The Gospel of Luke 6:20-38 [NLTse]
20 Then Jesus turned to His disciples and said, “God blesses you who are poor, for the Kingdom of God is yours. 21 God blesses you who are hungry now, for you will be satisfied. God blesses you who weep now, for in due time you will laugh.
22 What blessings await you when people hate you and exclude you and mock you and curse you as evil because you follow the Son of Man. 23 When that happens, be happy! Yes, leap for joy! For a great reward awaits you in Heaven. And remember, their ancestors treated the ancient prophets that same way.

24 “What sorrow awaits you who are rich, for you have your only happiness now. 25 What sorrow awaits you who are fat and prosperous now, for a time of awful hunger awaits you. What sorrow awaits you who laugh now, for your laughing will turn to mourning and sorrow. 26 What sorrow awaits you who are praised by the crowds, for their ancestors also praised false prophets.

27 “But to you who are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies! Do good to those who hate you. 28 Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you. 29 If someone slaps you on one cheek, offer the other cheek also. If someone demands your coat, offer your shirt also. 30 Give to anyone who asks; and when things are taken away from you, don’t try to get them back. 31 Do to others as you would like them to do to you.

32 “If you love only those who love you, why should you get credit for that? Even sinners love those who love them! 33 And if you do good only to those who do good to you, why should you get credit? Even sinners do that much! 34 And if you lend money only to those who can repay you, why should you get credit? Even sinners will lend to other sinners for a full return.

35 “Love your enemies! Do good to them. Lend to them without expecting to be repaid. Then your reward from Heaven will be very great, and you will truly be acting as children of the Most High, for He is kind to those who are unthankful and wicked. 36 You must be compassionate, just as your Father is compassionate.
37 “Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you. Forgive others, and you will be forgiven. 38 Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.”

Sermon
Anybody here like fast food? Amy and I were vegetarians for a while in our early marriage. But every day, when we took a walk together, we would pass by this McDonald’s and have to smell the French fry aroma… (I’m convinced they pump that smell out of their restaurants to torture and entice those walking by…)

After about a month of sticking so well to our Black Bean and Cheese Enchiladas with Ranchero Sauce and Eggplant Parmesan and Three-Bean Vegetarian Chili we couldn’t take the smell any more: We went in, ordered a large fry, and… “Ahh!”

I’m more of a Wendy’s-guy these days, [take out Wendy’s bag] but I still love French fries. And yet, something always seems to get confused when I order. Because the cook always serves me up an order of fries that looks like this [taking the typical fries out of the bag], when, in my head, my order of fries looks like this! [Take the “God-sized” order out of the bag.] [Set the two boxes of fries on the Lord’s Table.]

In our reading from Luke, the Lord speaks of four conditions in which people can truly know His blessing when they are following Him. He says, “Blessed are you who are poor… blessed are you who hunger now… blessed are you who weep now… and, blessed are you when people hate you.” And yet, who wants to be poor or hungry? Who wants to cry all the time or be hated by everybody around you? These are situations we want to get out of! These are situations that make us think that God is against us; that we’ve done something wrong that He’s punishing us for!

But the Lord Jesus says that such circumstances are okay to be in and go through in life. He says that such times are not a sign of God’s disfavor, they are just a part of life in this sinful world. In fact, He tells us, when you’re in such circumstances, know that God is with you to bless you: So, persevere and keep trusting God; because the Kingdom of God is yours, and in due time you will have more than you could ever possibly imagine, be satisfied, you will laugh, and you will be proven right in front of all those who did you wrong…

Of course, the Lord is not saying that every poor person or hungry person, mourner or outcast will have a place in God’s Kingdom. He is saying that Christians are much better off being poor, being hungry, crying all the time, and being excluded, rejected, and hated (if that is their circumstances), while following Him and being a part of His Kingdom than being rich, fat, happy, and popular, while satisfying their own desires and not being a part of His Kingdom.
That is why they were “blessed”.

In contrast with the disciples who’d given up everything to follow Jesus were those people who refused to follow Him if it meant they had to give up anything at all. Their things and their status was more important to them than Christ and eternal life. They didn’t understand the gravity of the situation confronting them: Heaven or Hell! When having to choose between the world’s happiness and success and the Kingdom’s happiness and success, they chose the world. And so the good things they knew in this life would be the only good things they would know. In the world to come it would all be taken from them…

The Lord Jesus goes on to share seven aspects of unconditional love. They are each supernaturally empowered. A person can’t truly love like this on their own, only in Christ. And such love is proof of the Holy Spirit and Christ’s righteousness upon a person.
1. Jesus said, “Treat lovingly those who are openly hostile towards you.”
2. He said, “Do good towards and treat well those who passionately dislike you.”
3. “Always build up and say good things about those who are always being nasty towards you and putting you down.”
4. “Ask the Lord’s help for and blessing on those who are actively hurting you.”
5. “Don’t take revenge on or try to get even with those who hurt you.”
6. “Give freely to all who ask and even to those who want to take.” And,
7. “Treat others the way you want to be treated.”
With all the talk about “bullying”, have any of us parents taught our kids to respond to bullies in these ways? That’s the path of blessing. That’s the way of love. One of the fundamental principles of the universe is that what we plant we will harvest. (Call it “karma” or say that “what comes around goes around”, but it is a simple fact of life that)
• Showing mercy leads to being shown mercy. (And showing great mercy leads to being shown great mercy!)
• Judging others leads to being judged. (And condemning others leads to being condemned.)
• Forgiving others leads to being forgiven. (And forgiving others even their horrific offenses will lead us being forgiven our horrific offenses.)
• And, giving to others leads to being given to. (And giving generously, lavishly, and overflowingly leads to being given to generously, lavishly, and overflowingly.)
The measure we give in showing mercy, judging others, giving and forgiving is the measure we will receive…

The world has small, medium, large, and sometimes even “Super-size”. But Jesus is coming, and He wants us, Christians, to be showing everyone around us “God-size” while we wait for Him: Pressed down, shaken together, and running over. The Kingdom of God is at hand!

Luke 1:67-80
As our reading begins, John the Baptist has just been born…
May the Lord add His blessing to the reading of His Word:

67 Then his father, Zechariah, was filled with the Holy Spirit and gave this prophecy:
68 “Praise the Lord, the God of Israel, because He has visited and redeemed His people. 69 He has sent us a mighty Savior from the royal line of His servant David, 70 just as He promised through His holy prophets long ago. 71 Now we will be saved from our enemies and from all who hate us. 72 He has been merciful to our ancestors by remembering His sacred covenant—73 the covenant He swore with an oath to our ancestor Abraham. 74 We have been rescued from our enemies so we can serve God without fear, 75 in holiness and righteousness for as long as we live.

76 “And you, my little son, will be called the prophet of the Most High, because you will prepare the way for the Lord. 77 You will tell His people how to find salvation through forgiveness of their sins. 78 Because of God’s tender mercy, the morning light from Heaven is about to break upon us, 79 to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide us to the path of peace.” 80 John grew up and became strong in spirit. And he lived in the wilderness until he began his public ministry to Israel.
The Word of the Lord…

Sermon
When friends, coworkers, husbands and wives, and others end an argument or a fight these days, you can hear one ask the other, “So, are we good?” And sometimes the other person can be heard saying, “Yeah, we’re good,” even when they’re still holding a grudge and things really aren’t “good”.

But God’s not like that. He wants us to know – to be assured – when we are “good” with Him and when we are not.
Under the Old Covenant, God created a “way” for His people to be in right relationship with Him. This “way” was dependent upon people obeying God’s commands, His Law.

Let’s take a look at this by opening our Bibles to Deuteronomy 30:15-18…
After Israel’s exodus from Egypt – when God set them free from their slavery there (about 1,200 years before Christ) – Moses preached to them as they were getting ready to enter the land God had promised to give them, the land we today call “Israel”. And Moses preached these words that are now recorded in Deuteronomy 30,
“Listen! Today I am giving you a choice between life and death, between prosperity and disaster. For I command you this day to love the Lord your God and to keep His commands, decrees, and regulations by walking in His ways. If you do this, you will live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you and the land you are about to enter and occupy.
“But if your heart turns away and you refuse to listen, and if you are drawn away to serve and worship other gods, then I warn you now that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live a long, good life in the land you are crossing the Jordan to occupy.”

So, through Moses, the Lord was giving His people a choice: Life or death. And, how did Moses say that the people could be assured of a prosperous life in good-standing with God? Showing God they loved Him by obeying His commands.
Now, that’s not all that different from how Jesus would later talk about how we relate to God: In John 14:15 the Lord Jesus said that if we love God we’ll obey His commands. But look at verses 17-18 and we see the difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant: What did God say would happen to His people if they didn’t keep His commands? He says that they would be punished for their sin: God would punish them with death for their disobedience.
Now, God is unchanging. There really isn’t a “God of the Old Testament” and a “God of the New Testament”, as some will say. No. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And yet we can tend to think that God was harsher in the Old Testament and more forgiving in the New Testament.

But this isn’t really an accurate way of thinking about God. God showed compassion and grace all throughout the Old Testament, as time and time again Israel disobeyed and turned from following Him. God even allowed for the sacrificial system so that people could have their sins paid for by the life of an animal instead of their own lives.
Even so, under the Old Covenant, if you didn’t obey all of God’s commands – if you sinned against Him – you were unable to completely clear that debt you owed God. You could sacrifice animals, but you had to sacrifice them again and again, never being truly clean; never really being “good” with God.

How many of you wanted something that saw someone else having today? I mean, did you see someone’s dress and think: I wish I had that dress? Anyone here look at someone else’s car and think: I wish I had that car? Did you look at someone else’s parents or someone else’s kids and think: I wish they were mine instead of the ones I have? (Don’t raise your hands…) Have any of you been worried at all today? Anyone here had feelings of worry about our nation? Had worries about money? Had worries about the health or safety of any of your loved ones?

I ask you all that because it’s all sin: Wanting what others have or being worried about how-things-are or about what-might-happen is sin. And sin always comes between us and God. And since God’s commands tend to show us just how often we’re sinning, the Law really just showed Israel how impossible it was to be at peace with God because sin was always there and because sin always got in the way!

But the prophets said that “The Old System under the law of Moses was only a shadow, a dim preview of the good things to come, not the good things themselves. The sacrifices under that system were repeated again and again, year after year, but they were never able to provide perfect cleansing for those who came to worship.” The Old Covenant was good because it provided a way for God’s people to know Him. But it wasn’t perfect. From the beginning God had planned to put into motion a perfect plan, a new “way”, a New Covenant.

This is where Jesus comes in.
In our Scripture reading, John the Baptist’s dad, Zechariah the priest, is filled with the Holy Spirit, praising God as he anticipates the birth of Jesus Christ. Because in Jesus, Zechariah says,
• The Lord has visited and redeemed His people;
• According to Zechariah, the Lord Jesus is a mighty Savior!
• Jesus will save God’s people from our enemies and from all who hate us;
• In Jesus Christ we have been rescued from our enemies so we can serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness for as long as we live!
And how will Jesus do all of this? How will He bring to us this great salvation? Through the forgiveness of our sins.
As Zechariah thinks about the Lord Jesus’ birth he says, “the morning light from Heaven is about to break upon us! To give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide us to the path of peace!”
In the Old Covenant, the blood of animals paid for the sins of the people. But these sacrifices needed to be offered over and over again, and were a constant reminder of the distance between God and His people because – as we showed in asking about wanting what others have and worrying – just as we constantly sin, God’s Old Covenant people constantly sinned. However, as God’s Son, Jesus’ life was the perfect offering to cover the sins of all people once and for all.
Jesus is the new “way”. He doesn’t point to the new “way”. He doesn’t represent the new “way”. He doesn’t teach us the new “way”. He is the new “way”!

In His love and wisdom, God sent His only, perfect Son to die in our place. This ushered in a New Covenant, one marked by grace through faith in His sacrifice to forgive us our sins. If we believe in Jesus and accept His sacrifice on our behalf, we are once and forever saved from our sins.

It’s not, “Did I do more good today than I did sin?” No. We don’t have to keep track of our sins, beating ourselves up for each and all the ways we’ve failed and fallen out of step with God. No. We are covered: Once on the cross, and for all of our sins – once and for all – we are covered. Through Jesus’ selfless sacrifice on the cross for us, we can have peace with God – even while we’re sinning – for eternity. And, as we’re sinning, and we’re realizing that we have peace with God, even so, it makes us want to stop sinning: [To the Lord] “I don’t want to do that to You!”

When the angel announced Jesus’ birth to the shepherds, what did the angel say? The angel said he had “good news” that would bring “great joy” for all God’s people: A Savior has been born! With His death and resurrection, Jesus forever took away the burden of our sins and created a new “way” of relating to God, through Himself, through His once and for all sacrifice!

Christmas is a celebration of the Lord Jesus’ birth, but is also be a celebration of the freedom we have to be God’s children. We don’t have to work to be His children, we can just be…

On account of the birth of Jesus Christ, we have been rescued from our enemies – including sin and death and self-condemnation – so we can serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness for as long as we live.

Mark 14:32-42 [NLTse]
32 They went to a place called Gethsemane, and Jesus said to his disciples, “Sit here while I pray.” 33 He took Peter, James and John along with him, and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled. 34 “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,” he said to them. “Stay here and keep watch.”

35 Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. 36 “Abba,[f] Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”
37 Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. “Simon,”he said to Peter, “are you asleep? Couldn’t you keep watch for one hour?38 Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
39 Once more he went away and prayed the same thing. 40 When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. They did not know what to say to him.

41 Returning the third time, he said to them, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Enough! The hour has come. Look, the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of sinners. 42 Rise! Let us go! Here comes my betrayer!”

Sermon
For years, when I thought of prayer, I saw it as an obligation: A discipline that needed to be a part of my daily routine if I was to be a good Christian. I will never forget the day God decided it was time for me to grow out of that small thought.
I was struggling with God! Over the years I had found myself having discussions and arguments with God. It didn’t make a difference to me that He had always proven right in the past, this time He had definitely got it all wrong!

I was hurting, and I was resentful of the Lord’s absence and silence in the midst of my crisis. I was afraid to be honest about my resentment, so it took me a while before I dared to boldly make my complaint. But, eventually, my complaints poured out like a torrent as I listed my faithful efforts to deal with the circumstance. I remember being amazed to hear myself defend and promote myself before God. It was obvious to me that I had done my very best but God remained unfeelingly absent!

As I recall, I was amazed at His response to the ways I was feeling so sorry for myself and to the ways I was being so critical of Him?! Because, as I wound down, I had a growing sense of the presence of Jesus. He seemed to be almost tangibly near to me.

I had the sense that Jesus had been graciously waiting for me to finish! In response to my self-righteous litany of personal faithfulness, my heart heard Him say: “That’s right, Benjamin, you did all those things and much more than you remember! BUT, do you know why you did those things?” The Holy Spirit then opened my eyes to see our wonderful Father “high and lifted up”, sovereign and loving.

“You have prayed many prayers,” He said. “And not one of them has fallen unheard before Me. And I am going to answer above and beyond what you have thought to pray, Benjamin!” He then informed me that the only reason I had even thought of the prayers I had prayed was because I had “glimpsed dimly” what He had shown me in His Own heart! He was teaching me that when I felt like praying it was because He had initiated the prayer!

I have always felt a close affinity with David! His walk with God was so spontaneous, so loving and trusting, so vulnerable, so appealing to me that I have always aspired to be like him. One day I was reading 2 Samuel 7, thoroughly enjoying the conversation David was having with our God, when – it seemed like for the first time – I read David’s words in verse 27, “For You, O Lord of hosts, God of Israel, have revealed this to your servant, saying, ‘I will build you a house.’ Therefore, your servant found it in his heart to pray this prayer to You.”

The Father had taught me that when I felt like praying that it was because He was calling me to prayer. Now He was teaching me that what I prayed for He had inspired! And immediately other Scripture came to mind: “…without Me you can do nothing…” “…we do not know what we should pray for as we ought…” GOD INITIATES PRAYER and GOD INSPIRES PRAYER! He shows me when and what to pray!

Prayer has never been the same for me since. I saw that, while my prayers can be merely the expression of my own ideas, if I choose, that prayer is intended to be a transfer of God’s thoughts and plans into my heart!
The Father wants me to share His heart!! He wants me to be a part of what He is doing! Prayer is intended to be at our Father’s impulse! At His inspiration!

Abba was showing me that prayer was both natural – from me – and supernatural – from God! That, when praying rightly, that God is bridging the gap between Himself and me!

Jesus said, “Ask, and ye shall receive.” James said. “You do not have because you do not ask…or ask amiss.” I think we instinctively know that we can ask. And we know that we should not ask amiss (selfishly). What we often don’t know is that God simply wants us to want what He wants!

As I received the revelations that God initiates and inspires prayer, as I recognized that I was actually praying what originated in God’s heart, I realized that that meant that God desired the answer to those prayers more than I did! And the immediate result was, “Thank You, Father, for what You are going to do!”

Whenever I would face a situation that seemed discouraging, difficult, or even devastating the Holy Spirit would remind me of the reality of God’s heart filling my heart. I would then change my prayer from, “Please, God…” to “Thank You, Father, for what You are going to do!” And problems became possibilities: Possibilities for God to act!

Romans I shows us the importance of such thanksgiving to God. Human beings have become futile thinkers and human hearts have darkened because we have not thanked God! Thanksgiving is an attitude God has designed us for and intends for us to choose! Praying from a place of thanksgiving – for what God has initiated and inspired – is vital to a healthy relationship with our Father! It is living in reality! It is choosing to believe that God’s promises and faithfulness are more real than our circumstances.

“For the things that are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.” (2 Cor. 4:18)
Burdensome and heavy prayers become outpourings of faith, hope, and love for our Father as we give thanks for what He is doing in our troublesome and wearying circumstances. Prayer is a joy and our privilege!

Introduction
Our Scripture this morning is from Mark 9:1-13. The Lord Jesus has just been teaching His disciples about self-sacrifice, the importance of living according to the Father’s will and not their own, and telling them about His return, saying, “If anyone is ashamed of Me and My message in these adulterous and sinful days, the Son of Man will be ashamed of that person when He returns in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

Mark 9:1-13 [NLTse]
Jesus went on to say, “I tell you the truth, some standing here right now will not die before they see the Kingdom of God arrive in great power!”

2 Six days later Jesus took Peter, James, and John, and led them up a high mountain to be alone. As the men watched, Jesus’ appearance was transformed, 3 and His clothes became dazzling white, far whiter than any earthly bleach could ever make them. 4 Then Elijah and Moses appeared and began talking with Jesus.

5 Peter exclaimed, “Rabbi, it’s wonderful for us to be here! Let’s make three shelters as memorials—one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 6 He said this because he didn’t really know what else to say, for they were all terrified.
7 Then a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is My dearly loved Son. Listen to Him.” 8 Suddenly, when they looked around, Moses and Elijah were gone, and they saw only Jesus with them.
9 As they went back down the mountain, He told them not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. 10 So they kept it to themselves, but they often asked each other what He meant by “rising from the dead.”

11 Then they asked Him, “Why do the teachers of religious law insist that Elijah must return before the Messiah comes?”
12 Jesus responded, “Elijah is indeed coming first to get everything ready. Yet why do the Scriptures say that the Son of Man must suffer greatly and be treated with utter contempt? 13 But I tell you, Elijah has already come, and they chose to abuse him, just as the Scriptures predicted.”

Sermon
With all of the busy-ness of life in the first-century world, and with all of the busy-ness that surrounded Him on account of people wanting to hear Him teach and come to Him for healing, the Lord Jesus valued time alone with His Father in Heaven. In our reading, the Lord Jesus has taken three of His closest disciples – Peter, James, and John – and hiked up a mountain to get away from the crowds and activity and the pressures and demands of the world to be alone together.

Luke tells us that the four men were praying, but that Peter, James, and John had fallen asleep. When they woke up they saw the Lord transfigured, as Mark describes Him: His clothes dazzling-white, and that looking at His face was like looking into the sun at its brightest!

Mark tells us that Moses and Elijah were there talking with the Lord Jesus when they awoke. (How they knew the two to be Moses and Elijah – if they heard the Lord call them by name, or if the Holy Spirit gave them this knowledge – we don’t know.) But Luke tells us that they were talking with the Lord about His soon-coming death and resurrection from the dead.

Mark tells us that all of the sudden they were enveloped by a cloud, but Matthew’s account makes clear that it was not a dark storm cloud or even a misty, foggy cloud. Matthew says it was a “bright” cloud, the shekinah of God – the cloud of His glory! The cloud that led Israel through the desert to the Promised Land. The cloud that rested on the Mercy Seat beneath the golden cherubim in the Temple’s Holy of Holies. When you see a halo around someone’s head, that symbolizes the shekinah of God. The Lord Jesus’ dazzling appearance here on the mountain is the shekinah of God showing the disciples His true nature! And Peter, James, and John heard God’s voice around them in the cloud, saying, “This is My Son Whom I dearly love. Listen to Him!” (But, “listen to Him” came with the nuance of not just always hearing what Jesus had to say but also always doing and acting on whatever it was He said.)

I quickly mentioned above that the Lord Jesus’ dazzling clothes and flashing, blinding face was the shekinah of God showing the watching disciples His true nature. This word “transfigure” that we use to describe the change in Jesus that took place on the mountain, comes from the Greek word metamorphoo, where we get our word “metamorphosis”.

Metamorphoo speaks of someone or something’s inner characteristics being made visible. When referring to a person, metamorphoo is describing how one’s outer appearance begins to more truly represent that person’s inner nature.

For instance, people who receive Jesus Christ as their Savior and who seek to follow Him daily as their Lord often become more joyful and peaceful inside. That inside joy and peace is often noticed by those around them in the ways these new believers handle difficult situations, and because they can tend to smile more and seem more relaxed. You can often hear of people asking new Christians, “It seems like there’s something different about you.” That is metamorphoo: There is an outside difference that is reflecting their new inside nature.

And the Lord Jesus was metamorphoo’d in front of Peter, James, and John.
The Lord Jesus’ outward appearance was that of the Man of Sorrows, the One acquainted with bitterest grief (Isaiah wrote of Him). To the world, the Lord Jesus was a travel-stained itinerant preacher claiming to be the Jewish Messiah. What the world saw was a peasant from Galilee, wearing homespun clothes, the son of a carpenter.

But in His metamorpho-sis, Peter, James, and John saw His true inner nature exposed: God the Son; the dazzling glory of the essence of His deity that He possesses co-eternally with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit! The Lord of Glory! It shone through His humanity and even out through the clothing He wore!

So, what are some ways that this touches us and our lives here today?
Well, first of all, the apostle Paul writes to the Colossians that each one of us who have given ourselves to Jesus Christ by trusting in Him to save us has Jesus’ nature inside of us, our “hope of glory” in this life; our “hope of glory” in the life to come! (1:27) The Lord Jesus told His disciples to expect Him to begin living in us – and to expect His glory to shine from us. He told them this on the night before He was crucified, when He prayed to the Father, “I have given them the glory You gave Me, so they may be one as We are one. I am in them [Father] and You are in Me.” (17:22-23) And as John wrote to the church in his first letter, “Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but He has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He really is.” (3:2) So, there is an aspect of us, Christians, that is glorious right now, and yet an aspect of us that will not be fully glorious until Christ appears.

Now, we are not God, so we can not and should not expect the unbridled manifestation of the Lord Jesus’ metamorphoo, but Luke does add the detail that both Moses and Elijah were “glorious”, perhaps not to the same degree the Lord Jesus was blindingly glorious, but glorious nonetheless. And so – Christ in us and us in Christ – we, too, can expect the metamorpho¬-sis of gloriousness to shine forth from us – and more and more – as we live for Jesus and grow in Him daily.

And we do that, as the Father called Peter, James, and John to in the shekinah-cloud, by “listening to Jesus.”
As I quickly mentioned earlier, this phrase, “listen to Him” most literally conveys the idea of always listening to Him. And yet, it is not just the idea of always merely hearing what the Lord Jesus says to us in His Word or by the Spirit, but of, always doing and acting upon what He says.

Too often we, Christians, second-guess Jesus. “I know You’ve told me to forgive the person, Lord, but…” “I know You’ve told me to give generously to all those who ask, Lord, but…” “I know You’ve told me to bless those who curse me, and to pray for my enemies, and to do good to those who’ve harmed me, but…” “I know You’ve told me to stop getting drunk, but…” “I know You’ve told me to stop making work a priority over You and my spouse and my family, but…” “I know You’ve told me to never worry and to never fear this world, but…”

We know what He’s said to us across the Scriptures, but we make our excuses for not always doing and acting upon what He’s said. But all that keeps His glory from shining forth from us.

Of course, we can do the same thing throughout each and every day when the Holy Spirit prompts us to stop and pray for someone or to stop and pray with someone or to go here or to do that. Too often we can object, “But, Lord..!” ? We must not…

Jesus says, “Anyone who listens to My teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds [of life] beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. But anyone who hears My teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. When the rains and floods [of life] come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.”

Let’s listen and follow.

Let’s be glorious!

Mark 7:24-37 [NLTse]
24 Then Jesus left Galilee and went north to the region of Tyre. He didn’t want anyone to know which house He was staying in, but He couldn’t keep it a secret. 25 Right away a woman who had heard about Him came and fell at His feet. Her little girl was possessed by an evil spirit, 26 and she begged Him to cast out the demon from her daughter.
Since she was a Gentile, born in Syrian Phoenicia, 27 Jesus told her, “First I should feed the children—My Own family, the Jews. It isn’t right to take food from the children and throw it to the dogs.”

28 She replied, “That’s true, Lord, but even the dogs under the table are allowed to eat the scraps from the children’s plates.” 29 “Good answer!” He said. “Now go home, for the demon has left your daughter.” 30 And when she arrived home, she found her little girl lying quietly in bed, and the demon was gone.

31 Jesus left Tyre and went up to Sidon before going back to the Sea of Galilee and the region of the Ten Towns. 32 A deaf man with a speech impediment was brought to Him, and the people begged Jesus to lay His hands on the man to heal him. 33 Jesus led him away from the crowd so they could be alone. He put His fingers into the man’s ears. Then, spitting on His Own fingers, He touched the man’s tongue. 34 Looking up to Heaven, He sighed and said, “Ephphatha,” which means, “Be opened!” 35 Instantly the man could hear perfectly, and his tongue was freed so he could speak plainly!
36 Jesus told the crowd not to tell anyone, but the more He told them not to, the more they spread the news. 37 They were completely amazed and said again and again, “Everything He does is wonderful. He even makes the deaf to hear and gives speech to those who cannot speak.”

Sermon
Anybody here have a dog that you love?

I grew up with Baggie (named after the Jungle Book’s Bagheera the Panther). He was a black lab who was so very faithful! We went everywhere with Baggie, and as long as we were with him, my parents felt we were safe.

A bunch of years went by after Baggie’s death, and we got Brandy (short for “Brandywine”), a golden retriever. Brandy had a ferocious-sounding bark, but we always joked that if a burglar ever knew to call Brandy by name that he would take the burglar and show him where the silver was. ?

As our reading begins, the Lord seems to be trying to get away from all the crowds and paparazzi.
When He’d heard that John the Baptist had been killed, He tried to take the disciples away to a quiet place where they could all get some rest. But some 5,000 men – not including women and children – had gotten to the place ahead of Jesus and been there waiting. After teaching and serving them all in that secluded place, the Lord tried again to get away with His disciples. Sailing across the Sea of Galilee, He landed in Bethsaida. But when He arrived everybody recognized Him, and He attracted the attention of a bunch of Torah-teachers and Pharisees, who were Jewish religious leaders in those days.
In our reading from Mark 7:24-37, the Lord Jesus is fleeing from the crowds and from the hard-heartedness of the Torah-teachers and Pharisees, so He and His disciples have trekked 50 miles to the entirely-Gentile port-city of Tyre, on the Mediterranean Sea.

Although the Lord is trying to keep a low profile, some lady some-how finds out that He is in town. Her daughter was being demonized by an evil spirit, so she immediately went to get the Lord Jesus’ help. And she falls at His feet and starts begging Him to drive the demon from her daughter.

Now, the Torah-teachers and Pharisees Jesus had just traveled so far to get away from looked upon Gentiles as “dogs”, and they called them “dogs” – kuon. The idea of “mongrel”, “stray”, “mutt”, or “junkyard dog” was in mind, since loose dogs – wild kuon – were seen as scavengers and trouble-makers and dangerous and needing-to-be-put-down in ancient times.

So, it’s unfortunate that most translations of this verse have the Lord Jesus calling this woman a “dog”, when He says, “It isn’t right to take food from the children and throw it to the dogs,” (v. 27) because the Lord doesn’t use the word for “mongrel” or “mutt” here. He doesn’t call this Gentile mom a kuon. No. The Lord Jesus calls her a kunarion.
When He tells this concerned mother that He shouldn’t be “taking food from the children and throwing it to the dogs,” He’s speaking of her and her fellow-Gentiles – these dogs – most literally as doggies, little dogs, puppies, treasured household pets. The Lord says, “No,” to this woman, but not because He sees her as some kind of mutt – a kuon –He says “no” to her using a picture of giggling young children sitting around the dinner table with their playful pups – their kunarion – lapping and nipping at their dangling feet.

Even so, this woman might have responded in all sorts of ways. I mean, “beloved pup” is better than “stray mutt”, but some might argue that it’s not much better. But the desperate mom chooses to humble herself to the Lord and God’s order of things: “To the Jew first, then to the Gentile.” (Romans 1:16) And she takes this picture the Lord has offered her – she accepts it – and then shares the reality that, because of the love that exists between children and their pets, that little dogs always get to eat the little bits that the little children feed them from their plates. “Okay, so I may be a pet in your eyes,” she seems to be saying, “but throw me a scrap, Lord. I’ll be satisfied with a scrap of Your mercy.”
And the Lord Jesus responds – on account of this woman’s attitude and her answer – the Lord tells her that He had, in that moment, cast the demon out of her daughter. When she goes home she will find the child well.

How does this connect with us today? As I’ve already said, this woman could have taken offense at Jesus’ words, labels, the truth as He saw it and put it forth. But she didn’t. She knew Who Jesus was. (Even if she didn’t completely recognize His deity, she clearly recognized the Almighty God’s hand of power upon Him!) And she doesn’t respond to Him in the trite ways so many across our culture want to come to Jesus: Demanding their own way, like they have a right to come before Him; forcing their own agendas, as though what’s important to them ought to set the schedule for God Almighty’s day; … Western people tend to make God out to be some sort of warm-fuzzy, sickly-sweet deity who should do whatever we want whenever we want it done; a god who’s concept of life and love should be exactly the same as ours; and who is pushed around and influenced by us, as though He were some kind of eternal people-pleaser.

But He is not! He is God Almighty! The Most High God! He is wonderful and terrible in His love and wrath! (As C. S. Lewis has so famously written of the Lord when asked if God was safe. “Who said anything about safe? ‘Course He isn’t safe. But He’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.” [The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe])

And this woman, without perhaps fully recognizing Jesus to be this awesome One in the flesh, at least recognizes the hand of that awesome One upon Him. And she does not get upset with Him or argue with Him that He has spoken to her as though she were a little dog or called her by such name. She accepts His description. She embraces His depiction. The Lord Jesus spoke and she didn’t try to rebuke Him (the way Simon Peter did when the Lord first spoke about His crucifixion), she didn’t try to correct Him (the way we can sometimes edit what the Bible says to make it better fit what we think is right about God or what we think is more true or more reasonable about God). No. She accepts His Word and humbles herself to the order of things as He stated them: “To the Jew first.” (Romans 1:16) And yet, in that humbled place she was still able to see the grace of God offered to her and her fellow non-Jews. She basically says to Jesus, “It’s okay if God has chosen to deal with the Jews first, but surely God has enough for all the rest of us, too?”
As a mother she trusted that God must love human beings at least as much as she loved her little girl!

The first step to a new life in Christ is knowing and accepting the truth about our life apart from Christ. Without Jesus – apart from the cross – we are sinners, separated from God by our sins.

Religion is such a huge part of human life – no matter our culture, no matter our status, no matter our language or our education – religion is a huge part of life for every people, for every person. Even atheists, whose religion is all about denying religion.

The science of Sociology shows human beings to be religious creatures – even defines us as religious creatures. Humans seem to be uniquely aware that there is some universal, ultimate, eternal standard of behavior – of morality – and we all seem to be aware that we are not living up to it, and longing for a way to, somehow, be at peace with the One who established it. (Or the ones who established it, for peoples who believe there to be many gods.)

Sinners, missing the mark of perfection, that’s who human beings are apart from Christ. People are not basically good. People are basically bad. And our basic “badness” separates us from God because He is perfectly and completely good. The apostle Paul describes this in Ephesians 2: “Once you were dead because of your disobedience and your many sins. You used to live in sin, just like the rest of the world, obeying the devil—the commander of the powers in the unseen world. (He is the spirit at work in the hearts of those who refuse to obey God.) All of us used to live that way, following the passionate desires and inclinations of our sinful nature. By our very nature we were subject to God’s anger, just like everyone else.” (Vv. 1-3)

And that’s why I love this Gentile mom: She knows who she is, and she knows Who God is. She doesn’t make herself out to be better than she is and she doesn’t make herself out to be worse. The Lord Jesus tells her what she is. She accepts His assessment. And that brings her into that place where she can cry out to the Lord for a miracle and be heard, and have her miracle be granted!

What about us? Do you hear the Lord Jesus telling you that you are a sinner but respond saying, “No, not me. I’m not so bad.” Or do you hear the Lord Jesus telling you that you are sinner and respond, “I’m worse than that, Lord. I’m horrid! And I know You hate me and want to have nothing to do with me because I’m such a miserable wretch!” Too often we make ourselves out to be better than Jesus says we are, on the one hand, or make ourselves to be worse than He says we are, on the other.

The Lord Jesus is telling you and me that we are sinners, today. And He is telling us that our sins have separated us from God. But Jesus goes on to say that He has come to repair the breach between us and God Almighty. He has taken our sins to the cross with Him and put them to death when He died there. Because of that, He can invite us back to God. There’s plenty of Him for the children and for the puppies at their feet! Plenty of Jesus – plenty of grace – for you and for me, for one and for all!

Will you accept who Jesus says you are so that you might become who Jesus has died to make you to be? He calls us to come to Him as the doggies we are because He wants to make us sons and daughters in the family!

Introduction
We’ve been reading through the New Testament as a congregation this year. We started at John and read all the way through Revelation, and have come back to the beginning, this past week finishing up Matthew and moving into Mark.
There’s a lot going on as we begin reading through Mark this week. One thing I want to highlight for us as we read a variety of excerpts from across Mark’s opening chapters today is the Gospel’s portrayal of Christ in us and us in Christ.
In the Book of Acts (before the apostle Paul has become a Christian, but is hunting down Christians) the Lord Jesus blinds Paul and brings him to his knees. And the Lord says to Paul, “Paul, why are you persecuting Me?” And yet, Paul had not, at that time, been persecuting Jesus. The Lord had already ascended into Heaven. No, Paul had been persecuting Christians! But the Lord Jesus recognizes no distinction between Himself and His people. Christ in us and us in Christ. And Mark demonstrates this across his Gospel. When the Lord Jesus is on the move, Mark is also calling us to be on the move with Him. For instance…

ELDER READS: Mark 1:9-11 [NLTse]
9 One day Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee, and John baptized Him in the Jordan River. 10 As Jesus came up out of the water, He saw the heavens splitting apart and the Holy Spirit descending on Him like a dove. 11 And a voice from Heaven said, “You are My dearly loved Son, and You bring Me great joy.”

PASTOR: Sermon
? Acts 10:38 makes clear that Jesus’ baptism with the Holy Spirit was when the Lord received God’s power to do good and heal all who were oppressed by the devil. The Lord Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River and His baptism with the Holy Spirit sets the standard for believers: When we come to trust in Jesus Christ, He wants us to be baptized with water to show that we’ve repented of our sins and turned to God to be forgiven, and He wants us to be baptized with the Holy Spirit to empower us so that we might join Him in doing good and healing those who are being oppressed by the devil today.
Who, here, has been baptized with water in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? … Who, here, has been baptized with the Holy Spirit for empowerment? …
And as we hear the Father’s words spoken over Jesus, know that He wants us to hear and know ourselves that – Christ in us and us in Christ – we are His dearly loved children, and that we bring Him great joy!
(Has anybody here made any really big mistakes lately, or done something you really regret? We are not treasured by God on account of what we’ve done or not done. We are saved by grace. Know that you are dearly loved and that you bring the Father great joy!)

ELDER: Mark 1:12-13 [NLTse]
12 The Spirit then compelled Jesus to go into the wilderness, 13 where He was tempted by Satan for forty days. He was out among the wild animals, and angels took care of Him.

PASTOR: Sermon
During times of temptation we can be brutally aware of Satan’s presence: Everywhere we turn, the enemy of our souls seems to be there in our faces, hemming us in, deceiving us, and baiting us to sin. Likewise, as the Lord Jesus was out among wild animals during this time of temptation, we, too, when we’re being tempted, can be so very aware of all manner of beasts surrounding us and snapping at us. Times of great temptation always seem to be accompanied by struggles in our relationships, financial troubles, health concerns… all trying to wear us down and have us sin. But here we see a fuller reality than what we ordinarily acknowledge and are aware of: Just as the Father’s angels were caring for the Lord while Satan and the wild things were assailing Him, just so, hosts of Heaven are also near to us during our times of being tempted, speaking God’s truth, granting us comfort and the grace we need to overcome.
Satan and his goons seem to pile on us during times of trial, but remember that God’s sent warriors to us during those times, as well. In Christ and Christ in us, there’s always more for us than against us!

ELDER: Mark 1:14-15 [NLTse]
14 Later on, after John was arrested, Jesus went into Galilee, where He preached God’s Good News. 15 “The time promised by God has come at last!” He announced. “The Kingdom of God is near! Repent of your sins and believe the Good News!”

PASTOR: Sermon
Notice, the Good News is not just that the Kingdom of God is near. And, notice the Good News is not just that God has forgiven our sins on account of our faith and trust in Jesus Christ. Along with God’s Kingdom arriving and advancing, and our being forgiven so that we can draw near and be a part of it, the Good News brings a constant and ongoing call to: “Repent of your sins!”
We have been born-again – brought back to life – through our faith and trust in Christ. We have died to our old, sin-filled way of living. So, how can we go back to it? The answer, of course, is, we can’t. We must keep on repenting! The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!

ELDER: Mark 1:16-20 [NLTse]
16 One day as Jesus was walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee, He saw Simon and his brother Andrew throwing a net into the water, for they fished for a living. 17 Jesus called out to them, “Come, follow Me, and I will show you how to fish for people!” 18 And they left their nets at once and followed Him.
19 A little farther up the shore Jesus saw Zebedee’s sons, James and John, in a boat repairing their nets. 20 He called them at once, and they also followed Him, leaving their father, Zebedee, in the boat with the hired men.

PASTOR: Sermon
Does your work seem like it’s keeping you from following Jesus? Well, if it’s truly getting in-between us and our Savior, some of us may need to leave our work to find other work where we can follow Him. Others of us may, simply, need to look at our work differently. (For instance, if you’re a builder, to begin seeing yourself not just a builder, but as building the Kingdom of Heaven! Or, perhaps, you’re a teacher. Christ is calling you to start seeing yourself as one who is pointing your students towards the Teacher! If you’re a lawyer, you’re not just a lawyer. You are fighting for the Truth! You are not just a cashier, you are not just a secretary, you are not just a nurse… Acknowledge that you are where you are, doing what you are doing, because Jesus Christ wants you there to do what you are doing for Him!
Likewise, do family obligations seem like they are keeping you from following Jesus? For some of us, that may mean setting some healthy boundaries between you and your family members. Others of us may, simply, need to look at our family obligations differently. That is, it can be a world of difference between taking care of our elderly parents because nobody else will and taking care of them because we want to honor them, as Christ has called us to. A world of difference…
Also, Luke and John give us a little bit of background to know that Jesus had encountered Simon and Andrew and James and John before this interaction where He called them and they dropped what they were doing to follow Him. Likewise, who around us do we believe God is calling to Himself? (I’m not asking who around you you want to become a Christian. I know many of us long to have our kids or our folks or other family members or friends become Christians. I’m not asking you about them. Who around you do you believe the Lord is calling to follow Him? On account of Christ being in you and you being in Christ, whoever might be coming to your mind as I ask you that question, I think you need to go tell them that the Lord wants them to become one of His followers; to join you in following Him…

ELDER: Mark 1:29-31 [NLTse]
29 After Jesus left the synagogue with James and John, they went to Simon and Andrew’s home. 30 Now Simon’s mother-in-law was sick in bed with a high fever. They told Jesus about her right away. 31 So He went to her bedside, took her by the hand, and helped her sit up. Then the fever left her, and she prepared a meal for them.

PASTOR: Sermon
When Jesus, James, and John saw that Simon and Andrew weren’t at church, they went over to Simon and Andrew’s house after Worship to check on them. It seems that the brothers had stayed home because of their mother’s illness. And when Jesus, James, and John heard about their mom’s illness, they all went to pray for her. And she was made well.
We should do likewise: We should check on our brothers and sisters when we notice they aren’t in Worship; we should gather together to pray for one another and our loved ones as soon as we hear that someone is in need. Christ in us and us in Christ, the Lord Jesus and those first disciples are showing us the Way…

ELDER: Mark 3:20-27 [NLTse]
20 One time Jesus entered a house, and the crowds began to gather again. Soon He and His disciples couldn’t even find time to eat. 21 When His family heard what was happening, they tried to take him away. “He’s out of His mind,” they said.
22 But the teachers of religious law who had arrived from Jerusalem said, “He’s possessed by Satan, the prince of demons. That’s where He gets the power to cast out demons.”
23 Jesus called them over and responded with an illustration. “How can Satan cast out Satan?” He asked. 24 “A kingdom divided by civil war will collapse. 25 Similarly, a family splintered by feuding will fall apart. 26 And if Satan is divided and fights against himself, how can he stand? He would never survive. 27 Let Me illustrate this further. Who is powerful enough to enter the house of a strong man and plunder his goods? Only someone even stronger—someone who could tie him up and then plunder his house.

PASTOR: Sermon
Three things… First, don’t be surprised when people around you get hostile or call you crazy when you talk about Jesus or do things in His name. People, even religious people, got mad at Jesus. It only makes sense that folks will likely get mad at us, too.

Second, don’t be surprised when you find yourself out-of-your-mind busy on account of ministry! It doesn’t necessarily mean you are doing something wrong or need to make changes. Sometimes, there’s just a lot going on around the Kingdom, and you are in the thick of it. Seek the Holy Spirit’s empowerment for what you need and His contentment through it all. Such times come and go…
Lastly, there will be times when you need to fight the devil in order to have him give up someone he’s been oppressing. Christ in you and you in Christ, you are stronger than the devil. In Jesus, you can tie up the devil – binding him and taking from him those he doesn’t want to let go. Your prayer might be as simple as, “In the name of Jesus Christ, I bind you from SO-AND-SO, Satan. He (or she) has chosen Christ and you have no right to oppress them any longer.”
Our nation is in a world of trouble. We live in the best of times! And yet it is also the worst of times! The Lord Jesus Christ has overcome death to empower us for Kingdom work! You and I have resurrection-power to be loving, joyful, at peace, and patient. The power that raised Jesus from the dead is ours so that we might be supernaturally kind, doing good, trustworthy, gentle, and self-controlled. The Lord Jesus wants to continue His work in you and me: Doing good and healing those oppressed by the devil.
When you live in Christ and Christ lives in you, nothing is impossible for you! Go and do likewise!

According to Matthew 22:23-33 [NLTse]
23 That same day Jesus was approached by some Sadducees—religious leaders who say there is no resurrection from the dead. They posed this question: 24 “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies without children, his brother should marry the widow and have a child who will carry on the brother’s name.’ 25 Well, suppose there were seven brothers. The oldest one married and then died without children, so his brother married the widow. 26 But the second brother also died, and the third brother married her. This continued with all seven of them. 27 Last of all, the woman also died. 28 So tell us, whose wife will she be in the resurrection? For all seven were married to her.”
29 Jesus replied, “Your mistake is that you don’t know the Scriptures, and you don’t know the power of God. 30 For when the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given in marriage. In this respect they will be like the angels in Heaven.
31 “But now, as to whether there will be a resurrection of the dead—haven’t you ever read about this in the Scriptures? Long after Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had died, God said, 32 ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ So He is the God of the living, not the dead.”
33 When the crowds heard Him, they were astounded at His teaching.

Sermon
In the Apostle Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, he wrote, “We would rather be away from these earthly bodies, for then we will be at home with the Lord.” (5:8) In his letter to the Philippians, he wrote, “For me, living means living for Christ, and dying is even better… I long to go and be with Christ, which would be far better for me.” (1:21, 23) In the Revelation to John a voice from Heaven cries, “‘Blessed are those who die in the Lord from now on. Yes,’ says the Spirit, ‘they are blessed indeed, for they will rest from their hard work; for their good deeds follow them!’” (14:13) In these and many other passages of Scripture, the New Testament encourages us to view our own death and the deaths of fellow-believers not with fear or dread but with joy at the prospect of going to be with Christ.
On account of this, sometimes Christians think it shows a lack of faith if they mourn deeply in the face of their own deaths, or if they mourn deeply and experience deep sorrow for fellow-Christians who have died. But the Bible does not support that view. St. Paul did not tell the Thessalonians that they should not grieve concerning their loved ones who had died, but he wrote, “so you will not grieve like people who have no hope.” (4:13) The sorrow we feel in the face of our own deaths and in the face of the deaths of fellow-believers is clearly mingled with hope and joy because of the knowledge that we and they are going to be with the Lord. So, although we may have genuine sorrow when we are going to die or when Christian friends and relatives do die, we also can say with Scripture, “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? … But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 15:55, 57)
When unbelievers die, the sorrow we feel is not mingled with the joy of assurance that they have gone to be with the Lord forever. Yet, “people judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart,” (1 Samuel 16:7) so no person can have absolute certainty as to whether or not another has persisted in refusing to trust in Christ all the way to the point of death. The knowledge of one’s impending death, even when it is sudden and a person’s life goes “flashing before their eyes”, will often bring about genuine heart-searching on the part of the dying person, and sometimes words of Scripture or words of Christian testimony that had been heard long ago, are recalled and the person comes to genuine repentance and faith. We do not know. We can-not know. But God knows.
Once a believer has died, though his or her physical body remains on the earth and is buried, at the moment of death the soul (or spirit) of that believer goes immediately into the presence of God with rejoicing. After all, the Lord Jesus said to the thief who was dying on the cross next to Him, “Today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43) And the author of Hebrews says that when Christians come together to worship they come not only into the presence of God in Heaven, but also into the presence of “the spirits of the righteous ones in Heaven who have now been made perfect.” (12:23)
Yes, we are surrounded this morning by a great cloud of the spirits of the Christ-loving dead! But ours is not a grim spectacle of ghostly horrors like that of unbelievers with their spirits and powers. No. This great cloud of Christ-loving spirits surrounding us this morning are rejoicing in the Lord with us; praising Jesus with us and cheering us on to victory over every temptation and doubt! Ours is a joyful scene! A festival scene, if we could see the heavenly places with perfect clarity!

So, here it is, the day before Halloween. And, if you’ve read the article inside this morning’s Bulletin, you know that Halloween began as a Christian celebration of those who’ve died in Christ; a celebration of our hope in God’s promise of their on-going life and eternal rejoicing in the Lord’s presence in Heaven; and, a celebration of our expectation of glad reunion with them in the resurrection to come. Because our God is a god of the living not of the dead!
So, on this day before Halloween, I’d like us to consider what it’s like to live day-by-day believing that our deceased, Christian loved-ones are separated from us, but alive with Jesus?

It strikes me that a parallel experience might be when our friends or beloved-family members have gone on long trips away from us, but don’t have good cell or Internet service. (I know of one of our families who experience such things because their son-in-law serves on a submarine, and another because their granddaughter is a missionary on a very remote and undeveloped island.)
One thing I know we don’t do during such times of separation is we don’t walk around our homes or schools or workplaces talking to our absent loved-ones, asking their advice or direction. We don’t do that when friends or loved-ones have gone away on trips because we know they can’t hear us; they are far away; that would be silly to do. Likewise, I want to encourage us not to talk to our loved-ones who have died, either. Although they likely can hear us, the Lord Who has saved them and is saving us has told us not to talk to or even try to talk to the dead. Some false teachers would have us believe that we need to talk to the dead so that they can get God’s attention on our behalf. But that assumes that our friends and loved-ones love us and that God may not, which is absurd. No one loves us like the Lord! None of our friends or loved ones have laid down their lives for us as He has. No. If we’re going to pray, let’s pray only to the Lord.
One thing we likely do for friends and loved-ones who are far away is to pray for them: Asking for God’s blessings on them while we are apart and for a quick and happy reunion. But, of course, we wouldn’t pray for those who’ve died because if they trusted in Christ in this life then they are with the Lord and if they did not trust in Christ in this life then they are not with the Lord. And there is nothing we can pray that will ever change that.
So, while we may keep ourselves from praying for them, we can know that they are praying for us and cheering us on. (Which is appropriate for them to do since their prayers can still reach and influence the Lord.) We can rejoice and be comforted and encouraged by their intercessions and their applause.
I think we all tend to wonder what our loved ones are doing when they are away from us on a journey. And the same can be true of our loved ones in death: We can (and perhaps should) think about all the joys the Lord has promised believers when we get to Heaven, and we probably should think about our loved ones enjoying those blessings each day, and that when it’s our time, that we will enjoy those blessings, with our loved ones, too.
If we’ll let ourselves, thinking in these ways about our loved ones who’ve been parted from us by death can bring us to big smiles and great joy as we think about what the Lord has told us and shown us and promised us about life in Heaven during this time when death has been defeated, but not yet destroyed; during this time in-between this current Heaven and Earth and the new Heaven and Earth that Jesus will bring with Him when He returns for us, to make all things new, and when we will alive and with Jesus, and He will be alive and with us, and we will be alive together with all our loved ones who’ve loved and trusted Him, too. And we will be at home in Paradise, and God will be all and in all!

The Gospel According To Matthew 18:1-14 [NLTse]
About that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven?”
2 Jesus called a little child to Him and put the child among them. 3 Then He said, “I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven. 4 So anyone who becomes as humble as this little child is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven.

5 “And anyone who welcomes a little child like this on My behalf is welcoming Me. 6 But if you cause one of these little ones who trusts in Me to fall into sin, it would be better for you to have a large millstone tied around your neck and be drowned in the depths of the sea.

7 “What sorrow awaits the world, because it tempts people to sin. Temptations are inevitable, but what sorrow awaits the person who does the tempting. 8 So if your hand or foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It’s better to enter eternal life with only one hand or one foot than to be thrown into eternal fire with both of your hands and feet. 9 And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It’s better to enter eternal life with only one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

10 “Beware that you don’t look down on any of these little ones. For I tell you that in Heaven their angels are always in the presence of My heavenly Father.

12 “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders away, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others on the hills and go out to search for the one that is lost? 13 And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he will rejoice over it more than over the ninety-nine that didn’t wander away! 14 In the same way, it is not My heavenly Father’s will that even one of these little ones should perish.

Sermon
In 2004, NBC debuted a reality TV series called, “The Biggest Loser”. The show features obese or overweight contestants competing to win a cash prize for losing the highest percentage of body weight. Although it’s received a massive amount of criticism from doctors and weight-loss professionals, “The Biggest Loser” has been a hit since it first aired!
That being said, when I think of someone being called “the biggest loser”, I don’t think of weight loss. Do you?

We should not be surprised that Jesus’ disciples asked Him “who would be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven”. After all, they had just seen Jesus feed 5,000+ people with only five loaves of bread and two fish, walk across a lake, feed 4,000+ more people with just seven loaves of bread and only a few small fish, heal the lame so they could walk, the deaf so they could hear, the mute so they could talk, and the blind so they could see, and Peter, James, and John had just seen transfigured into all His heavenly glory and talking with Moses and Elijah. I say we shouldn’t be surprised that their minds were on who would be the greatest because Simon Peter had just declared Jesus to be the Messiah. And in response, Jesus had seemingly rewarded Peter by saying that Peter would be the foundation for His worldwide, Hell-shattering Church. I can imagine the rest of the disciples thinking, “What about me, Jesus? I think You’re the Messiah, too! What place of honor do you have for me?”

Of course, the way God thinks about things are altogether different from the ways humans think about things and His ways of doing things are altogether different from the ways humans do things. So, in response to their question about “who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven” the Lord Jesus calls a little kid out of the crowd to stand as an object lesson for them.

Matthew makes clear that this kid was a paidion, a Greek word meaning “very young child”. So, the Lord has maybe a four, five, or six year old standing with Him; a kid who can probably dress himself, find food in a cabinet and eat it himself, talk-talk-talk-talk-and-talk for himself, and lay down and go to sleep by himself (that is, if Mom and Dad chose not to tuck him in), but that’s pretty much it. Such a little one can’t help with chores, can’t work in the family business, can’t protect himself if there’s danger, and can’t take care of himself if he were to be on his own. Paidions are completely dependent upon others for everything.

And the Lord says, “I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like a needy little paidion, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven. So anyone who becomes as humble as this little child is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven.” (“Humble” here translates the Greek word tapeinosei, which most literally means “lowly”.)
So, the Lord Jesus is saying, “You want to be great in God’s Kingdom? Be a nobody like this helpless, needy little child.” You want to be great? Be the biggest loser!

Let me start over.

The Scriptures make absolutely clear that human beings become members of the Kingdom of Heaven by an act of God’s grace: That is, when people trust in Jesus Christ, God grants them citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven. We don’t earn salvation, it is God’s gift.

Even so, the Scriptures also make clear that “being saved” – that being part of His Kingdom – will change us. (And if we aren’t changed then likely we’re really not saved.) For instance, the apostles Paul and James agree that we are saved by faith alone, and yet, if our faith does not result in any good works then our faith isn’t the kind of faith that saves.
Likewise, the Lord Jesus says that forgiving those who sin against us will become a characteristic of those whom the Father has forgiven. And He says that doing God’s will will become the habit of those who are saved. Jesus charges us: By the fruits of peoples’ lives we will be able to know whether they are in Christ or not.

Here, in Matthew 18, the Lord is revealing that those who are a part of God’s Kingdom will turn from their sins and will truly begin to think of themselves as “nobodies”. After all, God has done all the work to save them, just like Mom and Dad are doing all the caring, providing for, and protecting work in the lives of little children.

In other places around the Scriptures, this idea of thinking of ourselves as being “nobodies” is spoken of as being “humble”, it’s spoken of as “giving others more credit than we take for ourselves”, and such an attitude is shown in other places around the Scripture as “serving others, and doing what we know they would want instead of doing what we want”.
That’s how Jesus describes greatness in the Kingdom of God. [Spread my arms out wide.] Here’s God! [Point at a little speck in the air.] Here’s you and me. We are truly great only when we recognize that He is great and we are not, and yet when we trust that He is loving and good and always with us and always for us, then we are in that place where His greatness – with us and for us – makes us great, too!
….
I want to leave us this morning with an outlandish statement that the Lord Jesus then makes. In verse 5, He says, “When you make those who are “nobody’s” – losers – welcome around the church just because we know I would welcome them,” Jesus says, “it is the same to Me as you making Me welcome.”
I don’t know about you, but I want to make Jesus welcome here at Evangelical Presbyterian Church. So, I want you to think of the biggest loser you know… (Maybe it’s someone who’s a jerk. Maybe it’s someone who’s a bully. Maybe it’s somebody annoying or that person who everybody makes fun of…) Who’s the biggest loser you know?
In the name of Jesus Christ I charge you to invite them to church.
…
Worship Team, would you come forward to lead us in song?
As they come forward, let us pray…

Introduction
For those of you reading through the New Testament with me this year, you know we’ve just finished The Revelation and have begun The Gospel of Matthew. I’ve committed to preach from something we’ve read, so, here we are at the end of The Revelation. And John is given, in dreamlike visions and imagery, the long-awaited return of Jesus Christ.

Chapter 19 begins with the heavens singing God’s praises, and the herald-angel calling all to join in the Wedding Feast of the Lamb. And, as our reading begins, there is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ – transplendent – coming in the clouds of Heaven…

The Revelation to John 19:11-21 [NLTse]
11 Then I saw Heaven opened, and a white horse was standing there. Its rider was named Faithful and True, for He judges fairly and wages a righteous war. 12 His eyes were like flames of fire, and on His head were many crowns. A name was written on Him that no one understood except Himself. 13 He wore a robe dipped in blood, and His title was the Word of God. 14 The armies of Heaven, dressed in the finest of pure white linen, followed Him on white horses. 15 From His mouth came a sharp sword to strike down the nations. He will rule them with an iron rod. He will release the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty, like juice flowing from a winepress. 16 On His robe at His thigh was written this title: King of all kings and Lord of all lords.

17 Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, shouting to the vultures flying high in the sky: “Come! Gather together for the great banquet God has prepared. 18 Come and eat the flesh of kings, generals, and strong warriors; of horses and their riders; and of all humanity, both free and slave, small and great.”

19 Then I saw the Beast and the kings of the world and their armies gathered together to fight against the One sitting on the horse and His army. 20 And the Beast was captured, and with him the False Prophet who did mighty miracles on behalf of the Beast—miracles that deceived all who had accepted the mark of the Beast and who worshiped his statue. Both the Beast and his False Prophet were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur. 21 Their entire army was killed by the sharp sword that came from the mouth of the One riding the white horse. And the vultures all gorged themselves on the dead bodies.

Sermon – “A Tale of Two Banquets”
It will be the best of times. It will be the worst of times. Love like no other will billow in the hearts of many. And dread like no other will weigh down many others.
The return of Jesus Christ will be the rising up of many and the bringing low of many more. Some will be raised up from hardship and obscurity to seats of honor and privilege at the Lord Jesus’ Own wedding table. Others will be brought low from wealth, ease, and influence to places of horror and eternal suffering.
Which banquet are you preparing for?

There’s been a lot of talk in recent years about Heaven. Books and films like “Heaven Is For Real” and “90 Minutes In Heaven” have given readers and moviegoers a sneak-peek inside the pearly gates.
But Hell is for real, too.

About seven years ago a fellow reached out to me who had just had a massive heart operation. He’d died on the operating table, but they’d brought him back.
He’d called me, desperate to meet. When I got there he hurried me out of his home and into his car. He turned on the power, and then turned on the radio, though not too loud. And he started whispering to me, telling me he’d had a near-death experience during the time he’d been dead on the operating table. But that he hadn’t gone to Heaven. He’d gone to Hell.
(Anybody here ever read about or had anyone tell you about a near-death experience where the person had gone to Hell? It’s not as popular as the going-to-Heaven-ones.)

I wish I remembered the description he gave of what he saw and heard while he was there. But what has stuck with me in a way I will never forget was his fear and his panic: Whatever the details of what he’d seen and experienced, sitting there in the front seat of his car with the radio droning in the background, he was terrified.
I know he talked about the darkness, and maybe he even described it as being like a charcoal fire: Grey and dark, but with pockets of searing fire scattered throughout… I don’t remember the details.
The Bible confirms his horror and his dread, however. In parables, the Lord Jesus describes Hell as “outer darkness”, a place where people will “weep and gnash their teeth” (Matthew 25:30). Our Savior calls it “eternal punishment” (Matthew 25:46), so, it’s not a moment’s-worth of suffering and weeping and gnashing. This weeping and gnashing and punishment that goes on forever…
Jesus – “meek and mild” – says that Hell is like one of those horror-story garbage dumps, “where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:48). A place of maggots, always smoking, always burning.
Back in Revelation 14 John was given this picture: “Anyone who worships the Beast and his statue or who accepts his mark on the forehead or on the hand must drink the wine of God’s anger. It has been poured full strength into the God’s cup of wrath. And they will be tormented with fire and burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and the Lamb. The smoke of their torment will rise forever and ever, and they will have no relief day or night, for they have worshiped the Beast and his statue and have accepted the mark of his name.” (9-11)
If it is hard for you to accept the reality of Hell, that’s okay. It should be hard. If the knowledge of such anguish and horrors awaiting family members, friends, coworkers, and neighbors doesn’t sicken us then there is something missing in our spiritual and emotional sensibilities.

Paul, when thinking of his unbelieving kin, the Jews, says, “My heart is filled with bitter sorrow and unending grief for my people, my Jewish brothers and sisters. I would be willing to be forever cursed—cut off from Christ!—if that would save them!” (Romans 9:2-3) And the Father speaks of His Own sorrow at the death of the wicked: “As surely as I live, says the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of wicked people. I only want them to turn from their wicked ways so they can live. Turn! Turn from your wickedness, O people of Israel! Why should you die?” (Ezekiel 33:11) And we hear the Lord Jesus’ agony as He cries out, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones God’s messengers! How often I have wanted to gather your children together as a hen protects her chicks beneath her wings, but you wouldn’t let Me. And now, look, your house is abandoned and desolate.” (Matthew 23:37-38)
God has put in our hearts a portion of His Own love for people, even His love for sinners who rebel against Him. That’s why it’s hard for us to acknowledge the reality of Hell. And yet, too often, His compassion within us gets twisted so that we question His fairness and goodness. But it shouldn’t. If Hell-eternal is the loving and just God’s punishment for sin, that should make us question God, it should make us realize the enormity of the evil that is found in sin and rebellion against God, and the awesome wonder of the holiness and the justice of our God that would call forth such punishment.
No, the reality of Hell should move us to greater boldness in sharing the gospel and letting those around us know about the love and the grace of Jesus Christ.
?
Celebrating the Lord’s Supper
Expectation of a Great Feast on the Last Day began perhaps with this wonderful prophecy from Isaiah:
“In Jerusalem, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies will spread a wonderful feast for all the people of the world. It will be a delicious banquet with clear, well-aged wine and choice meat. There He will remove the cloud of gloom, the shadow of death that hangs over the earth. He will swallow up death forever! The Sovereign Lord will wipe away all tears. He will remove forever all insults and mockery against His land and people. The Lord has spoken!” (Isaiah 25:6-8)
You find echoes of this prophecy in the Old Testament and the New, finally being fulfilled in Revelation with the Marriage Supper of the Lamb (Revelation 19:6-9) and the New Heavens and the New Earth (Revelation 21:4).

“Just as My Father has granted Me a Kingdom,” the Lord Jesus said to His followers in Luke 22, “I now grant you the right to eat and drink at My table in My Kingdom. And you will sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” (vv. 29-30)
“People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the Feast in the Kingdom of God,” He said. (Luke 13:29-30; Matthew 8:11)
“He will send out His angels to gather His chosen ones from all over the world—from the farthest ends of the earth and Heaven.” (Mark 13:27; Matthew 24:31)
“The servants who are ready and waiting for His return will be rewarded. I tell you the truth, He Himself will seat them, put on an apron, and serve them as they sit and eat!” (Luke 12:37)

Revelation culminates with the Marriage Supper of the Lamb:
“Then I heard again what sounded like the shout of a vast crowd or the roar of mighty ocean waves or the crash of loud thunder:
“‘Praise the Lord! For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns. Let us be glad and rejoice, and let us give honor to Him. For the time has come for the wedding feast of the Lamb, and His bride has prepared herself. She has been given the finest of pure white linen to wear.’ For the fine linen represents the good deeds of God’s holy people.
“And the angel said to me, ‘Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding feast of the Lamb.’ And he added, ‘These are true words that come from God.’” (19:6-9)

I’m saddened by the many Christians who, for one reason or another, no longer attend church. The church is flawed, they say. Or, they’ve been hurt in the church. Or, the church is filled with hypocrites. Etc… And these things are too often true, but we are not to give up on Christian fellowship.
“Let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do,” the writer of Hebrews says, “but encourage one another, especially now that the Day of His return is drawing near.” (10:25)
For in our future is a seat at the Great Banquet with millions of other fellow believers. Isn’t it ironic that we would separate ourselves now from those with whom we’ll share the Feast and an eternity in Heaven? The essence of a banquet — and of the Lord’s Supper — is not food on which to gorge ourselves, but the joyful fellowship of those at the table.
The Lord’s Supper is our reminder that this life isn’t “as good as it gets.” Just as the seal of the Holy Spirit is your guarantee of future glory (Ephesians 1:13; Romans 8:23; 2 Corinthians 1:22), so the piece of bread and your portion of the cup are a token of your ticket to the Great Banquet at the end of the age.
The Lord’s Supper looks backward as a remembrance to the death of Christ for our sins. It looks to the present as a communion with the living Christ, and it looks to the future as a promise of eternal life in the presence of God.
On that day, the promise of Revelation will be realized. Jesus told His disciples that despite various appearances in one form or another, “No one has seen God at any time” (John 1:18; 1 John 4:12), that is, His essential Spirit-nature. But on that Day, the Scripture says,
“They will see His face, and His name will be written on their foreheads. And there will be no night there—no need for lamps or sun—for the Lord God will shine on them. And they will reign forever and ever.” (Revelation 22:4-5)

Father: So often our minds are focused on our own needs and problems. From now on, may the Lord’s Supper turn our eyes instead to the Great Banquet and the culmination of all things in You. Maranatha! Come soon, Lord Jesus! Amen.

The Revelation to John 13:1-18 [NLTse]
Then I saw a beast rising up out of the sea. It had seven heads and ten horns, with ten crowns on its horns. And written on each head were names that blasphemed God. 2 This beast looked like a leopard, but it had the feet of a bear and the mouth of a lion! And the dragon gave the beast his own power and throne and great authority.

3 I saw that one of the heads of the beast seemed wounded beyond recovery—but the fatal wound was healed! The whole world marveled at this miracle and gave allegiance to the beast. 4 They worshiped the dragon for giving the beast such power, and they also worshiped the beast. “Who is as great as the beast?” they exclaimed. “Who is able to fight against him?”

5 Then the beast was allowed to speak great blasphemies against God. And he was given authority to do whatever he wanted for forty-two months. 6 And he spoke terrible words of blasphemy against God, slandering His name and His dwelling—that is, those who dwell in Heaven. 7 And the beast was allowed to wage war against God’s holy people and to conquer them. And he was given authority to rule over every tribe and people and language and nation. 8 And all the people who belong to this world worshiped the beast. They are the ones whose names were not written in the Book of Life that belongs to the Lamb Who was slaughtered before the world was made.

9 Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand. 10 Anyone who is destined for prison will be taken to prison. Anyone destined to die by the sword will die by the sword.
This means that God’s holy people must endure persecution patiently and remain faithful.

11 Then I saw another beast come up out of the earth. He had two horns like those of a lamb, but he spoke with the voice of a dragon. 12 He exercised all the authority of the first beast. And he required all the earth and its people to worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13 He did astounding miracles, even making fire flash down to earth from the sky while everyone was watching. 14 And with all the miracles he was allowed to perform on behalf of the first beast, he deceived all the people who belong to this world. He ordered the people to make a great statue of the first beast, who was fatally wounded and then came back to life. 15 He was then permitted to give life to this statue so that it could speak. Then the statue of the beast commanded that anyone refusing to worship it must die.
16 He required everyone—small and great, rich and poor, free and slave—to be given a mark on the right hand or on the forehead. 17 And no one could buy or sell anything without that mark, which was either the name of the beast or the number representing his name. 18 Wisdom is needed here. Let the one with understanding solve the meaning of the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. His number is 666.

Sermon
We’ve been reading through the New Testament as a church in 2016. (The daily readings are at the bottom of the back flap in our Bulletins.) And I have committed to preach each week from something we’ve read. We’re in Revelation, and this past week we read Revelation chapters 13-18.

The Lord Jesus has given John potent visions to show John what is to come so that he can in-turn share these things with the people of Christ’s Church. Having shown John a series of visions to help him prepare the Church for life in these End-Times times in which we live, the Lord reveals to John a vision of the coming of Christ with a dragon representing Satan and a woman representing God’s faithful Old and New Covenant people.

This week we read about a Beast-Coming-Out-Of-The-Sea, and this Beast had seven heads and ten horns, with a crown on each horn, each head graffiti-ed with names saying blasphemous things about God. (Such as “He doesn’t love you,” and “You’re all alone in your troubles and sins,” … All sorts of things that aren’t true about God but that unbelievers say about Him.)

The Lord reveals to John that these ten horns on the Beast’s heads are kings, so this Beast has come to be called “Anti-Christ”, representing all the governments and authorities of the world that have set themselves against Jesus.
John then sees another Beast come out of the earth, This second Beast has only two horns (and the vision makes clear that these horns are like those of a lamb) but that this Beast speaks like a dragon. And, so, the imagery of this vision shows a power that has the appearance of Jesus (the Lamb) but who in reality speaks on behalf of the Devil (the dragon). This second Beast is called the “False Prophet” later in Revelation 16:13.

You see, just as our Father has a Son – Jesus Christ – to Whom He’s given all His power and authority, so that to worship and trust in Jesus you are in fact worshiping and trusting in the Father and declaring Him your King, likewise, the Devil has one – Anti-Christ – whom he has given all His power and authority, and when one worships and trusts in Anti-Christ that one is actually worshiping and trusting in the Devil and declaring him your king.

And just as the Lord Jesus has sent His People into the world to preach His Word and give Him glory, likewise, Anti-Christ has sent a people into the world seeking to lead Christ’s people astray by preaching and teaching in ways that sound like Jesus but actually speaking the words of Anti-Christ and give the Devil glory.

In Chapter 17 John is shown a woman whom he sees and describes as “a great prostitute”. And this woman is called “Babylon the Great, Mother of All Prostitutes and Obscenities in the World.” But, like Anti-Christ and the False Prophet, “Babylon” is not really a woman but is symbolic of a city. Just as the heavenly Jerusalem represents Christ’s worldwide Church, the hellish Babylon the Great represents the Devil’s people, human society centered around Anti-Christ, the Beast.
So, what does all this have to do with us as we’ve been reading these chapters this week and as we are striving to live as followers of our King, Jesus Christ? As we are striving to preach faithfully and give our King Jesus glory? As we are striving to live together in mercy and righteousness, living humbly with our God, His faithful, adoring Church?

Well – as a church – have you heard about the latest blasphemous things our old denomination, the Presbyterian Church (USA), has been doing? Well, as you may know, we left that denomination because they had rejected the Bible as the Word of God. We left because the General Assembly had begun treating the Bible as though it contained the Word of God instead of being the Word of God, allowing pastors and elders and teachers to pick and choose which parts of the Scripture were to be believed and which parts could be ignored.

This led them to making light of divorce, premarital sex, homosexuality, bisexuality, adultery, and eventually to make light of the Lord Jesus Himself. At their most recent General Assembly, the Presbyterian Church (USA) had a Muslim imam open the Assembly by praying to Allah and asking Allah’s blessing upon their proceedings, as though Allah and the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ were one and the same!

I hope you are as shocked and affronted as your elders and me! I hope you are shocked and affronted because even the most simple-minded Middle Eastern Muslim peasant-child with no education knows that Allah – the god of the Muslims – and Allah-al-Ab, the God and Father of Jesus Christ – the God of the Christians – are not the same! But it’s the False Prophet at work: Preaching and teaching and evangelizing in ways that seem faithful and wise and true – that seem like Jesus – but that, in reality, leads people away from Jesus to give His glory to the Devil!

I share all this with you because, as the Presbyterian Church (USA) continues down this blasphemous path – and makes headlines for itself and its churches nationally and locally for doing so – we are likely being seen as a part of that because we have its name, “Presbyterian”, in our name. And your elders would like to distance ourselves, as a church, from all that, if we could. Except that the truth is that this community has come to know us as “The Presbyterian Church”. So, if we take “Presbyterian” out of our name we’ll have some people around the community who’ll no longer have any idea who we are when we tell them what church we’re a part of or when we invite them to church. If our name doesn’t have “Presbyterian” in it, many won’t know the church we’re talking about. On the other hand, there’ll be some – if we take “Presbyterian” out of our name – who will hear the new name (but without “Presbyterian” in it) and say to themselves, “O, yeah, they’re talking about the Presbyterian Church.”

So, it seems we need to keep “Presbyterian”, but how do we do so and still distance ourselves from our old denomination? How do we distance ourselves from the False Prophet at work around us?

And then it came to us: We’re a part of a new denomination. When we were a part of the Presbyterian Church (USA) we were “First Presbyterian Church of Milford”. Now that we’re part of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, let’s just be the “Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Milford”!

Think about it: By adding “Evangelical”, not only do we get another word in our name that is really difficult to spell, but we get the opportunity to let people know we’re different, and for those who ask we get to let them know the euangellion – the evangel, the good news – that we’re a church that believes Jesus is God, and that we believe He died for the sins of everybody in the world who would believe in Him, and we believe He did that to bring those believers to God because God loves them – loves all the people of the world! – and wants to live with them and them to live with Him, forever! And that we believe the Bible is God’s Word, every word of it important and precious to show God’s love for us and His plan for bringing us to Himself through faith in Jesus Christ.

So, we’re going to be the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Milford. And we want everyone to come to next week’s Congregational Meeting for us all to celebrate that together, as we move ahead the same as we’ve always been, but more clearly set apart from Anti-Christ and the False Prophet and Babylon the Great, Mother of All Prostitutes and Obscenities in the World…

But, what about us all individually, or as couples, or as families? Our Father is bringing judgment against anti-Christian leaders (if they’re against the Christ of the Bible), anti-Christian preaching and teaching (if it’s against the Christ of the Bible), and anti-Christian peoples (whether few or many, if they are against the Christ of the Bible). And in Revelation 18:4 Christ calls out from Heaven, “Come away from [Babylon], My people! Do not take part in her sins, or you will be punished with her!”

So, I ask you, this morning, as I ask me: Are you watching what you know you shouldn’t be watching, are you saying what you know you shouldn’t be saying, are you doing what you know you shouldn’t be doing, OR are you not watching what you know you should be, are you not saying what you know you should be, are you not doing what you know you should be, but you’ve convinced yourself it’s okay because you’re not as bad as others?

It must not be so! We have given ourselves to Christ! We have entered into covenant – we have made a deal – with Him in baptism! We renew that covenant – we renew that deal – each and every time we eat and drink the Lord’s Supper! We have committed to be His faithful, sinless Bride! And He has committed to be our faithful, taking-care-of-us Husband!
Come away from it all, First Presbyterian Church of Milford! Come away from it all, Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Milford! Come away from it all. The Holy Spirit will help you. The Holy Spirit will help us.
Worship Team will you come forward as we pray?