. Fear only God, who can destroy both soul and body in Hell. 29 What is the price of two sparrows—one copper coin? But not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it. 30 And the very hairs on your head are all numbered. 31 So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.

I was recently talking with a friend who was considering purchasing a handgun for protection. (I know in the aftermath of the Newtown Elementary School shootings that some people have looked to guns as a way of protecting themselves and their families.) It got me thinking – this idea of protecting ourselves from society; this idea of protecting ourselves from “bad guys,” “crazies,” “people that have snapped” – it got me thinking…

If I have a handgun to protect myself from somebody who’s a “bad guy” or somebody who’s snapped: If they kill me, and Jesus has given me the confidence by adopting me into His family – has given me the confidence in salvation – to know where I’m going (that is, to be with Him in Heaven until He makes all things new), and that comforts me; and if the realities of the Holy Spirit’s saving work in my life – the ways I’ve been changed and am being changed for the good – and that giving them hope to know where I would be going, if that would all be a comfort to my wife and my children and my parents and all of you, my loved ones; then, in a manner of speaking, if I died or was killed, I’d be OK, and you’d all be OK… (Of course, you’d perhaps grieve, but your grief would be buoyed by the hope God would have given you in the promises of my being with Him in Heaven…)

But if I somehow killed them – killed the “bad guy, killed “the crazy,” killed someone who’d snapped – then, likely, they wouldn’t be ready, overwhelmed by all their troubles and likely still in their sins, and likely they’d end up going to the other place. So if I died or was killed, I’d be OK because I’m ready to die. But the ”bad guy” or the troubled guy, they wouldn’t be ready…

It all got me thinking, “Are you ready?” Are you ready to die, if that’s what comes? Or do you feel you need to protect your life here? Do you feel like you need to save your life here? Do you need to save yourself?

(I’m not talking about people that have handguns because they enjoy target-shooting and all that kind of stuff. I’ve never shot a handgun. I’ve never been target-shooting. People say it’s fun. Maybe it is? That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the idea of having guns to protect ourselves. I’m talking about all the extremes that some people can go to so that we can protect ourselves…)

I want to challenge us that this is a spiritual issue. It is a question that our faith as Christian men and women and boys and girls, as those of us who are getting to know God through Jesus Christ better and better by the Holy Spirit, and who are getting to love God through Jesus Christ better and better by the Holy Spirit. It’s a spiritual question – a spiritual issue – for us: Protecting ourselves…

It leads me to ask all of us, all of you this morning: Do you know where you are going? Do you have confidence, not just in your faith in Jesus Christ, but in what He has promised is true for us because of that faith?

Because the Bible tells us, as Christians, that the idea of our death should not fill us with fear but with joy! Paul says about himself and his missionary companions, “We would rather be away from these earthly bodies, for then we will be at home with the Lord,” in 2 Corinthians 5:8. And he writes to the church in Philippi: “For to me, living means living for Christ, and dying is even better. But if I live, I can do more fruitful work for Christ. So I really don’t know which is better. I’m torn between two desires: I long to go and be with Christ, which would be far better for me.” (1:21-23)

Yes, the Scriptures reassure us that not even death will “separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39) Once a believer has died, though his or her physical body remains on the Earth and is buried, at the moment of death their soul (though in some places it’s spoken of as their spirit) goes immediately into the presence of God with rejoicing!

We’ve already seen Paul’s writings to the Corinthians and Philippians about preferring to be away from the body and at home with the Lord, and that to depart and be with Christ would be far better! But our Lord Jesus also speaks to the repentant revolutionary on the cross, “Today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43) Sound joyful to you? You bet! And the author of Hebrews writes that each time we Christians come together to worship that we come, not only into the presence of the angels, God in Heaven, and the Lord Jesus, but also into the presence of “the spirits of the righteous ones in Heaven who have now been made perfect.” (12:23)

So don’t let the teachings about Purgatory steal your sense of hope and joy concerning Heaven, because if we’re in Christ when we die then Christ has fully paid the penalty for all our sins and there is no further condemnation or need for purging our sin further.

And don’t let the teachings about Limbo steal your sense of hope and joy concerning Heaven. In the case of Old Covenant believers the Bible makes clear that God is the god of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and that although these Patriarchs may seem dead to us that they are very much alive and in His presence to God! (Matthew 22:32; and see Luke 16:19-31) And in the case of infants or young children who’ve never been baptized, the Bible makes clear that God knows His Own, that He’s chosen us before the creation of the world, whether we are infants or adults, baptized or unbaptized.

And don’t let the teachings about “soul-sleep” steal your sense of hope and joy concerning Heaven. (“Soul-sleep” is the teaching that upon death believers go into a state of unconscious existence – like sleep – and the next thing they are conscious of is being with Christ when He returns and raises them to eternal life.) The Bible speaks of death as “sleep” only metaphorically, such as when Jesus says to His disciples about the death of Lazarus, “Our friend, Lazarus, has fallen asleep, but I go to awake him out of sleep,” in John 11:11 when Jesus is speaking about going to raise Lazarus from the dead. This and, of course, the passages about going immediately into Jesus’ joyous presence in Heaven that we’ve already read, make clear the promised reality that our souls (or spirits) go to be with Him immediately upon our deaths, awaiting the Great Resurrection and the consummation of the New Heaven and the New Earth!

Let’s not miss this, because all of this impacts our growing older, the aches and pains of aging, of this body breaking down; and of all the troubles we can have living in this fallen world. God in His Own wisdom has chosen not to drive out all trouble – the wicked, the unclean, dark powers, the cruel, the unjust – from this world. He has chosen in His wisdom to allow these things to continue until all His enemies are destroyed, the last being death.

And He has chosen not to grant us the fullness of salvation here: So our bodies know weakness; our bodies know the failure of systems breaking down; our bodies know death… And this death is not a punishment for sin, because there is “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1)

The deaths we experience as Christians are the realities of living in a world that has not yet unilaterally bowed the knee to Jesus Christ. And living in a world where our salvation is not all that it will be when the Lord returns to make all things new; as we live in a world where the Holy Spirit has been given us as a down payment – a foretaste – of the fullness that God has for us to come.

So growing old, getting sick, these are all most fully opportunities to show God’s glory to the watching world. You can go to any rehab, hospital, and doctor’s offices and dentist’s offices and hear people moan and groan, complain and grumble, about their bodies having trouble. And maybe they’ll blame it on their doctors, maybe they’ll blame it on their bodies, maybe they’ll blame it on God, whoever, whatever. But few, if any people, will you find glorifying God and trusting Him with their troubles, perhaps saying: “Yeah, I’ve got this or that going on, but, worse-comes-to-worse I know where I’m going. And although I hope and trust that God’s going to use this doctor to help me, even if He doesn’t…

It makes me think of the prophet Daniel’s friends – Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego – “We believe that our God can protect us from your fiery furnace, King Nebuchadnezzar. But even if He does not we will not bow down to your golden statue!” We believe that God can save us and heal us, but even if He does not… We believe He can restore us from the troubles of old age and refresh us and renew us and keep us from all illness and infirmity, but even if He does not we will not forsake Him Who has never forsaken us!

Because we know He has given us a promise of life everlasting, and that until He returns – even if we were to die today – that until He returns that we have good things to look forward to after our death: Life with Christ in Paradise; a better, completely spiritual life with Him; more intimate than we are able to experience with Him here in this fallen world; awaiting the fulfillment of all things as we await the time of His return…

From glory to glory! After all, this Earth can be pretty glorious sometimes. But the intermediate state – Heaven! – how even more glorious that will be enjoying Jesus’ mighty, glorious presence! And of course, more glorious still, the New Heaven and the New Earth where we will live with Him in our resurrected bodies – you and I perfected and living face-to-face with Him in that perfectly material and spiritual creation. “Onward and upward for eternity!” as C.S. Lewis put it… (“The Last Battle”)

So let us glorify God with your bodies! In our troubles let us give Him praise. Let us see, in our troubles, opportunities to learn perseverance of faith. Let us see, in our troubles, opportunities to be better molded and shaped, by the Potter’s hand, into Jesus’ likeness. Let us see, in our troubles, our infirmities, our aches, our pains, our gray, our weakness, our inability to do what we used to be able to do… In our getting sick more readily… Let us see in our lives in this fallen world opportunities to give our Lord and our Savior endless, unending praise to draw men and women and boys and girls to Him as we celebrate His goodness in the good times and the bad times. As we celebrate the abundant goodness of this One Who is Himself the very standard of goodness!

Because this life is not the end. Because this world is not our home. Because the end Christ has for us is glory, if we will be faithful and true to Him in this life. And because the home Christ has for us is Heaven, and a New Heaven and a New Earth, if we’ll be faithful in our lives as strangers and temporary inhabitants of this fallen world!

To God be the glory forever and ever. Amen.