Cities Church Sermons: Recent Episodes

Cities Church

Official feed for the sermons from Cities Church in St. Paul, MN. We are a church focused on three core values: Worshiping Jesus; Loving one another; Seeking the good of the Twin Cities. Sermons come from Pastors Jonathan Parnell, David Mathis, Joe Rigney, and the entire elder team at Cities Church. Learn more at Citieschurch.com.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon the examples of discipleship found in Acts 20:17-21. A generous discipler is someone who gladly and purposefully seeks to help other Christians follow Jesus. In this text, we find two methods for helping other Christians follow Jesus.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Jesus’s words to us in John 13:1-20 to see his example of serving and to follow it. Jesus wants us to be servants and to be a servant like Jesus means we serve at a cost, from freedom, and with joy.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis provides three reasons why our first and foremost calling is to be Jesus worshipers making connections to John 12:20-26. The first thing to know about Cities Church is that we worship Jesus. Being Jesus worshipers is just part one of our new fourfold way of capturing what we mean by “joyful disciples of Jesus.”

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell looks at Colossians 1:28 to begin this new sermon series called “We Are Cities Church” which is all about who we are. Who has Jesus called us to be and what does he want us to do? We learn three things here, from the apostle Paul, about the mission of our local church.

In this sermon, Marshall Segal wraps up our Summer of Psalms (Part 6), expounding upon Psalm 85 which is a psalm and a prayer for all our low moments in the Lord. We all have low moments of various kinds, and so we are all regularly in need of reviving. We look at our need for revival, our hope for revival, and then three fruits of revival.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Psalm 84 which shows us the way of happiness. Everybody wants to be happy, and Jesus is the way – Blessed are those who dwell in God’s house!

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Psalm 83 which is a psalm about a people in need of much help. In this passage, after first crying for help, the psalmist provides the reason he’s asking for God’s help, then makes his request to God, and then explains the result he is hoping for – that God may get his glory, no matter what.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Psalm 82 which is a perplexing passage but clearly affirms three truths about God and reality that matter for how we live: God reigns over all, God will judge all moral unrighteousness, and God will get his global glory.

In this sermon, Pastor Max Kozak expounds upon Psalm 81 which includes three scenes: A joyful song, a tragic story, and a hope-filled invitation. This psalm teaches us that singing about God can deepen our joy in Jesus, that God’s heart longs for His wandering people to return to Him, and that God invites us to come and be satisfied by Him.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley expounds upon Psalm 80 which is a corporate lament. The psalmist appeals for God to hear and save, laments the current destruction, and appeals to God to see and save. The prayer for God to turn his face towards his people has been answered again and again for his people, and has ultimately been answered through Jesus.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Psalm 79 which is a psalm of lament and shaped by a problem, a petition, and a praise. This psalm helps us answer the question: Can you really go to God in prayer when the reason for your ruin is your own rebellion against God?

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Psalm 78 which gives us three lessons for when we are going through something. We should recount our story to remember God’s grace, see the sad predicability of unbelief, and know that Jesus is our hope.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley expounds upon Psalm 77. This gritty psalm dives deep into the distress that we can have from the circumstances in our hearts and it teaches us how God answers us through His Word.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Psalm 75 which gives us the answer to a question that we ask so often in the Christian life: What do I do now? This passage teaches us that when we are faced with this question we should worship God, remember that God is God and we are not, and we should press on to know Jesus more.

In this sermon, Marshall Segal expounds upon Psalm 76 looking first at our fearful enemy, then at our even more fearful God, and then finally at how fear responds in faith.

In this last sermon of our series through the Book of Philippians, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 4:19-23 in which we receive the promise that God will provide for all of our needs according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. He will provide everything we need to be happy in him forever.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 4:14-18 in which Paul addresses his financial partnership with the Church at Philippi giving three reasons why Christian giving is not about the money. This church’s giving expressed their true partnership; it resulted in spiritual receiving; it was a sacrifice that pleased God – and these three things apply to us today.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 4:11-13 in which Paul reveals to us the secret of Christian contentment. It’s not funds, freedom, or food. It’s Christ-sufficiency! Christian contentment is a presence of heart that delights in Jesus’s plans for us and humbly seeks him to direct us in them.

In this sermon on Philippians 4:8-9, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Paul’s exhortation to think about the things that are worthy of praise. In a world that gets it backwards, we should think about these things because setting our minds upon these things will build our character and, like Paul, our identity will be as Jesus worshippers, joyful servants, generous disciplers, and welcoming witnesses.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 4:4-7 in which Paul exhorts us with three character qualities – joy, gentleness, and peace. We want to be a people growing in spiritual joy, obvious gentleness, and an inner peace. And it’s because of Christ Jesus that we are able to do so. It’s because of God’s love that he is still working on us.

In this sermon on Philippians 4:2-3, Pastor Jonathan Parnell highlights three observations in these verses that are relevant for our life together as a local church. With the disagreement between Euodia and Syntyche, Paul teaches us that local church unity really matters, it is owned by everyone, and local church members’ names are written in the book of life.

In this sermon on Philippians 3:20-4:1, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon Paul’s contrast between enemies of the cross (v.19) and those who are friends of the cross and citizens of heaven. As Christians, our true place of belonging is in heaven and it is real, right now. We marvel at the power of our king, anticipate the spectacular upgrade of our bodies, and wait eagerly to see Jesus face to face.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Philippians 3:15-19 in which Paul entreats the Philippians to think in a way that says: ‘I’m a member of God’s true people, because of Christ, who is my treasure. And I’m not there yet, but I am pressing on.’ A mature Christian thinks this way. Paul entreats us to imitate those who have walked the Christian life well.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 3:12-14. There are three things here that the Christian should remember as we progress and mature in our journey of the Christian life. Let’s press on to lay hold of Jesus Christ.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon Philippians 3:9-11 in which Paul teaches justification by faith alone. We are fully accepted by God in Jesus, and we will one day fully know Jesus and be satisfied in him forever. We know Jesus even now, and we want to know him more. Knowing Jesus will change us. We become more like him. In triumph and sufferings – we want to echo Christ’s heart and mind.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 3:3-9 in which Paul counts everything as loss because of Christ. Jesus Christ is the only true savior. We cannot be righteous by our own merit. The only way God accepts you is by looking at you and seeing something not of you. Jesus is the only one who gets you God, if it’s God that you want.

In this sermon, on Resurrection Sunday, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon Philippians 3:1-3. Easter is the highpoint of our rejoicing in the risen Christ. These verses have three threats, and so here are three safeties for us as we put our confidence in the risen Christ.

In this sermon, on Palm Sunday, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 2:25-30 in which Paul gets really personal. Paul shows his honesty is three ways in this passage by how he makes practical ministry decisions, how he shows honor to Epaphroditus, and how he talks about the sorrows of death.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley expounds upon Philippians 2:19-24 in which Paul gives instructions regarding Timothy. Paul was like a father to Timothy, living out a Godly life to be imitated by Timothy. And Timothy was faithful to receive this well. Paul commends Timothy to the Philippians and encourage them to follow his Christ-like example.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon Philippians 2:12-18 in which Paul turns from Jesus's obedience and reward to ours. We have God in us not only to will, but to work! And all this stands on the rock of God’s own joy, his delight, his good pleasure. He is not reluctant in helping us fight sin and pursue Christlikeness.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 2:5-11 which has been called not only the centerpiece of Philippians, but even the centerpiece of the entire New Testament. We must look to Jesus to know humility. The example of Jesus shows us true humility and it changes the way we see life in this world

In this sermon on Philippians 2:1-4, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds further upon the topic of church unity by focusing specifically on unity amidst opposition from within. In humility, we should count others more significant by remembering whose blood was spilled for them, remember how much God desires to bring that person all the way home, and look to the interests of others by praying for them and showing up for them even when you don’t feel like it.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell focuses in on just two verses in which Paul describes why real church unity is so important for the local church. In these verses, Paul provides 3 marks of real church unity. Real church unity means our church will be ready for battle: to hold our ground, to fight for gospel advance, and to be courageous when it costs.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Philippians 1:27-30 in which Paul tells the local church how they should be doing. There are things in this passage that are especially relevant for Cities Church as we enter our tenth year of life together as a church. The main exhortation from this passage is: It is absolutely necessary that our church’s life together in this world witness to the all-satisfying value of Jesus.

In this sermon on Philippians 1:19-26, Deacon Marshall Segal expounds further upon the implications of Paul’s passion for the glory of God magnified through the advance of the gospel. In this passage, verse 21, Paul writes a verse familiar to many of us ... “for to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” But do we really understand both sides of this precious, life-altering (and death-altering) verse?

In this sermon on Philippians 1:12-18, Pastor Jonathan Parnell’s exposition shows how Paul’s passion for the glory of God magnified through the advance of the gospel shaped his outlook on: how he was doing, how he understood the impact of his witness, and the way he viewed other ministries. This same idea of our passion shaping our outlook is still true for us today.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Philippians 1:9-11 in which Paul prays for the christians in Philippi to grow as believers – by abounding more and more in love with knowledge and discernment so that they will approve what is excellent, be pure and blameless, and filled with fruit – all for the day of Christ. So let’s also aim to present our very best to Jesus on that day; it will be excellent.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Paul’s words to us in Philippians 1:3-8. Paul loved the church at Philippi, which begs the question: Are there lessons we could glean from Saint Paul’s love for the church in Philippi that might shape our love for our church in St. Paul?

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis introduces our Philippians sermon series by expounding upon Philippians 1:1-2 and explaining four reasons why we love Philippians and will spend the next 5 months preaching through this letter here at Cities Church.

In this sermon, on Christmas Sunday, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon the benediction in Hebrews 13:20-21 which points to God equipping us to worship Him. We exist to be worshippers of God because the most important thing we can do with our lives is to magnify the glory of God. Worship is the goal, and it applies to all of life.

In this sermon, on the fourth and final Sunday of Advent, Pastor Mike Polley expounds upon Hebrews 13:10-13 which highlights the purpose for which Jesus came and walked on this earth. Jesus came into the world to save the world, Jesus went outside the camp to save the world, and we must go to Jesus to be saved.

In this sermon, on the third Sunday of Advent, Pastor Jonathan Parnell looks at Hebrews 5:1-10 and expounds upon the suffering of Jesus in the days of his flesh. And in this passage, the author of Hebrews answers the question: How does Jesus’s excruciating prayer in Gethsemane make him get us?

In this sermon, on the second Sunday of Advent, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon Hebrews 2:10-18 which is a “he get us” passage. But not only does he get us, he helps us. In Advent, we celebrate that he became man, fully human like us, not just to be one of us but to save us.

In this sermon, on the first Sunday of this Advent season, we return to Hebrews 2:5-9. Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds this passage in light of our current reality that Jesus reigns because “for a little while [he] was made lower than the angels”, yet we still live in a land of darkness and ashes. The future world has been introduced, but we are still waiting for Jesus’s second advent.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Psalm 74 which gives us a destructive story of the Temple. The psalmist’s reaction to this upheaval reveals a three-fold truth that he knows about God: He’s powerful, he has made promises to these people, and he is wholly devoted to the praise of his own name.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell asks the question “What is the good life?” In Psalm 73, we learn of 3 major lessons that are absolutely necessary in pursuit of the good life: recognize our broken perspectives, remember that God is real, and reorder our heart’s affections.

In this sermon on Psalm 72, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon this 3000-year-old, yet timeless, prayer for an ideal leader. This passage points to the ideal leader, King Jesus, who is unmoved. Jesus is the one true, perfect, immovable leader. Beyond Jesus, the passage reveals four aspects of the ideal leader: his people flourish, his strengths serve his people’s good, his heart pities the needy, and his God get glory. All of us are led and lead in some way so this passage is very practically applicable to all of us.

In this sermon on Psalm 71, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon the significance of the Psalmist's praise and how that connects to the way God cares for us. The psalmist wants us to see that his own praising of God is proof that God is his strong refuge, his mighty fortress. Let’s hear the songs ourselves when we praise God, “Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father, there is no shadow of turning with thee.” Following the season of life we never wanted, never asked for, and don’t see any way out of: Let’s continue to praise God more and more.

In this sermon on Psalm 70, Pastor Kevin Kleiman expounds upon the text by looking at what the text says, how it points to Jesus, and why it matters for us. David is in crisis, and he responds by crying out to God for help, also praying for the souls of those persecuting him. Jesus responds similarly in the Gospels, although he takes it even a step further by praying that God would deal with his enemies by forgiving them. How then should we respond?

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley expounds upon David's response to his distress and suffering in Psalm 69. This psalm is a lament for a time of suffering and distress. David was being piled upon, yet God did not abandon David, he did not abandon Jesus, and he will not abandon us. So we, like David, can praise God in the midst of the valley. We are not yet home, but he will see us through, and we can in confidence praise Him now.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell continues the ‘all nations’ conversation from last week's sermon (Ps. 67) by expounding upon the meaning of Psalm 68 – that the ‘all nations’ hope will be realized by the coming of a victorious divine king named Jesus – and then gets practical by sharing the ways Cities Church specifically may join in on this ‘all nations’ mission.

In this sermon on Psalm 66, Pastor Joe Rigney expounds upon five exhortations or calls from the psalmist's song. When we are facing trials, sad and frustrated, harried by the day and haunted by the night, with anxieties piling up in our soul – we should know God is the one doing it; he's purifying your faith. And so do you offer superficial obedience and bail when he sends relief? Or do you rebel and exalt yourself by accusing God of doing evil to you? Or, because you know that his steadfast love is better than life and that the goodness of his house is supremely satisfying, do you bless God for his awesome deeds and sing his praises?

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann expounds upon Psalm 65 in which the tone is silence, awe, and joy. In this Psalm, the psalmist testifies to God's working on behalf of his people: God supplies his people with life, he saves them from death, and he satisfies them with himself.

In this sermon on Psalm 64, Pastor Jonathan Parnell looks at a common theme in the psalms and slows down to think about how we approach the psalms as readers. When we look at the text we should look at it in three ways: text, Jesus, life. Psalm 64 leads us to the invitation from Jesus to join him in his joy. Jesus gives us joy, down deep in our souls.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz expounds upon Psalm 63 where David gives us a good example of how we should follow God. David knows that the things of God are better than life. Let our souls thirst for God, for he has been our help and he upholds us. His “steadfast love is better than life.”

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell begins our fifth summer of Psalms by expounding upon David's words in Psalm 62. The main message of Psalm 62, and the whole Book of Psalms, is to show what it looks like to have radical faith in God. Radical faith is the full-throated, consistent faith that we’re all called to, and it’s faith that only makes sense because of who God is.

In this sermon, Pastor Max Kozak expounds Hebrews 9:23-28 which focuses on Jesus appearing. Jesus now appears in heaven for us, has appeared to deal with sin decisively, and he will appear to welcome us home. Let's eagerly anticipate the return of Christ, and let's enjoy the little glimpses of this glory right now in the things of earth.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis expounds Hebrews 9:15-22 which tells us why Jesus had to shed his blood. Humans have sinned, thus the blood is required. But what does the blood do? Jesus's blood redeems former sins, enacts a new covenant, and uphold the new covenant. In the blood of his eternal covenant, we see the greatness of Jesus, and therefore, we come to worship him.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz expounds Hebrews 9:1-14 which teaches on our eternal sacrifice, the New Covenant. The blood of Jesus was better than the blood of a goat in the Old Covenant. This better covenant was a blood without blemish, a permanent and willing sacrifice by Jesus in which he substituted himself in our place against wrath, and because of what Jesus accomplished on the cross – our sins have forever been atoned for by God's forgiveness and love. Jesus is the only way to deal with our sin. Jesus went to the cross for you.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds Hebrews 8:7-13 which is all about the New Covenant. The New Covenant targets the Old Covenant problem of unbelief and unfaithfulness. All members of the New Covenant have the instruction of Yahweh written on their hearts. The New Covenant declares the entire forgiveness of all the sins of every covenant member.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis expounds Hebrews 8:1-7 which is the midway point of the Book of Hebrews. Jesus is the new covenant and he is so much superior to the old. Jesus serves in a superior place, Jesus makes a superior offering, and Jesus mediates a superior covenant. We live with this new covenant right now and forever.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds Hebrews 7:20-28 which is about the hope of the new covenant – a better hope, a better covenant, a better salvation. Jesus gives us a better hope because God swore that he is our High priest like Melchizedek. Jesus guarantees us a better salvation because he is our eternal high priest and he is our perfect high priest. Jesus – the all-sufficient sacrifice – is alive forever, and he intercedes for us.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz expounds Hebrews 7:1-19 which points to the reality that Jesus, in his perfection, is superior to the old way. The old covenant was not sufficient to complete the redeeming work we need, therefore we needed a new covenant. Jesus fulfilled this need through his power of an indestructible, never-ending life. He is forever our Great High Priest, the sure and steadfast anchor of our soul. Jesus is better.

In this sermon, on Easter Sunday, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds Hebrews 6:13-20 which is most importantly about the resurrection glory of Jesus. Last week, we learned the writer of Hebrews is confident in the salvation of these people and in this week's text we see that it is because God sees, God swore, and Jesus is risen.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell preaches on one of the strongest, most uncomfortable warning passages in the New Testament – Hebrews 6:4-6. The sad reality is that there are people who fall away from Jesus. They taste the truth, yet they fail to cling to Jesus. We can be confident that our story won't be like theirs. If we live in perseverance, we can be sure of better things because perseverance is the fruit of our new birth.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon Hebrews 5:11-6:3 which is the Hebrew author's inspirational word to the people to make a comeback by pressing on to maturity. They were still feeding on milk, when they ought to be eating solid food by now. When comparing and contrasting the world with the Church, we see churches in our society get stuck on the common ground preference, and our secular society approves of this. But despite societal opposition, we want Cities Church, by God's grace, to progress on to further maturity.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Schumann preaches from Hebrews 4:14-5:10. Jesus is the Great High Priest and as such he is Son, sinless, and sympathetic. The author of Hebrews ensures that we know Jesus is able to sympathize with our weaknesses, therefore we should know to draw near to Jesus when we are feeling weary.

In this sermon on Hebrews 4:12-13, Pastor Jonathan Parnell shows how the Bible is the living and active word of God, and therefore when we listen to it we are listening to God himself because it is an extension of himself. God's word performs a heart surgery in us so that we believe and confess our faith. This is a powerful word, and we should be thankful and allow that gratitude to shape our ministry of encouragement to one another.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon Hebrews 4:1-11 through the lens of four truths about genuine faith. This passage is about what faith is, what faith is not, what faith does, and the object of faith – which answers these questions: How can we have assurance of faith? How can we rest in the work of Jesus? Let's remember that Jesus will hold us fast. Do you have faith in Jesus?

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon the author's warning in Hebrews 3:12-19 of an evil, unbelieving heart. The heart of the warning is a warning about our hearts. Every sin comes from the heart, especially the sin of unbelief. The hard heart is the heart that is incapable of faith. The command here is to exhort one another to cling to Jesus, lest we be deceived by sin.

In this sermon on Hebrews 3:1-11, Pastor Joe Rigney explains how the author of Hebrews wants us to consider Jesus through what God has done in the past. Let's worship God with gratitude, and let's consider Jesus in his suffering and death, and in his triumph and life.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon what Hebrews 2:10-18 tells us about Jesus's relationship to us. Jesus suffered because he became human. And because Jesus suffered, with the same things that we suffer, he knows how to help us. When we cry out to Jesus for help, we must know – He has been there.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz preaches from Hebrews 2:5-9 which speaks of a future world to come, where all things will be redeemed. We are more sinful than we realize, yet at the same time we are more valuable than we realize. Jesus was made lower than the angles for a little while, but then the lower surpassed the greater. By the grace of God, Jesus tasted death for everyone. God became lower so that humans could be made greater in the world to come. The world where we will reign with Christ Jesus forever.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz expounds upon Hebrews 2:1-4 which implores us to "pay much closer attention" to Jesus. If we do not listen closely to Jesus, we will drift away before we even realize it.

In this sermon on Hebrews 1:7-14, Pastor Joe Rigney explores how the role of angels are a real part of the biblical vision of reality. We should recognize the place of Angels in God's works, let the love and hates of Jesus shape our own, and know that the joy of Jesus anchors us in his rule and reign. Angels are real; Jesus is better.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis expounds Hebrews 1:4-6 by emphasizing the timing, the location, and the significance of Jesus's coronation. Jesus sat down on the throne as the long-promised greater son of David. Jesus sits in the presence of God. Let's draw near to this throne of grace.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell begins our Hebrews series by examining an essential truth from Hebrews 1:1-4: Jesus is better than any other thing. Hebrews puts Jesus right in front of our heart's face. The prose is careful; the arguments are beautiful; the repetitions are strategic; and Jesus is front and center throughout the whole thing. Welcome to the Book of Hebrews.

In this sermon, on Christmas Sunday, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds 2 Timothy 1:9-10. Let's be unashamed of the gospel and remember Jesus Christ. Remembering Jesus is a mental action, scripture-led, and personal.

In this sermon, on the fourth Sunday of Advent, Pastor Josh Foster expounds upon 2 Corinthians 4:1-6. All we have is from God's grace and mercy. God's amazing grace is all we have. We once were blind, but now we see. We see Jesus. Do You See Him?

In this sermon, on the third Sunday of Advent, church planter Jordan Hecox expounds upon John 12:27-35. The time is short and the danger of darkness is real but God's offer still stands. Believe in the light so that you might become sons of light.

In this sermon, on the second Sunday of Advent, Pastor Joe Rigney looks at the gospel of John (1:1-13) to expound upon the link between the story of Jesus and what came before. The Word is Light and the True Light came and is still coming into this world. Let's recognize the darkness and point to the True Light that is Jesus.

In this sermon, on the first Sunday of Advent, Pastor Kenny Ortiz expounds upon God's promise of deliverance in Luke 1:67-79. God's mercy shall be a light in the darkness. God will rescue us.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz explores God's commands in Leviticus 23-27. God instructs the people in means of remembrance. Remember what God has done to cleanse our sins, and remember that the Holy God now dwells with us.

In this sermon on Leviticus 21-22, Pastor David Mathis draws out both what was made known about our God and the mysteries kept secret but revealed through Jesus. God is holy and God makes his people holy and without blemish - despite our sinfulness.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell draws out three timeless truths that are especially relevant for today. These truths in Leviticus 17-20 teach us how to love our neighbors, honor our bodies, and order sexual relations.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon the significance of two goats found in Leviticus 16. Verses 15-22 are at the center of chapter 16, chapter 16 is at the center of Leviticus, and Leviticus is at the center of the Pentateuch. These two goats are the center of the center of the center of the center. Jesus is the goats. He is our High Priest and our scapegoat.

In this sermon on Leviticus 11-15, Pastor Jonathan Parnell connects these chapters to the rest of the story of the Christian life. Becoming like Jesus is the whole point. Being close to God requires purity and sanctification, but we need not worry, for God will sanctify his people. It's about surrender, not self-improvement. We either move lifeward or deathward.

In this sermon on Leviticus 8-10, Mike Schumann expounds upon the sacrificial system and the significance it holds for us today. God gifted us with his son, the Great High Priest, Jesus Christ, allowing us to be near to him. We cannot create our own way to God, but we must pursue God as he has instructed us to do.

In this sermon on Leviticus 1-7, Pastor Joe Rigney provides some insight into understanding the sacrificial system. This system of atonement was Israel's process of drawing near to God, but thanks to Jesus–the unblemished Lamb of God, slain for us, then resurrected and ascended to heaven on our behalf–the living and holy God invites us to draw near!

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell provides an introduction to the book of Leviticus. He explains the significant background it provides to the meaning of the gospel and explores the chiastic structure of the Pentateuch – revealing sacrifice as the very center. Although nobody puts verses from Leviticus on coffee mugs or decor, Cities Church is committed to preaching the whole counsel of God. Therefore, welcome to Leviticus!

In this Sermon on Psalm 61, Pastor Jonathan Parnell gives three steps to take when we feel far away. It begins with desiring change, followed by remembering God is for us, and then we must also have hope in the Messiah. David has this hope moving from distance to devotion and he wants us to know that it is centered on Jesus.

In this sermon from Pastor David Mathis, we learn from Psalm 60 the spiritual dynamic of fleeing to God in our devastation. God's sovereignty inspires our hope, we should flee to the banner of his word, we should call upon his decisive action in prayer, and we should know that God protects his own – without even breaking a sweat.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz exposits David's feelings of being hunted by Saul's men in Psalm 59. God has determined David to be the next king and it is laughable to try and stop God's plan. David is confident in the steadfast love of God, therefore he will build his life upon this truth. Thus, he does not seek vengeance when the spears are hurling toward him. When faced with persecution, do not throw back – suffer the mistreatment and ask God for his deliverance.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell exposits Psalm 58 to provide three guiding principles to faithfully pray imprecations. We cannot, only God has the power and authority to, judge the wicked.

In this sermon from Psalm 57, Pastor Joe Rigney draws comparisons from the works of Plato and C.S. Lewis to help us picture the contrast between our dark world on earth and the greatness of the heavens. We should look to the heavens, preaching and singing to ourselves the greatness of God. We should be reminded of his good purposes and climb out of the cave by living like a Narnian.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell preaches from Psalm 56 on the assurance of salvation. He clarifies what it is and what it is not, as well as suggests one means by which we may experience more assurance in our lives.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz explains how Psalm 55 shows that the more often we preach to ourselves the goodness of God, the more confident we will be in the goodness of God. Pastor Kenny also provides many practical ways in which we can preach to ourselves and cast our anxieties and burdens on the one who cares for us.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell shows us David's example in Psalm 54 of three faithful acts to follow when we find ourselves in crisis situations. We can't, but God can.

In this sermon, Pastor Ryan Griffith explores the reality that we are all like the fool as described in Psalm 53. But as foolish as we are, we can have hope in the promise that God will restore his people.

In this sermon on Psalm 52, Jordan Hecox reminds us of the joy that catastrophe is temporary. The story will turn and Christ will reconcile all. Remembering that this life is not the end, we should be rooted like an olive tree because we know eternity with Christ is our happy ending.

In this sermon on Psalm 51, Pastor Jonathan Parnell explains how an honest perspective of our own sinfulness contributes to a good relationship with God. We are worse sinners than we think we are. God delights in a contrite heart. Praying Psalm 51 is a way in which we can seek God's mercy.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley expounds upon Psalm 50's direction to accept God's invitation to worship Him truly and flee from any misguided, empty, or hypocritical worship of which God rebukes us. God wants our genuine delight, not a mask or external posture. He doesn't want us to just act happy, but to be happy!

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny Ortiz expresses through Psalm 49 the significance of death for our lives. Yet, through Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 15 we know that Christ has defeated death. Jesus has paid our ransom!

If God is king of the world, then that means he is king over you. If the clapping of hands and shouts of joy from all the world are being directed toward him, then they are not being directed to you. This is not the way we, in our sin, prefer things. We’d prefer the crown of human praises to be placed upon our heads. We’d prefer the ability to declare right from wrong within our minds. We’d prefer the authority over what we are allowed to do be placed in our hands. But we are not king of this world. We are not king of ourselves. We are under a king. A great king. The LORD, the Most High, the one who is to be feared. So what area of your life has yet to submit to this king? Your home life, work like, your eyes and where you let them wander? Your mind and where you let it drift? Your feet and where you let them take you? We are under a king. A great king. May it be said that we held nothing back whether thought, word, or deed, from his lordship. Do you see in this Psalm God’s Authority over you?

Have you ever had a time in your life that you would call “a crisis”? Some in this room might be in a time of crisis right now.

I suspect that most of us — if we’ve lived long enough — can look back on some moment in our lives, some time, some season (if not many!) that we would identify as a crisis. We might say that it felt like the very ground beneath our feet was shaking. We might describe it as our world being turned upside down. We reach for catastrophic language, as Psalm 46 does (in verses 2–3), to put words, and concrete images, to the tumult in our own souls.

It could be a national crisis. That can indeed whip up our anxieties. It may have been a national crisis that inspired Psalm 46. But a national crisis in the modern world — playing out far away, in the news and on our screens — can be a far cry from a personal crisis.

Psalm 46 was composed in a time of crisis, and preserved for us today for our crises. This psalm gives us a crisis-ready vision of God. The particular crisis that gave rise to these verses is left unidentified. Which may not satisfy our curiosities, but it does show us the timelessness of our God. These words were not written for only one crisis, but many. And they are readymade for our crises today.

Psalm 46 casts the crisis in two life-or-death threats: the first and perhaps original threat is hostile nations, threatening Jerusalem: -verse 6: the nations rage, the kingdoms totter -verse 9, we hear of war, bows, spears, and war chariots — or perhaps carts for making siegeworks against the city.

The second threat is nature. The earth and mountains, typically images of stability, are shifting. Verses 2–3: -the earth gives way, -the mountains [are] moved into the heart of the sea [and] its waters roar and foam, -the mountains tremble at [the sea’s] swelling.

The stable, secure earth and mountains are being overtaken by the restless, raging, unstable, dangerous sea. It’s a picture natural cataclysm, perhaps even end-times catastrophe.

And into this particular chaos, this crisis, this life-or-death threat to the city of Jerusalem, verse 2 says, amazingly, “we will not fear.” That’s how God means to help us with this psalm. To displace fear, with confidence. To give us stable ground under our feet, even in crisis. If God’s people can be without panic when the ground shifts, and the seas rage, and the nations rage, then we can face any crisis with confidence.

Whatever trouble comes, Psalm 46 tells us, with its first word, where to turn. Not to a change in circumstances. Not to our best efforts to fix the problem. Not to our anxious strategies to avoid pain and loss. But rather, to God.

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

The psalm rings with the name of God. Verse 4, “the city of God.” Verse 5: “God is in her midst.” Verse 5: “God will help.” Verses 7 and 11: the “God of Jacob.” And his covenant name, the Lord (verses 7, 8, 11). And verse 10: “Be still and know that I am God.” That’s where we’re headed: Stop raging and scurrying and plotting. Cease your frantic efforts. Be still, and bow to God. But don’t just bow; know. Know him. Know for the first time, or know again, learn afresh, that he is God, and that as Jacob had him as his covenant God, so do we, and all the more, in Christ.

If God can handle the world’s ultimate undoing, and the nations raging against his own chosen people, he can handle your crisis, he can help in your trouble, however catastrophic it seems. This psalm will always be ready, because our God is always ready — which leads to what specifically this psalm tell us about our God. The power in this psalm is in its vision of God. It gives us God, so that we might not fear, but have real peace of soul in crisis by knowing him.

Three main pillars uphold this vision of God in Psalm 46.

1) He is infinitely strong.

One of the overwhelming effects of Psalm 46, perhaps the chief effect of the psalm, is that it communicates to our souls: your God is strong, with infinite strength. Some call this a “psalm of confidence.” By rehearsing God’s strength, his people displace their fears, based on lies, with confidence in him, based on remembering who he is.

Which is why Martin Luther loved this psalm, and took this psalm as the inspiration for his great “battle hymn” of the Reformation, “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.” In the face of proverbial raging seas, and literal raging enemies outside the gates, God’s people have Strength himself on our side, however quick we can be to forget that.

If you were to try depict God’s infinite strength and power to a weary soul, how would you do it? It’s one thing to say “God is strong”; it’s another to show it, to make it concrete and tangible. How do you quantify divine strength? How do you provide glimpses of infinite power? I see at least four here.

The first two are verse 1: “God is our refuge and strength.” That is, he both protects and empowers his people. “Refuge” is defensive, a place of protection and safety. Like Helm’s Deep in The Two Towers, a refuge is a place to flee to for protection when an enemy is approaching. “Strength,” then, is God’s providing his people with the inner power to keep going. Energy and hope to keep breathing, keep walking, keep fighting. So “refuge and strength,” are outward and inward, defensive and offensive, the first two depictions of God’s strength, to help his people.

Third, then, is the last part of verse 6: “He utters his voice, the earth melts.” God doesn’t need fire to melt the earth. He doesn’t even need hands and arms. He doesn’t need a tool or laser. He only needs his voice. He only says the word, and the earth melts. The power of our God is seen in the power of his word. All he has to do is say it and it happens. Just as he spoke the world into being, and then into order, so he can dissolve it into chaos and out of existence, simply with his voice, if he so chooses. And with his voice, with his word, he can dispel fear from the hearts of his people and give them confidence in him.

Fourth, and related, is verse 9: “He makes wars cease to the end of the earth; he breaks the bow and shatters the spear; he burns the chariots with fire.” In other words, God defeats the enemies of his people. No matter how fierce and strong and weaponized and terrible the army, when he’s ready, he says, “Enough.” And in the end, even as he now endures war and evil with patience, war will cease. There will be a full and enduring final peace. God, in his infinite strength, will see to it — and do it with his word.

So the first pillar that upholds this crisis-ready vision of God is his strength.

2) He is attentively present.

Which is amazing, given his strength. That is, amazing if you’re on his side, if he’s your God — and it is horrifying if you’re against him.

This is the second part of verse 1: “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” He is not only strong, with infinite strength, but he’s present to help in trouble. And not just present, but “very present,” attentively present. In other words, he is ready and eager to help. He is not only able to help, when he chooses; he is eager to help. And he’s near, he’s present, he’s accessible.

Verses 4–5 expand for us what it means that God is “a very present help”:

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved; God will help her when morning dawns.

The river in verse 4 is not the first mention of water in Psalm 46. What was the other water? The sea — the restless, raging, unstable, dangerous sea. The sea is threatening water. But now we have very different water: a river. That is, water that is predictable and life-giving. Water that keeps a city alive when cut off from the outside by the siege of a foreign army. This river, in the city of God, while it’s in crisis, is so precious that it doesn’t just keep the city alive, it “makes [the people] glad.” Even in the midst of crisis, there is gladness. There is joy, even in pain and threat. Because this life-giving river, who is God himself, is present with his people to sustain them in their crisis. Our God, as our refuge and strength, doesn’t only get us through crisis, but even gives us joy in crisis.

But this river and city raises an important question: where? This is a particular city which God makes glad with the water of life and the river of his presence. This is not any city. It’s Zion, the city of Jerusalem. The place God chose, to “be in the midst of her,” so that she shall not be moved. Which is significant for us reading Psalm 46 as Christians. No longer is there a particular physical place where God has pledged his special favor and presence. Now, there is a particular person, God’s own Son.

Christians do not rally to a particular city; we rally to a particular person for refuge, strength, and very present help in trouble. And we do so together — to form a people. Which means the church is a critical context for finding joy in crisis. And this place, where God chooses to be present, in all his strength — once in ancient Jerusalem, and now in Jesus Christ, and his body — verse 5 says “shall not be moved.” Verse 2 spoke of mountains being moved into the sea. Verse 6 speaks of kingdoms tottering, that is, literally, being moved. Nature is moved, nations are moved, and verse 5 says God’s people, then in his chosen city, and now in his beloved Son, by faith, “shall not be moved."

Which doesn’t mean that God’s people never enter into any trouble. This psalm, with all its confidence in the strength and nearness and eagerness of God, never promises that we will be spared crisis. In fact, it assumes crisis. It readies us for crisis. And in the crisis, it promises God’s help but not on our timetable. Verse 5: “God will help her when morning dawns.”

When Morning Dawns

In Exodus 14, as God’s people seek to escape from slavery in Egypt, with their backs against the Red Sea, and the Egyptians bearing down on them with “six hundred chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt” (14:7), the people panic. This is a crisis indeed, with no walled city, and no river of fresh water. And into this crisis, Moses, prompted by God, speaks these words his people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today” (14:13). Then he lifts his staff, the sea parts, and God’s people walk through on dry land. The Egyptians follow, and so, at God’s command, “Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to its normal course when the morning appeared. And as the Egyptians fled into it, the Lord threw the Egyptians into the midst of the sea” (Exodus 14:27).

For every crisis we face in Christ, and all its darkness, God has a dawn designed. He will help when morning dawns. Your dawn will come. God’s help does not mean that his people are kept from crisis, but that he keeps us through crisis. In his perfect timing, when the appointed morning dawns, he rescues his people from their trouble, having preserved them through the long night.

Which leads to a third and final pillar of this passage.

3) He will be exalted.

Which might be surprising. If God’s infinitely strong, and attentively present and ready to help, isn’t that enough? What does God’s being exalted have to do with the help we need in crisis? Why, at the very height of Psalm 46, in verse 10, the climactic verse — the famous “be still and know” verse —why does God say here, “I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!”? How does God’s own declaration that he himself will be exalted feed our confidence?

To answer that, let’s get verse 10 in context. Verse 8 issues an invitation to the raging nations, those setting themselves up as enemies against God and his people. It’s almost a taunt. And also an invitation to any among God’s people who might be fearful. Verse 8:

Come, behold the works of the Lord, how he has brought desolations on the earth.

Remember, all God has to do is say the word. As we saw in verse 9, when he chooses, in his perfect timing, he makes wars cease, breaks bows, shatters shields, burns chariots and siege works with fire. In other words, it is a lost cause to set yourself against the living God.

Verse 10, then, issues another word of invitation, again both to raging nations and God’s fearful people, and this is the climactic statement of the psalm. Raging nations, fearful people, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

Did you catch that change of voice? The first invitation, verse 8, is from the psalmist: “Come, behold the works of the Lord.” But now, in verse 10, God himself speaks. He issues the invitation. He utters his voice, to the raging nations and tottering kingdoms — and oh do we still know tottering kingdoms and raging nations.

And he speaks into the chaos, into the raging and tottering, Be still. Lay down your weapons. Cease your warring and deconstruction. Cease your rage and disorder. Be still. Which is first a rebuke to the raging nations, to our turbulent world.

However, it is also a word to God’s people, who hear him say it to their foes, and read it in their Bibles. Be still, church. You need not be anxious. You need not fear. You don’t need to go into a frenzy to help yourself and save your family and take your country back to the 1950s.

Be still, and look to me. Rest from all your horizontal diversions and distractions and discouragement, and look up. Be still, and in that stillness, own that you are not God, and can be happy about it. You are not infinitely strong. You are not attentively present. You dare not be self-exalting. But know that I am God.

And then follows the two great declarations from the mouth of God himself, of his own certain exaltation. As surely as he is God, “I will be exalted among the nations. I will be exalted in the earth!”

For God’s covenant people in Israel back then, and for his covenant people today in Christ, our God’s exaltation is our salvation. His exaltation is our refuge and strength — and very present help in trouble The surety of his exaltation is precious beyond words and gives us a place to stand when all around us seems unsure. The certainty that he will exalted is granite under our feet. It is the guarantee of our help. It is our fortress.

Psalm 46 ends with a powerful word. The word “fortress” in verse 7, and in the refrain in verse 11, the final word on which the psalm ends is an even stronger image of security that “refuse” in verse 1. This “fortress” is a picture of inaccessible height. Helm’s Deep is a refuge. Heaven in a fortress. Not just a strong bulwark but one never failing.

The refrain is beautiful in verse 7, but it comes with added force in verse 11, on the heels of God’s promise that he will be exalted. Not only is he infinitely strong, and attentively present, but he will be exalted. As surely as he is God, he will be exalted. And for his people, we have in this God, and his exaltation, an impenetrable fortress, come what may.

Stillness at the Table

As we come to the Table, we remember that Psalm 46 is not the last time the voice of the Lord uttered, “Be still.” God himself, in human flesh, slept in the middle of a raging storm. His disciples panicked. This seemed to be a life-or-death crisis. And when they woke him, Jesus was not frantic but spoke stillness into the crisis: “Peace. Be still.” And so the calm of his own spirit settled over the raging sea: “the wind ceased, and there was a great calm” (Mark 4:39).

In Jesus Christ, we know the God of Psalm 46. And in him come together the saving strength and presence and exaltation of the one to whom we turn in crisis, and who speaks, “Peace, be still” into the raging storm of our soul.

So today we start back into our series on the Book of Psalms, and just to remind you, the Book of Psalms is an ancient collection of prayers and poetry that are in the Bible to remind us that our hope is in God’s promised King, the Messiah, who is Jesus.

Every psalm, one way or another, is pointing to Jesus, and Psalm 45 points to Jesus in a fascinating way. Psalm 45 is a wedding poem, but it’s not just for any wedding, this is for the wedding of the Promised King.

And so right away I just wanna be super clear about the ultimate meaning of this psalm. There are three things here I want us to see, and I’m gonna try to say them as clearly as I can:

The King is Jesus.

The King is Jesus and he is worthy of adoration.

The King is Jesus and a wedding is coming.

We’re gonna look more at each of these in more detail, but first, let’s pray again for God’s help:

Father in heaven, we praise you! Hallowed be your name! Thank you for this morning and for this moment when your word is open before us. We ask that your pour out your Holy Spirit now and show us the glory of your Son! We ask this in his name, amen.

1. The King is Jesus

There are two ways to approach the kingship theme in Psalm 45: One way is to read the whole psalm and then ask at the end, Who is this ultimately about?

The other way is to say from the start who this is ultimately about and then read the psalm with that in mind. And that’s the way we’re gonna do it, okay: The King in Psalm 45 is Jesus.

Here are three reasons why — and I’ll say these quick, but I need you to hang with me …

First, we know the King is Jesus because in all the kingship psalms, Jesus is the ultimate fulfillment. So throughout the Book of Psalms, some of the psalms about kingship are more directly about David or Solomon or God himself as king, but the office ultimately belongs to the Messiah, who is son of David AND God the Son. And so right away, when we see the mention of a king here in Psalm 45, we should think: this is telling us something about Jesus.

Secondly, we know the King is Jesus because in the New Testament book of Hebrews, in Chapter 1 when the author is describing the glory and uniqueness of Jesus, he quotes from Psalm 45. This is Hebrews Chapter 1, verses 8–9:

But of the Son [God says],

Your throne, O God, is forever and ever.

The scepter of your kingdom is a scepter of uprightness;

you have loved righteousness and hated wickedness.

Therefore God, your God, has anointed you

with the oil of gladness beyond your companions;

That is verbatim Psalm 45, verses 6–7, which means the New Testament authors, without a doubt, understood Psalm 45 to be about Jesus. (And we all should all say: it’s good enough for the New Testament, it’s good enough for us!) The Book of Hebrews just settles it: Psalm 45 is about Jesus.

But also, thirdly, let’s take a look at what Psalm 45 is doing in the context of these surrounding psalms. Right before we get to Psalm 45, Psalms 43 and 44 show the psalmist in a desperate place. In Psalm 43 his soul is cast down, and he feels rejected. He’s in mourning and he’s oppressed, verse 2, and so he’s preaching to himself to hope in God (verse 5).

But then in the next psalm, Psalm 44, verse 9, the psalmist says again that God has rejected his people, and he’s asking God why. The psalmist says that God’s people have become the laughingstock of their enemies (44:14), and he implies that God has treated his people unjustly (44:17–21).

Which means this is a very low moment for the psalmist, and yet still in Psalm 44, verse 23, he practices what he preaches to himself in Psalm 43, verse 5: The psalmist hopes in God. He hopes in God enough to pray. He calls on God to act!

Look at Psalm 44:23, he says: “Awake! Why are you sleeping, O Lord? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever!”

And then the psalm concludes Psalm 44 with a clear petition for salvation. The psalmist says, verse 26: “Rise up; come to our help! Redeem us for the sake of your steadfast love!” (44:26)

That’s the last verse in Psalm 44. Does everyone see what the psalmist is asking God there in that last verse?

The psalmist is asking God to help his people. He’s asking God to redeem his people for the sake of his steadfast love. Psalm 44 ends with that bold request. And now we wonder, how will God answer that?

Well, Psalm 45 comes next and it happens to be about a King. … Because the King is the answer.

How will God save his people? By sending his King … and Yahweh’s King who saves is Jesus. In Psalm 45 the King is Jesus.

Now the second thing to see here in Psalm 45, and I think the most central thing and it’s that:

2. The King is Jesus and he is worthy of adoration.

Look at verse 1. In verse 1, the psalmist is being unusually self-aware. He’s describing both his emotion and what he’s doing. The actual song starts in verse 2, but in verse 1 he wants us to know the process. He wants us to know where this is coming from …

He says, verse 1:

My heart overflows with a pleasing theme;

I address my verses to the king;

my tongue is like the pen of a ready scribe.

Calvin actually says verse 1 is another reason we know this psalm is about Jesus, because nobody talks this way about a human king.

We can hear the exuberance and joy in verse 1. There’s not a trace of inhibition — the psalmist loves the king and he wants everybody to know — and my guess is that for most of us, most of the time, we don’t know what that’s like. … I want to slow down on this for a minute.

I wonder for us if we know what it’s like to have this kind of overflowing love for Jesus. I mean, can you imagine that when you pray, you just overflow with praise like this? A lot of times, just to pray at all, we have to [shock our hearts.]

I want us to be more like Psalm 45. I want the praise of Jesus to come easy for us. And whatever is standing in the way, I pray that God would free us from it.

So here’s a simple question just to think about for a minute: do you love Jesus?

It’s not a trick question, and don’t overcomplicate it. Just think about it: Do you love him?

I can remember the moment when it first occurred to me that I loved Jesus. I was in college, standing in the kitchen of my apartment, in the afternoon, frying an egg.

I was a Christian; I believed in Jesus; I had heard the gospel as long as I could remember, but I think that because I knew what Jesus’s love looked like for me, I felt like couldn’t really say that I loved him (or something like that) — but I was standing there that day, praying, talking to Jesus, and I don’t know how to describe it other than that it just occurred to me that I loved him. As imperfect or whatever it might be, my heart welled up with affections for Jesus. I knew that I loved him, and it brought tears to my eyes, and then I ate my egg. I remember.

And here’s the deal, I remember that because that’s pretty much all I really want in life. I want to know the love of Jesus and to love him. That’s what I want for my family; that’s what I want for you, as your pastor and brother; that’s what I want for these cities. I want us to know Jesus the way the psalmist knows him here. I want us to be able to adore him as easily as we read the psalmist do it here.

We don’t run out of things to say; we never get stuck; we just open our mouths and adoration gushes forth, because Jesus is worthy of such adoration. That’s the point. We’re not working something up here or putting something on, we’re just saying of Jesus what he deserves. He deserves our adoration. Look what the psalmist says:

Jesus is better.

First, Jesus our King is better. There’s nobody like him because he surpasses every comparison. Verse 2: “You are the most handsome of the sons of men.”

Now to be clear, this description of Jesus here in Psalm 45 is Jesus in his resurrected glory. In his first advent, when Jesus humbled himself and came into this world in the First Century, “he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him” (Isaiah 53:2). But in his resurrected body, Jesus as our glorified and exalted King, he is the most handsome of the sons of men — which is the ancient Hebrew way of saying that if we could see Jesus now we would not be able to take our eyes off of him, because he’s better than anything we’ve ever seen before; he’s radiant in glory.

Look at verse 7: “Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.” See, Jesus is set apart! “My beloved is chiefest among ten thousand” (Song 5:10).

Which means, line up ten thousand kings, put them all in a row and consider each one, and you will find out what the apostle Peter says in John 6, that there’s nobody out there like Jesus.

He is chiefest among ten trillion. Only Jesus has the words of life (John 6:68). “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

Jesus is in a category of wonder all his own, and so when we think about him we should think about that. When we think of Jesus and pray to Jesus, we are thinking and speaking to someone who is unlike anyone else we know, because he’s better than anything that we can imagine. Adore him!

Jesus conquers in righteousness.

Also, here, the psalmist tells us that Jesus conquers in righteousness.

Verse 3:

Gird your sword on your thigh, O mighty one,

in your splendor and majesty!

4 In your majesty ride out victoriously

for the cause of truth and meekness and righteousness;

let your right hand teach you awesome deeds!

5 Your arrows are sharp

in the heart of the king’s enemies;

the peoples fall under you.

So Jesus our King will always conquer, and he will conquer righteously in all ways. We can never separate his power from his justice … which reminds us of John’s description of Jesus in Revelation 19, when he saw the heavens opened,

… and behold, a white horse! And the one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. (verse 11)

See, at one level, Revelation 19 is a terrifying scene, because …

Jesus’s eyes are like a flame of fire,

and he has a dazzling crown on his head,

and his robe is covered in blood,

and the armies of heaven are following behind him —

— which is terrifying, but then we remember that Jesus is faithful and true and that everything he does is right.

Jesus never does anything wrong. He never misuses his power. He has never said a wrong word or taken a wrong step or given bad directions. He is a ruler who is completely and exhaustively perfect. In Jesus, the greatest power belongs to the hands of greatest good. And so

he strikes down the nations and he heals the brokenhearted;

he rules with a rod of iron and he makes the blind to see;

he slays the wicked with the sword from his mouth and he says to the dead little girl in Mark 5, “Sweetie, wake up.”

Jesus destroys his enemies and for his people he wipes away every tear from their eyes.

He has the greatest power, and he has the best heart.

“The scepter of your kingdom, Lord Jesus, is a scepter of uprightness; you have loved righteousness and hated wickedness.” And so we adore you! Adore him!

Jesus conquers in righteousness.

Jesus is eternally blessed.

Also we see here that Jesus is eternally blessed. This is in verses 2 and 7.

The end of verse 2: “therefore God has blessed you forever.”

The end of verse 7: “Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions” [and then in verse 8 we read the signs of God’s blessing] …

your robes are all fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia.

From ivory palaces stringed instruments make you glad;

9 daughters of kings are among your ladies of honor;

at your right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir.

Now in verse 7, the word “anointed” there is where we get the word “Messiah”, which is translated into Christ. So you could say here, “God, your God, has Christed you…” Because to be the Christ is to be the most blessed of God.

It reminds us of Jesus’s baptism where we see that the Christ of God is also the Son of God. God the Father says of Jesus, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” This is the Son I love, and I’m happy with him!

And that gladness of God surrounded Jesus throughout his entire earthly ministry. We know that even when Jesus faced the cross, when he prayed in the garden just before we entered into the valley of suffering and death, he prayed that his disciples would know the love that the Father has for him. He wanted them to see the glory that God the Father has given him (see John 17:24). The Book of Hebrews tells us that “for the joy that was set before him, Jesus endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (see Hebrews 12:2).

So even in his suffering, the blessing of God was on the mind of Jesus. He thought of God’s joy. Of his joy. Of him being seated on his throne. Which is what Psalm 45 envisions.

Psalm gives us an image of Jesus after his suffering and death. This is after Jesus was raised from the dead and ascended. The vision here is Jesus eternally blessed, on his throne, receiving the adoration he deserves, and with the King is his queen. That’s the last thing I want to say about Psalm 45.

3. The King is Jesus and a wedding is coming.

Psalm 45, verse 9 first mentions the queen. And so if this King is Jesus, we should ask: who is she?

Well, we know from the New Testament that the bride of Christ is his church. That’s the metaphor of the church that we find in the Book of Ephesians Chapter 5, and also in the Book of Revelation Chapters 19 and 21, and it’s also alluded to in the Gospels. Ultimately the church is in view here in Psalm 45.

And how she gets to be here is the best part of the story. She is here because the King came here to rescue her. This the bride for whom Jesus died and was raised.

Ephesians 5 tells us this, that Christ loved the church (his bride), and gave himself up for her,

that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. (Verses 25–27)

And those last few lines here from the apostle Paul are looking to a time in the future. Psalm 45 is doing the same thing. Notice that the mention of the bride is a summons for her to bow to the King. The psalmist describes the bride as beautiful, but her beauty comes after we see her allegiance. This is a vision of the church fully sanctified and cleansed, and having been washed and purified, the church is presented to Jesus as his bride in glory.

The church will be radiant like we see in Ephesians 5 and Psalm 45, and on that day of her radiance, there will be a wedding. That’s the image. A wedding is coming.

And speaking of weddings, I think Psalm 45 fits nicely as our kick off to summer, because we are now in wedding season, right?

I wonder: how many of you in here know of a wedding that’s happening within the next few months? [raise hands]

Most of us probably have at least one wedding on our calendar. Weddings are coming, and we look forward to them. They are meant to be looked forward to.

And the same goes for this one. We are to look forward to this last, great wedding that is to come.

John describes it for us in Revelation 19 as the marriage of the Lamb. Revelation 19:6,

Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out,

“Hallelujah!

For the Lord our God

the Almighty reigns. [we hear kingship there]

7 Let us rejoice and exult

and give him the glory,

for the marriage of the Lamb has come,

and his Bride has made herself ready;

8 it was granted her to clothe herself

with fine linen, bright and pure”—

The rejoicing and exulting and glory and purity of this future day is an understatement. It’s an ending so good that we can hardly believe it. This is a joy so thick that we have to stretch our imaginations just to think about it, and the image of a wedding is here to help us. Because weddings are the happiest events we get to celebrate in this life, and they’re always pointers to this.

And there’s one moment especially in weddings that I think is the most profound. It’s right at the beginning. It’s when everyone stands, and the doors in the back open, and there’s the bride. And everyone is standing to honor her.

I always tell the groom to anticipate that moment, and to know that in that moment, when those doors open and he sees his bride and everyone standing for her, in that moment he is the richest man in the world. He is.

And now to think that one day Jesus will see us like that. Us.

We, his church, his rescued people, redeemed by his blood, we will be the sign of his blessing, forever. He will take joy in us, and we will take joy in him. And it will be — and I don’t mean in any trite kind of way, but as deeply as I can say — it will be “happily ever after.”

Because God’s joy is deeper than the universe, and this one great wedding celebration is where all this is headed.

Which now brings us to the Table.

The Table

First, I want to say for anyone who is here and does not trust in Jesus, I invite you to trust him now. Put your faith in him. Bow to this King and be saved.

And for those of you who do trust him, at this Table each week, when we eat the bread and drink the cup, we are “proclaiming Jesus’s death until he comes.” Which means we are looking forward to the wedding celebration that Psalm 45 points to. And so this morning as you receive the bread and cup, receive it in that hope. A wedding is coming.

In this sermon, Kenny Ortiz preaches on the doctrine of the imputation of Christ's righteousness and full justification by faith alone. He covers several key passages in the Old Testament that allude to this doctrine and then examines Romans 3-4 and 2 Corinthians 5, culminating by highlighting the glorious truths in 2 Corinthians 5:20-21: "Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." Christians have been justified because Jesus became sin. Jesus became the very thing God hates, he became sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God.

One of my favorite details about Easter Sunday, and Jesus’s resurrection body, is his scars. The victory of Easter is so great, the triumph of the risen Christ over sin and death is so resounding, we might be prone to overlook, or quickly forget, an unexpected detail like this.

When Jesus first appeared to his disciples, “they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit” (Luke 24:37). So Jesus says to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” Then Luke comments, “And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet” (Luke 24:38–40) — meaning his scars.

In the Gospel of John, when Jesus finally appears to doubting Thomas, after eight long days, he says to him, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe” (John 20:27).

That Jesus’s resurrected body would still show evidence of his wounds, that the scars of crucifixion could still be seen and touched, was both a confirmation and a surprise. The confirmation was that this was, in fact, him, risen. The same body that was killed on the cross rose from the grave. He was not a spirit or ghost. He was risen, fully alive, now in glorified humanity.

The surprise is that we might expect a resurrected body not to have scars. That might seem like a defect. But it is not a defect. It is a feature. Because these scars, these rich wounds, are marks of his love. These scars tell the good news, that he did not die for his own sins, but for ours. His wounds are invitations to sinners, and assurances to his saints. His scars preach good news. They are marks of Easter glory, the very glory that makes the horrors of his death into what we now call “Good Friday.”

The Gospel in All CapsAnd so on Easter Sunday, we come to the end of our Galatians series, and one of the last things Paul writes, with his own hand, is this in verse 17: “I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.” Like Jesus, Paul also had gospel scars — scars which pointed not to his own work, but Jesus’s work. Just as sinners had struck and killed the Son of God, so too sinners had struck and scarred his messenger. In 2 Corinthians 11, Paul mentions some of what he has suffered for the sake of Christ:

countless beatings, and often near death. Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. (2 Corinthians 11:23–25)

Paul’s scars, “the marks of Jesus” he received from preaching the resurrection of Christ, are his final argument in Galatians. Before he closes in verse 18 with, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen,” he puts the final period in place with his own life, and what he has been willing to suffer, to preach and defend the meaning of Good Friday and the news of Easter Sunday.

But not only is Paul’s final argument “the marks of Jesus” that he carries in his own body, but in this last section, he takes up the pen himself, from the secretary to whom he has dictated the rest of the letter. And he says in verse 11, “See with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand.” This is Paul’s way, here at the end, with so much on the line in Galatians, of shifting into bold font. This is the apostle Paul in all caps. So these precious five sentences, from verse 12 to verse 17, are direct and blood-earnest with a power that is very fitting for Easter Sunday.

And what we see is that this last flourish of Paul’s pen turns on the reality of boasting. So, let’s look at these verses in that light, with Easter eyes, in three steps.

Humans are born to boast.

We are born boasters. You are a born boaster — in two senses. It would be easy to miss a first and important sense.

That first sense is that we are boasters by creation. God designed us, before sin entered in, with the capacity to boast. Indeed the calling to boast. And what I mean by boasting is rejoicing out loud in words.

God made humans not only to think and do, but to feel and to speak. He gave us hearts and he gave us mouths. He created us in his image, meaning to image him in this world, to represent him and remind others of him — both fellow humans and the watching angels. And he not only gave us the ability to think and consider, but also to feel. He not only gave us bodies to move and work and do, but tongues to speak, to give meaning to our works with words. In other words, God made us to boast in him — that is, to not only know him with our minds, but rejoice in him in our hearts, and not only live in obedience to him, but speak words, out of that heart, that point others to him. God made us to boast in him.

And, as we know all too well, there is a second sense in which we are born to boast. We are born into sin. And so our natural inclination to boast often becomes sinful boasting. Instead of rejoicing out loud about God, we rejoice out loud about ourselves, in all the various and complex forms this takes. We all know this. We all have lived this. And of course, we’re often far quicker to recognize it in others than in ourselves.

As a youth baseball coach, let me tell you, we don’t have to teach kids to boast. Rather, we try to help them not indulge their instinct, in the heat of the game, to boast. “Let your play do the talking.”

What about your own soul? What are your boasts? What aspects of life, whether manifest gifts from God or seeming abilities and accomplishments, do you rejoice in most, and feel most drawn to express in words? What are you so regularly excited about that you can’t help but talk about? What qualities, possessions, abilities, achievements, relational connections make you look good when others hear about them?

When Paul takes up the pen for himself in verse 11, he puts boasting at the heart of his last push toward the Galatians. They, as well as the false teachers trying to influence them, and Paul himself, are all born boasters. We are born boasters. The question isn’t whether we will boast, but in what, and in whom, will we boast. First, Paul turns to what not to boast in. Verses 12–13:

It is those who want to make a good showing in the flesh who would force you to be circumcised, and only in order that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. 13 For even those who are circumcised do not themselves keep the law, but they desire to have you circumcised that they may boast in your flesh.

I think this is the most direct and succinct summary of what motivates the troublemakers in Galatia. They are putting on a show to appease unbelieving Jews. They are play-acting. They themselves do not keep the whole Jewish law. They know they can’t, and they don’t want to, besides. But what they do want to do is avoid persecution. This new movement of Christians, claiming that Jesus is the long-awaited Christ, is troubling Jewish leaders. And now the movement is spreading to Gentiles. Non-Christian Jews want to snuff this out. They begin persecuting Christians — like Paul himself had done, before the risen Christ appeared to him and turned his life upside down. And so the false teachers are trying to avoid persecution. They want to appease non-Christian Jews by boasting to them that Gentile converts to Christ are coming under the Jewish law.

The word here for “make a good showing” is literally “have a good face.” The false teachers themselves don’t keep the law, but they are trying to get Gentile Christians to receive circumcision so they can boast in their flesh, and have a good face to avoid persecution. And Paul says that however well-intentioned or naïve this may be, it is dead wrong, and compromises the very heart of the Christian message that Jesus is enough for right standing with God.

So, we are born boasters — by God’s design, and also in our sin. And the false teachers, to save their own flesh (from persecution) want to be able to boast in the flesh (from circumcision) of these Gentile Christians in Galatia.

Second, then, Paul contrasts their sinful boast with his own holy boast, which he wants the Galatians, and us, to join him in. This is how he wants us to rejoice in words.

Jesus turns boasting upside down.

Paul does not say that becoming a Christian banishes all boasting. We still boast. Oh do we! Worship is boasting. Preaching is boasting. Sharing the gospel is a holy and humble kind of boasting — rejoicing in words. But Christian boasting is not like the natural, sinful boasting into which we’re born. It is not boasting in the flesh. It is not boasting in outward appearance. It is not boasting in our own strength. It is boasting turned upside down because of the worth and beauty and power of Jesus Christ. Look at verse 14:

But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

So Paul does boast. But he boasts in the cross, of all things. The cross.

Today, it’s easy for us to be all too familiar with the cross. We see them on steeples. We wear them on necklaces. We sing about the cross. And it’s easy to forget, or overlook, what the cross meant in the first century. Some might be familiar with the hymn “Old Rugged Cross” which calls it “an emblem of suffering and shame.” The cross was horrific. It was reserved for the worst of rebels against the Roman empire, and was designed to not only make death literally excruciating and lengthy, but also utterly shameful.

And Paul says, “May I never boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

What a turn, that the very thing — a crucified Messiah — that seemed so shameful, such a stumbling block to Jews, and such folly to Gentiles, would be not only a critical truth for Christians, but central. We talk about the cross every Sunday. We remember it at this Table, as we will in a few moments. We depict it in baptism. The cross — the public execution of the Son of God — is not just a barrier to overcome to embrace the Christian faith, but it is at the very heart of our faith. We celebrate it, and draw attention to it. We boast in it.

Why is that? Because the wounds Jesus received at the cross were not for his own sins, but for ours. As we read Thursday night, from Isaiah 53:5,

he was pierced for our transgressions;

he was crushed for our iniquities;

upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,

and with his wounds we are healed.

The eternal Son of God took human flesh and blood, and went to that rugged, offensive, horrific, shamefully public cross, as the spotless Lamb, to die for our sins. We were the ones who deserved to spill our own blood in violent death, and eternal separation from God. For our rebellion, for our countless sinful boasts in our own flesh. But the wonder of Christianity, the heart of our faith, the very good news which we call “the gospel” is that Jesus went to the cross for us — for all those who would take Paul’s invitation to turn our boasting upside down and rejoice in words, Jesus is Lord.

We see elsewhere in Paul how Jesus turns our boasting upside down. Instead of boasting in comfort and easy in this life, Paul says in Romans 5:3, “we boast in our sufferings.” If God works the greatest good through the greatest evil — that is, the crucifixion of the Son of God — then our sufferings in this life are turned upside down. We grieve them, yet even as we do, we rejoice in what God is doing in and through them. And instead of boasting in our own strengths and abilities, Paul says in 2 Corinthians 11:30, “I will boast of the things that show my weakness.” And in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

Jesus turns our boasting upside down. Instead of boasting in our comforts, we boast in our sufferings. Instead of boasting in our strengths, we boast in our weaknesses. Instead of boasting in natural human conceptions of glory and power, just like the world, we boast in the offense of the cross.

But it’s Easter Sunday. What about the resurrection? When Paul says in verse 14, May I never boast unless in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, how does Easter fit? If all Christian boasting is a boasting in and under the banner of the cross, what do we make of our Easter boast that he is risen?

The answer is that, Yes, we boast in the resurrection, but it is a certain kind of boasting. It is a humbled boast. It is a God-magnifying boast. It is a Christ-treasuring boast. It is a cross-conscious boast. It is a boast in the surpassing power of God uniquely on display in and through human weakness, and suffering, and even death. It is the kind of boasting that comes on the other side of the grave, on the other side of crucifixion, on the other side of Christ turning the world, and us, upside down.

And not only is the Easter boast permissible; it is essential. Paul’s boasting in the cross implies the Easter boast. If there is no Easter boast, there is no boasting in the cross. If Jesus stays dead, there is no glory in his cross. We boast in the cross, because the one who died there for our sins rose again Sunday morning to be our living, breathing, loving, reigning Lord. And our boasting in the resurrection is a certain kind of boasting because it is also a boasting in the cross.

Christians boast in the resurrection too.

Let’s see the resurrection for ourselves in verses 15–16, which begin with the word “for” and explain what Paul has just said in verse 14. Verse 15:

For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.

The first and most obvious link to resurrection is “new creation.” New creation points to God’s action and initiative and power, not ours. That’s the contrast between circumcision and new creation. In this context, circumcision would be an action the Galatians would take in an effort to make sure they’re in right standing with God. And remarkably, Paul says uncircumcision doesn’t count either. Neither taking that step in the flesh, or refusing to take that step, wins you God’s acceptance. You cannot, in your flesh, earn God’s full and final favor. What counts is what he does. His work in Christ. His new creation. And the beginning of this new creation is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Easter Sunday is the great first act, the great first and decisive initiative, the great burst of divine power that launches a new creation, beginning with Christ, then coming to us, as God makes us new creatures in Christ, through faith, and then culminating someday with a new heavens and new earth. So “new creation” is the first glimpse of Easter.

The second is the connection to Galatians 2:20 at the end of verse 14. Paul says that by the cross “the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” The other place in this letter where Paul talks about being crucified with Christ is 2:20:

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Verse 14 only mentions crucifixion, but what 2:20 makes plain is that crucifixion with Christ, by faith, means resurrection with him. Just as Christ was crucified, and raised, so Paul’s old self — our old self — was crucified with Christ by faith, and we too have been raised to new life. We now live with a new heart, a new center, a new ultimate allegiance; we are new creatures, indwelt by God’s Spirit, even as we continue to battle and make headway against remaining sin.

And this reality of being a “new creation” in Christ is both personal and individual, as well as corporate. Not only did Christ very personally “love me and give himself for me” at the cross. But he loved us, his church, and makes us a people together in him. Verse 16 says that “all who walk by this rule” — that is, all who own God’s work and power in making them new creatures — are God’s true people. He calls them “the Israel of God.” This is the church, the true Israel. “The Jerusalem above” as he says at the end of chapter 4 (verse 36). Or like he says in Philippians 3:3, “we are the [true] circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and [boast] in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.”

There is a twist of irony here, in response to the false teachers. Do you want to be God’s people? Do you want to be in “the Israel of God,” in contrast to the Israel of the flesh? Then leave behind the life of flesh, circumcision, and law, and live instead according to the Spirit and faith and love, as those who have been loved by God in Christ.

Finally, we end with one last Easter connection to the resurrection: “the marks of Jesus.” Paul comes to the end of Galatians, takes the pen in his own hand to write verses 11–16, and then his one last word, before the concluding benediction, is this. And it is one final boast, that is a boast in the cross:

From now on let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.

In other words, not only do I answer with this letter, but I answer with my life. My skin is scarred — from being beaten, and lashed, and stoned — because I have stood by this gospel with my own life. Rather than trying to tweak the message to avoid persecution, as the false teachers are, I have not been deterred by threats. Rather than seeking, under pressure, to make marks in other people’s flesh, and boast in a head count of circumcisions, marks have been made in my flesh, as I have preached and defended that Jesus’s cross and resurrection, embraced by faith alone, are enough to get and keep us right with God. And so I bear on my own body, Paul says, as faint echoes and pointers, the very “marks of Jesus” he bears on his resurrection body — marks that are no defect, but shine with glory. And so Paul boasts in the cross, and the resurrection. And so we boast, The Lord is risen.

The Lord is risen indeed.

Commune with the Living Christ

As we come to the Table on this Easter Sunday, we celebrate that the Jesus whom we remember here is alive. His resurrection not only makes good on God’s word, and not only vindicates his sinless life, and not only confirms that his cross-work was effective to cover our sins, and not only gives us access to that salvation by union with him, but the resurrection means he is alive, right now, in glorified humanity, scars and all, at God’s right hand, to know and enjoy forever.

We call this Communion, not only because we commune with each other as come together to his Table, but first and foremost because we commune with him, the risen, living Christ. As we eat in faith, we receive him afresh, by his Spirit, and commune with our risen, living Lord.

One of my favorite details about Easter Sunday, and Jesus’s resurrection body, is his scars. The victory of Easter is so great, the triumph of the risen Christ over sin and death is so resounding, we might be prone to overlook, or quickly forget, an unexpected detail like this.

When Jesus first appeared to his disciples, “they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit” (Luke 24:37). So Jesus says to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” Then Luke comments, “And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet” (Luke 24:38–40) — meaning his scars.

In the Gospel of John, when Jesus finally appears to doubting Thomas, after eight long days, he says to him, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe” (John 20:27).

That Jesus’s resurrected body would still show evidence of his wounds, that the scars of crucifixion could still be seen and touched, was both a confirmation and a surprise. The confirmation was that this was, in fact, him, risen. The same body that was killed on the cross rose from the grave. He was not a spirit or ghost. He was risen, fully alive, now in glorified humanity.

The surprise is that we might expect a resurrected body not to have scars. That might seem like a defect. But it is not a defect. It is a feature. Because these scars, these rich wounds, are marks of his love. These scars tell the good news, that he did not die for his own sins, but for ours. His wounds are invitations to sinners, and assurances to his saints. His scars preach good news. They are marks of Easter glory, the very glory that makes the horrors of his death into what we now call “Good Friday.”

The Gospel in All CapsAnd so on Easter Sunday, we come to the end of our Galatians series, and one of the last things Paul writes, with his own hand, is this in verse 17: “I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.” Like Jesus, Paul also had gospel scars — scars which pointed not to his own work, but Jesus’s work. Just as sinners had struck and killed the Son of God, so too sinners had struck and scarred his messenger. In 2 Corinthians 11, Paul mentions some of what he has suffered for the sake of Christ:

countless beatings, and often near death. Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. (2 Corinthians 11:23–25)

Paul’s scars, “the marks of Jesus” he received from preaching the resurrection of Christ, are his final argument in Galatians. Before he closes in verse 18 with, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen,” he puts the final period in place with his own life, and what he has been willing to suffer, to preach and defend the meaning of Good Friday and the news of Easter Sunday.

But not only is Paul’s final argument “the marks of Jesus” that he carries in his own body, but in this last section, he takes up the pen himself, from the secretary to whom he has dictated the rest of the letter. And he says in verse 11, “See with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand.” This is Paul’s way, here at the end, with so much on the line in Galatians, of shifting into bold font. This is the apostle Paul in all caps. So these precious five sentences, from verse 12 to verse 17, are direct and blood-earnest with a power that is very fitting for Easter Sunday.

And what we see is that this last flourish of Paul’s pen turns on the reality of boasting. So, let’s look at these verses in that light, with Easter eyes, in three steps.

Humans are born to boast.

We are born boasters. You are a born boaster — in two senses. It would be easy to miss a first and important sense.

That first sense is that we are boasters by creation. God designed us, before sin entered in, with the capacity to boast. Indeed the calling to boast. And what I mean by boasting is rejoicing out loud in words.

God made humans not only to think and do, but to feel and to speak. He gave us hearts and he gave us mouths. He created us in his image, meaning to image him in this world, to represent him and remind others of him — both fellow humans and the watching angels. And he not only gave us the ability to think and consider, but also to feel. He not only gave us bodies to move and work and do, but tongues to speak, to give meaning to our works with words. In other words, God made us to boast in him — that is, to not only know him with our minds, but rejoice in him in our hearts, and not only live in obedience to him, but speak words, out of that heart, that point others to him. God made us to boast in him.

And, as we know all too well, there is a second sense in which we are born to boast. We are born into sin. And so our natural inclination to boast often becomes sinful boasting. Instead of rejoicing out loud about God, we rejoice out loud about ourselves, in all the various and complex forms this takes. We all know this. We all have lived this. And of course, we’re often far quicker to recognize it in others than in ourselves.

As a youth baseball coach, let me tell you, we don’t have to teach kids to boast. Rather, we try to help them not indulge their instinct, in the heat of the game, to boast. “Let your play do the talking.”

What about your own soul? What are your boasts? What aspects of life, whether manifest gifts from God or seeming abilities and accomplishments, do you rejoice in most, and feel most drawn to express in words? What are you so regularly excited about that you can’t help but talk about? What qualities, possessions, abilities, achievements, relational connections make you look good when others hear about them?

When Paul takes up the pen for himself in verse 11, he puts boasting at the heart of his last push toward the Galatians. They, as well as the false teachers trying to influence them, and Paul himself, are all born boasters. We are born boasters. The question isn’t whether we will boast, but in what, and in whom, will we boast. First, Paul turns to what not to boast in. Verses 12–13:

It is those who want to make a good showing in the flesh who would force you to be circumcised, and only in order that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. 13 For even those who are circumcised do not themselves keep the law, but they desire to have you circumcised that they may boast in your flesh.

I think this is the most direct and succinct summary of what motivates the troublemakers in Galatia. They are putting on a show to appease unbelieving Jews. They are play-acting. They themselves do not keep the whole Jewish law. They know they can’t, and they don’t want to, besides. But what they do want to do is avoid persecution. This new movement of Christians, claiming that Jesus is the long-awaited Christ, is troubling Jewish leaders. And now the movement is spreading to Gentiles. Non-Christian Jews want to snuff this out. They begin persecuting Christians — like Paul himself had done, before the risen Christ appeared to him and turned his life upside down. And so the false teachers are trying to avoid persecution. They want to appease non-Christian Jews by boasting to them that Gentile converts to Christ are coming under the Jewish law.

The word here for “make a good showing” is literally “have a good face.” The false teachers themselves don’t keep the law, but they are trying to get Gentile Christians to receive circumcision so they can boast in their flesh, and have a good face to avoid persecution. And Paul says that however well-intentioned or naïve this may be, it is dead wrong, and compromises the very heart of the Christian message that Jesus is enough for right standing with God.

So, we are born boasters — by God’s design, and also in our sin. And the false teachers, to save their own flesh (from persecution) want to be able to boast in the flesh (from circumcision) of these Gentile Christians in Galatia.

Second, then, Paul contrasts their sinful boast with his own holy boast, which he wants the Galatians, and us, to join him in. This is how he wants us to rejoice in words.

Jesus turns boasting upside down.

Paul does not say that becoming a Christian banishes all boasting. We still boast. Oh do we! Worship is boasting. Preaching is boasting. Sharing the gospel is a holy and humble kind of boasting — rejoicing in words. But Christian boasting is not like the natural, sinful boasting into which we’re born. It is not boasting in the flesh. It is not boasting in outward appearance. It is not boasting in our own strength. It is boasting turned upside down because of the worth and beauty and power of Jesus Christ. Look at verse 14:

But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

So Paul does boast. But he boasts in the cross, of all things. The cross.

Today, it’s easy for us to be all too familiar with the cross. We see them on steeples. We wear them on necklaces. We sing about the cross. And it’s easy to forget, or overlook, what the cross meant in the first century. Some might be familiar with the hymn “Old Rugged Cross” which calls it “an emblem of suffering and shame.” The cross was horrific. It was reserved for the worst of rebels against the Roman empire, and was designed to not only make death literally excruciating and lengthy, but also utterly shameful.

And Paul says, “May I never boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

What a turn, that the very thing — a crucified Messiah — that seemed so shameful, such a stumbling block to Jews, and such folly to Gentiles, would be not only a critical truth for Christians, but central. We talk about the cross every Sunday. We remember it at this Table, as we will in a few moments. We depict it in baptism. The cross — the public execution of the Son of God — is not just a barrier to overcome to embrace the Christian faith, but it is at the very heart of our faith. We celebrate it, and draw attention to it. We boast in it.

Why is that? Because the wounds Jesus received at the cross were not for his own sins, but for ours. As we read Thursday night, from Isaiah 53:5,

he was pierced for our transgressions;

he was crushed for our iniquities;

upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,

and with his wounds we are healed.

The eternal Son of God took human flesh and blood, and went to that rugged, offensive, horrific, shamefully public cross, as the spotless Lamb, to die for our sins. We were the ones who deserved to spill our own blood in violent death, and eternal separation from God. For our rebellion, for our countless sinful boasts in our own flesh. But the wonder of Christianity, the heart of our faith, the very good news which we call “the gospel” is that Jesus went to the cross for us — for all those who would take Paul’s invitation to turn our boasting upside down and rejoice in words, Jesus is Lord.

We see elsewhere in Paul how Jesus turns our boasting upside down. Instead of boasting in comfort and easy in this life, Paul says in Romans 5:3, “we boast in our sufferings.” If God works the greatest good through the greatest evil — that is, the crucifixion of the Son of God — then our sufferings in this life are turned upside down. We grieve them, yet even as we do, we rejoice in what God is doing in and through them. And instead of boasting in our own strengths and abilities, Paul says in 2 Corinthians 11:30, “I will boast of the things that show my weakness.” And in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

Jesus turns our boasting upside down. Instead of boasting in our comforts, we boast in our sufferings. Instead of boasting in our strengths, we boast in our weaknesses. Instead of boasting in natural human conceptions of glory and power, just like the world, we boast in the offense of the cross.

But it’s Easter Sunday. What about the resurrection? When Paul says in verse 14, May I never boast unless in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, how does Easter fit? If all Christian boasting is a boasting in and under the banner of the cross, what do we make of our Easter boast that he is risen?

The answer is that, Yes, we boast in the resurrection, but it is a certain kind of boasting. It is a humbled boast. It is a God-magnifying boast. It is a Christ-treasuring boast. It is a cross-conscious boast. It is a boast in the surpassing power of God uniquely on display in and through human weakness, and suffering, and even death. It is the kind of boasting that comes on the other side of the grave, on the other side of crucifixion, on the other side of Christ turning the world, and us, upside down.

And not only is the Easter boast permissible; it is essential. Paul’s boasting in the cross implies the Easter boast. If there is no Easter boast, there is no boasting in the cross. If Jesus stays dead, there is no glory in his cross. We boast in the cross, because the one who died there for our sins rose again Sunday morning to be our living, breathing, loving, reigning Lord. And our boasting in the resurrection is a certain kind of boasting because it is also a boasting in the cross.

Christians boast in the resurrection too.

Let’s see the resurrection for ourselves in verses 15–16, which begin with the word “for” and explain what Paul has just said in verse 14. Verse 15:

For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.

The first and most obvious link to resurrection is “new creation.” New creation points to God’s action and initiative and power, not ours. That’s the contrast between circumcision and new creation. In this context, circumcision would be an action the Galatians would take in an effort to make sure they’re in right standing with God. And remarkably, Paul says uncircumcision doesn’t count either. Neither taking that step in the flesh, or refusing to take that step, wins you God’s acceptance. You cannot, in your flesh, earn God’s full and final favor. What counts is what he does. His work in Christ. His new creation. And the beginning of this new creation is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Easter Sunday is the great first act, the great first and decisive initiative, the great burst of divine power that launches a new creation, beginning with Christ, then coming to us, as God makes us new creatures in Christ, through faith, and then culminating someday with a new heavens and new earth. So “new creation” is the first glimpse of Easter.

The second is the connection to Galatians 2:20 at the end of verse 14. Paul says that by the cross “the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” The other place in this letter where Paul talks about being crucified with Christ is 2:20:

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Verse 14 only mentions crucifixion, but what 2:20 makes plain is that crucifixion with Christ, by faith, means resurrection with him. Just as Christ was crucified, and raised, so Paul’s old self — our old self — was crucified with Christ by faith, and we too have been raised to new life. We now live with a new heart, a new center, a new ultimate allegiance; we are new creatures, indwelt by God’s Spirit, even as we continue to battle and make headway against remaining sin.

And this reality of being a “new creation” in Christ is both personal and individual, as well as corporate. Not only did Christ very personally “love me and give himself for me” at the cross. But he loved us, his church, and makes us a people together in him. Verse 16 says that “all who walk by this rule” — that is, all who own God’s work and power in making them new creatures — are God’s true people. He calls them “the Israel of God.” This is the church, the true Israel. “The Jerusalem above” as he says at the end of chapter 4 (verse 36). Or like he says in Philippians 3:3, “we are the [true] circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and [boast] in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.”

There is a twist of irony here, in response to the false teachers. Do you want to be God’s people? Do you want to be in “the Israel of God,” in contrast to the Israel of the flesh? Then leave behind the life of flesh, circumcision, and law, and live instead according to the Spirit and faith and love, as those who have been loved by God in Christ.

Finally, we end with one last Easter connection to the resurrection: “the marks of Jesus.” Paul comes to the end of Galatians, takes the pen in his own hand to write verses 11–16, and then his one last word, before the concluding benediction, is this. And it is one final boast, that is a boast in the cross:

From now on let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.

In other words, not only do I answer with this letter, but I answer with my life. My skin is scarred — from being beaten, and lashed, and stoned — because I have stood by this gospel with my own life. Rather than trying to tweak the message to avoid persecution, as the false teachers are, I have not been deterred by threats. Rather than seeking, under pressure, to make marks in other people’s flesh, and boast in a head count of circumcisions, marks have been made in my flesh, as I have preached and defended that Jesus’s cross and resurrection, embraced by faith alone, are enough to get and keep us right with God. And so I bear on my own body, Paul says, as faint echoes and pointers, the very “marks of Jesus” he bears on his resurrection body — marks that are no defect, but shine with glory. And so Paul boasts in the cross, and the resurrection. And so we boast, The Lord is risen.

The Lord is risen indeed.

Commune with the Living Christ

As we come to the Table on this Easter Sunday, we celebrate that the Jesus whom we remember here is alive. His resurrection not only makes good on God’s word, and not only vindicates his sinless life, and not only confirms that his cross-work was effective to cover our sins, and not only gives us access to that salvation by union with him, but the resurrection means he is alive, right now, in glorified humanity, scars and all, at God’s right hand, to know and enjoy forever.

We call this Communion, not only because we commune with each other as come together to his Table, but first and foremost because we commune with him, the risen, living Christ. As we eat in faith, we receive him afresh, by his Spirit, and commune with our risen, living Lord.

“If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25) — and to keep in the step with the Holy Spirit means we submit to the Holy Spirit; it means we yield to his guidance and his fruit; and we, by his power, understand that the cross of Jesus Christ is the very center of our lives. To live the Spirit-filled life is to live the cross-centered life. And if that’s the case for us it will have a good effect on our church.

Keeping in step with the Spirit will result in a healthy church — and Galatians Chapter 6, verses 1–10 shows us what that looks like. We learn at least three things in this passage.

If we’re keeping in step with the Spirit, resulting in a healthy church, it means:

We move toward the wayward.
We love one another truly.
We endure in love as central to our witness.

We’re gonna spend some time on each of these, but first let’s pray again for God’s help:

Father in heaven, by the power of your Holy Spirit, please speak to us today. Speak to our church, and bless us, in Jesus’s name, amen.

We move toward the wayward (verse 1)

So walking in the Spirit effects good in the church, and part of that good means, right away, that the church tries to keep one another from ruining their lives. Verse 1:

Brothers, if anyone is caught in a transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.

There three pieces here I want us to see:

There is the person caught in transgression;

There is the spiritual person who seeks to restore that person caught in transgression; and

There is the manner of how the action to restore is carried out.

In verse 1 Paul is talking about corrective church discipline. So let me explain a little more about what that is. There’s two kinds of discipline in the local church:

there’s formative discipline (which means we’re learning and being trained together in the Word), and

there’s corrective discipline (which means we together correct sin in the hopes of redirecting fellow church members to Jesus). …

And this corrective discipline is very much a part of discipleship. At its most basic level, corrective discipline happens anytime we are challenged by the word of God and/or we recognize the conviction of the Holy Spirit. And, brothers and sisters, I hope that happens a lot.

Because if we read the Bible and we’re never challenged by it, it either means that we’re perfect or we’re doing wrong (and we’re not perfect).

We want this to be part of our life together as a church. It’s why every Sunday in our worship we have a time of Confession, that follows an exhortation. We are invited to confess our sins, and to repent, and to receive the forgiveness of Jesus. At its most basic level, corrective discipline is a normal aspect of the Christian life when we live honestly and whole.

And then there are some times when corrective discipline becomes a more formal practice.

Jesus taught us about this in Matthew 18:15ff. Paul mentions this several times in his letters, especially in 1 Corinthians. But formal corrective discipline happens when a church member gets “caught in transgression.” This means the church member is doing some outward, serious sin and they don’t stop. They are unrepentant.

In that case, a spiritual person should seek to restore them. And by spiritual person here, Paul simply means a person who has the Holy Spirit. Paul is talking about a fellow church member who lives by the Spirit — which could be any of us! That person, any person, walking in the Spirit, should go to the person who is caught in sin and exhort them to stop. It’s meant to be a way out.

And the main purpose of corrective church discipline that Paul mentions here is restoration. We exhort the member to stop their pursuit of sin because we sincerely do not want our brother or sister to ruin their life, which is what unrepentant sin will do. So we move toward them to restore them.

And we do that in a spirit of gentleness — which is a fruit of the Holy Spirit — and it’s something that’s not hard for us to do when our real purpose is restoration. We’re not trying to punish the person caught in sin! We’re trying to help them! We’re not trying to hurt them; we’re trying to keep them from the hurt and wreckage that sin will cause. So we move toward them to restore them, and we do it gently … and we do it according to the way Jesus commands us in Matthew 18. And at the end of the day, this really all comes down to simple obedience to Jesus.

Look, I understand that corrective church discipline is not easy; it’s uncomfortable; and sometimes our goal for restoration fails.

But the question of whether a church practices corrective church discipline is a question of whether that church follows Jesus and does what the Bible says. If we are a church keeping in step with Holy Spirit, if we’re a healthy church, Galatians 6, verse 1 will be true of us. We will move toward the wayward.

We will love one another truly (verses 2–5)

The central command for this entire passage is verse 2.

Verse 2 is the main idea that Paul elaborates in everything else he says through verse 10 — but for now I want us to focus on verses 2–5, because these few verses are kind of packaged together. Notice three parts:

First, there’s the main idea, and then there are two clarifications.

Main Idea: Bear One Another’s Burdens

Now the main idea is verse 2: “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”

So this is a command — “Bear one another’s burdens” — and Paul has embedded into the command its effect. The grammar is actually future tense. Paul says “Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way — by bearing one another’s burdens — you will fulfill the law of Christ” — and so what is the law of Christ?

Well, it’s to love others. That’s the command Jesus gave us in John 13, on the night he was betrayed (which is coming up this Thursday, Maundy Thursday). On that night, Jesus said to his disciples, John 13:34:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.

And of course Paul knew this command. Paul was thinking about this command in Chapter 5.

In Chapter 5, verse 6 Paul says: “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.”

In Chapter 5, verse 13, Paul says: “… but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Then in Chapter 5, verse 22, love is the first fruit of the Spirit.

So by the time we get to Chapter 6, we know that:

Faith is expressed through loving others;

Love is expressed through serving others;

And love expressed through serving others is so deep and important that it actually fulfills the Old Testament law.

Well, Paul is repeating those same ideas in Chapter 6, verse 2. So try to track with me here:

Jesus’s new commandment for his people is love one another — that’s the law of Christ. And we fulfill that law — we actually will love one another the way Jesus said — when we bear one another’s burdens.

Loving one another truly means bearing one another’s burdens. That’s the main idea here. But now notice Clarification #1 in verse 3.

Clarification #1: This Applies to Everyone

Clarification #1 is that Paul’s command here applies to everyone.

When Paul says verse 2 he’s speaking to the whole church about how we live together, and he has in a mind a holy reciprocity; he’s saying: Hey, all of y’all, bear one another’s burdens. Y’all do this together.

But Paul suspects that there will be some individuals who hear that command and think it does not apply to them. They’ll hear Paul say: “Bear one another’s burdens” and they’ll say: Yeah, I’m good. I don’t actually need help. I can handle my stuff on my own.

Well, Paul anticipates that thinking and says, “For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself.”

In other words, if you think you’re something as in: You think you don’t need help; you think you can handle life without burden-bearing support from others; if you think that, you deceive yourself. You’re actually buying a lie. It’s not true. You do need help. We all need help.

We know that, right? Every single one of us needs help. How’s that landing on you right now? How does it land on you to know that you have needs that God intends for others to meet?

Several years ago I read this little book called Side by Side, written by a Christian psychologist named Ed Welch. I was reminded about the book this past week, and I went back, found it, and read my notes — and it’s such a helpful book.

It’s actually divided into two parts: the first part is about having burdens that others help you bear; and second part is about how you help others bear their burdens. And the real genius of the book, to me, is how it starts. Right away, first page, Ed Welch says that to be human means two things — you know what they are?

He says to be human means we need help and we give help.

And that’s true of humans because God made us that way, on purpose. God made us to need others and for others to need us, and if that’s true of humans in general, then how much more so for us in the church? All of us as brothers and sisters, in our life together as a church, we each need help and give help. And if we don’t understand it’s both — if we ever think it’s one and not the other — that will actually distort the church community. Here’s what I mean:

If you think you help others bear burdens, but you don’t need any help with your own, it will eventually lead to pride, and that pride will alter the source of your help for others from being God and his word, to being yourself. The only real and lasting way you help others is to know, like Luther once said, that even on our best days we are all just beggars telling other beggars where to find bread. Givers of help are also needers of help.

The other side is also true.

If you think you only need help from others, but you don’t give help (or you think you can’t give help), it will also lead to pride — but not the pride of arrogance, it leads to the pride of self-pity — to the thinking that you’re poor and pitiful and the whole world should be bending over backwards to make things easier for you. That’s not good.

Both kinds of pride harm the church’s life together. It warps the church community.

So we need to get this, brothers and sisters: Givers of help are also needers of help; and needers of help are also givers of help. That’s what Paul means (and clarifies) when he says “Bear one another’s burdens” — and understand this applies to everyone. You are deceived if you think this doesn’t apply to you.

And the way to not be deceived — the way to realize that you have burdens and you also need help — is to just take an honest look at your life. Just examine yourself. That’s verse 4.

And verse 4 gets to the Clarification #2.

Clarification # 2: Everyone Takes Personal Responsibility

Clarification #2 is that each person must take responsibility for themselves.

Now look, verses 4–5 can be a little puzzling — so we gotta follow Paul’s train of thought. Paul says, verse 3: Hey, don’t think you’re something and deceive yourself, but, verse 4:

… let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor.

So to test your own work and actions means to examine yourself, but don’t examine yourself in comparison to your neighbor. If there’s something about yourself that you think is great, don’t make that assessment based upon how you size up with others, because verse 5:

For each will have to bear his own load.

The word for “load” in verse 5 is different from the word for “burden” in verse 2. When Paul says “burden” in verse 2 he’s taking about something really heavy and concerning and overwhelming. But the word for “load” is not like that. It’s simply a load. That’s a good translation. The idea is a “load of responsibility.”

Paul is saying that each individual member is responsible for themselves. We all have burdens we need others to help us bear, just like we help others bear their burdens — and at the same time we are responsible for our own stuff.

So I’ve got an issue I need you to help me with, but it’s not your issue, it’s mine — and ultimately I’m going to be held accountable not for how you did or did not help me, but I’m going to be held accountable for what I did.

You see how this goes?

It’s interesting that verse 5 is future tense: “each will have to bear his own load.” Many commentators think Paul is referring to the future Day when we each will stand before the judgment seat of Christ (see 1 Corinthians 5:10). One day we all are gonna stand before Jesus as individuals, and when we do, in that moment every comparison we make today between ourselves and others, it will be silly then. Every complaint and grumble we might have today about so-and-so, it will be empty then.

Look, whatever you have going on in your life right now, one day we all will stand before Jesus responsible for ourselves.

That’s a helpful clarification, right? Thank you, brother Paul.

Okay, so now, let’s just put verses 2–5 altogether. Here’s my paraphrase of what Paul is saying. He’s saying:

Bear one another’s burdens, and by doing so you will fulfill the law of Christ to love one another. And don’t think that you don’t need help — if you think that you’re deceiving yourself. Just examine your own life and you’ll see, but don’t examine your life in comparison with others. Don’t focus on how you measure up with so-and-so, because in the end we all will be held accountable for ourselves.

That’s Galatians 6, verses 2–5.

And if we keep in step with the Spirit, resulting in a healthy church, this will be a reality in our church.

It will mean that we love others truly — which means that we live interdependent lives of mutual burden-bearing — we need help and we give help — and we’re responsible for ourselves.

God, let it be.

And this brings us to #3.

If we keep in step with the Sprit, resulting in a healthy church, it will mean:

We endure in love as central to our witness (verses 6–10)

Okay, there are three parts to need to see here. There’s the Principle, the Encouragement, and the Focus.

The Principle

For the Principle, skip down to verse 7.

In verse 7 Paul reinforces what’s he’s been saying with the principle of sowing and reaping, which is basically the principle of causality. This is about the way God has ordered the world. If you sow apple seeds, you get apple trees and then apples.

See, this means we are able to do certain things now that we trust will have a certain effect in the future. And this is really important for human life — in fact, without this, everything in the world, from our perspective, would be random and absurd.

Because we’d plant apple seeds and say: I don’t know, we’ll see?!?

We would have no clue what our actions effect. And that type of randomness and unpredictability would make our actions pointless; everything would be a crapshoot; and eventually we would self-destruct. And so that’s not how God made the world, and that’s not how it goes for the life of the church.

If you sow in the flesh, you’re gonna reap the corruption of the flesh. If you’re walking in the works of flesh described in Chapter 5, verses 19–21, you will not get a healthy, united church — you’ll get a corrupt, divided church that will destroy itself, like Paul says in Chapter 5, verse 15.

But if you walk in the Spirit, if you sow in the Spirit, you will reap eternal life — which, of course, refers to our life with God in the future new creation, but it doesn’t only mean that.

The eternal life that Paul says here is not just life in the future, but it’s the joy of life with God that we can begin to experience now, together, as the church. Eternal life is a blessing that doesn’t just start after we die, but it’s a blessing that we can begin to experience now and then it just only gets better.

But the problem with the churches in Galatia, is that there were at least some who thought that they could live in the flesh, boast in the flesh, sow in the flesh, but still reap that eternal life blessing — and to think this way is to defy the way God ordered reality. To think this way is to mock God.

And this is something we all should consider for a minute: Do you ever think like that? Do you think you can sow in the flesh but reap in the Spirit? Do we as a church ever think like that?

Last year the pastors did an exercise over the course of several weeks where we considered some diagnostic questions related to our church’s culture — we just tried to pop the hood and discuss some good, pointed questions, and one of the questions went like this:

Is there some place in our church’s life where obedience to Jesus is being withheld but we expect his blessing anyway?

That’s a good question. It’s a good question for a church, and it’s a good question for us all personally. It’s another way of asking: Is there any way we might be mocking God? Is there any way we might be sowing one thing and expecting to reap another?

Church, we want to sow in the Spirit — amen! And we want to sow in the Spirit in the confidence that sowing in the Spirit will mean reaping eternal life, and it’s actually that confidence that enables us to endure in love. That’s where Paul goes in verse 9. Look at verse 9.

The Encouragement

I think in verse 9 there’s an implied “therefore.” Because of this principle of sowing and reaping — because if we sow in the Spirit we will reap eternal life — therefore let us not grow weary in doing good. Why? Because in due season — or literally, in its “own time” — we will reap, if we don’t give up.

See how that’s connected? The principle of sowing and reaping is meant to encourage us. Paul is saying:

Hey, because sowing in the Spirit will mean reaping eternal life, keep on sowing in the Spirit; don’t grow weary, but keep on doing good, keep on loving one another. Don’t think that it’s pointless, it’s not pointless. Keep on because if you do you will experience the harvest. You will, church. There will be a harvest.

And that’s why, verse 10, whenever we have an opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially those in the “household of faith”, which is the local church.

And this makes sense, right? If sowing in the Spirit means we will indeed reap, then not only do we want to endure in sowing, but we want to sow as much as we can. Every opportunity. If we’re gonna reap from doing good, we want to do good more and more and more.

Which all comes back to love.

The Focus

I want to be sure that we catch this. In this whole passage, the word “love” is not explicitly used, but all of the verbs here about the church’s life together fall under the banner of love.

This is what loving one another looks like in the local church:

it means we move toward the wayward

it means we bear one another’s burdens.

It means the church supports their pastors (that’s verse 6).

It means we sow in the Spirit and keep on doing good.

And doing good means precisely that. It means we do good to others in the effort to seek their good. It means we love them.

All of this is about loving one another.

And as we seek the good of everyone, in every opportunity we can, we especially want to do that to the church. We especially want to love our brothers and sisters in the family of God.

In fact, I think it’s a prerequisite for any kind of good we do outside the church.

In terms of how we talk around here, our church as three essentials. First, we worship Jesus. Second, we love one another. And then third, we seek the good of the Cities.

And that order matters, because we can’t really “seek the good of the Twin Cities” if we don’t “love one another.”

Why? Because our love for another is central to our witness.

That’s what Jesus taught us. And we know from verse 2 that Paul is thinking about Jesus’s words in John 13. The “law of Christ” is the new commandment that Jesus gives us to love another. That’s John 13, verse 34. But do you know what Jesus says in verse 35?

In verse 34, Jesus says, “Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” Verse 35: “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

The reason we focus our love on the church — the reason we especially love one another as brothers and sisters in Christ — is because that love is precisely what shows the world the life-transforming love of Jesus.

Hey, church, we all just beggars who have found bread. That’s who we are on our best days. And as we love another, we just want each of us to have more bread; and as we’re having more bread together, we then go out and invite others. Is there anybody hungry out there? Are there any hungry people in these cities? Come to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Know that Jesus came to this world to save sinners. Jesus died on the cross in our place, taking upon himself the punishment that we deserved for our sins — Jesus was crucified for us, dead and buried for us, and then on the third day he raised for us — and right now, if you put your faith in Jesus, you will be saved. God will forgive all your sins and declare you to be righteous in Jesus, and you will know eternal life. Trust him.

That’s the invitation for all of us, and for you who do trust in Jesus, this is what brings us to the Table.

The Table

At the Table the bread represents the body of Jesus, and the cup represents his shed blood, and this is a meal for everyone who is united to Jesus by faith.

For those of us who have put our faith in Christ, when we eat and drink together, we remember the his death for us, we receive his grace afresh, and give him thanks. We worship him, which is our first essential.

We’re gonna start with a question here: What kind of church do you want to be?

Now the reason that I’m asking y’all the question is because y’all — as in we, all of us together — we are the ones who determine the answer. What makes a church the kind of church it is is the people of that church. The pastors have a responsibility to teach the Bible and to shepherd and to lead, but ultimately it’s the church together that forms and shapes that church’s character. And our passage today in Galatians Chapter 5 is all about this.

Last week Pastor David Mathis mentioned that beginning in Chapter 5, the apostle Paul starts to focus on the church’s life together. Paul moves from expounding the gospel in Chapters 1–4, to now he’s exhorting the church about how they should live together because of that gospel.

And verses 7–14 here in Chapter 5 is kinda like a fork in the road. There’s a dichotomy that begins to emerge here, and it’s like Paul is saying to the church:

Hey, you can either be this kind of church OR that kind of church. …

You can go down this road or that road — but you’re gonna go down one road or the other, and who decides, Paul would say, is YOU. It’s who he wrote the letter to. He’s not talking to a denomination; he’s not talking to only pastors; but he’s talking to the church, because the church decides. We decide together the kind of church we’re going to be.

So let me tell you the options that Paul lays out.

The Options Before Us

Go ahead and skip down to verses 14–15 for a minute. This is the conclusion of the passage, but I wanna start with the conclusion so that we can get an idea of the two different roads we’re looking at.

Verse 14 continues verse 13 where Paul says “through love serve one another” — verse 14 says to love your neighbor as yourself. “But if” — verse 15, which marks a contrast — “But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.”

And those are the two roads. You either love one another (verses 13–14) or you devour one another (verse 15, which connect back to verses 7–12).

It’s either the road of love or the road of strife.

The road of love leads to flourishing; the road of strife leads to destruction — and we need to make sure we’re on the right road.

So what I’d like to do for this sermon is to slow down in this passage and describe more of what these two roads are like:

What is the road of strife?
What is the road of love?

That’s the plan. Let’s pray:

Father in heaven, you who are with us by your Spirit, in this moment, we ask for more of him. Please pour out your Spirit upon us, and show us the glory of your Son! We ask in his name, the mighty name of Jesus, amen.

1) What Is the Road of Strife?

Okay, so what is the road of strife?

Well, I think there are three things Paul tells us about the road of strife, and first one stands out right away in verse 7. It’s this:

1 - The road of strife starts with doctrinal compromise. (v. 7)

Look at verse 7. Paul says:

You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?

So this is the metaphor of a long-distance runner, which is one of Paul’s favorite metaphors. He uses it several times in his letters. And the image here is that the church is this runner who’s been running down the right road in good shape. They’ve been trucking along, keeping a good pace, but then somebody hinders them.

The word here for “hindered” is the same word Paul uses in 1 Thessalonians 2:18 when he said that “Satan hindered” his ministry efforts. The idea is to obstruct. It’s to get in the way.

So let’s stick with this running metaphor: imagine that there’s a runner trucking along, doing great. [We have some runners in this church, right?]. Imagine: You’re running along, doing great, but then somebody comes out of nowhere, they start running beside you and then they start jabbing elbows in your side.

But you’re a good runner, and so you keep running, but all these elbows in your side start to change your direction from the one you started down, and before too long you’re going a completely different way, down a completely different road.

That’s what is going on with the Galatians. They’ve been hindered.

And this hindrance that Paul is talking about is a hindrance from obeying the truth. And when Paul uses the word “truth” he means the truth of the gospel (just like he says in Chapter 2, verses 5 and 14). Somebody is hindering this church from the gospel, and this somebody, verse 8, is not God. The church was running well; they were on the right track; but they keep taking in the side that are against the gospel of God. Which means you’re running, and these elbows are saying …

“Hey, faith in the gospel is not enough.”

“Hey, keeping Jewish law is required.”

“Hey, Paul doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

“Hey, did God really say …?”

And see, the problem is, if you take that first elbow, and then you don’t really resist the second elbow, then the third elbow is gonna land a little bit easier, and the next thing you know you’re just getting used to these elbows, and then, as Paul says in Ephesians, you end up getting “tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine” (4:14).

You end up on the road of strife, headed toward destruction, and it all started by giving just a little bit of space to an elbow that contradicts the truth of the gospel. The result of one compromise will lead to a very different place from where you were meaning to go.

Look, I know there are some who might roll their eyes at churches who are serious about doctrine. I get that there are some who might ridicule churches who are concerned about “slippery slopes” — I get it — but I just wanna say that the importance of doctrine and vigilance against false doctrine, that comes from the New Testament. It’s what the Bible says. And the question of whether we do what the Bible says is the question of whether we actually want to be a real church.

Because churches who forsake the Bible, churches who abandon the truth of the gospel — like the Galatians were on the verge of doing — they are not real churches anymore. Now they still might have a building; they might meet together on Sundays; but if they have forsaken the gospel of Jesus Christ, they are not a real church. And for all so-called churches in these Twin Cities, I want to replace them with a church plant. That’s what we’re trying to do here, God willing.

When it comes to the road of strife, it starts with doctrinal compromise.

2 - The road of strife gradually worsens over time. (v. 8)

Paul says in verse 8: “A little leaven leavens the whole lump.” And this means he’s changed the metaphor. He goes from talking about running a race to now he’s talking about bread-making, and the connection between the two is the gradualness of the effect.

It doesn’t take that many elbows for a runner to veer off course, and it doesn’t take a whole lot of leaven to make bread. Just a little bit changes the entire thing (see 1 Corinthians 5:6).

See, for the Galatians, maybe this seemed to be a small issue —

we’re were just talking about circumcision, right? Relax!

we’re just talking about keeping a few Jewish laws, right? That’s all!

— and Paul says, Look, just like it doesn’t take a lot of leaven to make bread, the slightest deviation from the truth of the gospel will eventually lead to destruction.

And of course you never get to see this in real time. We don’t have a time-lapse perspective on a church’s apostasy. We seldom ever see get to see something decay as it’s actually happening. The closest example in my mind of where we might see this is when I go bowling.

I went bowling with some friends a couple weeks ago, and I did horrible. I bowled so badly that I lost respect for myself. I’m working through it. But the way bowling works is, you know, there are ten frames, and you get a couple rolls each frame, and they have the computer that’s calculating your score.

And in that first frame, you know you leave a couple pins — but it’s no big deal. You get more chances. Then you leave a couple pins the next few frames — and you think it’s fine because you’re still knocking down most of pins, but if you keep doing that (maybe you gutter one) and the next thing you know the game’s over, you bowled a 77, and you hate yourself.

It’s a gradual thing. It was a couple pins here and there. But it adds up and gets worse. It always starts smaller than what it becomes. We need to know this about the road of strife. Most people don’t say, Hey, I choose strife! But it happens over time. We need to know that.

3 - The road of strife must be seen for what it is, and thus rejected. (vv. 10–12, 15)

Paul makes it clear in verses 10–12 what the Galatians are up against. He starts,

I have confidence in the Lord that you will take no other view.

Remember, the Galatians had been tempted to embrace a different view of the gospel than what Paul preached, but Paul said in Chapter 1 that there’s really no such thing. There are not different views of the gospel. There is the gospel as Paul preached it, or there’s no gospel at all.

In fact, remember what Paul said in Chapter 1, verses 8 and 9. He said twice that “If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received [from me], let him be accursed.” That’s an imprecatory statement. In Chapter 1, Paul spoke a curse on these false teachers, and it’s relevant in Chapter 5 because he’s about to do it again. Look at the second part of verse 10. Paul is confident in the Lord that the Galatians are gonna get this right and he’s confident that …

the one who is troubling you will bear the penalty, whoever he is.

Paul is saying that these false teachers, these troublers, will face the judgment of God. God will punish them for their deceit, or actually in this case, it’s singular. It seems like Paul is talking about one person: “whoever he is” — do you see that?

Maybe this is the ring leader of these false teachers — we don’t know — but what’s important for us to see, I think, is that Paul speaks differently about the church than he does about the false teacher.

When it’s the church, Paul is hopeful. Now he exhorts them strongly; he admonishes them; but he doesn’t give up on them.

But for the false teacher, Paul is already speaking judgment on him. Which helps us understand verse 12.

Skip to verse 12 for a minute. In verser 10 Paul has already said that this false teacher will be punished. Now he says, verse 12, “I wish that those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves!”

And that means precisely what you think it means … if you think it means castration. Paul is saying that those false teachers who are teaching that circumcision is needed for salvation might as well go ahead and keep on cutting.

This is the second most intense thing that the apostle Paul says in any of his letters.

The most intense thing is what Paul has already said here in Chapter 1 when he said that the false teachers should be accursed. Because by accursed he means eternal damnation. Which means that if we think Paul is being more severe in Chapter 5 verse 12 than he is in Chapter 1 verse 9 it’s because we don’t understand hell. … And it’s because we don’t understand the gravity of this situation!

What’s at stake here is verse 15. It’s the total destruction of this church; it’s the full apostasy of all these Christians! And unless we get how serious this is, nothing else that Paul is saying is gonna make sense.

Seeing the Wonderful Cross

The false teachers were teaching that circumcision is necessary for salvation —

which means they were saying the death of Jesus was not enough;

they were treating the death of Jesus like it’s a coupon;

they were spreading a man-centered false gospel heresy —

and Paul says in verse 11:

If I was preaching that garbage, I would not be persecuted, because in that case, according to that message, the offense of the cross is removed.

What does Paul mean by that? What makes the cross offensive?

Simply put, what makes the cross the offensive is that the cross says you can do nothing to save yourself. Nothing. The cross says that you are wrong … and you’re needy.

And we don’t like to be wrong or needy. The cross says you are so sinful and depraved, you are so broken and distorted in your sin, that you can’t do anything to change it yourself, but the only chance you’ve got is the death of Jesus in your place. Do you see? The only way you can be saved is if Jesus Christ the Son of God is slain for you.

The Jewish people consider that shameful; Greeks consider that foolish; every sinful human considers that offensive … until the Holy Spirit opens our eyes to know that this cross is actually wonderful.

Because this cross, the cross, is the display of God’s love for us. The cross is God saying, I love you this much …

and if God did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?

Do you see it? The cross is the keyhole to all grace.

This cross is our life. This cross is our boast. The cross of Jesus is everything to us.

And the Galatians have to get this. Because they were headed down the road of strife, and it must be seen for what it is and rejected. Don’t go that way.

And if we don’t go that way, then we must go the other way. We reject the road of strife, and we choose the road of love. And so let’s learn more about this road. We’ve seen the road of strife, now What is the road of love?

2) What Is the Road of Love?

Well, I think in this passage Paul also tells us three things about the road of love, and we see the first in verse 13:

For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.

Right away this tells us …

1 - The road of love does not misuse freedom to indulge the flesh. (v. 13ab)

Verse 13 connects us back to last week’s passage, to Chapter 5, verse 1, where Paul tells us that Jesus has set us free.

Jesus has saved us by his grace through our faith in him, not by our works, and he has freed us from sin and the law and the curse and from death. All the things that used to enslave us and trap us in fear — the power of those things that used to rule us — has been broken.

Pastor David said last week: we are freed from those things AND we are freed for loving one another. Verse 13 here just extends what we’ve already seen in verse 6, but here Paul adds the negative warning: “Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.”

Now at the most basic level, the reason Paul gives this warning not to misuse our freedom is because it’s possible to misuse our freedom. And we know this. You know this.

You’re saved by faith in Jesus; you’re not saved by good works; and so then you might think that since I’m not saved by good works then I don’t have to do any good works — if I don’t have to love others in order to be saved, why bother?

I remember a conversation I had with a neighbor a few years ago. He comes from a nominal Catholic background, and I was explaining to him the meaning of grace. I said that we can never deserve God’s love for us. God’s grace means that God loves us because he loves us, not because we’ve done anything ourselves to make him love us. And you know what he said?

He said: Oh, so that means I can go out and live and party and do whatever I want, and just ask God to forgive me, and he will. You mean I can just do or not do whatever I want and God just loves me.

Maybe you’ve heard responses like that before. Maybe you’ve thought that yourself. But see, Paul understood that responses (and behavior) like that are possible. People can misuse their freedom to indulge their flesh, but it’s only because they don’t actually understand grace.

See, in this wrong way of thinking, people confuse grace and salvation. Grace is how we are saved, but what is this salvation that grace brings us into? Ultimately our salvation is that we get God. We belong to God. Grace does not make us a god unto ourselves, but grace reconciles us back to the God who made us and fills us with his Spirit. Our salvation is fellowship with God and in that fellowship we have the freedom to live for God’s glory … and for others and their good.

This brings us to the second thing Paul tells us about the road of love.

2 - The road of love through love serves one another. (v. 13c)

Look at the end of verse 13. Don’t misuse freedom to indulge the flesh, but, verse 13:

Through love serve one another.

And this is the absolute perfect way to say it. In light of what’s going on with the Galatians, Paul says it this way on purpose: “Through love serve one another.”

So it’s not just serve, but it’s serve through love. It’s not just love, but it’s through love serve.

See … serving without love is busyness, but love without serving is empty. So we need them both to stay together.

There is a way to serve others not from love. It’s a kind of going through the motions that might either be frenzied or it might be boring — it may look like a lot of activity, or it may look humdrum — but either way, serving without love means we’re doing things but we’ve lost touch with our motive. It means maybe we’ve gotten “good” at ministry but we’ve forgotten the heart behind it. This is something to beware of. Serving without love is busyness …

But love without serving is empty. There is a way to only theoretically understand the importance of love. If you read the Bible, you have to at least start here, because the Bible has so much to say about love. We can easily see that love is important, and we can nod our heads, but if we’re not actually putting love into action by serving others in tangible ways, then we are missing it.

Don’t just check the box that love is important, show love. Don’t just agree with the idea of love, but practice love through actions. First John 3:18, “Let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.”

So SERVE through love;

through love serve —

— this is the road of love, and if we’re all thinking this way, if we as men and women are centered on the gospel and holding these things together … it will change your home; it will change a church; it will change a city.

This is the road of love.

Last thing to see here:

3 - The road of love embraces the depths of love. (v. 14)

Now we all know that the word “love” is overused. It’s so common that it doesn’t sound profound to us. It doesn’t come across as significant. It might even sound a little trite or cliche, right? But to be clear, that is not at all the way the Bible talks about love. Look at verse 14:

For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

The whole law. y’all. All of the laws in the Old Testament about how we should treat one another. All of them. Paul says it’s really quite simple. He says the same thing in Romans 13:8–10,

Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

So there you go! So next time you’re reading the Old Testament and you get a little confused, just skip to here. This is your answer in the back of the book. All the laws are basically one law: love.

And Jesus taught us this: the greatest commandment of all, he said, is to love God with everything you are; the second commandment is to love others. Jesus said on these two commandments depend all the Law and Prophets (see Matthew 22:37–40).

Love God; love people. Simple, right?

But do we really have any idea how deep this is?

First, love is our primary calling in relation to God. We are called to love God, which does not mean to merely have a positive, sentimental disposition toward him. But we are called to love God as in have a wholehearted, life-encompassing, community-impacting, exclusive commitment to God.

See, a lot of folks might think they love God because they have some good feelings about him. Jesus said to love God with every fiber of your being … and … love other people too. Ultimately, love them as in seek their good in God. Serve others through love so that they would know a little bit more about God’s love for them.

And see now we’ve come to the very foundation of it all.

The Foundation of It All

We’ve looked at these two roads — we’ve seen the road of strife and now we’ve looked at the road of love — and whichever road our church takes is for our church to decide. So can we decide love? [Can we all agree on that?!]

But see, get this: if we are going to walk down and keep walking down this road of love, the most important thing is to know God’s love for us. The apostle John says “We love because God first loved us” (1 John 4:19). And that is profoundly true. We’re talking depths here.

I like the way one pastor has put it: He says, “a heart aloof from God grows aloof from others. …and ends up engaging in merciless comparisons and endless faultfinding” — or Paul would say you devour one another. This is strife! — And “therefore all restoration” — any renewal we might experience in our love for one another — “begins by going back to God first, prodigals that we are.” (Ray Ortlund, The Gospel, 117)

This is where the road of love starts, and it’s what we have to remind one another every step along the way.

God — the Creator of the heavens and earth; the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; Yahweh who says I will be who I will be and I will show mercy on whom I will show mercy — God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who through the gospel of Jesus Christ has become our Father who knows the very number of hairs on our heads, even as he knew us and chose us before the foundations of the world not to be destined for wrath but to obtain salvation, this God who is so radically for us that nothing can be against us, and nothing can come between us, this God … loves you. He loves you. He loves you.

And he made that clear to us at the cross of Jesus, which brings us to this Table.

The Table

At this Table, as we receive the bread and the cup, we give Jesus thanks for his death in our place. We eat and we drink remembering that Jesus and his cross is everything to us. And if that’s your story this morning, if you trust in Jesus Christ, if you know that you are loved by God, we invite you to eat and drink with us.

Good morning, Cities Church. Great to be here with you this morning. Over the last several weeks we have been traveling through the book of Galatians. And we’ve seen that the Galatians had abandoned the true gospel.

There had been this group of false teachers, we call them the Judaizers, and they preached a false gospel. Rather than preaching the true gospel, that we are saved by faith alone in Jesus, they proclaimed that belief in Jesus was not enough—maybe it was a good start, but that they needed to do more to be saved. These Judaizers claimed that the Galatians needed to follow the Old Testament law to be saved.

But Paul makes it clear in this letter, no, you are not saved by obeying the law… and not only can you not be saved by following the law… the reality is that no one has ever been saved by obeying the law.

The law was never designed to save. That’s been a big part of Paul’s arguments thus far. And as a part of making these arguments Paul uses Abraham to make his point. Paul leverages Abraham is Galatians 3 and then does so again here in Galatians 4.

God established a covenant with Abraham, a friendship, and he says, “Abraham, I’m gonna bless you. Abraham. I’m gonna have a covenant with you. Your family is gonna be my family.” So, being in the family of Abraham is a big deal because that’s the family that God has chosen. That’s the family that God has an agreement with. And Paul has been making the point, “Y’all want to be in Abraham’s family, but you’re going about it all wrong.”

Abraham didn’t earn his way into God’s family by obeying the law. No! Abraham was called a friend of God because he believed. It’s by faith, not by works. We are justified by faith, we are forgiven of our sins by our faith in Jesus, not by our good behavior.

Abraham didn’t earn a ticket into heaven. He didn’t earn a spot in God’s family, no, so why would you think that you could earn it?

That’s what Paul has been saying thus far in this letter. Then, Paul points out a moment in Abraham’s life when he didn’t rely on faith, where he did actually try to take matters into his own hands, and Paul shows the result, and it’s not good. Look at Galatians 4:21:

“Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not listen to the law?”

22 “For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and one by a free woman. 23 But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was born through promise.”

Now, many of you surely are familiar with this episode from the life of Abraham. If you’re not, quick synopsis. When Abraham was 75 years old… and his wife was 65. God promised that Abraham would be blessed, and God said that he would make Abraham into the father of many nations. Well, presumably if you’re gonna be the father of many nations, then you’re gonna need to have some children, but Abraham and wife could never have children. Well, several years go by and Abraham and Sarah, they’re trusting in God, they’re believing in him. But eventually they take matters into their own hands.

They assume they need to do something to make this happen. It’s up to them and their ability to push this forward. So, Sarah says to Abraham, “Why don’t you take my slave girl Hagar? Why don’t you go to bed with her? You can have a child with her. And that could be the child through whom the promise of God is fulfilled.” And that’s what Abraham does. Abraham has a child with Hager.

It’s like they said to themselves, “We’re gonna have to take matters into our own hands; we’re going to need to manipulate this or manufacture this; they basically took it upon themselves to do what they could do to bring about the thing God promised. And the child is born, and his name is Ishmael. At this point Abraham was 86 years old and Sarah was 76 years old. And they think it’s all good. They made it happen. But God says, “No, that’s not the right way.”

Look at what Paul says here, look at verse 23, Paul says… “the son of the slave was born according to the flesh.” The son of the slave… the slave is Hagar and the son is Ismael… he was born the flesh, this is not a supernatural thing. This thing you guys concocted, this was the handiwork of human hands, not supernatural intervention, the promise of God cannot be manufactured and cannot be brought about by human efforts. No.

Ishmael, he ain’t it. And the way you conspired to make this happen, that ain’t the way! But then, 14 years later, when Abraham was 100 years old, and Sarah was 90 years old, Sarah gives birth to a child: Isaac. Finally, after years of waiting, 25 years of waiting, the promised child is born. Abraham was 75 when God told him he’d be the father of many nations, he was 86 when Ismael was born, and now he’s 100 years old when Isaac was born. And Sarah is 90 years old.

Remember, she was 65 when God told them that Abraham would be the father of many nations, she was 76 when Ismael was born, but here she was at the ripe old age of 90, giving birth to Isaac. This is supernatural. This is a miracle. I don’t know if you know this, but women don’t typically have children at age 90. Uhhh, that’s not normal, right?

God had promised that he would do something supernatural, and then, he did it, he did the supernatural thing. And Isaac is the result of God’s supernatural work. Look at the second half verse 23… “the son of the free woman was born through promise.” Now in verse 24, the apostle Paul will make a statement about how we are to view these two sons: Ishmael and Isaac. Look at verse 24, Paul says: “Now this may be interpreted allegorically.”

Two very important side notes.

First, Paul says that we can learn something from these two women, we can see this as an allegory or metaphor.

However, it’s very important to know that Paul does not merely believe that this story, that’s the first side note.

This story, from the book of Genesis, it is not merely an allegory. That’s an important point. Paul did not see the Old Testament as merely myths or fables, with good life lessons. There are some modern scholars that would want you to believe that the Old Testament is nothing more than illustrations.

But, when we examine how the apostle Paul talks about Abraham, in Galatians 3 and Galatians 4, it is clear that he believes Abraham was a real person. He’s not saying, “Hey, that was an allegory.” No, he’s saying Abraham was a real person. Hagar was a real person. Sarah was a real person. These are historical events. And, in addition to that, these events also serve to teach us spiritual truths; they point to greater realities.

But at no point should we think Abraham and Sarah are fictional characters in Jewish mythology. It’s also clear that Paul believed Abraham was a real person when we examine how Paul talked about Abraham in Romans 4. He believes that Abraham was a real person. The apostle Paul often harkens back to the Old Testament, and in 100% of those cases, it’s abundantly clear that the apostle Paul believed the people in the Old Testament were real people, that the Old Testament is accurate in its accounting of history.

We see Paul doing this in Romans 5, 1 Corinthians 11 and 15, in Ephesians 5, and 1 Timothy 2, and 1 Corinthians 11, in those passages he’s mentioning Adam and Eve and creation, it’s abundantly clear, he believes Adam and Ever were real people, and if Paul believed it, so should we. If you’re here and you have any questions about that, maybe you’re a skeptic, I’d love to talk to you after the service, feel free to come on up. Let’s talk about it.

Christians, you can trust the Bible. We can trust the veracity and the accuracy and the historicity of both the Old and New Testaments!

Okay, second major side note, in addition to being historical events, these events were orchestrated by God to teach us key doctrines, there are components of these Old Testament narratives that point toward New Testament concepts, and this is NOT by accident. God, in his tremendous providence, he specifically orchestrated these events throughout history to serve as fantastic illustrations for us, to give us insights into greater realities and greater spiritual truths.

We can learn a lot by peering back into the Old Testament and looking for how those events point toward the things revealed in the New Testament. These moments in the Old Testament are often referred to as “types” and studying them is often referred to as “typology.” That’s what us theology nerds call it… typology.

And there are some very clear examples of this in the New Testament. In Matthew 12, Jesus explicitly tells us that Jonah is a type, Jonah being swallowed by a large fish, he appears to have been defeated by death. However, on the third day, Jonah is given new life and comes back to herald the message of repentance, likewise, Jesus was seemingly defeated by death, but on the third day he rises, and he preaches a message of repentance. Jonah is a type.

Now, again, Jonah, and the whale, it actually happened. It’s a true story. It’s a matter of history, but it’s simultaneously a metaphor, an allegory for us. There are other examples in the New Testament. The apostle Peter talks about Noah’s flood being a type that points toward Christian baptism. In the book of Hebrews, we see the writer of Hebrews talking about the tabernacle as a type, all of the interior components of the tabernacle, the design, the structures, the furniture, all of those things were types, they pointed forward to some greater realities.

We should be looking for types in the Old Testament. Jesus expects us to look for him in the Old Testament. There are a few passages that teach us this but I think the clearest comes from John 5:39. In that passage, in John 5:39, Jesus was rebuking some Jewish leaders, these guys were not apostles, they were regular peeps, just like you and I, and he’s rebuking them for not seeing Jesus in the Scriptures. Jesus says to them, “you search the scriptures because you think in them that you have eternal life. And it is, they, that bear witness about me.”

Jesus is like, you guys are studying the Old Testament. You’re studying it. You’re getting in there. But you’re missing the main point. He’s like, you think it’s the scriptures that give life, but no, it’s not the scriptures that give you life; the Scriptures point you to the person that gives you life, that’s Jesus. Jesus was expecting them to see the Messiah on the pages of the Old Testament. And he certainly expects us to do the same. So, when we read the Old Testament, we should look for Jesus, we should look for types.

And that’s precisely what the apostle Paul is doing here in Galatians 4. He is reading an historical event. And he’s highlighting how that Old Testament event points toward a glorious New Testament doctrine. Let’s look at how Paul uses verse 24:

Now this may be interpreted allegorically: these women are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she is Hagar. 25 Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. 26 But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother.

Hagar and Sarah represent two distinct covenants. Hagar is Mount Sinai, that’s where the law was given. Hagar represents the old covenant, the law of Moses, the law that the Galatians were trusting in.

But Sarah represents the New Covenant and she is the mother of those who embrace the New Covenant. So, Paul is saying, “you who trust in Mt. Sinai, your mother is Hagar, and you’re not in the lineage of Isaac, you’re in the lineage of Ishmael.” Paul continues, he says that Hagar is the present Jerusalem, here on earth, which is enslaved—enslaved politically to the Romans and enslaved spiritually to sin.

But Sarah, she is the Jerusalem above, the new Jerusalem. Then he contrasts the two sons. Ishmael is born of the flesh, born through natural means. Isaac is the child of the promise, born because God miraculously opened Sarah’s womb. Ishmael was not the true heir. Isaac is the true heir. And, if you try to take matters into your own hands, if you start your faith journey by believing in Jesus, and trusting that you would be saved by faith, but then you turn around and then try to manufacture circumstances, you try to do it on your own, if you think you can bring forth the promise of God by your own efforts… then you are doing what Abraham did when he slept with Hagar, and what resulted from that was a child who’s mother was a slave, and in the same way, when you trust your own ability to save yourself, when you look to the law to save you rather than trusting in Christ to save you, then your result shall also be slavery, a spiritual slavery.

This would’ve been startling to Paul’s audience in the first century. They would’ve been absolutely shocked by this. Let me give you a silly example. A few weeks ago, my wife and I were watching a movie recently where a wealthy man died. And, after he died, all of his family got together at his estate to hear the family attorney read the will. There are hundreds of millions of dollars on the line here.

So the family attorney’s there and the whole family is there and the attorney opens the letter and then he tells them that all of them have been cut out of the will… hundreds of millions of dollars are going to someone outside of the family.

Everyone is shocked, then they’re angry, and then chaos ensues. They thought they were in, they thought they were in line to inherit all of the wealth, but they discovered that they’re on the outside looking in. I imagine, this is how many of Paul’s audience, the people reading this section in this letter, that’s probably how they felt.

In the minds of many people in the first century, they assumed that if you’re someone who has committed to the law, then you are in the family, you are in Abraham’s downline, you’re in the will, and you’re in-line to inherit the promise of Abraham!

They knew that the promise of God to Abraham would then be carried out through to Isaac, and then to Jacob, and then to Jacob’s children, and then to their children, and their children’s children, all the way down the line. The people in the first century committed to following the law would have seen themselves as being descendants of Isaac, they would have looked to Sarah as their mother.

But Paul’s implies that for those who trust in the law for salvation, Sarah is not their mother, they’re actually in Hagar’s family, that’s your mother.

Hagar represents taking matters into your own hands, she represents trying to manufacture the promise of God, on your own, based on your own efforts, and that’s what the Galatians were doing with their salvation, they had stopped trusting in Christ alone for salvation.

No, at this point, there’s no doubt, Paul knows that he has totally messed with their heads. He has totally thrown them for a loop. They cannot believe what he’s saying, and they’re thinking, but weren’t the Jews the ones God was faithful to for centuries, and weren’t they the ones that followed the law?

Paul anticipates this sentiment and he proactively addressed this sentiment by quoting from Isaiah 54:

“Rejoice, O barren one who does not bear; break forth and cry aloud, you who are not in labor! For the children of the desolate one will be more, than those of the one who has a husband.”

Over and over again throughout the Old Testament, God speaks to Jews as being their husband, and over and over again, throughout the Old Testament, God speaks of the Jewish people as being unfaithful to him. They continually flirted with other gods. He calls Israel a harlot.

The ones who had a husband were the Jews, they were the ones that had been given the law, but they were unfaithful, so God is declaring, through the prophet Isaiah that there’s going to be a group of people that have been seen as desolate, they didn’t have God as their husband for centuries, but they are going to become greater than the ones who did have a husband.

Paul’s point is that the Gentiles were called desolate by the Jews, but they believed in Jesus, and that unites them to God.

Paul is implying that God is the husband to the Galatians, through Christ. To them Paul says, “you are in covenant with God through trusting Christ… but if you turn away from Christ and your turn toward the law, you’re turning you’re back on your husband. Don’t do that!” And then Paul explains why they ought not do this. Look at verses 30-31 with me:

“What does the Scripture say? “Cast out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit with the son of the free woman.” 31 So, brothers, we are not children of the slave but of the free woman.”

The apostle Paul points out that Ishmael and his mother are eventually cast out of Abraham’s house, in the same way, those who insist on trusting in the law for salvation, they too shall be cast out. They will suffer the same judgment. When Abraham tried to do it on his own, the result was someone being born to a slave mother. When Abraham trusted God, the result was God fulfilling his promise.

The same is true for us… when we try to do this on our own, slavery will be our mother. But if we trust Christ the result will be the same as when Abraham trusted God, we will see God fulfill his promises. And this was made possible, by Jesus, at the cross. We are all sinners, by nature and by choice, we deserve to be cast out, we deserve to be condemned. But Jesus took on the punishment we deserved, and he made it possible for us to be saved.

If we trust in Jesus, if we wholeheartedly believe on him, we then are counted members of God’s family. As Paul said to the Galatians, Cities Church, I say to you… We are not children of the slave women, but we are children of the free woman, and we are now in the family. And that is worth celebrating!

My aim today in this message is to remind you of your salvation. There are so many glorious aspects of our salvation and of redemption that it is like looking at a prism and seeing how the light refracts into different colors. There is only one salvation and yet there is a universe of glories in this great salvation. Psalm 3:8 and Jonah 2:9 both say that “Salvation belongs to the Lord.”

And so my goal, by God’s grace, is that you would love the redemption of God even a little bit more. That you would understand how we’ve been redeemed even if just a little bit more. That you would taste and see the riches of His grace that you’ve been adopted in. And that it may overflow in thanksgiving and multiply into heartfelt sacrificial worship, a true worship that would lead to endurance, to a personal regard of holiness, to a greater love of humanity in general and the family of God specifically, and to an ever deepening appreciation of what Christ has done for you and a boldness to that witness. All for the good of these Cities and for the glory of God.

We can’t do this in our own strength. This is only possible with God. So let us go to our Father.

Father, by the grace of your Spirit, and in your Son’s name we ask for your help. We need your grace. Lead us, guide us, in your will, and for your glory. Amen.

This passage continues the train of thought from last week's message from Pastor Jonathan which was the second half of Galatians chapter 3. We started seeing the glorious reality that God is our father and we are children of God.

We saw that the law was added because of transgressions. We saw that Paul was not being exhaustive about the uses of the law under the New Covenant but because of the specific context that the Galatian church was facing, Paul was being clear that the law could not save.

There were false teachers that were saying Christians needed to believe in Jesus and live under the Mosaic law to have life.

As I heard it once said, when it comes to salvation, Jesus + something = Nothing, but Jesus + Nothing = Everything.

The message of the Gospel is that law keeping does not give life but only grace through faith in Jesus gives life.

And so the Apostle Paul here in verses 1 and 2 of Ch.4 finishes his train of thought from the previous passage about how the law was meant to be a guardian.

Galatians 4:1–2 (ESV): 4 I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything, 2 but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father.

V.1 and 2 is describing Paul and all Israelites under the Old Covenant and it’s protective role designed to keep them mindful of their condition looking forward to the promises of God.

He compares them to a child who has an inheritance but can’t use it until they are a certain age or until the date that is set by the parents. The child, in regards to touching and using the inheritance is no different than the lawyer who helped write the will, until that set time.

The law under God’s specific covenant with the people of Israel in all of its requirements was necessary in that stage of redemptive history.

[My 2 sons find car seats very annoying. And you know what I do too.]

But in their specific stage of physical development it is meant to protect them. It is meant to guard them. And in a similar way that’s what the law under the old covenant was like.

V.3 states “In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world.”

That phrase, “elementary principles of the world” is the same wording we find in Colossians ch 2v 8, 20 where its translated “elemental spirits of the world”. The context there is similar where people are being taken captive by different teachings and traditions and not walking in Jesus as they were taught. They were replacing faith and obedience to Jesus through biblical standards with a faith and obedience to another set of regulations and standards.

Paul says in Colossians 2:23 that “These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.”

This is similar to what Jesus told the Pharisees, the religious leaders of his day, saying in Matthew 23:28:

“So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

And it’s actually demonic, the Apostle Paul, says in 1 Timothy 4:1 “some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons.”

Back in our passage the old covenant was a type of bondage relative to the freedom found in the new covenant.

A commentator notes that Paul uses the same phrase in v.3 that he uses in v.9 and he states “v.9 is referring to the idolatrous practices in the Galatians’ pagan past, drawing an implicit and shocking link between the false teachers misuse of God’s law and the pagans’ allegiance to false deities.”

Outside of freedom in Christ we are enslaved. It doesn’t matter if there is a religious exterior or a non religious exterior.

Titus 3:3 “For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures”

John 8:34 Jesus says: “everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.”

John Piper describes sin as:

The glory of God not honored.

The holiness of God not reverenced.

The greatness of God not admired.

The power of God not praised.

The truth of God not sought.

The wisdom of God not esteemed.

The beauty of God not treasured.

The goodness of God not savored.

The faithfulness of God not trusted.

The promises of God not believed.

The commandments of God not obeyed.

The justice of God not respected.

The wrath of God not feared.

The grace of God not cherished.

The presence of God not prized.

And the person of God not loved.

Oh church let us not allow our hearts to be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin but let us love the Lord God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength.

We saw in last weeks passage that the law was added because of transgressions, that the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin… we were held captive under the law… and today in this passage we’ve seen we were enslaved…

but then we are shown the glorious truth of our redemption, and this sets up how our redemption allows us to be adopted to be the children of God—

in v.4 and the beginning of v.5 here in this 4th chapter of Galatians it says that “when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law”

Here we see the beautiful Christological truth that Jesus was the God-Man, he was both fully divine and fully human. Truly God and truly man. Though he was born of woman he was sent by God. Sent purposefully at just the right time.

Galatians 4 continues saying “He was born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law”

He redeemed us. He lived sinlessly under the law and fulfilled all that the law required. In his life of obedience, and through his atoning sacrifice on the cross and His resurrection from death He did all that was necessary to redeem us. And one aspect of our redemption is God declaring us righteous in justification.

At the end of Galatians chapter 3 from last week’s passage it said “We were held captive under the law… until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.”

Some of you might know I have been arrested before. When I was a younger I got into a fight with someone and after the police showed up I ended up getting into an altercation with the police and I was charged with 3 misdemeanors: assault, interfering with an officer, and breach of peace.

And one of the things that happened is by God’s grace I had the opportunity to go through a specific pre-trial diversion program that they offered in Connecticut, the state I was living in, and I was able to fulfill the requirements needed and it allowed me to avoid criminal conviction.

And so when I fill out a job application. And the question comes up “have you ever been arrested?” I can legally say that I’ve never been arrested. And everytime I’ve had a background check it comes up clean. In my eyes I know what I’ve done but in the eyes of the law, I have been legally declared completely innocent and it’s like it never happened.

And in an infinitely greater way that’s what happens with us in Christ. Even though we are guilty, by grace through faith in Christ, we are covered by the righteousness of Christ because of the blood of the cross, and God declares us innocent.

Listen, when someone is justified in Christ, when by God’s grace, they repent of their sins and put their faith and trust in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, trusting in Christ alone as their only hope for their salvation, though they are guilty, God looks at them with the innocence of Christ and declares them righteous.

And our adoption as children of God is similar.

Scottish theologian John Murray wrote “Adoption, like justification, is a judicial act. In other words, it is the bestowal of a status, or standing, not the generating within us of a new nature or character” he goes on “in adoption the redeemed become sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty; they are introduced into and given the privileges of God’s family”

John 1:12–13 “12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

Joel Beeke, on this verse says, “This may be the clearest statement of adoption by God in the Gospels, for “right” implies a legal authority, liberty, or privilege. A believer does not receive power to make himself into a child of God, but receives the privilege of being counted a child of God.”

1 John 3:1 “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

Yo this is a glorious thought. In one way it’s simple. God loves and he makes us his children. And yet in another way there are vast glories in that truth, an ocean of the riches of the goodness of God’s love that are contained in that verse.

It’s a statement that transcends the loftiest places of the human imagination. A truth that ventures deep into the eternal recesses of the heart touching an instinctive familial desire and yet it’s also a truth that goes outside of us beyond the reach of space and time and journeys into the shores of eternity, to where as the scriptures say in Ephesians 1 “he chose us in him before the foundation of the world” and that “he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will” An echo of the reality that we find in Revelation that “the dwelling place of God is with man.” and of what God proclaimed through the prophet in Jeremiah 31, when he said “I have loved you with an everlasting love.”

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God, and so we are”

Romans 5:5 says that “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”

Our adoption into the family of God is such a precious truth. God is creating in himself and for his glory a new family. We were dead in our trespasses and sins in which we once walked, following the ways of the world, we were sons of disobedience, children of wrath, we were like the pharisees, when Jesus told them that there “Father was Satan.” But God sent the Son to redeem us and then God sent the Spirit of the Son because he adopted us.

V.6 says “And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son in to our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”

We see the word “Abba” which is an aramaic word for Father and here we see a glimpse of the mysterious glory of the Trinity at work that God sends the Spirit of His Son to our hearts, the Spirit of Jesus, the Holy Spirit, who cries out with the very cry of Jesus for His father. And His cry for the Father becomes our cry for the Father so that we can cry out to God our Father as His children.

Wilhelmus à Brakel, a pastor in the Netherlands in the 1600’s wrote “God hears and answers [his children] as their loving Father. As children they take refuge [in] their Father [even] in perplexity and by reason of this relationship they call Him, “Abba, Father!” In an intimate manner they bring their needs before Him, and with tearful eyes they tell Him what their sorrow is [by crying] out…. “The Lord looks upon such children in love, and is pleased with their childlike complaints and their taking refuge [in] Him. He will most certainly answer them and deliver them at His time and in His manner.”

Jesus in the gospel of John says something fascinating. He said, “I will not leave you as orphans.”

The disciples hearts were troubled, they knew they were coming to the end of Jesus’ ministry even if they didn’t fully realize what was going to happen.”

Let me read to you John 14:16–18, Jesus says

16And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever,

17even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. 18“I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.

I will not leave you as orphans.

That’s why when Jesus taught the disciples how to pray, he astonishingly tells them to say “Our Father in Heaven” “Our Father.” We can call God, “Our Father”

And so here in Ch. 4 of Galatians Paul says in v.7, “So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.”

It is one thing to free someone who is enslaved but God frees us, adopts us, and allows us to be an heir through Him. Our inheritance is through Him.

And so one important implication of our adoption is that— we are heirs with Christ if we suffer with Christ

I get this from Romans 8:15-17, which is a parallel passage to our Galatians passage. It says.

15For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”

16The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,

17and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

Think about this: the span of your life in light of eternity is a speck of dust. It’s a grain of sand. And in that short amount of time is the only time and opportunity in your existence that you will get to suffer for Christ and to suffer with Christ.

Romans 8:18–19 “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time... are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.”

2 Corinthians 4:16–18 “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. 17For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, 18as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

We suffer but we have hope in our suffering. And because of our hope sometimes we even risk suffering.

A Pastor in Ukraine this past week in the midst of what’s going on in his country wrote, “We have decided to stay, both as a family and as a church. When this is over, the citizens of Kyiv will remember how Christians have responded in their time of need. And while the church may not fight like the nation, we still believe we have a role to play in this struggle. We will shelter the weak, serve the suffering, and mend the broken. And as we do, we offer the unshakable hope of Christ and his gospel.”

Oh Father may we live faithfully for your glory in light of these glorious realities, give us grace even right now to live in light of your redemption and the truth that we are your children. Thank you that we have been adopted into a family that spans the globe. Give grace and strength to our brothers and sisters around the world including Ukraine and that whole region. May we live obediently to you in what you have placed before us in our specific lives. May you be to us the God of all comfort who comforts us in all our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with your very comfort. Would we be renewed and sanctified through your Spirit and by your truth, going to you and crying out to you. Knowing you are our father who cares for us and loves us with an everlasting love. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.

Back in 1656 there was an English Puritan pastor named Richard Baxter who wrote a book for pastors called The Reformed Pastor.

And by the word “reformed” he didn’t mainly mean Calvinistic, but he meant to be born-again. By “reformed” he really meant “revived.” Because at that time in the 17th century it was not a given that pastors were even truly Christian. And so Baxter, who was burdened for the church in his country, he wrote this book urging pastors to first truly believe the gospel — be changed by the gospel yourself — and then serve others from that.

And in one section of the book he says something that has really stuck with me — [and I feel like I’ve said this before at some point, so maybe you’re hearing this again, but it helps me, so bear with me] — but Baxter, speaking of pastors, says: “He preacheth not heartily to his people, that prayeth not earnestly for them.”

In other words, if a pastor wants to preach genuinely, effectively, to his church, then he should pray earnestly for them. And I think this actually points to something much more central when it comes to the preaching of a local church, and I wanna tell you. Now this is an unusual way to start a sermon, but I want you to know the purpose for why we do this.

Every Sunday at this moment, when it comes to the preaching,

we’re not doing this just because we think “this is what you do”;

we’re not just going through the motions;

we’re not trying to talk at you,

but really, we, as your pastors, are preaching for you — which means, we open the Word of God and we want to tell you what God has to say in Christ by his Spirit!

And what he has to say to you, church, essentially, is that he loves you.

Through your faith in Jesus — not on the basis of your performance, but only because of the atoning death of Jesus in your place — God has fixed his love on you and that will never change. The only thing that can change is how much you come to understand his love, and so we preach for that.

Our preaching is for your assurance. It’s so that you would “have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth — so that you and me and us!) — it’s so that we would know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge” (Ephesians 3:18–19).

Because I’m convinced that if we are assured of God’s love, then we experience personal renewal that then flows into relational renewal. Hey, do you need help in your marriage? It starts here [pointing to heart].

So personal renewal leads into relational renewal, which then leads to church renewal. And church renewal as it multiplies leads into city renewal — and that’s the vision! We’re just trying to change a couple cities here. That’s why we’re called Cities Church. We want to saturate the Twin Cities with the gospel of Jesus Christ that has transformed US … and our relationships … and our church for our joy and the glory of God. We preach for that. That’s what we’re doing here.

And I say all this now because today’s passage aims right at the heart of this, and you’re gonna see it when when get there, Galatians Chapter 3, verses 15–29. Let’s organize the sermon this way. There are just two parts:

Part One is THE LAW (verses 15–24);

Part Two is THE PROMISE (verses 25–29).

So Law and Promise, and then some additional things to say in both of these, and before we get started, let’s pray again for God’s blessing.

Father in heaven, by your grace, we ask that you send your Holy Spirit now to accomplish your will, in Jesus’s name, amen.

Part One: The Law (verses 15–24)

And what we read in these verses is connected back to all that we’ve seen so far.

Remember that Paul is writing this letter to address a problem in the Galatian church. A false teaching had slipped into the church and it was causing confusion about the gospel. The false teaching said that in order to be saved (or justified), “faith in Jesus was not enough, but you also have to keep Jewish law.” And so Paul is writing to demolish that idea.

He does his demolition work first by telling a personal story of when he confronted Peter (2:1–21). He explains that we are justified by faith in Jesus alone — that faith in Jesus is both necessary and sufficient for salvation — and to suggest anything else makes the death of Jesus pointless.

Then Paul reminds the Galatian Christians of their own origin story — he tells them that their very existence is the because of God, not their works. And to illustrate the point, Paul brings in Abraham.

Now we spent several weeks on Abraham back when we preached through Genesis. Remember Abraham started as “Abram from Ur of the Chaldeans.” Abraham was once a lost pagan idolator in the middle of nowhere, but God came to him by absolute grace and promised to bless him and his descendants. And Abraham believed God.

Abraham had faith in God and he was justified through his faith in God — and we are too when we have faith in God! — which is a completely different way of life than relying on the law. If you rely on the law for your justification you’re under a curse. But see, Jesus died to redeem us from that curse. Jesus took the curse for us so that through faith in him we receive the blessing of Abraham — even if we’re coming from a place as lost and pagan and idolatrous as Abraham once was.

Paul says all of this to us in Chapter 2, verse 1 to Chapter 3, verse 14. He says all of this to demolish the false teaching. And he does. By this point in the letter nothing is left standing that thinks obedience to the law is needed for justification. Paul had made his point. And he still has more to say, and for this next part, he goes next level.

In our passage Paul steps back and he compares the two biggest covenants in the Old Testament, the Abrahamic covenant and the Mosaic covenant.

[Y’all ready to see this? Now look, I gotta set it up for a minute. First we need to have an idea about what a covenant is.]

What Are Covenants in the Bible?

A covenant is simply an agreement between two parties with mutual obligations. And when it comes to the relationship between God and humans, this idea of covenant is central. You could say the whole Bible is a series of different covenants that God makes with humans. The idea of covenant is another way to talk about how God relates to us.

And God makes several covenants in the Old Testament, and they’re all important, but there are two really big covenants. The first is the covenant God made with Abraham. God came to Abraham and promised to bless him, and God said that through Abraham’s offspring all the nations of the earth will be blessed (see Genesis 12:3; 22:18). A lot of times this is just called the Abrahamic Promise.

The second big covenant is the one God makes with the nation of Israel at Mount Sinai. We just preached through this in the Book of Exodus. The covenant at Sinai was a book of laws for Israel that God gave them through Moses. And it included the Ten Commandments, and then a bunch of other detailed laws that Israel should follow, and blessings and curses if they do or don’t. A lot of times this is just called the Mosaic Law.

So two covenants: with Abraham there is the promise. With Moses (or Sinai) there is the law.

[Everybody tracking?]

The Promise Came First

Now with that established, look at verse 15:

In verse 15, Paul gives a human example on the way covenants work. Paul says that even on just a people level, nobody makes and ratifies a covenant and then annuls it or changes it. Once the covenant is made, it’s made. That’s the point. A covenant is a settled commitment, and everybody gets this.

Then in verse 16, Paul says that God’s promise to Abraham (his covenant with Abraham) was also with Abraham’s offspring (singular) which is Christ.

Look at this:

In verse 16 Paul quotes a phrase from Genesis 22:18, which says: “And in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.” And Paul says that God made that promise to Abraham and to Jesus, who is Abraham’s descendent. Jesus is the offspring in view in Genesis 22.

So in the Book of Genesis, God promised to Abraham and Jesus that one day the nations, the Gentiles, will be blessed in Jesus by faith. God promised that by covenant. And in case we’re still unsure about what Paul is trying to get at here, Paul says verse 17.

He says: Hey, this is what I mean.

And I love that Paul says this. He’s spelling it out for us. He wants us to track with him. So if we’ve zoned out a little. If we’re confused on how it all comes together, Paul says, Look, this is what I’m saying.

God’s promise to Abraham came first. The Mosaic law came 430 years later, and it did not cancel out the promise. The promise stands.

Verse 18: The fulfillment of the promise, the blessing we have in Christ, our “inheritance” as the children of Abraham by faith, our justification, that comes in the promise to be received by faith. It’s not found in the law. Our hope and salvation comes through God’s promise, not God’s law.

And now that brings up a super important question: “Why then the law?”

Why the Law?

Why do we even have the law? If our hope is not in the law; if our obedience to the law doesn’t save us; if God’s promise to Abraham still stands, why did God give us the law?

Well, Paul is about to tell us! In fact, he’s going to tell us three important things about the law. Why did God give the law?

1. The law was added because of transgressions. (v. 19b)

Have any of you parents in here ever left your kids unsupervised (like in a totally safe way)?

Say, for example, that you gotta run to the hardware store to get a bag of salt. It’s a little icy on the front steps, and you need to some more salt; so you tell the kids, Hey, I’m going to be gone for half an hour. That’s all you say, and you leave.

And you know your kids know you’re their dad; they know you exist; and things are stable. However when you get back, and you walk in the front door, and it’s just a complete mess. The house is trashed. It looks like a zoo — a dirty zoo. You come back to a situation like that, and you know what you do? You start looking around and you say:

Hey, guys, don’t eat candy for dinner.

Hey, don’t throw garbage on the floor.

Don’t leave the fridge door open.

Don’t leave the milk out (and where’s the top to the milk?)

No, don’t bake brownies with orange juice.

Don’t pull your sister’s hair.

Don’t forget to flush the toilet.

See what’s going on? You’re adding rules. And you’re adding rules because of transgression. You have to go all Mount Sinai on the kids, and if the kids are really bad — like if the nation is totally depraved — then you’d have to say things like:

Don’t set yourself on fire.

Don’t be gross with animals.

Don’t murder your children. (See Leviticus 18:21–23)

God added law because of transgression, verse 19. The law acted like guard rails to keep Israel from self-ruin, because without any prohibition, if they were left to themselves, the nation of Israel would have pranced into destruction like [snap of fingers].

Remember the golden calf? Moses had not even come down from the mountain yet, and the people were gone.

The first thing Paul tells us about the law is that the law was added because of transgression.

2. The law was never meant to impart life, but be a guardian. (v. 21)

Now we see this in verse 21, but first, what is this about angels and an intermediary (or mediator) in verses 19–20?

Quickly here: remember that Paul is making the case that our hope is in the promise, not the law. The Abrahamic promise is superior to the Mosaic law.

And to make help make the point, Paul adds at the end of verse 19 that the law was “put into place through angels by an intermediary.”

He’s saying that the Mosaic law, which was handed down at Mount Sinai, involved some kind of angelic administration and a human mediator, who was Moses.

In other words, God did not say the law directly to the people, but the law had creaturely mediation. And what’s implied here is that the promise is different! God spoke the promise directly to Abraham.

And these covenants are so different it might imply that there’s more than one God, but Paul assures us: God is one. There is one God who gave two different covenants, and the promise is superior to the law. But does that mean that law is contrary to the promise? Does the law contradict the promise?

No, it does not, because of the law’s purpose, verse 21 —

the law was never meant to impart life.

If the law could give life, then we don’t need the gospel. But that’s not what the law was for. Rather, Paul says, the law was for:

v. 22: imprisoning everything under sin

v. 23: holding us captive

v. 24: being our guardian

And you can see, this is the same idea.

Hey kids, I gotta run to the store again to get another bag of salt, BUT I’m leaving this nanny here — who honestly is more like a security guard-bouncer with tattoos on his face, his name is Sinai, and he’s got some rules for ya.

Look, Sinai is not here to bless you; Sinai is here to keep you from drinking Clorox.

The law was never meant to give us life. That’s not the purpose. That’s the second thing Paul tells us about the law. The third is:

3. The law had a temporary role in salvation history. (v. 19, 23, 24)

And really, this point is the most repeated throughout this whole passage. And I mention the salvation history part because, to be clear here, because Paul is not being exhaustive about the law and its uses and what Christians can learn from it. Paul is focusing on the role of the law in the saving action of God throughout history, and Paul says in that light the law is temporary.

Notice all the temporal language here:

We see first in verse 19:

the law was added because of transgression, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made

Verse 23:

Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, [that is] [we were] imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.

Verse 24:

So then the law was our guardian until Christ came

“Until” “before” “until” “until” — the law’s role was temporary. We see that plainly here.

So these are three things Paul tells us about the law [right hand]:

It was added because of transgression;

it was never meant to impart life;

it had temporary role.

And all of this is setting up verse 25. Verse 25 is the hinge. Verse 25 is the change. This is where we go from Part One on the Law to Part Two on the Promise.

[We tracking?]

Part Two: The Promise (verses 25–29)

The change happens with two simple words, verse 25: “But now.”

And it’s hard to overstate how big a deal this is for Paul. Because up to this point he’s been saying the law is until, until, until. The law was temporary until faith came, until the coming faith, until Christ came.

But here in verse 25 he says, Hey, BUT NOW that faith has come … now that Jesus has come … now that the gospel is here —

See, this changes everything.

It’s interesting: if you were to read through the whole letter of Galatians you’d notice that, compared to Paul’s other letters, he doesn’t say a lot about the Second Coming of Jesus, or our future resurrection, or really, in Galatians Paul doesn’t say a lot about the future at all, which is unusual. But the reason is that the Galatians didn’t need to be reminded of their Christian future, because they had forgotten their Christian now.

Oh how we need to be remember the NOWs of the Christian life!

Do you know the NOWs of gospel reality that are true of you in this moment?

Think about your life for a minute. Think about the hardest, most difficult thing you have going on right now. [Are you thinking about it?]

Well look, it is good news that in Christ your future is bright; in Christ, truly the best is always yet to come — now that doesn’t mean that every circumstance is going to go the way you want it to go in this world; sometimes God calls us to suffering and disappointment— but we do hope in the future. We’re called to hope.

However, we can’t begin to imagine our future hope if we don’t recognize the grace that God has already given us now. God says something about you now that transcends your circumstance.

How do you get through the hard stuff? Yes, you think about what God will do. Yes, we look forward.

AND ALSO, we remember what God has done. We look forward and we look back to the cross of Jesus Christ and we embrace the NOW of who God says we are.

And I want to tell you what that is. And I know that what I’m about to say you may not feel. But it doesn’t matter. In Christ, this is your reality now. Two things:

You are a child of God (v. 26)

This is verse 26.

Verse 25 says “But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian,” verse 25: “for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.”

The apostle John says the same thing in the Gospel of John, Chapter 1, verse 12: “But to all who receive [Jesus], who believed in his name, he gave the right to become the children of God.”

John also says in 1 John 3:1, “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

Paul says it again in Romans 8 and Ephesians 5.

The New Testament is super clear: Christian, through your faith in Jesus, in Jesus you have become a child of God.

And I’m gonna guess that for many of us in here, we’ve probably heard that before — and we’re gonna see it again next week in Chapter 4 — we’ve read this, we’ve heard this. We know that in Christ we are the children of God, but do we really get it?

I mean, on a daily basis, in our felt reality, do we know what it means to be God’s children?

Toward the end of last year I had been studying Galatians and meditating on this point, and it was an early morning; everyone’s asleep; it’s pitch dark outside; I’m in my study, Bible open, lamp on, house is silent — my favorite time of the day.

And I’m reading and journaling on Galatians 3 into Chapter 4, and I’m just chewing on this fact that in Christ I am a son of God. And I’m trying to put together that this is a fact not just to be known, but to be practiced. We actually relate to God as his children. It means that we call God Father.

And I’m journaling this, still trying to grasp what this means, and as I’m in silence, writing the words in worship “I can call you Father!” — as I’m writing “f-a-t-h” — my study door cracks open, and a little voice on the other side says “father.”

I was stunned. Not a normal quiet time. It was Micah and I told him to come in, and I said, “Buddy, that’s crazy! I just was calling God Father at the exact same time you said it to me. That’s crazy!”

And it is crazy … that in the same way my children relate to me, I can relate to God. Because he is my Father, and I am his son through faith in Jesus — and so are you, Christian. Brothers, sisters, in Christ we are the children of God.

And that means something vertically, but also horizontally. This is the second NOW of gospel reality. It’s that…

You are part of a new family (verses 27–28)

Verse 27 Paul says, “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” And the point of baptism here is the metaphor of incorporation. When you are united to Jesus by faith, baptized into him, you become a new person and you live like a new person — and that new person is part of a new family. That’s verse 28:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Now within the Jewish worldview, the major distinctions among people, next to Jewish/Gentile, was slave/free and then male/female. These are the three categories of ethnicity, economic capacity, and sex. And these categories, of course, are still very much active today. These are distinctions among people within our world, but the issue in Jewish thought was not just that these distinctions existed, it was that these distinctions were used as primary markers to determine different degrees of religious access. Under the law, the best-case scenario — the way to have the best standing before God — was to be a Jewish free man.

But Paul is saying that in Christ it doesn’t work that way. In Christ there is nothing about ourselves that keeps us from God OR brings us to God. Differences among people still exist, but those differences have no bearing on our relationship to God — because our relationship to God is solely based on our union with Christ. We are all one in Christ.

Now some have taken verse 28 the wrong way. This does not mean we become androgynes humans and everyone is an exact replica of everyone else. No! We’re different people, but NONE of those differences are an advantage or a disadvantage in our standing before God, because all of us can only come to God one way: faith in Christ.

By faith in Christ, everyone, no matter where you’re coming from, no matter what your story is, by faith in Christ you become a son or daughter of God; in Christ you become part of the family — in the family tree of Abraham, where by faith in Christ we all have the same status and the same access. God is the same kind of Father to all of us because of our union with Jesus. And understanding that union leads to radical unity.

In the church, in this new family, we’re not competing with one another, but we’re encouraging one another. We’re building up one another because we’re convinced that when my brother and sister are built up, then we’re all built up. And so we become this kind of family that is all looking toward and praying toward and working toward one another’s good.

And what is that good?

What is the “good life” in the Christian life? Is it position or status? No.

Our good that we seek is our being assured of the love of God.

Brothers, sisters, your good is to know more deeply that God loves you. That through your faith in Jesus — not on the basis of your performance, but only because of the atoning death of Jesus in your place — God, your Father, has set his love on you and that will never change. What “good” could possibly be better than that?

To be assured of the love of God, for our joy and his glory. This is what we want, Cities Church, and this what brings us to the Table. …

The Table

… because at this Table, as we take the bread and the cup, we move a little bit closer to comprehending with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth of the love of God in Christ that surpasses knowledge. If you receive God’s love in Christ, if you put your faith in Jesus, eat and drink with us!

His body is the true bread.

His blood is the true drink.

Let us serve you.

So one thing true for all of us is that we live within days that have a start and an end. Seasons start and end (thank God); weeks start and end; and days start and end — and I’m convinced that the way we start and end each day matters. Again, this is not about whether we do this (we all do this) what matters is how we do this — how we start and end each day. And this morning’s passage in Galatians Chapter 2, I think helps us.

Because this passage is all about getting “the truth of the gospel” crystal clear. The first thing Paul does here in verses 15–16 is he explains the truth of the gospel; and then in the few verses that follow he shows us how the truth of the gospel reorients everything about our lives. And so for the sermon today, this is what we’re looking at. There are two parts:

Gospel Explanation (verses 15–16)

Gospel Reorientation (verses 19–21)

Before we get started, let’s ask again for God’s help:

Father in heaven, we are gathered here now, with your Word open before us, and all your saints together ask, by the power of your Spirit, speak to us and show us the glory of your Son. We ask in his name, amen.

Part One: Gospel Explanation (verses 15–16)

So we’re going to pick up in verse 15, but in terms of where we are in the Book of Galatians, this week just continues what we saw last week when our brother Paul confronted our brother Peter in Antioch.

For the Galatians and Us

If you look at your Bible you’ll see that back in verse 14 that there are quote marks around the sentence that Paul said to Peter. Paul said to Peter (or Cephas) in verse 14: [Quote]: If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews? …

Now in some English translations, the quote marks end there at verse 14, but I think Paul’s actual quote continues through verse 21. So we’re gonna pick up in verse 15 today, but just know that this is part of what Paul started in verse 14. Paul is saying all this to Peter — although Paul also means to be saying this to the Galatians.

Okay, don’t think that just because this is what Paul said to Peter, that he’s merely transcribing it here, rather he’s saying what he said to Peter for the Galatians’ benefit. Paul is telling the Galatians — and us — what he said to Peter for our sake.

Back to the Confrontation

And what Paul is saying, again, goes back to last week: It’s that a person is saved not by works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ alone. Faith in Jesus alone, plus nothing else is how we are saved.

Because remember there’s a controversy going on here: There were some “false brothers” — or some “troublers” — who had been telling the Christians in Galatia that in order to really be saved, in order to really be part of the people of God, faith in Jesus was not enough, but you also had to keep Jewish law.

The false teachers were saying: Yes, trust in Jesus, but also, for the men, you need to get circumcised like Jewish men, and you need to abide by Jewish dietary laws and so forth.

They said that: faith in Jesus is important and necessary, but you also have to do these other things. They were teaching a “Jesus plus something else” heresy.

And the apostles struck this down.

The apostles, together in Jerusalem, in verses 1–10, they were united in their rejection of this false teaching. The apostles confirmed the truth of the gospel, that Gentiles don’t have to become like Jewish people in order to be saved because you are saved by faith in Jesus alone plus nothing else.

And it’s because Peter’s behavior suggested something different, that Paul confronts him. Verse 14:

Peter, you’re Jewish and live like a Gentile [which means he lives like he’s not bound to Jewish law.] And therefore, don’t force Gentiles to live like their Jewish.

And Paul’s going to expand what he means here in verses 15 and 16.

Focusing on Verses 15–16

These two verses are one long, amazing sentence, and I’m gonna read the whole thing first, and then we’ll slow down and look at each part. Verse 15, Paul is continuing here what he’s saying to Peter … he says:

Peter, we ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners, yet knowing that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.

Okay — have any of you ever read a book or had a class on public speaking? [Okay, you’ll get this.] There’s an old adage in public speaking advice that goes: “Tell them what you will say, say it, tell them what you said.” [Anybody heard that?] That whole idea is basically what Paul is doing here.

It feels like he’s being super redundant, but let’s slow down and look at the pieces, and I think there are three things we need to see in order to track with Paul. [The first is that …]

We need to understand the justification metaphor.

Now last week and so far today I’ve been using the word “saved.” We are saved by faith in Jesus plus nothing else. And that’s a good Bible word. Paul uses that word in other places, but you’ll see the word that Paul uses here is “justified.”

Now to be “saved” or “justified” mean the same thing — they’re getting at the same idea — but they are different metaphors or images. To be “saved” means you’re trapped in a house that’s on fire, so somebody runs in, takes you, and brings you out. They rescue you. They save you. We get that. Well to be justified is a law-court metaphor.

Did anybody in here used to watch Judge Judy or any court TV?

I think we all can probably imagine a court room.

There’s always at least a judge and a defendant, and the judge issues a verdict on the defendant, who is a person with charges against them. The climatic moment of a court-room is when the judge pronounces the defendant either guilty or not guilty. Or you could say: either guilty or justified.

To be “justified” means to be declared “in the right.” To be justified is to be declared righteous — and theologically, for God to justify us it means that God is the Ultimate Judge and we’re in his court with charges against us and he declares that we are righteous. For God to justify us means that he says we are right with him.

That’s what Paul is talking about here. This is about: how can we be right with God?

The answer to how we can be right with God is the same answer for everybody.

In verse 15, Paul starts with the common ground of his and Peter’s Jewishness. Paul and Peter were both by nature, by birth, ethnically Jewish. Which means they were not “Gentile sinners.”

Remember, in the ancient world, within the Jewish mindset, there were just two categories of people: There was Jewish people and was everyone else — and everyone else was called the “nations,” or “Gentiles,” or a lot of times just simply “sinners.” The word “Gentile” and “sinner” were interchangeable. And Paul is saying:

Hey, Peter, we know that we’re Jewish. We know that we’re in this category of people (not that category of people), but we also we know that being in this category is not what makes us right with God. It’s not by works of the law.

Now when Paul says “works of the law” he means any and every kind of Old Testament law-keeping. This is what makes a Jewish person a good Jewish person. And Paul says, We know that’s not what justifies us. And in fact, law-keeping, works-doing is not what justifies anybody.

Skip to the last sentence of verse 16 (right before verse 17) and notice Paul repeats, “because by works of the law no one will be justified.”

Well, when Paul says this, he’s actually quoting from Psalm 143, verse 2, when David prays to Yahweh:

Enter not into judgment with your servant, for no one living is righteous [or justified] before you.

And the “no one” is put strongly here. It means no human flesh. No humankind. Paul gets this from the Old Testament because the evidence is there: being Jewish does not make you right before God. Keeping Mosaic law doesn’t do it. Sacrifices and offerings and all the most genuine acts of religious devotion does not do it. But everybody, Jewish and Gentile, can only be right with God the same way: not by works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ,

That’s what the apostles have confirmed; Paul and Peter have agreed: All peoples have in common their need for Jesus … and Paul and Peter, our brothers, this is something they knew firsthand.

Paul and Peter have embraced the necessity and sufficiency of faith in Jesus.

This is really Paul’s point in verse 16. It’s not just that Paul and Peter shared the same conviction about faith in Jesus, but it’s that they have acted on that conviction by they themselves putting their faith in Jesus and not their works.

One fascinating thing about this passage is that Paul stays away from theoretical and he gets practical and personal.

Look at how practical he gets here. We can see this in the language. In the Greek, the noun for “faith” and the verb for “believe” are the same words. We have words like this in English too. For example, take the word “trust.”

“Trust” is a noun and a verb with the same meaning. And this is a small thing, but I think hearing the sameness of the words in verse 16 will help bring this together for us. So I’m gonna put verse 16 in a paraphrase and I’m gonna use the word “trust” — because I want you to hear the sameness in English. Paul says:

Peter, because we know that even Jewish people like us are not justified by works but through trust in Jesus, we have trusted in Jesus.

Because we know we can only be right with God by trusting Jesus, we trust Jesus.

See! Paul is saying: Look, we don’t merely affirm this; we don’t merely agree with this; but we are banking everything on this truth. Our background does not matter.

And we know that Paul, from his other letters like Philippians, he was a fantastic law-keeper. Paul was an outstanding Jewish religious person. And he said none of that matters.

Hey, Peter, look! All of our eggs are in the faith-in-Jesus basket.

Which means that faith in Jesus is not just necessary for justification, but it’s also sufficient.

And those are the two words that I think are central to Paul’s explanation of the gospel here. It’s the two words necessity and sufficiency. Faith in Jesus is necessary and sufficient for justification. In other words, contra the false teachers: what goes for everyone, Jewish and Gentile, is that faith in Jesus is not just needed to be justified, but faith in Jesus is enough to be justified.

And that changes everything. And Paul knows it.

Which is why Paul now goes from explaining the truth of the gospel to showing how it reorients everything about how we live.

And this is Part Two of the sermon. We’re going from Gospel Explanation to Gospel Reorientation, and what I wanna do here is a little bit different.

Part Two: Gospel Reorientation (verses 17–21)

My hope is to make what Paul is saying here very practical for us. So we’re gonna work through verses 17–21, but I’m going to summarize what Paul is saying in the form of three resolutions in the first-person.

And I’m saying these as resolutions partly because I’ve been reading Jonathan Edwards and he loved some resolutions; but also, as resolutions in the first-person, these are things that I want you to take and embrace for yourself.

These resolutions are truths (and opportunities) that I want you to remind yourself all the time. Put these on your fridge or in your car or wherever. These are practical things to take with us. Make sense?

Okay here’s the first:

1. Resolved, I can do nothing to contribute to my justification because God gets the glory, not me.

Look at verse 17. In verse 17 Paul is answering an accusation from the false teachers. Remember in the Jewish mindset, there are two categories of people: Jewish and then Gentile/sinner. [Right? Got it?]

Okay, so track with me: the false teachers were saying that if you listen to Paul and embrace that you’re justified by faith in Jesus alone so that you stop the works of the law, to stop the works of the law is to no longer be Jewish, but it’s to be like a Gentile sinner.

So they’re saying that when Jewish people believe the gospel that Paul preaches it actually moves them from the Jewish category to the sinner category, and therefore Jesus is just making more sinners in the world. That was their thinking.

And Paul says No, first, your whole dichotomy is wrong. We’re all sinners.

And in fact, now, Pauls says, if I go back to relying on the works of the law for my justification, that’s actually what makes me to sin.

See, Paul turns the tables!

Faith in Jesus is not what moves us into “the category of sinner,” but now it’s that, because we have believed in Jesus, WE SIN if we go back to relying on the law.

That’s verse 18, and then 21. In verse 21, Paul understands that if he has contributed to his justification in any way, it nullifies the graces of God. It empties the grace of God of its power.

And this is something for us to nail down and get clear in our hearts. The question is: Did GOD save me or did God help ME save myself?

Like, did God bring me 90% of the way, but then the last 10% is my part? Or is it 99% faith in Jesus, and the last 1% is my law-keeping?

Well, Paul would say that if that’s the case — even if it’s 99 and 1 — that invalidates God’s grace altogether (Paul will say more about this in Chapter 5, but it’s already clear in verse 21). If we could be justified in any way by the law, it means the death of Jesus was pointless. Because it would mean that Jesus’s death was not enough to save you. Basically this would make the gospel of Jesus not a gift, but a coupon.

Okay, so Melissa and I, by God’s grace, we’ve been married for 15 years, and over the years, for Christmas and birthdays and anniversaries, I’ve been able to get her some really good gifts, I think. But also in that stretch of time I’ve gotten her some not-so-good gifts. You live, you learn. And so, for some of you younger guys, you can just take this as marriage advice: giving someone a coupon as a gift is not a gift.

Any of you ever seen a person unwrap a coupon? See, I’ve been there. At one point you thought this was a good idea, until you see it being unwrapped and you’re like, Oh …

Now it might have been a good try. It could be a decent head-start. Because that’s all a coupon can be.

Look, we need to know that the death and resurrection of Jesus was not a coupon.

When the Son of God was slain for you, when nails were driven through his hands and feet, and the wrath of God that you deserved was poured out on him; when Jesus died in your place, he died to save you all the way AS A GIFT — which is what faith represents as the empty-handed embrace of that gift.

If we come to the cross of Jesus and we think that it only partially saves us, if we think that we still gotta do this part on our own — if we make the cross a coupon — it actually makes the death of Jesus pointless and it dishonors him.

I hope that you can see here that what’s at stake is the glory of God.

If we have contributed anything to our justification it means that we should get credit for it. It would mean that God does not get all the glory, but we some too. Even if it’s just 1%. It would mean that we get glory too.

I mean, can you imagine meeting Jesus one day, and standing before him face to face, and saying to him, I’m here because we worked together …?

And yet every time here and now that we act like our performance or our works contributes to our justification, we are acting like we will say that to Jesus one day. You’re in a fantasy land.

God gets all the glory. Hey! Hey. He gets it all.

God has determined that in the gospel, in every way, he is the only one who saves us so that he is the only one who gets the glory. And even our faith as the empty-handed receiving of Jesus, that too is not our own doing, but it is the gift of God so that no one may boast (see Ephesians 2:8–9).

We contribute nothing! Faith in Jesus alone is sufficient and we need to get that clear: Resolved, I can do nothing to contribute to my justification because God gets the glory, not me.

Here’s the second resolution:

2. Resolved, to love others freely and fearlessly.

Now Paul doesn’t address love head on in this passage like he’ll do later, but I bring it up now because this answers a common objection to justification by faith. It’s that: if we’re justified by faith alone in Christ alone for the glory of God alone, what is there left for us do? If we’re not on the hook to contribute to our justification, what does that mean for the activity of the Christian life right now?

Well, it means that we love others and we love them freely. One helpful way this has been explained, going back to the Reformers in the 16th century, is that we’re justified by faith alone, but faith is never alone — in that, faith is productive and active. Martin Luther called it fides viva — “living faith.” The faith in Jesus that alone justifies us becomes a power plant of righteous energy expressed through love, and the love is expressed freely because it’s not what I must do in order to be saved, but it’s what I get to do because I am saved.

Our love is not driven by compulsion, but it flows from freedom. To get more practical here, in the next 12 hours we all are going to come upon opportunities to love others. And when you encounter that opportunity, and you’re trying to decide whether you should step into it or not, just know that you are not being asked to justify yourself; it is not a demand with your eternal soul at stake; but it really is an opportunity where your love might Flow, Freely, from the Fact that you are justified by faith in Jesus alone.

We can love freely, but also fearlessly. …

I think one of the biggest hurdles to loving others is not distraction or indifference, but it’s the fear of how it will be received. We fear repercussions — like what if this person doesn’t receive this act of love? What if somehow this goes sideways and it backfires on me? Or, here in America, what if I get criticized?

Criticism from others — disapproval, disparagement — that fear, I think, is one of our main barriers to love. Basically, it’s the risk that others might think badly of you.

And just want you to know that the answer to that risk is justification by faith in Jesus alone.

Because justification by faith in Jesus alone means that we believe the worst and best thing that someone could say about us has already been said.

This is an insight from the late David Powlison (and I mentioned it to our men last week). It’s that at the cross the worst thing that could be said about you was said, by Jesus: it’s that you are so sinful, you are so guilty, you are so incompetent to save yourself that it requires the death of the Son of God — nothing worse could be said about us, right?

But also, nothing better could be said about us. Because it’s not just that you’re so sinful that Jesus had to die, but it’s that you’re so loved that Jesus willingly died. You are loved by Jesus. You are loved by Jesus so much that he gave himself for you. What could there ever be said about you that is better than that?

See, Christian … the worst and best things have already been said about you, by Jesus, and if we really believe that, it means we are … untouchable. It means that we look at people and think (or say):

Your potential scorn cannot touch me because of the gospel. So, I will love you fearlessly as an effect my justification by faith.

Resolved, to love others freely and fearlessly.

And finally, …

3. Resolved, to live not I, but Christ in me.

First, verse 19:

For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God.

This is the fundamental reorientation. The way I used to live, enslaved to the law as my hope for righteous, that’s over. It’s dead to me. I’m dead to it, so that I might be alive to God. Now what does that mean? How’s that look? This is verse 20.

And I’ve tried to save the best for last here in verse 20. And many of you might know this verse, and I just wanna stop for a minute to say that I’m amazed I get to preach this to you. The very fact that I get to stand here right now and say this is because it’s true. Hear the word of Lord, Galatians 2:20,

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Do you see it? I’m alive right now. I’m living right now. Christian, you’re living right now. But it’s not us, it is Christ living in us.

This activity — all this that we do here, in our skin and bones, this life — it is lived by faith in Jesus. Our lives are the empty-handed receiving of Jesus’s power. Don’t think “I’m living for Jesus!” Jesus lives in you and through you.

Do you know what is pulsing through my veins right now? You can call it blood, OR you can call it grace! I’m not kidding you. Right now, in this moment, Jesus Christ, the Son of God is living in me. He’s living in you.

Because it’s Jesus, the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

I mentioned earlier that in this passage Paul stays away from theoretical, but he’s practical and personal. And well, here is the personal part. Which doesn’t mean sentimental. This is a fact, man. Paul is stating the fact of Jesus’s love for him, which is seen in that Jesus gave himself for Paul. Paul says he loved me! He died for me! And Paul knows that Peter can say the same thing. And he know that you, Christian, you can say the same thing — you must say the same thing. Everyday.

Because everyday has a start and end, and the way you start and end matters, and there is not a better way to start and end your day than to remember that Jesus loves you and that he died for you, and that the life that you’re living now — this waking life, this resting life — it is Jesus alive in you. Resolved, to live, not I, but Christ in me.

And that’s what brings us to this Table.

The Table

Because at this Table, as we take the bread and cup, we remember and demonstrate our union with Jesus by faith. We are saying that indeed, all of my hope is in Jesus. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. If that’s your confession, your hope, if you trust in Jesus, let’s eat and drink together.

His body is the true bread.

His blood is the true drink.

So if you were to be walking just outside here, on the sidewalk, headed west on Summit, just as you cross over Saratoga, if you looked up high at this corner of our building, you would see a statue a man who is bald, has a long beard, and he’s holding a parchment. It’s a statue of the apostle Paul.

And in this sermon I want to tell you part of the story for why that statute is there — and when I say there, what I mean is here, in the middle of North America, a very very long ways from Jerusalem.

There’s a story behind this, and a big part of the story has to do with Galatians Chapter 2, which is the passage for today’s sermon. And when it comes to the sermon outline, it’s super simple. There are two parts.

First, we’re gonna see what is happening here in Galatians 2.

Second, we’re gonna consider why it matters for us.

What’s happening? Why does it matter?

Let’s ask God to help us:

Our Father in heaven, for your glory, so that your glory be known and delighted in, we ask that you, by your Spirit, would open the eyes of our hearts see what you have for us in the preaching of your word. In Jesus’s name, amen.

What Is Happening? First, what is happening in Galatians 2?

Now the big event here comes in verses 11–14, but in order for us to understand that, we need to back up a minute and look at this thing as a whole. And overall, I think we can see what’s going on here in three steps: Context, Conflict, and then Confrontation.

CONTEXT For the Context, we’re gonna start in verse 1, and just so you know, this is kind of a long story, but there are some high drama moments. And to help us stay on track, at certain points while I’m telling the story, I’m gonna stop and ask if you’re tracking. [And I need you to say yes or nod or thumbs up, etc.]

Check out verse 1. This is part of Paul’s autobiography, he says, verse 1, “Then after fourteen years — [he’s talking about 14 years after his conversion to Christ] — after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem.”

So Jerusalem is the setting. That is where Paul is at, and remember from last week, this was only the second time Paul had been to Jerusalem since he became a Christian. And the reason Paul was there was to meet with the other apostles to confirm that he and they were preaching the same gospel of Jesus.

Are you tracking?

Now in terms of the apostles, let me remind you who these apostles are. The word “apostle” literally means “messenger” and these men were the official messengers of Jesus. They were the disciples of Jesus … minus Judas, plus James (Jesus’s brother), and plus Matthias.

(Now, you’ll notice in this passage that the apostle Paul calls the apostle Peter “Cephas” — why is that? Well, it’s simply because Cephas is the Aramaic way to say Peter. Both names mean the same thing. They both mean rock, which is the name Jesus gave Peter.)

And one thing that’s really important about Peter and the apostles is that these were all men who had witnessed the resurrection of Jesus. They were eye-witnesses of the resurrection — which means they ate and drank with Jesus after he was raised (see Acts 10:39–43).

These were the men that God chose to be apostles of Jesus and go preach the gospel, which they did, and which we can read about in the Book of Acts.

But now Paul also was an apostle, because he also had witnessed the resurrected Jesus, although he did in a different way. Paul didn’t eat and drink with Jesus after he was raised because at first Paul hated Jesus. Paul was against the gospel; but then Jesus, as the Resurrected and Ascended Lord appeared to Paul and changed his heart. Jesus had a “come to Jesus” talk with Paul, literally, and everything changed. And so God also chose Paul to be an apostle of Jesus and go preach the gospel, which he did, and which he can also read about in the Book of Acts. These men are the apostles.

We tracking?

Now remember, all of these men, all of these apostles, were Jewish.

Which means, they had always been taught that faithfulness to God meant that they keep Jewish law. In order to be part of the people of God, in order to be right with God, you expressed your faith through abiding by Jewish laws and customs. It meant that you abided by Kosher food laws. You do not eat unclean meat, and you do not hang around unclean people, such as any non-Jewish people, aka Gentiles. You do not hang out with Gentiles. That was the Jewish mindset that these men had been steeped in their entire lives.

But see, the gospel of Jesus says something different. The gospel of Jesus says that “faith in Jesus plus nothing else” is what saves you, and that goes for Jewish people and Gentile people.

You don’t have to keep a certain law or perform a certain way or belong to a certain ethnic group to be right with God. You are saved only by faith in Jesus.

The apostle Paul had been preaching that, because that’s what Jesus told him, and now Paul comes to Jerusalem to meet with the other apostles to make sure they were preaching the same thing. And guess what? They were.

That is the central thing that is confirmed in verses 1–10 during Paul’s time in Jerusalem. Paul and the other apostles — all the apostles — were preaching the same gospel.

And one of the ways we really see their unity on the gospel is how they handled these “false brothers” in verse 4.

Here’s what happened: While Paul and the other apostles were convening about the gospel and what they preached, somehow “false brothers” secretly slipped into their gatherings.

Now, these “false brothers” were not apostles and they were not Christians. They were false. They were “counterfeit Christians.” They were the “troublers” that Paul mentions in Chapter 1, verse 7. And the trouble they caused is that they were going around saying that the apostles got it wrong. These troublers were false teachers who were saying that you DID have to keep Jewish law in order to be saved.

And they didn’t just say that theoretically, but they were pointing at Titus. Remember Titus was with Paul at these meetings in Jerusalem, and Titus was Greek. He was a Gentile. And so these false teachers were calling for his circumcision. Could you imagine the tension in this place?

These false teachers were saying that Titus is not really “in” unless he is circumcised and becomes like a Jewish man. And they were saying this against all the apostles, and so all the apostles unite in their rejection of this false teaching. The apostles all said NO. That’s verse 5: “to them [the false brothers] we [the apostles] did not yield in submission even for a moment.”

And that’s the whole point of verses 1–10. The whole point of the context here is to let us know that Paul and the other apostles — namely Paul and Peter — they are united on the gospel. The gospel is that you are saved by faith in Jesus alone. Nothing else. Peter preached that gospel. Paul preached that gospel. They preached the same gospel.

Are you tracking?

That’s the context.

CONFLICT And now we can see the conflict in verse 11, which takes place in Antioch. So we started in Jerusalem, verses 1–10. Now we’re Antioch, verse 11 — and Antioch was a majority Gentile city in what is today southern Turkey (Antioch is directly north of Jerusalem, about a ten-hour drive). Paul and Barnabas had been in Antioch, preaching the gospel to Gentiles, and Peter visits.

Now we don’t know how often Peter visited Antioch, but apparently he had been there enough times or a long enough time to develop the habit of eating with the Gentile Christians there. Now, if you read any commentary, the word scholars use for this is “table fellowship.” Peter had table fellowship with Gentile Christians. It means that he hung out with them. Peter ate and drank with Gentiles; he spent time with them. And this was a Christian act.

Because remember, in Jewish law and custom, Jewish people did not eat Gentile food or hang out with Gentile people because they were considered unclean. But Peter is a Christian; he believes the gospel; he believes that everyone is only saved by faith in Jesus; including these Gentile Christians he hung out with.

So a normal day in Antioch was that, during the day, everyone went about their work doing whatever they did, but every mealtime, they’d all come together: Paul, Barnabas, Titus, all the Gentile Christians, and Peter — they would come together and they’d eat and drink and talk and fellowship, and this was a simple, glorious thing.

But then one day Peter didn’t show up for dinner. Oh, he must have something else was going on. But then it’s the next day and again everybody’s like: Where’s Peter? Y’all know where Peter’s at? What about Barnabas? Where’s he? Hmm? Oh, maybe they’re doing this or that.

But see, actually, Paul knew what was going on. Look at verse 12.

Peter’s absence has to do with “certain men” who came from James in Jerusalem. Because before these “certain men” came, Peter was hanging out with Gentile Christians all the time, but now since these certain men came, Peter has stopped, he has drawn back and separated himself, verse 12, “fearing the circumcision party.”

Now what does that mean?

Are you tracking?

Who are these “certain men” and who is this “circumcision party”?

Now like Pastor Joe said last week, we’re not 100% sure about all the details Paul is writing into, but there’s enough here — and enough we know historically — that we can piece together what’s going on. Here it is:

At this time historically, there was a lot of tension between the Romans and Jewish people. The Romans ruled the world at this time, and there had been several Jewish revolts against Roman rule. And these Romans, these Gentiles, had done horrible things to the Jewish people. And so in response to that, Jewish people doubled down on their hostility toward Gentiles, and the “circumcision party” of verse 12 led that hostility.

The “circumcision party” was made up of Jewish leaders — they were not Christians, but they were Jewish leaders and they led the way in making sure all things Jewish and Gentile stayed polarized. This circumcision party intensified an “US” vs. “THEM” mindset in Jerusalem.

And then they heard that Jewish Peter —who followed Jesus — was now hanging out with Gentiles. And so these Jewish leaders, this circumcision party, they went over to James and the other Jewish Christians in Jerusalem, and they said: “You have betrayed your people.”

This “gospel” you preach — it’s not the fulfillment of the Hebrew Scriptures; this Jesus is not the Jewish Messiah, but you are traitors to your heritage. You have joined sides with our Gentile enemy — do you not know what they’ve done to us?

And James hears this and knows this is not good, especially in terms of optics. Because he was trying to win the Jewish people to believe in Jesus. He wants them to become Christians, but now this is a problem in the way. And so James in Jerusalem gets some men together — the “certain men” of verse 12 — and he sends them to Antioch to tell Peter what’s going on:

Hey, go tell Peter that his hanging out with Gentiles is making things difficult for us here in Jerusalem. It’s causing the circumcision party to bully the Jewish Christians and it’s ruining all of our chances at evangelism.

And so then when Peter hears this from these certain men, of course, he doesn’t want that to happen, and so what does he do? Well, he didn’t show up for dinner last night. He’s not here this morning. Has anybody seen him? Where’s Peter? Peter had stopped hanging out with the Gentile Christians. And it wasn’t just Peter, because he influenced others to do the same, including other Jewish Christians in Antioch — and even Barnabas got mixed up in this. The Jewish Christians had stopped table fellowship with Gentile Christians, and Paul called this hypocrisy.

Are you tracking?

So Context. Conflict. Now that leads to confrontation.

CONFRONTATION This is verse 11, and then verse 14. First, Paul tells us he opposed Peter to his face because Peter stood condemned. That word “condemned” simply means to be found guilty. When Peter stopped eating with Gentile Christians he was in the wrong. And Paul told him that.

Verse 14:

But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?”

Now Paul mentioned the word “hypocrisy” in verse 13, but here in verse 14 is where he explains the hypocrisy. And we all know what hypocrisy means. Hypocrisy is when you say you believe something, but your behavior contradicts it. You say this, but you live that.

And what’s implied is that actions speak louder than words — so the way you act will reveal if your convictions are pretense. The way you live is the real measure of what you believe, and so if you say you believe something but don’t live it, it means you’re lying. You’re pretending.

That’s what hypocrisy means, and we get it. We understand how it works. My late grandfather understood how it works.

My first year of seminary in North Carolina, I only took one class because I worked everyday with my dad and my grandfather in my dad’s drywall business. And a lot of those days at work I would drive all over Raleigh with my grandfather — we called him Papa — and as we drove I would talk to him about Jesus.

My Papa had heard the gospel, and he had been to different churches his whole life, but his big hangup was the hypocrisy he had seen in so many so-called Christians — and he had a list of stories. There were all these people who were part of churches and claimed the name of Christ, but if you looked at their lives, they were no different than anybody else — and that’s confusing, right? When our conduct is out of step with our confession, it’s confusing.

That’s true today. And that was true in the First Century.

Peter said we’re saved by faith in Jesus alone, and that this salvation is for everyone who believes, Jewish people and Gentile! We are Christians. We are one people in Christ — but by not eating with Gentile Christians he was acting like you have to become Jewish in order to become a Christian.

See, Peter’s behavior is contradicting what he believes and preaches, because his behavior (motivated by fear and good intentions) suggests (even faintly) that you have to keep Jewish law in order to be saved.

Because of his behavior, Peter was in the wrong, and the real turning point is that Paul confronted him. This is where we move from Part One to Part Two.

In Part One, What Is Happening? — we’ve seen Context, Conflict, and Confrontation, and now that takes us to Why It Matters

Why Does This Matter for Us? This is why:

Paul confronted Peter because his conduct was out of step with the truth of the gospel, or more specifically, it was because Peter was behaving as if you need more than faith in Jesus to be saved. Peter’s behavior was undermining the all-sufficiency of Jesus for salvation.

And just categorically, this means it is possible for you to live in a way that contradicts the gospel. Like Peter did here, you can do things that deny the all-sufficiency of Jesus, and that is was wrong.

Are you tracking?

Now get this: if it’s possible for us to get it wrong, the converse must also be true. We can get it right. Which is why Paul is doing what he’s doing here!

Hey, it’s possible for you, for me, for us! — it is possible for us to live in a way that is congruent to the all-sufficiency of Jesus! Gospel congruence is what it’s called. Gospel congruence is the way we wanna live, right?

We want to live — and we can live — in step with the gospel. We can show with our lives that Jesus alone is our salvation. But guess what? We have to help one another.

I think that’s the main takeaway for us here. This is the main thing we see in Paul and Peter. It’s that gospel congruence is the way we help one another live.

Gospel congruence — living in step with the gospel — is the way we help one another live.

Now, in closing, I want to give you three reasons why:

1. BECAUSE IT IS RIGHT.

It is right that we live in congruence with the gospel because the gospel is meant to change how we live. The gospel is for all of us. Head to toe, mind to heart, every part of who we are, is who Jesus came to save, because every part of us needs saving.

Remember, we’re fallen humans. We are sinners who are totally depraved, which means every part of us is broken, and we cannot save ourselves. We have to start there, and when we realize that we can’t save ourselves, and that we need a Savior from outside of us, then we look to cross.

We look to the gospel of Jesus — that Jesus came here to save sinners like us. He walked through this life in our shoes, and in all the ways that we have failed, Jesus was perfect. And being perfect, he became a spotless sacrifice. Jesus went to the cross in our place and he took upon himself the punishment we deserved for our sins, and he died for us bearing that punishment.

The judgment of God that I deserved for my sins — judgment that was coming at me — Jesus took it instead, and he died and was buried, but then on the third day he was raised. Jesus was raised and ascended victorious over sin and death. By his resurrection, Jesus proved that he has overcome both the power and penalty of sin, and when we put our faith in him, when we trust him, his victory is applied to us. By faith, we are united to Jesus, and all the favor that God has for his Son becomes favor that God has on us. We become the adopted sons and daughters of God through faith in Jesus.

That is the gospel, and Jesus didn’t just do that so we’d “agree” with it, he did it to change us.

Look, I used to think that the biggest problem for the church was the issue of behavior. From all those conversations with my Papa, I thought, If Christians could just live right and not be stupid! I used to think that was the issue, but it’s not. The issue is that if Christians, if we, could just truly understand the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Church, Jesus’s love for you is not shallow. He is saving all of you, and his salvation shows up in how we live. This is gospel congruence. And it’s just right. It’s our calling.

Gospel congruence is the way we help one another live …

2. BECAUSE WE CANNOT DO IT ALONE.

We help one another live in gospel congruence because we have to help one another. Remember that when we become Christians, we become part of the family of God; we’re part of the church, and we live that out in her local assemblies, in local churches like this one.

As a church, we are together learning to obey all that Jesus commands us. We’re learning how to follow Jesus together on this journey of faith through life in this world. We are pilgrims in progress.

John Bunyan wrote The Pilgrim’s Progress in 1678 — one of the most famous books in the world. And it’s an allegory of a Christian’s journey of faith. Christian, the main character, is on a pilgrimage from the City of Destruction (which is this world) to the Celestial City (which is heaven). And on this journey, Christian experiences all the things that we Christians might experience here — it’s really amazing how relevant this book is hundreds of years later. And part of the genius of the story is that Christian, the main character, does not make the journey alone.

At first it was Christian’s friend Faithful, who traveled with him, but then after Faithful was martyred, it was Christian’s friend Hopeful. And Christian and Hopeful journey together, and at different times in the story they both need each other to remind them of the gospel. They’re both correcting and encouraging one another along the way. And as the church, we are called to do that for one another.

There will be times on this journey when we as brothers and sisters will see the gospel more clearly than the person next to us, and when that happens, we have to tell them. Because there’s also gonna be times when we don’t see the gospel clearly, and we need our brothers and sisters to tell us. There will be times for all of us when our step is off, and we have to help one another.

We can’t do this alone. Gospel congruence is the way we help one another live.

And lastly, #3, that’s …

3. BECAUSE THE TRUTH OF THE GOSPEL WILL BE PRESERVED.

I think there are some things we can learn here from Paul and Peter that apply to our current situations, but the main way that Galatians 2 is different from any other situation is that the stakes are uniquely high.

Peter’s hypocrisy was that his conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, which didn’t just undermine what he believed and preached, but it threatened to rip apart the church.

Peter’s behavior suggested that something more than faith in Jesus is needed for salvation, and if that behavior was left unchecked would have created a kind of Jewish syncretism that distorted the message of the gospel.

And Paul understood this. He understood how high the stakes were, which is why in verse 5 he said that the apostles did not yield to the false teachers even for a moment, “so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you.” What is driving Paul more than anything is the integrity of the gospel. Paul’s highest allegiance was to the gospel.

And I think the same thing could be said of Peter.

You’ll notice in Galatians 2 that Paul doesn’t say anything about Peter’s response to him. We have no indication anywhere that Paul and Peter argued about this, which means it’s best to assume that when Peter heard Paul say all this to him, he received it. Because his highest allegiance was also to the gospel.

Paul’s highest allegiance was to the gospel, not his ego, so he confronted Peter and risked being disliked. Peter’s highest allegiance was to the gospel, not his ego, so he didn’t argue with Paul but accepted that he was wrong, and he showed up for dinner that night.

And because our brother Paul and our brother Peter — because their highest allegiance was to the gospel — God used this confrontation to preserve the truth of the gospel for us.

See Peter and Paul continued to preach the truth that we are saved by faith in Jesus alone, plus nothing else, and through Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, that gospel message has advanced to the ends of the earth … even to here, in the middle of North America, where there’s now a statute of Paul on our building in a city named after him.

Look, it’s not about Paul. When Paul looks down from the cloud of witnesses and sees this statue, he probably face palms. It’s not about Paul, but Jesus used Paul, and Jesus used this moment in Galatians 2, so that we would know the gospel today.

Hey, you are saved by faith in Jesus alone. Stop looking to yourself. Stop looking anywhere else. Look to Jesus and trust him.

And if you do, we come now to this Table to give him thanks.

The Table At this Table, the bread represents the broken body of Jesus; the cup represents the shed blood of Jesus; and when we receive it, we remember Jesus’s death and give him thanks. We are saying that Jesus is our only hope, and if that’s your confession this morning, let’s eat and drink together.

His body is the true bread.

His blood is the true drink.

One of the things that my family does on a normal night is that, over dinner, we go around the table and we talk about the highs and lows of our day.

What happened today that made you excited?

What happened today that was difficult?

What was your high and what was your low?

I try to help the kids name their emotions and draw out the language of the heart — and it is the most chaotic thing I do.

Don’t imagine that anything about this is orderly. Most of the time it’s just crazy town — because half our kids are younger, and so there’s a lot of squirming and side-conversations and corrections that are needed and all that, but somehow we manage to get the highs and lows. Which I think is important.

Because we all have highs and lows, as family members and as a family as a whole. There are gifts and losses, blessings and disappointments. The life of a family has highs and lows, and so does the life of a church.

The life of the local church is full of things we have to endure. Burdens to carry; valleys to walk through; complexities to navigate. If one member suffers, we all suffer together (see 1 Corinthians 12:26). We as a church have our lows.

And we have our highs — there are the ways God’s faithfulness is displayed; the ways he provides for us; the evidences of grace in our lives. If one member is honored, we all rejoice together (see 1 Corinthians 12:26). And I wonder: if you were asked to name a few high points from 2021, what would they be?

I try to reflect on these things this time of year, and there are a handful of moments stand out to me. Three big ones:

One is when our parents dedicate their children to God;

And then another is when we celebrate God’s grace in baptism; and

And then another is when new members join our church.

These are high points for us, and recently, as I was thinking about these things I noticed at least one common thread in all three. At each of these events there are things that we say, and I’m gonna read from some of that, and I want you to see if you can pick up on a theme:

First, at child dedications, we ask our parents:

Do you promise, God helping you, to make it your regular prayer that, by God’s grace, your children will come to trust in Jesus alone for the forgiveness of their sins and for the fulfillment of all his promises to them; and in this faith follow Jesus as Lord, Savior, and supreme Treasure of their lives?

Then, at baptism, the third baptismal question we ask:

Do you intend now, with God’s help, to obey the teachings of Jesus and to follow him as your Lord, Savior, and Treasure?

And then when we affirm our membership covenant together, that covenant starts like this:

Having been led, as we believe, by the Spirit of God, to embrace Jesus as the Lord, Savior, and supreme Treasure of our lives …we enter into covenant …

Okay, did you hear it? What does all of that have in common?

Well, first, it’s that we call Jesus “Jesus” … because that’s his name and he is a real person! Amen!

But also, we say that we embrace Jesus as our Lord, Savior, and Treasure.

Most of the time, Christians will say “Lord and Savior” but we add this Treasure part, for the reasons Pastor David Mathis showed us last week: Jesus as Lord and Savior is who he is and what he does, and Jesus as Treasure is what he is like as Lord and Savior.

It’s the paradox of Jesus as the Lion and the Lamb, the one who is mighty and meek, transcendent and near, fully God and fully man. There is nobody like Jesus. Nobody. He is Lord, Savior, and Treasure.

And he is King. If there’s one thing clear about Christmas, it’s that Jesus came as the King. I think that’s the most repeated theme in all our favorite Christmas songs: “Hark! The herald angels sing ‘Glory to the newborn King!’” “Joy to the world, the Lord is come! Let earth receive her King!”

Jesus is King! — and so how should we think about this?

How does Jesus’s kingship fit with him as “Lord, Savior, and Treasure”? Why not add “King” to that list? We could! We could also add Priest and Way and Truth and Life — the glory of Jesus is inexhaustible, and we’re never gonna get it all in a sentence, but the way to think about Jesus’s kingship (and priesthood, as we’ll see next week), is that Lord, Savior, and Treasure are descriptions of Jesus, but Jesus as King is the office he holds.

Jesus being a King is his job, you could say. You go to work everyday and you do what you do, Jesus goes to work as King. And that’s what we’re going to talk about today: Jesus, Our King.

And there are three things to see about his kingship in Luke Chapter 1. And this is the sermon:

Jesus, our King, was long expected.

Jesus, our King, is unlike other kings.

Jesus, our King, must be obeyed.

Let’s pray:

Lord Jesus, I am a severely weak man whose only chance of doing anything of any lasting good is if you work through me. In our weakness you promise to be strong, and I ask for your strength this morning. Please stand by me and help me. By your Spirit, through your Word, show us your glory. In your great name, amen.

Jesus, our King, was long expected. Look at Luke Chapter 1, verse 32. The angel, Gabriel, was sent by God to Mary, and he told her that she will conceive and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. And then in verse 32, Gabriel explains. Verse 32:

He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David…

And so right away, make no mistake about it, this baby is a king. That would have been the most obvious thing to Mary in this encounter, and that’s mainly because of her Jewish faith. She had a king category. Because, going back hundreds of years, echoing through the pages of the Hebrew Scriptures, there was the promise that a king would come. And it wasn’t just any king, but this was a king in the lineage of David.

So that part made sense to Mary.

So much of this was troubling, like verse 29 says. This was a surprise. But the “king in the line of David” part , Mary had heard that before, and she knew she was of the house of David. So she is tracking with that.

This is why the first thing she says back to Gabriel is not “I have no idea what you’re talking about” but she says “How’s this gonna happen?”

And Gabriel goes on to explain the virgin birth, but he doesn’t have to explain the king part.

Mary gets the king part, and I want us to step into her shoes for a minute. Where does this hope for a king come from in the Old Testament?

Okay, for a minute here we’re going to go back and see, and there are three mile-marker passages in the Old Testament to highlight. This is like a cheat-sheet. Three key texts in the Old Testament about Israel’s hope for a king.

Deuteronomy 17;

2 Samuel 7;

1 Kings 10

You don’t have to turn there. I’m gonna briefly explain them to you, starting with Deuteronomy 17.

DEUTERONOMY 17 The people of Israel had been set free from Egypt;

they received the law of God;

they received the arrangement of God’s presence through the temple, despite their sinfulness; and

they received the promise of their own land, which is where they’ve been headed through 40 years of wandering in a desert.

Now, finally, they’re about to enter the Promised Land and Moses is preparing them by basically preaching a sermon. He summarizes the law and recounts their history and prophecies about their future, and he tells them one day they’re going to have kings. They didn’t need human kings because God was their king, but one day, in the future, they’re going to want a king and God will give them one. And in view of that, Moses lays out some stipulations for these kings in Deuteronomy 17. Here are some things that the king should do and should not do.

In the positive, Israel’s king is to be devoted to the word of the Lord. He is to write for himself a copy of the law, he’s is to keep it with him and he’s to read it all the days of his life (Deuteronomy 17:18ff).

Remember this and hold onto it. Deuteronomy 17. Now there’s 2 Samuel 7.

2 SAMUEL 7 When God eventually gives Israel a king, the first one is Saul, and he was your typical George Washington-type figure. He was a man’s man, a natural leader, his presence commanded attention. But he proved unfaithful, and God took the kingdom from him and gave it to a little shepherd boy named David.

And that moment itself was one of the most significant moments in the whole king storyline, because Jesse, David’s father, had eight sons. David was the youngest.

And at first, when the prophet Samuel came to find the son of Jesse that God had chosen to be the next king, David wasn’t even there. Right away Samuel thought it was Eliab, the first son, but God said no. Then Samuel thought it was Abinadab, but God again said no. Then Samuel said, Okay, it must be Shammah, but again, God’s answer was no. Jesse put forward seven of his sons, and God said no to them all. And Samuel is confused and he says, “Is this all?” And Jesse said, “Well yeah, except for the youngest” (see 1 Samuel 16:11). And that word for youngest is not so much about birth order, it means something like “insignificant one.” We might say something like “the little guy.” The shrimp.

Samuel says, “Are these all your sons?” And Jesse says, “Yeah, except for the little shrimp out keeping sheep.” Samuel says to go get him. So David comes and the Lord says, “That’s him.” And we gotta learn the lesson: God doesn’t see as man sees; we look at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart, and David is his man. God makes him king, against all odds, and in 2 Samuel 7 God promises David one of the most important promises in the entire Bible.

God tells David that God will raise up his offspring to be king forever (2 Samuel 7:13). David will have a son, a son in his lineage, and God will establish the kingdom of this son forever. This son will be the Anointed One, the Messiah. Remember this and hold onto it. 2 Samuel 7.

Now 1 Kings 10.

1 KINGS 10 1 Kings 10 is all about King Solomon, David’s son. And what’s important about this chapter is that many thought that Solomon was the son that God promised in 2 Samuel 7. He seemed to fit the bill. He was a son of David, and God established his kingdom and the kingdom of Israel flourished under Solomon, at least at first. But what we find in 1 Kings 10 changes things.

Remember back to Deuteronomy 17 there’s the lists of things the king should and should not do. Well, the negative side of those things is that the king of Israel must not acquire many horses; he must not acquire excessive silver and gold; and he must not acquire many wives (see Deuteronomy 17:16–17).

And see, some thought Solomon might be his promised King, he might be the One, but then in 1 Kings 10 we read, almost like in a list…

that Solomon had 12,000 horsemen — that’s a lot of horses.

He had more gold than anyone in history, and he had so much silver that it wasn’t even worth anything — that’s a lot of gold and silver.

And then we read that Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines — that’s a lot of that.

And all this means that by the time we finish reading 1 King 10 we think, Wait a minute! Solomon can’t be the guy. And then we have to look to the next king and then the next, and then the kingdom falls apart, and all we see from here out is one king after another rises and falls. They come and they go, some are good, most are bad, but they all die. Which means, where is this promised King from 2 Samuel 7? Is he really going to come?

By the end of the Old Testament, with Israel in exile, we’re still looking for this king.

We’re looking for the king to be born in the lineage of David. And what does the angel Gabriel say?

Your son, Mary, your son named Jesus, the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David.

And she knew about that. Jesus, our king, was long expected.

And also, secondly, Jesus, our king, is unlike other kings

Jesus, our king, is unlike other kings. Jesus is a king in his own class. Nobody has ever been a king like him, for at least two reasons: his reign is eternal, and his reign is good.

HIS REIGN IS ETERNAL Notice verse 33. This newborn King from the house of David “will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”

There have been lots of kings throughout the history of the world, and lots of kingdoms, but no king or kingdom has lasted forever. None except this one. Jesus is unlike other kings because there will never be a king to succeed him. No king will ever be over him, but all kings will always be under him. That is why he is called the King of kings (see Revelation 19:16).

And that is not hypothetical or subjective, it is a bold fact. It’s the truth about reality. Christmas is about Jesus coming here to be the king forever, and since it’s forever, that applies to right now. Don’t hear the word “eternal” and think: way out there someday. It’s more like in this moment and unceasingly so.

Which means part of our witness to Jesus is not inviting people to make Jesus their king; it’s exhorting people to recognize Jesus as the king.

And see, this is part of the problem with pluralism. While we absolutely respect the dignity of our neighbors to believe whatever they choose, every belief system is not equally valid, and only one is ultimate. Only one King lasts forever. And so we have to be careful not to buy the lie that “what’s true for you is true for you, and what true for me is true for me.” Jesus the King will have none of that.

The proclamation of the gospel says that Jesus is King and we’re all guilty of treason. We either repent and submit to his kingship now, or we continue in our rebellion and face his judgment. That’s what we’re looking at here.

And if we’re honest, this is not something that’s easy for us, especially in our American society where we have such a distaste for monarchy and authority. The American spirit is anti-king. We are anti-authority — “Don’t tread on me!” “We the people!”

In our historical imagination, kings are tyrants, and in many cases throughout history that’s been true. But that’s been true because of our depravity, not because monarchy as a form of government is wrong. Monarchy is God’s design for government. In the new creation, which is the future of this world — where everything in this world is trending — the new creation will NOT to be a democratic republic. It’s going to be kingdom with a king who rules over everything, and who rules even now, whether we like it or not. The reign of Jesus, our King, is eternal.

HIS REIGN IS GOOD But also — and this makes the all the difference — the reign of Jesus our King is good. And I love to talk about his goodness.

This is where it all comes together, Jesus our King, is Lord, Savior, and Treasure. And he’s unlike other kings not just because he’s eternal, but because he is truly good in the deepest sense of the word. He is the truly righteous king. He is the king who will put all things as they should be and whose power is seen in his mercy.

We proclaim that in the gospel too. That is the gospel. It’s that Jesus is King and we’re all guilty of treason, every last one of us, but somehow, to our great surprise, in the command to repent is the assurance of our complete forgiveness.

It’s that if we turn from our treason, turn from our sins, and bow to Jesus, he will erase all of our guilt. Even if you’ve been on the payroll of hell, even if you’re drowning in shame, bow to Jesus and be forgiven. Bow to Jesus and be cleansed. How?

Because Jesus is the king who gave his life for his people. Rather than execute judgment on the guilty, he suffered judgment in the guilty’s place.

What king ever did that? Do you see what kind of King he is?

There is no limit to his power. He upholds the universe by his words. He sits forever on his throne. He has the whole world in his hands. And yet on the night that he was betrayed he took those same hands and tied a towel around his waist and bent down on the ground to wash his disciples’ feet.

He is a king who doesn’t use his people for his gain, but who saves his people at greatest cost to himself. He is a king who doesn’t bend his subjects to meet his needs, but he calls his subjects beloved and restores them to God’s original purpose, life abundant and unending. There is no king like Jesus.

So what are you doing?

What are you gonna do about Jesus our King?

Jesus, our King, must be obeyed. Here we learn from the example of Mary. But before we look at Mary’s response to Gabriel, I just want to make sure we’re clear on what’s happened here.

Mary was a Jewish girl engaged to be married to Joseph, and although the Gospels don’t tell us her age exactly, because we know she was a virgin and that she was engaged, according to the customs of this time, she was mostly like a young teenager. Think 16 years old.

So the angel Gabriel comes to this 16 year old girl and tells her that she is going to become pregnant with the promised King from the house of David. And the way she will conceive is a miracle. God will do it. He will make it happen with no human cooperation. The embryo will just BE, and the child will grow, and it will show.

Mary, this 16 year old engaged girl, unmarried girl, will look the way all women look when they are pregnant. And I doubt that we appreciate the social cost this meant for her. The obvious conclusion of everyone around Mary when they saw her would be that she either had sinned with Joseph prior to marriage, or she had been unfaithful to him.

This sincere, faithful Jewish girl would be seen as insincere and unfaithful. And not just in her pregnancy, but all the days of Jesus’s life, because people can do math: So Jesus is six years old and he’s already lost his teeth, but you’ve only been married how long?

We know later on, in Jesus’s ministry — so when he was around 30 years old — he’s in a dispute with the Pharisees, and they said to him, “We were not born of sexual immorality” (John 8:41), which implied that they believed he was. There was a reputation, three decades later.

The misunderstanding of Mary, the wrong interpretation of her pregnancy, that was not just a nine months thing, but it followed her the rest of her life. And she knew it would when Gabriel said what he said to her. God sent Gabriel to tell Mary something outrageous, something she did not sign up for, something that had a cost. And what does she say? What is this 16 year old girl’s response to the shocking announcement of God?

“Behold, I am a servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38).

And Luke, the Gospel writer, tells us this for our benefit. This encounter with Gabriel ends with this response of Mary because this response is an example of the response that we all should have when we meet Jesus.

Because Jesus is the true King, the King of kings whose reign is eternal and good, what do we do? We obey. We do like Mary. We say from our hearts: I am your servant, Lord. Whatever you want.

Which doesn’t mean we check a box. This doesn’t mean that we try to relegate Jesus as some kind of side-gig to our lives. It means we yield to him our everything. We surrender to Jesus our all.

That’s an old song we don’t sing much anymore.

I surrender all. I surrender all. All to Thee my Blessed Savior, I surrender all.

That is how we must respond to Jesus our King.

And that is, in fact, what we do every Sunday when we come together at this Table.

The Table For those of us who have obeyed Jesus our King, for those of us who have, by God’s grace, turned from our treason and bowed to him in faith, when we receive this bread and cup, we are saying anew that indeed we trust Jesus. We belong to Jesus. Our hope is in Jesus. We are saying, Behold, we are servants of the Lord. Whatever he wants.

And when it comes to highs and lows, church, this is the true high point for us. It’s when we remember together the love of Jesus and his gospel, which we do now for the 51st time in 2021.

His body is the true bread.

His blood is the true drink.

Let us serve you.

One of the reasons that we love Christmas is its paradoxes.

At Christmas in particular, we see realities come together that our human instincts do not expect to be together, and then we see, with surprise and delight, that they do indeed fit together, contrary to our assumptions — and it makes us happy.

The paradoxes of Christmas expose our false and weak and small expectations. They remind us that we did not design this world. We do not run this world. And we did not design God’s rescue of us. And we cannot save ourselves, but God can, and does, in the Word made flesh.

Some of our most beloved Christmas songs capture the great paradox of the high and holy God becoming human in a lowly baby born in Bethlehem:  > Word of the Father now in flesh appearing (“O Come, All Ye Faithful”)

Hail, Hail the Word made flesh (“What Child Is This?”)

Veiled in flesh the Godhead see Hail the incarnate Deity Pleased as man with men to dwell Jesus, our Emmanuel (“Hark”)  And of course, the hymnwriters didn’t make it up but found the beautiful paradox in Scripture:

In the words of the angel in Luke 2:11: “unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

In the words of the apostle Paul in Colossians 2:9: “in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.”

I love this great paradox of Christmas, that God became man, and its countless accompanying paradoxes, as in the words of the great Augustine, who said,

Man’s maker was made man that He, Ruler of the stars, might nurse at His mother’s breast; that the Bread might hunger, the Fountain thirst, the Light sleep, the Way be tired on its journey; that Truth might be accused of false witnesses, the Teacher be beaten with whips, the Foundation be suspended on wood; that Strength might grow weak; that the Healer might be wounded; that Life might die.

As the late J.I. Packer wrote,

The Almighty appeared on earth as a helpless human baby, needing to be fed and changed and taught to talk like any other child. The more you think about it, the more staggering it gets. Nothing in fiction is so fantastic as this truth of the Incarnation.

Lord, Savior, Treasure

Two weeks ago, to begin this Advent series, we considered “Jesus, Our Lord.” Jesus is fully God. He is the towering, all-knowing, all-wise, all-powerful God of Isaiah 45. As God, he formed and made all things, and every knee will bow, and every tongue confess, that Jesus is Yahweh — the sacred name of God revealed in Exodus. Jesus is creator, sustainer, supreme Lord of heaven and earth, almighty in power, infinite in majesty, our Lord and our God.

Then last Sunday, we turned to “Jesus, Our Savior.” Without ceasing to be God, Jesus took our full humanity, flesh and blood, human body and reasoning soul, with human mind and emotions and will, and with all our lowliness and ordinariness. Jesus had a normal name: Yeshua. Joshua. In the incarnation, he added to his eternal divine person a full and complete human nature, and came among us, as one of us, to save us.

Now, this morning, we consider “Jesus, Our Treasure,” and to do so, we will linger in the great Christmas paradox of Revelation 5. But before we do, let’s not miss the Advent-like moment in Revelation 5, before we see the great paradox.

Season of Waiting

Kids, what kind of season is Advent? (Advent is a season of waiting.) Where are we waiting? (In a land of deep darkness.) What are we waiting for? (For the Light to shine on us.) Advent is a season of waiting, of anticipating, of aching, of longing, of minor keys (like “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel”).

In verse 1, the apostle John looks and sees — in the hand of God, the one seated on heaven’s throne — “a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals.” These are the purposes of God to be unfolded in history, the judgments against his enemies and salvation for his people in Revelation 6–22. Some speculate that this might be the scroll in Daniel 12:4, where God said, “shut up the words and seal the book, until the time of the end.”

John wants to know what it is that God has to say, and he hears “a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, ‘Who is worthy to open the scroll and break it seals?’”

At this point, it can be tempting to run right through verses 3 and 4, and not feel the weight of this moment in heaven. This what we do during Advent: we feel the weight of waiting. Instead of racing ahead to Christmas, we prepare our hearts by pausing to feel some of the longing and ache of what God’s people felt for centuries as they waited for the promised Messiah. Advent helps us see and enjoy Jesus as the supreme Treasure he is.

So the angel asks, Who is worthy to open the book? And verse 3 says, “no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it.” No one in heaven. None of the four great creatures around the throne in chapter 4. None of the elders in heaven who lead in worship. None of the angels, in all the heavenly host. Not Gabriel. Not Michael. And not even the one sitting on the throne opens the scroll. Not the Father. Not the Spirit. So heaven waits. How long did they wait?

And if no one in heaven, then of course, no one on the earth or under the earth. Kings of earth, beware. None is worthy to open God’s scroll. Mere humans like us are not worthy to open the scroll. Satan, be warned, demons, beware, with whatever power you wield for now, you are not able to open the scroll. And so heaven waits. “No one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it.”

John begins to weep. And not just weep, but loudly. Perhaps he even wonders, What about Jesus? Verse 4: “I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it.” John doesn’t tell us how long he wept, but it must not have been long. He says, “He began to weep.” Mercifully, the announcement soon came.

Then in verse 5 — I love this moment — one of the elders of heaven, one of the leaders in heavenly worship, turns to John and says, “Weep no more; behold” — do you know what a Christmas word “behold” is? “behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus” (Luke 1:31) “behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem” (Matt 2:1) “behold, the star . . . came to rest over the place where the child was” (Matt 2:9) “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people” (Luke 2:10) “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many” (Luke 2:34)

And here, in Revelation 5, the elder says, “Weep no more; behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.”

So, now through the lens of verses 5–6, let’s look together now at three aspects of the Advent longing fulfilled in “Jesus, Our Treasure.” 

1. We long for majesty and might.

We long to see and admire and benefit from greatness. And the elder says in verse 5, “Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered.”

“Lion of Judah” signifies that this is the long-promised king of Israel, the Messiah. In Genesis 49, as the patriarch Jacob neared death, he prophesied over each of his twelve sons, and said to Judah that his tribe would be heir to the throne and produce the kings of the nation:

Judah, your brothers shall praise you . . . . Judah is a lion’s cub; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down; he crouched as a lion . . . . The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples. (Genesis 49:8–10)

Like a lion, Judah’s offspring will rule. Lionlike he will be king, with majesty and might. (And just so we don’t get the wrong impression of this rule, Judah received this honor not because of raw strength but self-sacrifice. He stepped forward to be the pledge of safety to redeem Benjamin from prison.).

“Root of David” is much the same, prophesied centuries later, in Isaiah 11:1, which we often read during Advent: “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse [David’s father], and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.”

So, Jesus is first shown to be majestic and mighty. He is king, ruler, judge. He is sovereign, and fulfills our longings for greatness, for a ruler strong and mighty, to impress us and win our trust and protect us and provide for us and give us life.

But we not only long for a great human king. We long for God himself. And as we saw two weeks ago, the Lion of Judah is not just Messiah, a human king. He is God himself.

Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) famously spoke of an “infinite abyss” in each of us we try to fill it with all the wonders and the worst this world has to offer. But that ache in us, that restlessness, that infinite abyss in us, can only be filled by the infinite God himself. As Augustine famously said, God made us for himself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in him.

Have you found your soul’s rest in God, in his eternal, divine excellencies? Are you still searching? Or have you found the place, the Person, in which your soul, in all the ups and downs of life, will be satisfied forever? Or did you learn it in the past but you now desperately need to come back to it? Behold the Lion of Judah.

God wired your soul for him. Hard as you may try, you will not be truly, deeply, enduringly happy without him.

We long for majesty and might, and Jesus is the Lion.

2. We long for meekness and nearness.

Look at verse 6. Having just heard the announcement in verse 5 about the worthiness of the Lion, John turns, and what does he see?

. . . between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain . . .

In verse 5, the elder said Lion, but in verse 6, John sees Lamb. And this is no disappointment. This is not a loss. This is gain. This is an addition. Jesus is the Lion of Judah, and no less, but he is also the slain Lamb. The Lion became Lamb, and gave himself to slaughter, that he might rescue his people. His lamb-ness doesn’t take away from his lion-ness; it adds to it.

Jesus is not only majestic and mighty. He is meek and near, lowly, among us, as one of us. We not only want to see greatness from afar; we want to know greatness personally. We not only want a hero to admire. We want a brother to be at our side, a companion, a friend. And Jesus, as Lamb, is Emmanuel, God with us. With us to be one of us. With us to sacrifice himself for us. With us to shed his own blood that we might be forgiven. With us to befriend us.

God designed our souls not only for his greatness, but also his nearness, and his meekness.

You might ask, If Jesus is already God, and has been from eternity, what does his humanity have to add to his being our treasure? His divine excellencies are infinite. Yet we are human, and his becoming human exposes to our view glories we otherwise would not see. This is why we love Christmas and its paradoxes. The paradoxes don’t take away from his glory; they add to it.

In 1734, Jonathan Edwards preached a famous sermon on “The Excellency of Christ.” In it, he says,

Christ has no more excellency in his person, since his incarnation, than he had before; for divine excellency is infinite, and cannot be added to. Yet his human excellencies are additional manifestations of his glory and excellency to us, and are additional recommendations of him to our esteem and love [to be our treasure!], who are of finite comprehension. . . . The glory of Christ in . . . his human nature, appears to us in excellencies that are of our own [human] kind, and are exercised in our own way and manner, and so, in some respect, are peculiarly fitted to invite our acquaintance and draw our affection [our treasuring him]. . . . (emphasis added)

So, the Lion, in becoming Lamb — the eternal Son in becoming man — while not enhancing his divine worth became even more a Treasure to us, who long for meekness and nearness, for companions and friends.

3. In Jesus, we have it all in one person.

It is one thing to see and enjoy the divine excellencies of unmatched strength and knowledge. And other to see and enjoy the human excellencies of humility and friendship. And then, greatest of all, to see and enjoy divine and human excellencies in one person. Because when majesty and meekness come together in one person they accent each other. As Edwards says, they “set off and recommend each other.”

See it first in verse 6: John says he “saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes.” This Lamb is not dead. He is not slumped over. He is not kneeling. He is standing, alive and ready. And he has seven horns — signifying the fullness of his strength. And seven eyes, meaning he sees and rules all. That he is Lamb makes his lionlike work, from Revelation 6, through the rest of the book, all the more glorious.

For the rest of Revelation, Lamb will be the main title for Jesus, as he displays his power and strength again and again: We’re told it is the Lamb who has conquered to open the scroll and seals, 5:5; 6:1; 8:1 The lowly Lamb ransomed people for God from every tribe, 5:9 The humble Lamb is declared Worthy to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing, 5:12–13 The four living creatures and the elders of heaven fall down and worship the Lamb, 5:8, 14 Unbelievers tremble before the wrath of the Lamb, 6:16 The robes of the saints are made white in his blood; he has the power to forgive, 7:14 His blood conquers the accuser of the brothers, 12:11 With this lowly Lamb are 144,000 strong, who followed him wherever he goes, 14:1, 4 The Lamb conquers those who make war on him, 17:14 And the Lamb, in all his meekness, is not only with the one on the throne (7:9, 10) but in the midst of the throne, 22:1, 3

And of course, we not only admire the Lamb for his lionlike strength and power, but also the Lion for his lamblike gentleness and lowlines, that he gives his own neck for our rescue. “A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not quench” (Matthew 12:20; Isaiah 42:3). As Revelation 1:4–5 says, Jesus is not only the lionlike “rule of kings on earth”; lamblike, he is also “him who loves us and has freed us from our sin by his blood.”

We admire his greatness all the more in his nearness to us, as one of us. And we enjoy his nearness all the more because of his greatness. Because he is the Lamb, and has drawn near to save us, we can enjoy his lionlike majesty and holiness, without shaking in terror. And because he is the Lion, and wields the very power of God almighty, we can enjoy his lamblike humility and meekness and obedience, as man, to his Father, without worrying that he’s powerless to help his friends.

God designed our souls for Jesus. Not just a divine Father, and not just a human friend, but God himself in human flesh. God himself, in the person of his Son, becoming one of us — God with us, as fully God and fully man, in one spectacular person.

We not only marvel at his eternal divine excellencies that fill the infinite abyss of our souls, but also his human excellencies add to (for our human eyes and hearts) his glory and our joy, and finally his divine and human excellencies “set off and recommend each other to us.”

He is not only our Lord. And not only our Savior. He is our Treasure. He is the Pearl of Greatest Price. He is the one of surpassing value, for whom we consider all else loss. He is the Treasure hidden in the field worthy selling all to have. Eternal life is to know him — not only the one true God but Jesus Christ whom he has sent (John 17:3).

You were not only made for God, but for the God-man, who loved us and gave himself up for us, and rose again to be our living, knowable, enjoyable King. Which brings us to the Table

Nails, Spear at Advent

Critical to Jesus being our Treasure is that he not only came to live among us but — another paradox of Christmas — he was born to die for us. John not only saw a Lamb in verse 6 but the Lamb who “had been slain.” He came lamblike to lay down his life for us, then to rise, ascend, and rule the nations as both Lion and Lamb. He is our Treasure not only because of how he came but also how he saved us.

As we pass the elements, we’ll sing “What Child Is This?” with its line about his being that slain that might seem out of place during Advent — but it is filled with glory:

Nails, spear shall pierce him through. The cross be born for me, for you.

Do we really need nails and spear in Advent? Yes, we do. See the glory of our Treasure: God himself, and Lion of Judah, and Lamb who was slain for us.

Picture an iceberg. A massive iceberg, with ice mountains rising from the sea in all directions, and ice roots stretching into the unseen depths of the ocean. Biblical revelation is like that iceberg. What we have in the Scriptures is the part of the iceberg that juts out of the water, but the fullness of God’s meaning plunges to the depths.

Thus, in seeking to know God through the Bible, we have to go deep and wide. We read biblical sentences and paragraphs and chapters and books, and we go deep, meditating on the word and drawing out implications as we seek to trace the depth of the iceberg. And we go wide, connecting biblical sentences and paragraphs and chapters and books to other biblical sentences and paragraphs and chapters and book, showing the connections between one part of Scripture and another as we seek to chart the breadth of the iceberg.

A few weeks ago, Pastor Jonathan went deep, exploring the meaning and implications of God’s name in Exodus 34. Last week Pastor Kenny went wide, connecting Exodus 35-40 back to Genesis 3 and forward to Revelation 20-21.

So here at Cities, we’re whole Bible people. We love the whole counsel of God. We ask questions like, “What must be the case, in order for everything in the Bible to be true?” That’s a systematic theology question; it goes deep into reality to make sense of biblical claims. And we ask questions like, “How does God progressively reveal himself over time?” That’s a biblical theology question; it goes wide into the Bible to trace themes from Genesis to Revelation.

In doing this, our aim is to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, both the breadth and the depth.

A fundamental conviction as we seek to go deep and wide is that we learn to read the Bible from the biblical authors. We learn to read the Torah by seeing how the prophets read the Torah. We learn to read the Old Testament by seeing how Jesus and the apostles read the Old Testament. We look for quotations and listen for echoes so that our minds begin to run in biblical ruts. We don’t merely accept Paul’s doctrine; we seek to imitate Paul’s method. We follow Paul’s train of thought and then seek to reproduce it elsewhere.

This brings us to Isaiah 45. This is Isaiah’s oracle concerning Cyrus, king of Persia. Isaiah wrote this 200 years before Cyrus appeared on the scene. Despite being a pagan ruler, Cyrus is the Lord’s anointed, his messiah, his Christ. Though Cyrus does not know Yahweh, Yahweh knows Cyrus, names Cyrus, calls Cyrus, and equips Cyrus to fulfill God’s purposes. God will go before Cyrus and subdue nations and open locked gates for him (45:1-3). He does this so that God through Cyrus will restore the fortunes of Israel following their exile to Babylon (Isaiah 45:4-5). And Yahweh acts in this way so that all people will know “I am the Lord, and there is no other, besides me there is no God” (45:5, 6).

In fact, the uniqueness of the Lord becomes the dominant theme of this entire chapter. Again and again, Yahweh asserts his unique divine prerogatives. Again and again, the Lord, through his prophet, shouts that he alone is God. Hear the trumpet blast of God’s absolute uniqueness sound seven times in this one chapter.

In this sermon, Kenny Ortiz closes out the Exodus series by giving a recap and overview of the entire book and then summarizing the last six chapters. Way back in the Garden of Eden, humans enjoyed God's presence, but we sinned and the perfect fellowship was broken. But God immediately promises to send a savior. Then, the entire books of Genesis and Exodus are the unfolding plan of God to fulfill his promise to send that savior; to bring us back into the presence of God.

At first it appears that the tabernacle is going to be the place where humans re-enter into the presence of God, but they're boxed out of God's presence there, and the tabernacle actually becomes the place where humans realized that all their efforts cannot bridge the gap between humanity and God. The tabernacle cannot remove the separation between God and man, but it foreshadows the person who will be able to remove the separation: Jesus.

So over the next two Sundays, God willing, we’re going to spend two sermons looking at Exodus 34, and that’s because this chapter is the high-water mark of God’s revelation in the Old Testament. Next week we’re gonna deal more with the Mosaic covenant and what that means for us, but this week we’re going to focus on verses 1–9 as the continuation of what Pastor David Mathis showed us last week in Chapter 33.

And there are a few different ways that I could preface this passage, and I struggled to know exactly what to say, but here’s where I landed, and so I just wanna say this for the sake of honesty and invitation.

Here it is: Our readiness — your readiness — to hear Chapter 34, verses 5–7 depends upon how you heard Chapter 33, verse 18.

Look back again at Chapter 33, verse 18. Moses begs Yahweh, “Please show me your glory.”

And Moses, of course, is saying this in the middle of a high-stakes situation. He has a lot of uncertainty ahead of him. He has reasons to be frustrated and afraid, but he knows that what he needs more than anything in this moment is to see the glory of God, and so he asks for that. Moses is asking God, “Please show me your glory.”

And here’s the thing: if what Moses is asking doesn’t pique your interest — if it doesn’t compel you to lean in and listen up — then Chapter 34 will not matter to you. Because Chapter 34 is God’s answer to Moses’s question … but why would you care about the answer if you don’t care about the question? Right?

We understand how this works. It’s pretty simple. The world is full of answers (and so-called answers) to all kind of different questions. That is what media is, and it’s in our face all day long — more information and messages and answers to all kinds of different questions, but the only answers we care about are to the questions we’re asking — and of all the questions we ask, does anybody want to see the glory of God?

Would any of us echo Moses here and want with him and ask with him of God, “God, please show me your glory”?

Because, if you don’t care about the question you won’t care about the answer. I’m just being honest.

But also — and this is the invitation — maybe you’ve not cared to see the glory of God before, but you can care to see it now.

Maybe you’re here this morning and you’re in a difficult situation and you’re desperate, like Moses was.

Or maybe you’re here and you’re just sick and tired of shallow answers to shallow questions.

Or maybe you’re here and you have a growing desire to just know God, because you realize that all the searchings and longings of your heart are really for him.

See, wherever you’re coming from, this morning you can, and you may, pray with Moses, “God, show me your glory.” And I invite you to do that. This morning I invite all of us to make this the question we’re asking, okay. Because God answers it.

Let’s pray:

Almighty God, Creator of heaven and earth, our Father through Jesus Christ our Lord, this morning with your Word open before us, in dependence upon your Spirit, we ask as humbly and sincerely as we can, please show us your glory. In Jesus’s name, amen.

So the passage is verses 1–9 and there are two parts here that’s gonna serve as the outline for the sermon.

First, in verses 1–7, there is the revelation of God.

Second, in verses 8–9, there is the response of Moses.

So, the revelation of God [up here]; the response of Moses [down here]. We’re starting here [high], verses 1–7, the revelation of God.

The Revelation of God (verses 1–7) Here’s what’s happening: God is showing his glory to Moses by proclaiming his name.

And we’re going to slow down to see this in verses 5–7, but first, let me remind you about the context again.

THE CONTEXT (VERSES 1–5) In Chapter 33, verse 18, when Moses asks to see the glory of God, God tells him, basically, Okay. In verse 19, God says to Moses, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘Yahweh.’

So God says he will reveal his glory to Moses through proclamation — in Chapter 33 God says he will do that, and then in Chapter 34 God does it.

In Chapter 34, verses 1–4, God tells Moses to cut two tablets of stone. (Remember the first tablets in Chapter 32, Moses threw them down and broke them because of the golden calf. That symbolized that the covenant had been broken, and I think it’s mentioned here in verse 1 because we’re supposed to still have the sin of the people in the back of our minds.)

So God tells Moses to make two more tablets and come back up to the top of the mountain, which Moses does early the next morning. That’s verse 4. So Moses is by himself, holding the new, blank tablets, back at the top of the mountain. Now look at verse 5:

Yahweh descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of Yahweh. [verse 6] Yahweh passed before him and proclaimed Yahweh, Yahweh …

And we can see the connection here back to Chapter 33. God is doing what he said he’d do. His glory is passing by Moses by proclamation. Which means, God is showing his glory by saying something about himself. God is saying his name; he’s saying who he is.

And I wanna highlight this saying piece, this proclamation piece, because God could have done this however he wanted, right? God can do whatever he wants, and yet, he chose proclamation. God chose to reveal himself through words — through sounds that have meaning. That’s what proclamation is.

And get this: sounds that have meaning from thousands of years ago can be translated into new sounds today that have the same meaning. …

Yahweh, Yahweh, El rahum vey-hannun.

Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious.

God proclaimed that about himself. Those are the words that came from the mouth of God about who he is. Look, do we understand that we, right now, we get to hear what Moses heard?

God said these words to Moses, and this is not just a truth about God, but this is God himself telling us his heart. God tells us, first, his nature; and then second, he tells us his actions that flow from his nature.

God’s Nature (verse 6) Verse 6: “Yahweh passed before him and proclaimed, Yahweh, Yahweh …” —

This is literally Yahweh proclaiming his name, and this is the only time in the entire Bible when the divine name is mentioned twice like this, back to back. It’s meant to get our attention, it’s meant for emphasis, and, I think, this is an echo.

Now there’s a super important connection here we need to see, but it’s going to take some work, okay? So I need you to really track with me. …

Chapter 34, verse 6 is a developed restatement of Chapter 33, verse 19.

You can see the repetition in the text.

In both cases, 33:19 and 34:6, God repeats the proclaiming of his name, and right away, in both cases, he says that he is merciful and gracious.

Now we might have missed that in Chapter 33. Look back at verse 33:19. God says,

I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘Yahweh.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.

“MERCIFUL AND GRACIOUS” So you see that? Gracious and mercy in 33:19 is repeated as merciful and gracious in 34:6, and in both cases, God leads with this as the explanation of his name. It’s the first thing he says after he says “Yahweh.”

And so when we read these words repeated in 34:6 we should think back to those same words in 33:19. Grace and mercy. Mercy and grace.

But, why are they stated in a phrase in 33:19?

Why, in 33:19, does God put grace and mercy in the phrase: I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy?

Why does God do that?

It’s because 33:19 is an echo way back to Exodus Chapter 3, at the burning bush.

So in your minds, back up and remember the scene when Moses encountered the burning bush (this is in Exodus 3, which we looked at in September of 2019).

God tells Moses that he has seen the affliction of Israel and he’s about to rescue them. He’s going to send Moses to lead the rescue, and Moses, of course, is reluctant, but do you remember what Moses says to God?

Moses says if I go to the people of Israel and tell them what you’ve said, they’re going to want to know? Remember?

So Moses says to God: What is your name so I can tell them?

And in Exodus 3, verse 14, God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” Which means, I will be who I will be. That’s how God first told Moses his name. It means that God is absolutely free. There is no other way to define him other than in terms of himself. He is the I am. His name is Yahweh — he will be who he will be and that is that is Chapter 3.

But see now, in Chapter 33, there’s a lot that’s happened since the burning bush … and as Moses looks out at his next assignment, he is desperate to know a little more about what kind of God Yahweh is.

So hear this echo happening in Chapter 33:19. God tells Moses his name again, but this time it’s not “I will be who I will be” but it’s “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”

So see, this is the burning bush all over again, but better — because it’s not just that God is free, it’s that God is free to show mercy and grace to whoever he wants, because he in his nature is merciful and gracious. God is telling us more about who he is.

And in 34:6, as God explains his mercy and grace, Moses doesn’t just need to take his sandals off, but he needs to be hid by God in the cleft of the rock, because the glory is too much.

Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious — that is, he is a God who is slow to anger.

“SLOW TO ANGER” Now it’s fascinating to me that as God elaborates on his being merciful and gracious, he mentions anger right away. He’s going straight for the problem here, because we know by now that God can be angry, right? That’s the issue in Chapter 32.

After the golden calf, God’s wrath burned hot against the people (32:11) and Moses had to deal with that. Moses knows that God can be angry, and so how’s this going to work?

Because this is a stiff-necked people and it’s just a matter of time before they offend again the holiness of God. How will this play out? Is Moses’s mediation between God and the people always going to be Moses just trying to hold off God’s anger? Do you get the problem here? The question is: is God just always angry and Moses is the real difference-maker? Is that what’s going on?

The answer is No. Because God is slow to anger. God’s anger is not like human anger. Human anger tends to be unpredictable and irritable, because we are perturbable creatures. Sometimes with us anger is a mood. [And you know what I’m talking about. Sometimes we can just be grumpy.] But that’s never the case with God. God is never in an angry mood; he’s slow to anger. Which means every moment of his anger is a perfectly calculated righteous response to sin, and he doesn’t have to zap it out like a reflex because he has the capacity to forbear. Do we know the patience of God!

He is a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger — that is, he is a God abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

“ABOUNDING IN STEADFAST LOVE AND FAITHFULNESS” And we can see how this completes the picture: if God is slow in one way, what is, as it were, “natural” to him? If he’s slow to anger, what abounds or gushes or overflows or emanates from him?

Steadfast love and faithfulness.

And we know these words. “Steadfast love” is a good translation, but maybe my favorite way to say it is that this is God’s “never-stopping, never-giving up, unbreaking, always-and-forever love.” That’s what this is.

Just like God’s anger is not unpredictable and arbitrary, the same goes for his love. God means to love who he loves, and he never stops. You can’t stop him. Nothing can stop him. Seriously:

neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, not height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, can stop the love of God. (see Romans 8:38–39)

And if this steadfastness of his love doesn’t assure us enough, he joins it to his faithfulness. It’s steadfast love and faithfulness — which means, he always does what he says he will do. And that is foundational to this relationship, because in terms of the covenant, the only reason Yahweh is still dealing with Israel here is because of what he promised Abraham. Remember that Moses goes there in Chapter 32. Moses says, God, you swore to Abraham! And God confirms it here, Yes, and I keep my promises.

This is who God is. Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

And because we know who he is, we can know how we will act, because God always acts in harmony with his nature. We see this fact in the pages of Scripture. The prophet Jonah knew this. …

Remember the prophet Jonah did not want to preach in Nineveh. He tries to flee, but God brings him there anyway, dramatically. And Jonah preaches as he’s told; the people repent; God has mercy on them; but then Jonah is angry because he hates Nineveh, and so he finally tells the truth, Jonah Chapter 4, verse 2. He says, This is why I didn’t wanna come to Nineveh! It’s because

I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love … (Jonah 4:2)

Jonah is quotes Exodus 34:6. This is why Jonah tried to keep God from his enemy — it’s because he knew that God acts in harmony with his nature, and because his nature is mercy and grace, therefore God will forgive.

Forgiveness is the action that flows from the heart of God. Verse 7 takes us there.

God’s Actions (verse 7) Verse 7 lists four actions, two positive and two negative, and then there’s a timing piece. I’ll mention the timing piece first.

In verse 7, in the first clause, notice the word “for thousands” (or “to the thousandth generation”);

and then in the final clause notice the “to the third and fourth generation.”

Those are two different timeframes that are meant to be juxtaposed. One is to say: a very very long time that basically never ends; and the other is to say: a specifically long time here on this earth.

The idea is that these are not the same. One is a fact because it’s the heart of God; the other is a fact because it’s necessary.

Yahweh keeps (or guards) steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. This is God’s heart in action.

Yahweh does not clear the guilty (he doesn’t let sin go unpunished), visiting the iniquity on as many generations as it calls for. This is God’s holiness offended, which deserves his righteous response of judgment. Don’t the misimpression that God being merciful means he is some big “anything goes” Teddy bear in the sky.

God is just and therefore he judges sin. His judgment comes at times in this life (which is verse 7), but it will certainly come in the final judgment. Remember the anger of God is a reality. And this creates tension in the text. We have more questions about how this works. But to the question, “Show me your glory!” … God has given his answer:

Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

This is the glory of God.

This is the proclamation of his name: Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious.

This is the revelation of God

Now what do we do with this? This is the truth about God. What does it mean for us?

Well I think we can learn from the response of Moses.

The Response of Moses (verses 8–9) Moses responds in two ways: Praise and Petition. And we’re going to start with the last first. That’s verse 9. It’s that Moses prays. He petitions God.

PETITION (VERSE 9) Remember back in Chapter 32 when Moses petitions God not to destroy Israel, he prayed on the basis on God’s reputation. He didn’t ask for God to forgive Israel; he just asked that God not destroy them. But now look at how he prays, verse 9:

O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.

Because Moses now knows that God is free to show mercy and grace, he has the confidence to ask for mercy and grace. Because God is merciful and gracious, that is the only way Israel stands a chance. And the same goes for us. I just wanna be super clear about this.

Pastor David Mathis nailed it last week, and I just want to say it again. The only chance we have to receive mercy from God is because God’s mercy is not dependent upon us. That is good news for sinners. It means that maybe you’re here this morning and you’ve done something terrible and you hate yourself for it — well guess what, God can forgive you.

That God shows mercy on whom he will show mercy means that he will show mercy to you regardless of how badly you’ve messed up. His mercy doesn’t depend on you. Yahweh shows mercy because he is merciful.

And so we ask for it. We turn from our sin and we ask God for mercy. Like Moses does here. But verse 8 comes first. Look back at verse 8.

Praise (verse 8)

Right after Moses has seen the glory of God, after he has heard Yahweh proclaim his name, verse 8:

And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped.

In Chapter 32, Israel as a nation had quickly turned away from God in sin, but here in Chapter 34, Moses, the mediator, quickly turns to God in worship.

Before he asks for anything, before he makes another move, he puts his face on the ground — and the text doesn’t tell us anything he said, just that he worshiped.

This is praise without words. What is there to say? Moses is in awe of the glory of God. Who is a God like this? The prophet Micah will say this later,

Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love. (Micah 7:18)

We have to understand that there was no category for a God who forgives. Moses asked to see God’s glory because he wanted to know him more, but what God said to Moses overcame him. It stopped him in his tracks.

You know, when we gather here on Sundays for worship, we sing together. And it’s good and biblical to sing together as worship. I’m glad we do that. But it also would be good and appropriate if we gathered together and didn’t say a word, but just bowed our heads in awe of the glory of God. What if we just stopped for a minute … what if we just stopped and let the truth of the mercy and grace of God just wash over us?

If before anything else Moses would do that, how much more should we who have seen more than Moses?

Brothers and sisters, remember, of all that Moses has seen here, this is God’s back, but we have the cross of Christ.

See, there are details here that Moses does not know. Remember the question of: how does this work? How can God both forgive the guilty but never clear the guilty? How does God forgive sin but also punish sin?

Well, it’s called substitutionary atonement, and God shows us this in the Book of Leviticus, the very next book, but all of this is pointing to our Lord Jesus Christ when he was slain in the stead of sinners.

Jesus dying on the cross was the most vivid display of the glory of God, because there God didn’t proclaim his heart through words, but he demonstrated his heart through the shedding of his Son’s blood. How much, how deep, is God merciful and gracious?

Bearing shame and scoffing rude In my place condemned He stood Sealed my pardon with His blood Praise be to Yahweh, what a Savior!

Do you want to see the glory of God? Look at the cross of Christ!

And yes, we ask for his mercy, we do! — and we worship him! We praise his name! We rejoice in God’s heart that he has made known to us, front and center, in Jesus.

And I want to invite you now to give him thanks.

The Table That is what this table is about. We come here each week to remember together the death and resurrection of Jesus, and to thank him. And it’s not so much that we say something right now, but it’s that we receive him in awe of who he is. Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love — receive Jesus. If you trust in him this morning, this meal is for you.

His body is the true bread.

His blood is the true drink.

In 1539, about 22 years after the Reformation had begun, a Catholic Cardinal named Sadoleto wrote a letter to Protestant Geneva, trying to convince the city to return to the Catholic Church. John Calvin had been a pastor in Geneva, but was exiled the year before. But Geneva turned to Calvin to write a response to the Cardinal.

In it, Calvin identifies the main issue of the Reformation as this: the glory of God. Calvin says to the Cardinal, “[Your] zeal for heavenly life [is] a zeal which keeps a man entirely devoted to himself, and does not, even by one expression, arouse him to sanctify the name of God.” In other words, Catholic theology is man-centered, and does not honor God as it ought. “It is not very sound theology,” writes Calvin, “to confine a man’s thoughts so much to himself, and not to set before him, as the prime motive of his existence, zeal to illustrate the glory of God.”

350 years later, in 1891, New Testament scholar Geerhardus Vos, identified this “zeal to illustrate the glory of God” as what enabled Reformed theology to grasp the fullness of Scripture unlike any other branch of Christendom. He said, “Reformed theology took hold of the Scriptures in their deepest root idea. . . . This root idea which served as the key to unlock the rich treasuries of the Scriptures was the preeminence of God’s glory in the consideration of all that has been created” (Redemptive History and Biblical Interpretation, 241).

So, this morning, on Reformation Sunday, and on Reformation Day itself, we remember our heritage as Protestants as zeal to illustrate the glory of God, and taking hold of the preeminence of God’s glory. It is a sweet Providence, as we continue our Exodus series, to open together to chapter 33 where Moses prays, “Please show me your glory.”

Ten Words to Golden Calf This fall we have journeyed from Exodus 20 and the giving of the Ten Commandments, to the refracting of the Commandments in the case law of chapters 21–23, and to God formally making a covenant with the people in chapter 24. Then Moses goes up the mountain for forty days and nights (24:18) and there receives God’s plan for the nation’s worship: detailed instructions for a traveling temple, called the tabernacle, and its furniture and utensils, and garments for the priests and their consecration. All that in chapters 25–31.

Then we saw last week the screeching, tragic fall of Exodus 32. Just as God finishes speaking with Moses on the mountain, he informs him that the people “have corrupted themselves” (32:7). “They have turned aside quickly out of the way that [God] commanded them.” In their impatience, and pride, they “have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it” (32:9). Within forty days of making a covenant with God, they have broken it, flagrantly. God says to Moses in 32:9–10, “Behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them.”

Moses implores God not to destroy the people, for the sake of God’s own name and reputation, and in faithfulness to his promises. And God relents. At least for now, he will not wipe out the nation, great as their sin is. Chapter 32 ends with Moses wondering aloud whether atonement might somehow be made, whether God might somehow forgive their sin. That’s the question in the air as we come to chapter 33.

Reformation Truths in Exodus 33 On this Reformation Day, let me draw your attention to three great Reformation truths on which the account of Exodus 33 turns.

TOTAL DEPRAVITY (VV. 1–6) First, the people receive a “disastrous word” about their sin and how it separates them from the holy God — which is not just a word for Israel. Look at verses 3–6:Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey [so God is fulfilling his promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob]; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.”

“When the people heard this disastrous word, they mourned, and no one put on his ornaments. 5 For the Lord had said to Moses, “Say to the people of Israel, ‘You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, that I may know what to do with you.’ ” 6 Therefore the people of Israel stripped themselves of their ornaments, from Mount Horeb onward.”

Stiff-necked. Twice God says here (to the people) what he had said (about them) to Moses in 32:9. Then: “behold, it is a stiff-necked people.” Now: “you are a stiff-necked people.” It isn’t that chapter 32 made them stiff-necked. The great sin of the golden calf didn’t cause their necks to be stiff with pride; it revealed the stiffness of their necks. They were arrogant. They did not submit to God’s law and God’s timing. They were haughty. Stubborn with pride.

Another way to speak about this stiff-necked people, and the condition into which we ourselves were born, is the Reformation term “total depravity.” In our sin, whether at Sinai or in the modern world, we do not have untainted hearts, or untainted minds, with which to see God for who he really is, and sin for what it really is.

Total depravity does not mean we are as depraved as we can be, but that we are depraved in all our faculties. Sin has infected every aspect of our being. We do not have the ability to think or feel or choose or achieve our way out. We are “dead in our sins” (Ephesians 2:1, 5), “darkened in [our] understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in [us], due to [our] hardness of heart” (Ephesians 4:18). We are born totally depraved, as Israel was. Stiff-necked as Israel was.

Verse 4 calls it a “disastrous word.” Because of their sin, God will not “go up” among them to the promised land. He will fulfill his word and send them on, but he will not be among them, lest his holiness consume them. (This is a ray of hope, and Calvin would be pleased, that the people are not content to have the promised land without the presence of God, at least in this humbling moment.)

So Israel’s honeymoon with God is over. Their sin has been exposed; his holiness has been revealed. The nation has been humbled. They remove their ornaments in verse 4: “When the people heard this disastrous word, they mourned, and no one put on his ornaments.” Now they know their sin, and what they deserve; now they will put away triumphalism and pretense, and walk with a limp, from Sinai to Canaan. May God make us today Christians without ornaments.

UNCONDITIONAL ELECTION (VV. 18–23) Moses’s advocacy for the people that began in chapter 32 comes to its culmination in his brief and audacious request in verse 18, and in God’s response in verses 19–23.

By verse 18, Moses is caught in the tension between God’s holiness and the nation’s need for mercy. On the one hand, the people deserve to be consumed. And God, in his holiness, cannot simply be among them, in their sin. Given God’s holiness and the people’s sin, how can Moses confidently “go up” from Sinai to the promised land. Will this not end in disaster? So Moses wants to know more about this God. Who is he? What kind of God is he? Will he forgive? And so he says in verse 18, “Please show me your glory.”

God’s response, then, in verses 19–23 has two parts: a revelation and a limitation. First, the revelation in verse 19. God says,

“I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord’ [Yahweh, as we saw in Exodus 3]. And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”

This is the kind of answer Moses was looking for. When God says, “I will make all my goodness pass before you,” he addresses Moses’s fear about the badness of the people, their depravity, their stiff necks. God does not point to the people’s lack of goodness, but to the reality of his own. He will uphold the covenant with his people, not because of their goodness, but because of his goodness. His choice of Israel to be his people is not based on their deservedness. His election of his people is without their meeting any conditions. That is, unconditional election — true at Sinai, true of the church.

God is utterly free to choose whom he will as recipients of his mercy, with no external constraints. He is not dependent on Israel’s choice. He is not dependent on our goodness. He is free to choose any people, and any persons, he so chooses. You want to know why you can count on his commitment to his people? Not because of their goodness, God says, but because “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”

And this goodness of God on display in his grace and mercy is his glory — his weight, his character, his heart. And this is the answer Moses needed to go forward. This is not on the people. And this is not on Moses. This is on God. He has chosen his people. He will see them through. His goodness and sovereign freedom in choosing whom he will sustains the covenant. And so the Reformation slogan was soli Deo gloria, to God alone be the glory.

So, God’s unconditional election of Israel was a precious word to Moses, and to the people. And it is a precious balm to God’s people today, and especially to the weak in faith, to those who doubt, to those who are honest with themselves about own lack of goodness, who wonder, Can God really show someone like me grace? Can he really have mercy on me? Can he forgive? He knows how bad I am.

If that’s you this morning, I want you to hear your Father reply, without equivocation, and with a smile, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.” I choose you not because you are good, but because I am. Your badness cannot stop my choice. Your evil cannot spoil my freedom when I set my love upon you. I am free to show you mercy, free to show you grace, free to choose you, despite your sin; free to love you, however unworthy you feel.

But God’s not done. There is not only the answer Moses needs, the revelation, but also a limitation. God says “But” in verse 20:

“But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” 21 And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, 22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

Moses will get to glimpse the glory of God, but it will be only a glimpse — not God’s face, but his back. Moses may know more of God, but not all of God. Which Moses will have to be content with for now. But God is not done revealing himself to Moses and to Israel.

As God has shown his glory in redeeming his people from Egypt, he will show his glory in preserving them in the wilderness for forty years, and making the walls of Jericho fall, and bringing his people into the promised land, delivering his people through the time of the judges, and in taking a humble shepherd boy and putting him on the nation’s throne. And God will show his glory as he justly punishes the nation’s idolatry in decline and exile, and when he raises up prophets to proclaim hope beyond exile.

And he will show his glory when he himself enters the world as a humble infant, laid in a manger, and lives in obscurity for thirty years. He will show his glory when he calls and trains disciples and heals the sick and proclaims good news. And climactically he will show his glory on a hill called Calvary outside Jerusalem, where God himself, in the person of his Son, bears the sins of his people — like Moses could not do — and takes upon himself all the destruction we deserved for depravity and stiff necks. And then the glorious God rises again in triumph.

What Moses could not yet see of the glory, we see far more fully in Jesus, especially at the cross. When Moses cried, “Show me your glory,” it’s as if God responds, “Just you wait. For now, Moses, I’ll proclaim my name. I’ll renew the covenant. You’ll see part. And one day, I’ll show you and the world far more of my glory.” And that glory is the gospel that Jesus, who is God himself, died to save idolaters like us. The gospel of Jesus is the culminating revelation of God’s glory.

ALIEN RIGHTEOUSNESS (VV. 7–17) Now, finally, with Jesus already in view, let’s marvel at the Christlike intercession of Moses in verses 7–17 as he leverages his own favor with God for the sake of the people.

Verses 7–11 create a striking tension with verses 1–6 and the “disastrous word” about the people’s stiff necks and depravity. Verses 7–11 present an amazing contrast in God’s favor on Moses. God has said to the people, You are stiff-necked; if I go up among you, I’ll consume you. Yet, the holy God speaks “to Moses face to face,” verse 11, “as a man speaks to his friend.”

You might wonder at this point, didn’t we just see in verse 20 that God said “you cannot see my face,” and in verse 23, “my face shall not be seen”? But here, in verse 11, God speaks “to Moses face to face”? That’s a good question. I think the answer is, as one wise commentator says about verse 23, “The attempt to describe the indescribable strains language to its limit” (Alec Motyer, Exodus, 299). Verse 11 includes “two idioms for direct communication” (Robert Alter, Hebrew Bible). The point is, in verse 11, God’s stunning favor on Moses.

Watch, then in verses 12–17, how Moses leverages his favor with God (he mentions it four times!) to intercede for the people — the people that God has been saying to Moses are “your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt” (32:7; again in 33:1):

When Moses asks in verse 12 about the identity of the angel, he slides in, at the end of verse 13, “Consider too that this nation is your people.”

Then in verse 15, after God has promised to go up with him, Moses moves from “me” to “us”: “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here.”

Then twice in verse 16, he identifies himself with the people: “how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?”

In other words, Moses, knowing he has found favor in God’s sight, seeks to leverage that favor for the sake of the people. And God grants Moses his request. Verse 17: “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.”

And if God would do that for Moses, how much more for his own Beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased?

Jesus’s Favor and Faith Alone “Alien righteousness” is the term Protestants have used to talk about the righteousness with which we are justified, fully accepted, before the holy God.

On our own, we, like the people of Israel, are unrighteous, ungodly stiff-necked, totally depraved. But Jesus Christ is righteous. He is God’s Beloved Son. He has found full favor with God. Christ is our righteousness before God, not our own. So, our righteousness is an alien righteousness, not native to us.

Jesus is not only the better glimpse of divine glory but also, as man, the better Moses who leverages his favor with God for the sake of his stiff-necked people, joined to him by faith alone.

Manuscript forthcoming.

Manuscript forthcoming.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan examines Exodus 28-29 and discusses the garments of the high priest. This foreshadows our New Testament high priest, Jesus! He sacrificed himself for us, and because he is raised from the dead and ascended to the Father, Jesus is in the Most Holy place for us right now, not with our names engraved on his garments, but our names are written in his wounds. Jesus as our High Priest means that in the heavenly sanctuary of God, there is not a moment that passes by where you are not remembered.

In this sermon, Pastor Joe examines the design of the Tabernacle outlined in Exodus chapters 25-27. God gave particular instructions because the design demonstrated the magnitude and gravity of holiness of God. The old covenant was established and the people of God could worship, but there were limitations upon how close they could get to the presence of God. God had given them very specific instructions because the design gives insights into the character and nature of God.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny examines Exodus 24. This is the passage wherein we see the establishment and confirmation of the covenant between God and the nation of Israel, established through the shedding of blood. Throughout this narrative we see that God was willing to go to great lengths to make it possible for his people to approach him and commune with him. God wants us to experience his presence and wants to dwell amongst his people.

In this sermon, Pastor Kevin examines Exodus 23 and highlights the theme and exhortation for us to remember; in the manner that God's people are instructed to do so in the Old Testament. This is very relevant for us today because we live such fast-paced lives and our sanctification so often feels much slower than we want, so it's very helpful for us to slow down to remember that God is not just the God of razzle-dazzle, the incredible miracles and immediate victories, but he's also the God of “little by little” in the day by day.

In this sermon Pastor David Mathis examines a chapter and a half from Exodus, specifically examining portions of the case law, and how those portions shed light on the character or heart of God. Mathis highlights the truth that God wrongs no one when he extends his saving compassion to his people in Christ. He did not compromise cosmic justice to show us mercy. He put his own willing Son forward at the cross, to cover, with his blood, the justice we owed for our sin.

In this sermon, Pastor Joe Rigney examines Exodus 21 and gives us insights into how to approach the "case law" that is included as part of the Old Testament. The case law gives us examples that reveal the morality and will of God, and we can use that to help us navigate various situations in our modern world. This sermon especially highlights the laws related to slavery and helps us understand how Exodus 21 informs our thinking around slavery, both the ancient and modern versions of it. This sermon ends by highlighting verse 21:5 and the slave who says, “I love my master, my wife, and my children. I’m staying here.” In this, we see a picture of our relationship to Christ, our Master in heaven. We love him, and we love the people in his household. And in the passage, the love slave has his ear bored by his master at a doorpost, no doubt leaving his blood there. And as I said, that can’t help but call to mind the Passover, in which the blood of a lamb on the doorpost protected the people from the eye-for-an-eye justice due to them.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley gives us an "Exodus Refresh." He overviews the story of the first nineteen chapters of Exodus and lays the foundation for what we see in Exodus 20 with the giving of the Ten Commandments. In this sermon, we ultimately see that God rescues his people and then gives them the Law as a means of cultivating intimacy with his own chosen people. Ultimately, Jesus pays the price in order to rescue us from the slavery to sin that we were in and then Jesus makes it possible for us to be near to God. Jesus, the one who knew no sin, made the payment for sin, so that we may be reconciled to God, and be in His presence forever. The sins that had separated us, now have been paid for and removed.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny closes our Summer of Psalms series by examining Psalm 44, another Psalm of lament, but this one takes the lament a bit further by not only lamenting but also protesting. The Psalmist raises the question: "If God loves us, why doesn't be stop the tragedies we face? In this sermon we are reminded that there will certainly be times in this life when we feel like God has left us, we feel like we're sheep handed over to be slaughtered. In those moments it's essential that we remember that nothing in this life will ever separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

In this sermon, Pastoral Resident Max Kozak preaches from Psalms 42-43. Max explains the value of laments in the Psalms and how they point us to God—our only hope in times of trouble and insecurity. When we feel alone and in anguish, we can lament, we can cry out to God. He is our hope. And the ultimate hope us demonstrated at the cross, where Jesus Christ took on our sins upon himself and died in our place.

In this sermon Mike Schumann examines Psalm 41 and gives us a great word of encouragement and challenge. We are reminded that today we have sorrow, today we have pain, today we have worry, today we have doubt, and one day our bodies will be laid in the dust. But we will not go down with it, because God will raise us up to dwell in the city that has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light.

In this sermon, Pastor Joshua examines Psalm 40 and reminds us that nothing can stop an "idea whose time has come." Therefore, we ought to seek the Lord and patiently wait for his intervention. God has revealed himself to us, he has shown us his steadfast love and faithfulness, which will always sustain us and preserve us. We can be confident that God will not restrain His mercy from us.

In this sermon Pastor Mike Polley examines Psalm 39 and helps us see David's emotional turmoil as he laments and seeks the mercy of God. We are reminded that, like David, our hearts have illnesses that we do not know of, but Jesus aims to heal them. Jesus is our reconciler. Often, he will not give us to fleeting joys because he loves us too much. Pastor Mike challenges us to trust in Jesus to receive forgiveness from Him.

In this sermon Pastor Ryan kicks-off our third installment of 'Summer of Psalms' at Cities Church. He examines Psalm 38 and helps us see three things: our sin often messes everything up in our lives, that the pain we experience after our sin is often God’s mercy in disguise, and only God’s mercy can save us from God’s wrath.

In this final sermon of the Living Hope series, Pastor Kenny Ortiz examines the last section of 1 Peter 5. He reminds believers that there is a future grace awaiting Christians, so let us guard one another to ensure that no one is devoured by the devil. We must be alert, and sober-minded, and cast our anxieties on God, because he cares for us.

We learn that Christians will win our war against sin and the devil, but not because of our own will but because Jesus prayed for us and because Jesus died for us and because Jesus rose from the dead.

In this sermon, Pastor Joe examines 1 Peter 5:1-5 and, simultaneously, seeks to model for the congregation the exhortation found in the passage. In this passage the apostle Paul gives insights into the role of the elder and exhorts the elders to shepherd the people well. We are reminded that, ultimately, Christ is the chief shepherd, the overseer of our souls. Christ rules his church and governs his church and guards his church. He leads us and he feeds us. The elders are to model Christ for the people and lead them well and exhort them to set their hope fully on the grace that is coming and to rejoice as we share in Christ's sufferings.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell examines 1 Peter 4:12-19. In this passage, the apostle Peter returns again to the topic of suffering, which has been a major theme throughout this book, but here especially, in these verses, Peter dives into this topic with more detail. He gives us here the Christian perspective on suffering, and that’s what we’re going to look at today. This is a sermon on how to suffer as Christian.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis examines 1 Peter 4:7-11 and exhorts us to remember the times in which we live, rely on the strength and grace of that Christ supernaturally supplies, and to remember our calling, that is to fulfill the command to love another because, as Peter reminds us, love covers a multitude of sins. In the post-pandemic world of the next few months and years, there will be moments that seem foreign or awkward that were once normal, and there will be a temptation to just "move on" and seek to just put it all behind us—a temptation to forget what living in a global pandemic was like. Instead, however, we ought to seek to use this next season of life as an opportunity to re-engage relationships in a gospel-centric manner; an opportunity to proactively demonstrate hospitality to one another without grumbling. In this season we will have new opportunities to love tangibly through greeting and inviting each other into our homes.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan clearly asserts that our biggest problem is the fact that our sin separates us from God. Pastor Jonathan examines 1 Peter 3:18-4:6 and clearly shows how Christ is the answer to that massive problem. Jesus is our supreme treasure, and he was the one who solved our sin problem. In his death and resurrection, Jesus fulfilled God's purpose for us, he defeated our enemies, and he proved that suffering does not have the final say.

In this video, Mike Schumann examines 1 Peter 3 and reminds us that we are called to represent Christ in this age, no matter what face. We ought to be prepared to speak of Jesus and proclaim the hope he has promised us.

We may encounter social unease or even harm for the gospel. We're not to be seek ought suffering, we're not to be looking for opposition, looking to pick a fight, for that would not fit with a gentle, respectful tone. But we are called to be prepared to speak, and we will, if we find ourselves to be so captivated by the unique, perfect, holiness of our Savior and the heaven-centric hope that he has promised us.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan examines 1 Peter 3:1-7. This passage covers some essential ideas and doctrine related to marriage that seem controversial in our modern culture, specifically with the Bible's call to women to submit to their husbands, and the Bible's call for men to use their authority in a God-honoring manner. However, we must be willing to be informed and governed by the Scripture, rather than our culture and its norms.

The enemy wants to destroy our souls and our marriages and our churches and our witness. He wants to destroy us by distorting the truth. Our greatest defense against the enemy's tactics is not an interpretation of the Bible that is appetizing to the world, but it's the right understanding of the Bible's teaching and its right application.

In this sermon Pastor Kenny examines 1 Peter 2:11-25 and exhorts us to keep our conduct honorable. The apostle Peter gives us this exhortation and grounds this in our identity in Christ, which Peter has been unpacking throughout the early segments of this letter.

Ultimately, Peter gives us these exhortations: Abstain from the passions of the flesh. Keep your conduct honorable. Be willing to submit. Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor. Herein we are reminded that submission, and the accountability that comes with it, humbles us, and keeps us in check. Submission to authority is good for us, it is an instrument of sanctification in our lives and helps is to keep our conduct honorable.

In this sermon, Pastor Ryan Griffith preaches from 1 Peter 2:1-10 which is a transition passage in this epistle. This sermon is the sixth of fourteen sermons in our series on 1 Peter and this text serves as the key for Peter's Old Testament exposition and his encouragement to the persecuted Christians.

This passage is packed with Old Testament imagery, allusion, and quotation which helps us better understand what Peter is teaching the Christians. His focus is their identity in Christ, his goal is to reorient them on the bigger picture of the gospel and to exhort them to long for the word of God which instructs them in troubled times. Lastly, Pasto Ryan reminds us, via the apostle Peter's words, that in the midst of harassment and opposition, we have much to be encouraged by. We have a new hope, a new family, a new identity.

In this sermon Pastor Jonathan exposits 1 Peter 1:22-25 and exhorts us to love one another. The apostle Peter gives us this exhortation and roots this in both the atoning work of Christ and the prophecy of the Old Testament from the prophet Isaiah.

Here we are reminded that God caused us to be born again—apart from our own ability or choice. We believed the Gospel because God has given us the ability to believe and this is one of the primary reasons why we ought to love one another. This should humble us and inspire us to love others—to love our fellow members of the body of Christ unconditionally just as the Father loved us and foreknew us.

In this sermon Pastor Joe exposits 1 Peter 1:13-21 and helps us to see that the Father pays our debts and ransoms us with something even more precious than earthly material. He pays with the precious blood of Jesus, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. This was the plan all along. Jesus was foreknown, chosen before the foundation of the world for this mission, and he was manifested at the right time for our sake, so that through him we might believe in God.

In this sermon Pastor Jonathan exposits 1 Peter 1:10-12 and helps us see how the Bible is inspired by God and how its message is relevant to our lives. We see that the Old Testament prophets described the living hope in the Messiah and their hope in the resurrected Redeemer, alluding to Jesus, and when they wrote their words they wrote them for us today.

The same Spirit who guided the prophets in their prophecies of Jesus accompanies the preaching of the gospel of Jesus today, which is the primary message of the Bible, which is why this Book makes our hearts burn. This Book, inspired by the Holy Spirit, is written for me, but it is not about me. This Book is all about Jesus, it reveals the Son of God, and it ushers us into intimacy with him.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley exposits 1 Peter 1:3-9. He reminds us that God has caused us to be born again and has given us a living hope!

When we come to faith in Jesus, we do not merely conform to a set of facts about Jesus, but we believe in him, and trust him... we entrust our lives to him. This births joy in us and inspires us to honor God in our suffering. And when we face trials, our hearts will shout: “Blessed be God, who according to His Grace Mercy has caused me to be born again!”

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny kicks off our sermon series on 1 Peter. This letter is written to Christians facing suffering. This sermon looks at the introduction of this letter. In the brief introduction Peter refers to Christians as "elect exiles" because we, as Christians, are not living in our homeland, which is heaven. We are sojourners in this world, strangers in this land, just passing through.

In addition, Peter gives us three key prepositional phrases to describe these exiles: according to the foreknowledge of God, in the sanctification in the Spirit, and for the obedience to Christ and sprinkling with his blood. The Father foreknows, the Spirit sanctifies, and the Son cleanses through his blood. We can be confident in these realities. Therefore, whenever you are suffering in this life, remember that the members of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Spirit, they are all cooperating to sustain us.

In this sermon, Pastor Joe Rigney examines John 11, highlighting the key elements and themes seen in the narrative about Jesus bringing Lazarus back from the dead. Jesus waited to arrive—if he had arrived in their town sooner, he would have been able to heal Lazarus before death. But Jesus waited. Why? Because he loved Lazarus.

We clearly see that Jesus loved Martha and Mary and Lazarus, and because he loved them, he waited to arrive in their town. Jesus knew there was great purpose and value in the waiting—even if it didn't make sense to Mary and Martha. Jesus also loves us, contemporary believers. We know that he loves us, and because that is true, he may wait to bring the healing we long for too. He may take us through unimaginable suffering and loss and pain in this life. And when he does, he will weep with us. He will receive our questions and our confusion and our tears and our cries of, “Where were you?” He’ll take them and he’ll join us in your indignation at death and sin. And someday, because he loves us, he will raise the dead.

This sermon is the sixth and final installment of our ROOTED series. Pastor Jonathan examines passages from the book of Colossians, exhorting our church to be rooted in the faith, to embrace the vision of our congregation, and to commit to investing in the future ministry of our church. Christ has rescued us, therefore we commit to sharing the good news with others—the good news that Jesus saves sinners!

In addition, Pastor Jonathan reminds us that thanksgiving is our response to any gift that comes from outside of us. We say thank you because we recognize that this is not from me, it’s for me—and I don’t deserve it. Thank you! And if we’re abounding in thanksgiving, it means that at every angle of the Christian life, in every direction we look in Christ, it’s only thanks, and it’s thanks that overflows. This sermons ends with a unique moment where many members of Cities Church made financial pledges toward the ROOTED initiative.

In this sermon, part five of our ROOTED series, Pastor Jonathan examines 2 Corinthians 9 highlighting the Apostle Paul's exhortation for them to be generous. Pastor Jonathan gives clear biblical principles around giving and generosity, helping us clearly see what "God-centered" generosity looks like.

The God who made everything and who needs nothing, this God, our heavenly Father, he loves cheerful givers because he himself is the cheerfullest of all givers, and he gives according to his ability. God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.

Our giving is only because of his giving, because of his surpassing grace upon us — which produces thanksgiving to him.

In this sermon, part four of our ROOTED series, Pastor Jonathan looks at Matthew 6 and asks the question, "Could it be that anxiety is the real cause of greed?" Pastor Jonathan Parnell examines the teaching of Jesus in Matthew 6:25–34 and its connection to money in the previous passage (vv. 19–24). The reason we don’t give more to God is because we are anxious it will make us miserable. The remedy? To remember that God is our heavenly Father and he cares for us.

In this sermon, part three of our ROOTED series, Pastor David Mathis gives us a clear vision for our calling to serve the Twin Cities. He exhorts our congregation to not fear the Cities, but instead be committed to loving the Cities. He preaches from Jeremiah 29:4–14 and highlights several lessons we can learn from the Jewish people being dragged off to Babylon as exiles more than 2,600 years ago. If God’s people could build there, in Babylon–if they could put down roots there–then why could we not we do so today?

Pastor David exhorts us to remember afresh our calling as a city church, and now to put down our roots as a church. In a rootless time, in a restless city, we’re putting down roots. Our call is to be a gospel presence in these Cities. Let’s multiply, not decrease. Let's not wait and see. Let’s put down roots now, together, as a church. Let’s be the best citizens of the Twin Cities, who love this place, and its people, all the more, when it’s hard. Being Rooted in the Cities is a significant part of our transition from having been a church planted to becoming a church rooted.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan preaches from Ephesians 3 as the second part of our ROOTED sermons series.

In 2014 Cities Church was commissioned out as a new church plant from Bethlehem Baptist Church. Now, in our seventh year, our pastors believe that this is the time—both consciously and practically—that we transition from having been a church planted to becoming a church rooted. One of the most important elements of a church that is rooted is being rooted in love for one another.

The cosmic centrality of Jesus is expressed in the radical reality of the church, and that expression is seen and felt and known, when we love one another. Love one another.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan, opens the "ROOTED" sermon series and explains the importance of this sermon series in the life of our church.

In 2014 Cities Church was commissioned out as a new church plant from Bethlehem Baptist Church. Now, in our seventh year, our pastors believe that this is the time—both consciously and practically—that we transition from having been a church planted to becoming a church rooted.

The foundation for this, and for all we do as a church, is the reality of Jesus. We believe that Jesus is real and he saves sinners! He is worthy of our worship and our adoration.

In this life we have no certainties other than Jesus is real and he saves sinners, that's it. As much as we want to control the script, we ultimately have no guarantees, which is why it is essential that we be rooted in Christ--personally and corporately. God does not owe us anything, but he promises that he will give himself to us. Being rooted in that reality is essential to the Christian life—and essential for our congregation in this next season. We love Jesus and we root our lives in him because he is worthy.

In this sermon, Pastor Kevin examines the final letter from Jesus in the book of Revelation, the letter to the Laodiceans. This letter contains the harshest rebuke of any of the seven letters.

Jesus makes clear that the Christians in this region (that see themselves as rich and privileged) are, in actuality, poor and wretch. The symptom is lukewarmness, a variation of Christianity that, quite frankly, is repulsive to Jesus. The cause of this problem is a lack of true love for Jesus, fueled by a lack of communion with Jesus. The cure is personal communion time with Jesus.

In this message, Pastor Kevin exhorts us to consider what our time with Jesus has been like? Ask yourself, "Have I spent time seeking Him, seeking to know him deeper?" If no, know that Jesus gracious invites you to return to him, and in so doing, because Christ is our Great Physician, the dangers of the disease of lukewarmness fade away as our souls burn brightly in the presence of our King.

In this sermon, Pastor Kenny examines the sixth letter from Jesus in the book of Revelation. In this letter Jesus praises the church of Philadelphia for their faithfulness and Jesus makes several promises to them. He promises to open the door of the family of God, and no one can shut the door. Jesus promises to protect the believers, to vindicate the believers, and strengthen the believers. Jesus reminds us that when we feel like we don’t measure up, we can remind ourselves that we are the ones that he loves! Jesus loves us, and he demonstrated that love at the cross. This sermon closes with an illustration from the movie "Toy Story" that illustrates the truth that Jesus owns us and he promises to write his own name upon us.

In this sermon, Pastor Ryan examines the church at Sardis in Revelation 3. The church was once vibrant and faithful and missional, and developed a strong reputation. However, Jesus sends a message to the church to warn them that they are dead, even though they have a reputation of being "alive."

The church at Sardis still had some faithful people, but the church largely had lost its faithfulness and fidelity to the gospel. Jesus tells them that if they do not wake up, he will come to them like a "thief in the night." This is a cautionary tale for us, and with it comes an exhortation for all believers to remain faithful to Christ.

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis examines Jesus' message to the church at Thyatira. Jesus praises elements of the church and rebukes their tolerance of sin. In this letter to the church, Christ makes clear that he is patient toward them. But his patience toward them is not indefinitely. He will, in time, exact fitting justice, and Christ's justice is never gratuitous and never overdone. Christ's letter to the church culminates with Christ himself reminding them that he is the greatest possible thing that he could promise to his church. Jesus will give us himself. We will see him face to face. We will be his, and he will be ours. Our final reward is to be with our Lord.

In this sermon, Mike Schumann examines Jesus' message to the church at Pergamum. Jesus rebukes the church, telling them that their trajectory as a church is similar to that of the Israelites in the Old Testament that were enticed by Balak and held to the teaching of Balaam. The Israelites could not be cursed, but they could be enticed to sin by eating foods sacrificed to idols and by committing sexual immorality. Likewise, Christians must be aware of these same temptations that exist in our contemporary context. This is a story that plays itself out over and over again throughout human history. Jesus exhorts that church at Pergamum to be wise and to avoid falling into this same pitfall—and this exhortation applies to us today.

In this sermon, Pastor Mike Polley examines Jesus' message to the church in Smyrna and gives us application for our modern church context. Jesus message to us: Be faithful, even unto death.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan introduces the Book of Revelation and kicks off our series on the seven letters to the seven churches. As we examine these letters, we learn that it matters to Jesus a great deal what happens in the local church. He takes an interest; he leans in; and he watches and tracks and keeps up with what’s going on, and he has thoughts about local churches.

In this standalone sermon, Pastor Nick Aufenkamp expounds upon Hebrews 13:12-16, exhorting us to live in light of the second coming of Christ. Jesus has come, and he will come again—that truth inspires us no matter what we face. It is essential for us, as believers, to remember that eternity future shall be glorious for us, because of what Jesus has accomplished on our behalf. For the Christian, the best is yet to come.

This sermon is Pastor Nick's final sermon as a pastor of Cities Church (his family intends to relocate to the Pacific Northwest in spring 2021 to potentially pursue church planting or other ministry opportunities).

In this video, Pastor Jonathan expounds upon Titus 3:8-15, examining the value of good works. If, when you hear the words “good works” the first thing you think is: I’m not saved by them! You’re exactly right. You are not saved by them. You are saved by Jesus alone, on the basis of his grace alone, through faith alone — it is the gift of God, not a results of works. And, your salvation, which is not the result of good works, does result in good works. Because you’ve been created in Christ Jesus to walk in them — Ephesians 2:10. “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). Cities Church, we are called and equipped to abound in good works!

In this video, Pastor Josh Foster expounds upon Titus 3:1-7, examining the exhortations the Apostle Paul gives Titus in light of the grace we, as Christians, have experienced. Paul charges Titus to behave righteously as a response to the grace we have been shown.

In this video, Pastor Joe expounds upon Titus 2:11-15 and the Apostle Paul's charge for Titus to exhort the churches to behave and live in light of Biblical grace. Our conduct is based on what God has done, in history in the past—his gracious acts toward us. Jesus gave himself for us. And it is anticipating what God will do in the future when the glory of Jesus appeared. So that now, in the present age, you stand on God’s past work with confidence and you lean into God’s future work with expectation, and therefore in the present you renounce ungodliness, you live a sober-minded, self-controlled, upright life, zealous for good works. And all of this fits. This joyful, self-controlled, upright, godly life adorns and fits and accords with the doctrine of this great salvation.

In this video, Pastor Jonathan expounds upon Titus 1:5–16 and the Apostle Paul's charge for Titus to plant churches in his region. We learn that there are many great reasons to plant churches. It glorifies God and it is the best evangelism strategy. Church planting is biblical — and the clearest biblical reason to plant churches is for the sake of gospel purity.

In this video, Pastor Jonathan expounds upon Titus 1:5–16 and the Apostle Paul's charge for Titus to plant churches in his region. We learn that there are many great reasons to plant churches. It glorifies God and it is the best evangelism strategy. Church planting is biblical — and the clearest biblical reason to plant churches is for the sake of gospel purity.

In this video, Pastor David expounds upon Titus 1:1–4 and gives us insights into the catalytic hope we have in Christ. God himself in human flesh, the founder and perfecter of our faith, did the single greatest good of all time? What propelled him, against the greatest possible obstacles, to go to the cross? It was hope. Faith looking to the future and seeing the reward. Not wishful thinking about the future. The eyes of faith looking to the future and realizing, and tasting, that this outcome is as good as the promises of God. This hope is as solid as God’s promises. And so Jesus, “for the joy that was set before him endured the cross” (Hebrews 12:2). Faith fed hope. Hope produced godliness.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan expounds upon 2 Timothy 4:9–22 and reminds us of the "realness" of Jesus. We see that the Apostle Paul often relied on people, because we as humans need other people, but ultimately Paul knew that Jesus was enough for his. The Lord stood by him and strengthen him. We need people. And Jesus is enough. We make every effort to surround ourselves with people who will help us, but when nobody comes, when we're all alone, we must remember that Jesus is all we really need.

In this video, Pastor David Mathis expounds upon 2 Timothy 4:1–8. He points to the urgent reality that what people need most from preachers are the simple truths we see in the Scriptures. People don't need pithy statements, jokes, stories, or social commentary; what they really need to know is what God has to say. Christ's opinion is supreme because he is the judge. This is good news for Paul and Timothy, and us, but terrifying for those who wander away. Christ is coming back, with all authority and sovereign power, and when he does, he will right every wrong. Justice in this age, as much as we work for it, and pray for it, will not be perfect and complete in this life. But one day true justice will be done, finally and fully, once and for all, when the judge returns — and he will get the glory as the final judge. And Jesus will reward his people who have endured. Not just for Paul. He says, "and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing."

In this sermon, Kenneth Ortiz expounds upon 2 Timothy 3:10–17 showing how the Apostle Paul exhorts Timothy to rely on the sacred writings as the means of grace and strength in the face of persecution and suffering. God gives us the Bible, so that we can know him, so that we can be equipped in this life, and so that we can have intimacy with him. The very existence of the Bible shouts to us the kindness of our God. We as Christians ought to be fiercely committed to being people of the book!

In this sermon, Pastor Joe Rigney expounds upon 2 Timothy 3:1–9 showing how the "servant of the Lord" points to the ultimate servant–Christ Jesus himself! Christ was not quarrelsome, but he did fight. He was kind to all, even his opponents. He exposed the hearts of men, he taught well, he stood for righteousness, all while patient with all, even those who opposed him. He was the man of sorrows, acquainted with grief for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell expounds upon 2 Timothy 2:14–19 and reminds us of the simple, yet profound truth, that Jesus Christ is the son of God, took all of our sins and guilt and shame, and the punishment we deserved, and he raised from the dead for us. And because of him and his work, the church is going to make it through, no matter what we face. Christians will make it through and be sanctified to be like him. We will endure!

In this sermon, Pastor Joshua Foster examines 2 Timothy 2:8-13, pointing us to the most important questions any person could ever ask: 1) Who is Jesus?; 2) What has he done? Jesus is more than just a good teacher, he is the Son of God, who was incarnated and lived among us, descended from King David, the one who had been prophesied for centuries. He also died and rose from the dead, and because this is true is solidifies our communion to him. If we trust in Christ, he will remain committed to us and will never leave us, even in our moments of doubt or folly. However, if any person denies Christ, refusing to believe and trust, then that person remains condemned in their sins. Christ is always faithful to do what he promises—he is who he claimed to be, and he triumphantly accomplished what the Word claims he accomplished.

In this sermon, Pastor Jonathan Parnell examines 2 Timothy 2:1–7 and introduces us to the exhortations and wisdom from the apostle Paul to pastors. The church needs pastors who will stick with Paul's teaching, and think the same way he thought. We need pastors who know that one day they will look at Jesus, and Jesus will look at them — and that moment is going to make all the hardship worth it, and the only way we’re going to make it now is to remember the promise of that moment — we have to remember Jesus Christ, the real person, risen from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in Paul’s gospel. It’s not easy, but it’s worth it. Pastors, stick with Paul — because Paul points us to Jesus.

In this sermon, Pastor Joe Rigney examines the first chapter of 2 Timothy showing the Apostle Paul's care and concern for this spiritual son, Timothy. Paul encourages Timothy and gives him instructions and warnings on how to navigate the difficult situations Timothy is facing in pastoral ministry. Paul's final encouragement to Timothy is to rely on God's power to guard and keep Timothy. Paul states, with confidence, "I know him, and because I know him, I am convinced that he will guard what has been entrusted to me, which includes you, and so, because I know him, I can entrust you to him and call you to fan into flame the gift of God and to follow the example you have in me."

In this sermon, Pastor David Mathis introduces our 2 Timothy series, "Final Words From a Spiritual Father." In this message we are exhorted to remember that this age will end; Jesus Christ is coming back, which is spectacularly good news to his people, and an untold horror to his enemies. He is coming as “the righteous judge” who will “judge the living and the dead.” He will bring full and appropriate and uncompromising justice on those who have rejected him and turned away from him. And he will bring rescue and reward, not just for Paul, but for “all who have loved his appearing.”

This is the twenty-fifth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell highlights the truths in Psalm 37 that clearly describe the differences between the "righteous" and the "wicked" ones. The righteous are those who trust in Christ; the wicked are those that live as if there is no God and choose not to trust in the Lord.

This is the twenty-fourth video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Joe Rigney highlights the truths in Psalm 36 and compares it with the Apostle Paul's exhortation in Ephesians for the "sleeper" to awaken and take refuge in Christ.

This is the twenty-third teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell highlights the truths in Psalm 35 that point to the supremacy of Christ and exhort us to trust him. The first and most important thing we can do is to put our faith in Jesus. If we do trust in Jesus, then the best thing to do is to praise him and rest in the truth that God will rescue us. In view of our final salvation, because we know God will save his own, we tell of his righteousness and we praise him all the day long!

This is the twenty-second video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor David Mathis highlights the apostle Peter's use of Psalm 34 and its encouraging words to Christians facing afflictions. Pastor David asserts that God is not so magnified in our words, and our lives, when we simply report the truth, but is truly magnified when we rejoice in him—when we are glad in him. He is honored and he looks good when we celebrate him and his goodness to us. He is honored and magnified when we take refuge in him—and especially when we taste and see he is good in the midst of many afflictions.

In Psalm 33 we see the exhortation for us to sing praise to God with joy and to exalt his character. Pastor Jonathan highlights the command to sing in this Psalm. It commands us to sing praise to God and then for the rest of the Psalm we see why we ought to want to sing praise to God. This text is meditating on God and his work. This is who he is and what he does, and when that truth is put before our minds and hearts, it compels us to praise him. We’ve been compelled. That’s my hope for us this morning.

This is the twenty-first video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Kenny Ortiz highlights the exhortation from Psalm 33 for us to sing to God with joy because of the great attributes we see in God. Psalm 33 commands us to worship God with music and singing, and then it gives us all the reasons why we ought to want to worship God in this way.

This is the twentieth video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Mike Polley highlights the amazing blessing and gift of forgiveness of sin. God became a man to reconcile us—sinful human beings—back unto God, to make a way for our sins to be forgiven. It is an amazing blessing to be counted among those that are forgiven through the work of the cross.

This is the nineteenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell helps us see how Psalm 31 points us to the glory and supremacy of Jesus Christ.

This is the eighteenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor David Mathis helps us see how Psalm 30 points us to a greater joy that comes in the midst—and beyond—the mournful moments of this life, ultimately pointing to the glory and supremacy of Jesus Christ.

This is the seventeenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell brilliantly points to the glory of Jesus Christ and the blessings reserved for those individuals who are in Christ. Pastor Jonathan uses the words of Psalm 29 to challenge us to ascribe to Christ the praise he is rightly due.

This is the sixteenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Mike Polley shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 28—which is one of the most hopeful Psalms from David.

This is the fifteenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 27.

This is the fourteenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, church planting resident Brett Toney shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 26.

This is the thirteenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Joe Rigney shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 25. From this passage we see that God is the one who takes our shame, making it possible for us to be separated from our sin, and be reconciled back unto God.

This is the twelfth video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 24.

This is the eleventh teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Jonathan Parnell shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 23.

Recent events have reminded us of our own mortality. Death is a real thing, and it’s going to happen to you, and to me. Unless Jesus comes back first, we’re all going to die, and do you ever think about that? Do you ever think about those last moments of your life?

Whether or not you want to hear Psalm 23, we all need the truth of Psalm 23—because Psalm 23 is about Jesus, and he’s the one we want to see. He’s the one who has made the way. Jesus has trod the Psalm 23-journey before us.

This is the tenth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching, Pastor Joe Rigney shows us the glory of Jesus Christ from Psalm 22, reminding us that from generation to generation, we will declare that the Lord has done it. Or to be more specific, we will declare, that it is finished. That’s the message of Psalm 22: From divine absence to divine action. From desperate cry to triumphant praise. From the Lord has forsaken to the Lord has done it.

This is the ninth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series (designed for Household Worship). In this teaching Pastor Jonathan unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 21—showing how this Psalm highlights the majesty and royalty of Jesus. He is the Universal, Eternal King.

This is the eighth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series (designed for Household Worship). In this teaching Pastor David Mathis unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 20—showing how this Psalm highlights the character and nature of God.

Our God is not just the God of persons but the God of a people, a special people, a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a people for his own possession, called the church. The church is not a building. We are not a Sunday morning event. We are not a team of pastors. We are a people. And we are not alone as God’s people in our city and in this world and in history.

This is the seventh teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching Pastor Kevin Kleiman unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 19.

This is the sixth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching Pastor Jonathan Parnell unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 18.

The only reason any of us are Christians is because Jesus reigns — it’s because Psalm 18 is true of Jesus. He is resurrected and exalted. Jesus is raised! Jesus does triumph! So let us give God praise!

This is the fifth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching Pastor Josh Foster unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 17.

This is the fourth teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship for Easter Sunday morning. In this teaching Pastor Jonathan Parnell unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 16, making clear that this Psalm points us to Jesus. It is the joy of God for us to know Jesus because he is the resurrected king that will reign forever.

This is the third teaching in our spring 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this teaching Pastor Joe Rigney unpacks the valuable truth we find in Psalm 15: Only the one who is blameless can enter into God's presence. Pastor Joe reminds us that Jesus is the one who is blameless—he is our forerunner—and because we are in Christ, our failures do not keep us away from God's presence.

This is the second video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this video teaching Pastor David Mathis unpacks the truth and wisdom we find in Psalm 14.

This is the first video teaching in our 2020 Psalms series, designed for Household Worship. In this video teaching Pastor Jonathan unpacks the wisdom and encouragement we find in Psalm 13.

The tenth and final commandment says, "You shall not covet"—which is actually in a different category than all the other commandments. And what makes this commandment different is not that it’s talking about different things—it’s talking about the same things we’ve already seen—but the tenth commandment talks about them in a different way. And this difference completely reconfigures the way we think about sin and obedience. The tenth commandment clarifies the level of obedience God demands in all his commandments. He does not merely seek our behavior, He wants your heart.

When we examine the ninth commandment, we often summarize it as “do not lie." But upon further examination we find that the commandment is slightly more wordy than that, and perhaps has more subtle nuances than a simple summary. Ultimately, the ninth commandment goes much further, exhorting believers to embrace the aspiration of telling to truth in “full color.” That’s our dream, to speak truth in color, not gray. We are not seeking to blur the lines of honesty, but proactively tell the maximum amount of truth. We renounce disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or deception. We refuse to tamper with or twist God’s word. We feel the freedom and joy in this: “by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of our God.” May God make it so in our church.

The eighth commandment is a straightforward commandment that condemns theft, but it does more than that. It exhorts us to understand property ownership, be good stewards, and—most importantly—give cheerfully because God has cheerfully given so much to us.

Marriage is a comprehensive, exclusive, lifelong union of a man and a woman, created by God for our good and for the expansion of the kingdom of God on Earth. We guard marriage, not because it is inherently fragile, but because it is precious. Marriage is harnessing powerful desires that are capable of tearing human society apart. These desires are so potent that we bind them with covenants and oaths before Almighty God, and seek to channel them in fruitful directions that build families, households, societies, and civilizations. Marriage is the foundation and seedbed of society.

The sixth commandment might even be the most popular of all the commandments. When it comes to the Hebrew word translated “murder” in verse 13 there’s actually not an exact correlation in English. In fact, in the old King James Version, the Hebrew word is translated “kill” — “Thou shalt not kill” — that’s how I first learned this commandment, but for us in English, we usually think differently about the words “kill” and “murder.” And I’m going to try to explain how we do this: Kill is a broader category, and murder is a narrower one. We use “kill” and “murder” to mean different thing — “kill” is broad, “murder” is narrow — and when it comes to the Hebrew word in verse 13, it’s sort of in between those. The Hebrew word means something narrower than our word “kill” but broader than our word “murder.” For a definition, basically, the Hebrew word for “murder” refers to the ending of life that is unlawful or forbidden, whether it is intentional or accidental.

Honoring father and mother, as we’ll see, is much bigger than childhood obedience. That’s just the beginning. It’s not less than that. But it is more.

This is our fifth message on the Ten Commandments, and today we move from the so-called “first table” (the first four, which are expressly Godward) to the “second table” (the last six, which are more horizontal, toward fellow humans).

Of the last six commandments, there is something appropriate about “honor your father and your mother” being the hinge from the first table to the second. Dad and Mom are very much like God to young children. It’s Dad and Mom that they know first, and learn to honor first, and in doing so, they are learning to honor God.

So, here’s the plan for this morning: Let’s walk the path from the cradle to the grave, more or less, as we consider what it means to honor father and mother, not just in childhood but throughout life, and how it extends into all areas of life. As with the first four commandments (and as we’ll see with the remaining five), there’s more to it than first meets the eye, and how the ripple effects go out into all of life.

So this morning in Exodus 20 we’re looking at the fourth commandment to “Remember the Sabbath” and I want to say right from the start that this commandment is not confusing — it’s as easy to read as the other nine commandments, however, when it comes to actual practice, this commandment is the most controversial. There is debate here not so much on the commandment itself, but on how we apply it, and when we apply it, and in what ways it’s different for us as Christians than it was for Israel.

The fourth commandment is a different commandment from the others because, two reasons: 1) Its application has changed in redemptive history; and 2) in the Gospels we see how the Pharisees abused the Sabbath — and we’re going to look at both of these — but my macro goal for this sermon is simply to show you that the fourth commandment counts. It matters! And we should not ignore it. So here’s the plan. I would like for us to look at two things: 'What is the Sabbath?' and 'How do we remember it?'

The Lord is jealous for our affections. He is uniquely worthy of our love. Our attitudes and deeds ought to reflect the truth that Yahweh is supreme. For this reason we are commanded: Do not take the Lord’s name in vain.

Only worship Yahweh. That's the first commandment. The second commandment: “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them.” In summary, the first commandment is to only worship Yahweh, and the second commandment is to only worship Yahweh in the way of Yahweh.

The first commandment is about the who of worship; the second commandment is about the how of worship. Only worship Yahweh in the way of Yahweh. And it’s that simple.

Today we continue our series through the book of Exodus, but with a little twist. The story thus far has led us to Mount Sinai, where the presence of God descends in fire and smoke, thunder and lightning and a trumpet blast in order to make a covenant with his newly delivered people. The rest of Exodus is devoted to the terms of that covenant—the laws and statutes that were to govern Israel’s life as God’s holy nation and royal priesthood (as well as some narrative sections detailing how the people respond). In fact, Israel will be in and around Sinai for the rest of Exodus, Leviticus, and halfway through Numbers, learning from Yahweh what he expects of them as his people.

We ought to read the Ten Commandments as the instructions of a loving Father to his firstborn son. These commandments show what God’s character is like—what he cares about and values, how he loves and what he prioritizes. And they do so, in order that God’s son—his people—will come to resemble and reflect him, to share his priorities and values, to join him in his loves and hates. In reflecting on the Ten Commandments, we’re seeking to understand the heart and character of our Father as he instructs us in how to live for our good and his glory.

One author writes: "I have often said that the sole cause of man's unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room." The writer writes this sentence as a lament to the busyness that surrounds him. Everyone is hurried, preoccupied, and distracted. We fill their lives with stuff, and then give the rest of their time in pursuit of the ability to acquire more stuff. Most of our energy is given to the attainment of things we do not yet have rather than the enjoyment of things we already have — and it’s an epidemic — and it is a spiritual problem. One writer has said "hurry is a form of violence to the soul." Because we cannot crowd our lives without crowding our hearts. Which means, if we’re honest, the space in our hearts is as jam-packed as the inn of Luke 2:7. We’ve got no room for a king.

"Yahweh is the Author. He is the Creator. He is the author of the story, and we are his characters. He is everywhere and everywhen. He hears and knows everything. He sees, he hears, he remembers his covenant, and he acts in faithfulness."

What God intended first for a person (Adam), and then a people (Israel), has now been realized in a Person (Jesus) and a people (the church). The church is the people of Jesus. We are men and women brought into fellowship with God by God through faith. We are created new in Jesus. We are forgiven by the cross of Jesus and filled with the Spirit of Jesus, to walk in the way of Jesus.

The story of the Exodus is a paradigm by which Christians can understand our own salvation. Through the first seventeen chapters of Exodus, Yahweh consistently and convincingly delivers his people with miraculous, supernatural power. But as we come to Exodus 18, we something much more ordinary. In chapter 18, we see how normal, everyday relationships are transformed by the good news of what God has done. As we review Exodus 18, we see Moses and Jethro’s interactions, and we learn from two very different people, and we see practically, how our lives should look differently after experiencing the saving grace of God. We are reminded to tell the whole story of God’s rescue, take a risk and offer good advice, and to happily receive feedback in humility.

The Old Testament teaches us that people sin and we deserve God’s judgment, but God still gives grace. Humans are rebellious. God has every right to be done with, but he chooses to show grace. Some have shook their fists at God. Others have just ignored him. Either way, our rebellion demonstrates our spiritual thirst. And God proactively sought us and provided the means to quench our spiritual thirst.

In Exodus 17 the Jewish people drank from a rock that was struck. This was a foreshadowing of the true rock, Jesus. He was struck so that we might drink from him. We’re all dying of spiritual thirst, until we drink from the Rock that was struck. Jesus is the Rock. Jesus was struck so that we might drink.

The manna in the book of Exodus is all about the self-giving grace of God. In Exodus 16 God's provision of manna demonstrates God's mercy and desire to provide for his own people. The greatest provision he has given is Jesus. In fact, Exodus 16 is actually all about Jesus. Jesus is God's way when there is no way. And Jesus is always enough.

When we examine the Exodus, Yahweh rescuing his covenant people from slavery, we see a single event where the God of heaven revealed much about himself. In that single event God revealed more about himself, and more clearly and memorably, than he had revealed about himself at any other event up to that point in human history. In fact, the Exodus, and more specifically the Israelites crossing the Red Sea, demonstrated more about God than any event in human history, ever, except for Calvary.

At Calvary the cross of Christ became the new single greatest and most God-revealing event in the history of the world. In the person and life of the Son of God, God reveals himself in a profound way, and at the cross both the mercy and fury of Yahweh are demonstrated.

This sermon is more of a theological summary message. A key theme in the Exodus is God’s relationship to Pharaoh’s heart. And this raises questions for us about God’s sovereignty and human responsibility.

The good news from Exodus is that God rules and reigns over and in this hardening. He is sovereign over our hearts. Our hearts are streams of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns them wherever he will. He can break into our efforts to strengthen our resistance and deaden our hearts. He can humble us and turn us around, not against our will, but by transforming our hearts so we have a new will. And then, he can strengthen our hearts for faith and obedience.

In Exodus 13 we see God instituting rituals for his people. The reasons for these rituals are clear. God is reminding his people: 1) Worship is the primary he rescues us; 2) Freedom means saying no to sin; 3) Your future will cost you everything. Rituals have the potential to greatly remind us of these truths, and to usher us into greater intimacy with Yahweh.

When God made a distinction in the earlier plagues, he just did it. God's people didn’t have to do anything. But here, with the tenth plague, they must do something, or else God won't make a distinction. This difference is important.

In Exodus 7, we begin to see God orchestrating the plagues on Egypt. Pharaoh has refused to obey Yahweh's commands to release the Hebrews. But, as we examine the plagues, it’s important to keep in mind that the plagues will not convince Pharaoh to release the people of Israel. God is clear about that in Exodus 7.

So the purpose of the plagues is not persuasion, it’s revelation. Pharaoh is not going to listen, but he is going to see. He's going to understand what it means that Yahweh is Yahweh. That is the purpose of the plagues, and, like we saw a couple weeks ago, that purpose statement gets repeated over and over again in these chapters. All of this, Yahweh says, is so that they may know I am Yahweh.

After several decades of living in the desert, God calls Moses back to Egypt, at age 80, to be the deliverer of God's people. Moses tells Pharaoh to let God's people go. Of course, Pharaoh refuses. Moses seems to have accomplished nothing and his confidence is greatly shaken.

However, in Exodus 6, we see that Moses’ discouragement and his lack of confidence doesn’t keep God from using him. Moses is dejected, but he will still be the one who delivers the Hebrews from slavery.

God calls Moses to his most important, most intimidating work—speaking face to face with Pharaoh—when Moses manifestly doesn’t feel ready for it or worthy of it. But God reassures Moses, then commands Moses to continue the task. And God handles us similarly in our dejection and discouragement. There’s a time to answer questions and address objections. But eventually it is time to "do the next thing." Eventually it’s time to obey God’s instructions and trust that God will do what he has promised to do.

In Exodus 5, Moses confronts Pharaoh. Moses tells Pharaoh that Yahweh wants him to release the Hebrews from slavery. Pharaoh, of course, refuses, citing the fact that he does not know Yahweh. This will begin the chain of events that leads to Yahweh doing two amazing things: 1) Freeing his own people from slavery, and 2) Making himself known to Pharaoh.

The reason why God wants his people to be free is simple: God desires to feasts with his people. This was true in Exodus, and it is still true today. Yahweh is the Holy One who celebrates with us. He invites us into his joy. What does he celebrate? His own victory and majesty.

God is Supreme over all, and that is worthy of feasting and celebration. God invites us to feasts with him as the means of celebrating his sovereignty and supremacy. For that reason Jesus came to Earth and died for us, to make a way for us to celebrate with Yahweh for all eternity.

At age forty, Moses left Egypt. He spent the next forty years living in Midian. At age 80, he encountered God, and that led him back to Egypt, to be the eventual deliverer of God's people. Exodus 4 tells us the story of how Moses begins his trek back to the land where he was born.

However, this passage is also filled with unique and strange elements. Passages like Exodus 4 provoke lots of questions. Quite frankly, it is a strange passage of Scripture. But this passage also highlights that God is faithful, he has supernatural powers over nature, and he is mighty to save.

God is sovereign and free. He does what he wants. We cannot twist his arm. This is the picture of God we see in Exodus 3. Yahweh, the Creator, the Holy One, is absolutely sovereign over everything, and he is the one who saves by grace.

Many of us feel ordinary, or even subpar. However, God uses ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things. God accomplishes his will through people who feel ordinary and subpar. God accomplishes these feats by first developing his own people, molding us and sanctifying us through desert experiences. We see this play out in the life of Moses in a beautiful and glorious manner. Before Moses could be a deliverer and a protector, he first needed to be delivered and protected. What we see in Moses' life highlights the sovereignty and faithfulness of God.

Throughout the pages of Scripture, we see God's continual faithfulness to his own covenant people. This seems to standout to us when the circumstances are dire. In Exodus 1, the sons of Israel are not living in the land God had promised, and they face the threat of genocide in Egypt. They were not where God promised they'd be, but God is sovereign, and he always keeps his promises. We have no need to fret, even as there are wars being waged all around us. God is stronger than all other leaders and he is always faithful.

Lies, flattery, and double-speak are rampant all around us. It seems like we face malevolent deceit, manipulative flattery, and two-faced deception at every turn. This was just as true in ancient days as it is today. In Psalm 12 we see the Psalmist lament this reality. But in this Psalm we also see the believer's hope: God is the one who sovereignty protects us from the deceit of our world. God is our deliverer!

It often seems like anxiety is the air we breathe today. Whether you consider yourself an anxious person or not, you cannot deny that fear and anxiety pervade our cultural landscape. And anxiety has a wide range of intensity. At every turn, it seems like darkness and despair are everywhere. However, Psalm 11 models for us a faith-filled response and reminds us that God is our refuge. It may seem to some as if the Gospel has lost its potency, but that is simply not true. Christ is our rock. God is always our refuge.

If God is really present then how can the wicked live like he’s not and live so well? If God is really present then how can the wicked persist in their wickedness with no consequences?

Those are the kinds of questions that try to mess with us. And to add insult to injury, or to deepen the disconnect, in Psalm 10 the psalmist shows us how the wicked actually think. There are four quotations in this psalm of what the wicked think and say to themselves — and we don’t find this anywhere else in the Bible. This is profound.

God’s righteousness means that he rules his creation with impartiality, he punishes the wicked with wrath, he keeps his promises, and he rescues the oppressed. All of these things are right. But they are not the heart of God’s righteousness. They are what God’s righteousness does, but they are not what righteousness is.

In other words, when we’re talking about God’s righteousness and justice, there is something deeper than ruling creation impartially, and judging the wicked, and rescuing the oppressed, and keeping his promises. And we can get at this deeper thing by asking, “How does God know what is right?” Does he have a book that tells him? When he’s deciding on a course of action, does he pull a volume off his shelf and consult it?

Because David was righteous. David did the right thing. So for this Benjaminite to accuse David of wronging Saul, for him to say that David was unethical, or that David had sinned against Saul — it’s just not true. David has walked with integrity.

Which is not the same as self-righteousness. Only the righteousness of Jesus makes us acceptable to God; it’s our integrity that makes us usable for God; and every bit of it is grace. Grace is the rock bottom, which means there’s never any room for pride.

David is not being prideful in Psalm 7, he’s just saying: God, you know! You hear the words of Cush the Benjaminite, and you know I have walked in the integrity of my heart. So, God, you have to judge this thing.

That’s David’s appeal. And it’s all focusing in on verse 9. This is David’s hope.

David’s pain and confusion here is great. His words are no exaggeration. If anything, I suspect, they’re understatement. And in such a whirlwind, God doesn’t tell him, and us, to just grit our teeth, put on smile, and sing a happy song. God says tell me all your sorrows, even when we may be partially at fault. He sees and knows our disorientation, and doesn’t sweep it under the rug, but acknowledges it with the most common type of psalm in his inspired songbook. And he calls us to more than just rehearsing our pain. He wants us to move beyond the disorientation that prompted our lament.

This is the kind of praying that has a clear starting point. There’s this moment when you acknowledge that right now in prayer I’m doing something distinct from what I was just doing two minutes ago. I’m not merely thinking thoughts. I’m not just continuing on in a stream of consciousness, but right now, in this moment I am praying to God. Which means, right now, I am speaking to God and I believe that God is able to hear me.

To summarize, the original context that produced the psalm is not clear. The people that David addresses at various times is not clear. It’s not clear when the shifts happen in the psalm. And even some of the exhortations are ambiguous (“Be angry and don’t sin”). However, despite that ambiguity, there is a much that is clear. David pleads with God for relief from his distress. David knows that God has chosen him for himself and will hear his prayer. David exhorts others to offer right sacrifices to God and to trust in the Lord no matter what. And David knows that when God’s face shines on him, he has more joy than any earthly joy, and therefore he can sleep well.

Now this psalm is a psalm for sinners, for the weak and weary and ignorant like David. But the story behind it has some remarkable anticipations of another story. David faces foes and opposition from his family, his friends, and from the people of Israel, just as a thousand years later, the True Son of David faces opposition from his family (who think he’s out of his mind), from his friends (who fall away in his hour of need) and from crowds of people who cry out “Crucify him!”

If you are here this morning and you are fed up with God and with the conditions of his rule, hear this urgent warning. Be instructed and become wise. The serpent would like for you to believe that true life exists outside of God’s kind designs. But it is a lie. Instead of being a servant to God, Satan would have you become a slave to yourself. That is a miserable exchange—and its end is dissatisfaction, disappointment, and destruction. Instead, you must heed the commands of vv 10-11. “Be wise” “Be warned” “Serve the Lord.” The Messiah’s enthronement and his universal rule is good news, if you will have it—because he has come to deliver you, once and for all, from your sin. There is nothing you need to do except to run to him.

At the level of structure, Psalm 1 and Psalm 2 actually go together, and they are meant to be an introduction to the entire Book of Psalms. When it comes to Psalm 1 and 2, notice that unlike most psalms, neither of these have a superscript. There’s not a header to these that say anything about the author or the context about the time when they were written. These two psalms are just there, both of them together, and they are tied together by the bookends of Psalm 1:1 and Psalm 2:12. Psalm 1 begins: “Blessed is the man...” and then Psalm 2 ends: “Blessed are all...”

So, at the level of structure, these two psalms go together, and they are the lens through which we’re supposed to understand the whole Book of Psalms. And so now what exactly is that lens?

We all in Christ have been “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10) — and if you have wealth in this present age then one of those good works prepared beforehand for you is generosity. A good work for those who have money is to do good with that money — and again this applies to all of us. We, as Christians, especially as Christians in America with money, we want to be cheerful givers. We are called to be generous people.

This is the mechanics of faith. It means we embrace the things hoped for. We have a deep conviction about things presently unseen (see Hebrews 11:1) — but that one day will be seen. And although they are not seen now, they are no less real, and so we grip them. We take our future reality and we bring it to bear on the here and now. We seize the assurance of our eternal life and we apply it to our present life.

For this sermon I want to move in four directions. First I want us to go into the Scriptures and make a few observations about what’s there. Then I want us to go inward and identify a discomfort that we feel about what’s there. Then I want us to go backward to the past to attempt to resolve that discomfort. And then I want to close with some exhortations for us as a church going forward. Into the text, into our hearts, into the past, and forward to the future.

This morning we come to a solemn text and a weighty topic. As Christians, we welcome all, and affirm none, because all of us are sinners. Including leaders. Including Christian leaders. And sometimes gravely so. Power often corrupts, or at least magnifies the corruption of sin already in us. It is tragic on Capitol Hill and in Hollywood, and even more tragic in the church.

We all have heard far too many stories about Christian leaders abusing power and failing egregiously — especially when not held accountable by a plurality of other leaders. And we’ve heard of leaders covering up the sins of other leaders, both in the Roman Catholic Church, and in Protestant denominations. This is a great evil. And it is expressly what Paul stands against here in this text.

Women have influence in the local church — that’s why the apostle Paul wrote this chapter. If women did not have influence — if women did not matter — then Paul would not be addressing them. But because women do have an important influence in the church, the issue has to do with how they use that influence. The issue is whether women will use their influence for good works or not.

That is the option put before every woman of every church throughout every moment of history. Will they be women worthy of true widowhood, or will they not? Will they be godly women or not?

On the principle level, for our context, we can use this passage as a guideline for helping others. First, we can look to help those who are in need. But we can also look at the practical guidelines that Paul gives Timothy on how to help those in need in the church family. Even with some of these possible guidelines from Paul that we just went over, at the end of the day let's be a church family that is ready to help those among us in need.

Who has your attention? Who has your devotion? What are you giving your attention to? You are devoted to something. Someone has your attention. What’s on your screen? Who’s in your ear? Who gets your attention? My plea with you this morning is that Jesus is worthy of your ear. Christian teaching, God’s truth, the word of God, culminating in Jesus himself, is worthy of your attention. He will not disappoint, both in this life and in the life to come.

Wasn’t the whole life of Jesus a sowing in tears?

And isn’t that the way of God? Jesus is God become man to show us the way, and the way is hard. The way is a cross. And how did he do it? Hebrews 12, verse 2 says that Jesus “for the joy that was set before him endured the cross.” How? How did Jesus hope for joy in the way of the cross?

It’s because in God’s way, he knew God’s work. Jesus sowed his tears in hope because he knew what the psalmist knew in Psalm 126, and it’s that we have a God who can send rain. We have a God who makes rivers in the desert. We have a God who gives life to the dead.

And so the whole life of Jesus then was sowing. Last Sunday he rode into Jerusalem, sowing. He was conspired against on Wednesday, sowing. He was betrayed on Thursday, sowing. He as crucified on Friday, sowing. And then he was dead. Then it was over. He was finished. His body was wrapped. The tomb was sealed. All his tears had been sown.

But Sunday morning came the reaping. Sunday morning came the shouts of joy.

“He is not here,” the angel said. “For he has risen.”

Remember Paul intends for the whole church at Ephesus to read this letter. Although it’s addressed to Timothy, he is giving instructions for everybody, and so he uses a phrase with wide application. Every Christian is a servant of Jesus, and every Christian should want to be a good servant of Jesus. Which means, this is not just a section in the letter when Timothy leans in, but this when everybody in the church leans in. For all of us who follow Jesus, verse 6 gets our attention.

There are all kinds of things that we fear in life. There are all kinds of things that we consider to be challenging. We all have adversity. “In this world you will have tribulation,” Jesus says in John 16:33. But I need to tell you that your greatest enemy in this life — your greatest enemy is lies. And lies come from Satan.

At the outset today, I want you to think about BELIEF and BEHAVIOR. Paul says here that how one ought to behave in the household of God (the church), is connected to what we confess (believe to be true). We’ll think about this as we walk through four truths that we learn about the church in this passage.

The Church is a family.
The Church is alive.
The Church holds a secret.
The Church advances and protects.

The structuring and ordering of God’s household, the church, is based on a wise and prudent application of God’s design in creation, as expressed and clarified by the word of God, and is designed to both protect and advance the gospel of Jesus, to the glory of God.

And one thing I really appreciate about this summary statement is that it’s pointed toward our goal. Our hope, our goal, what we’re trying to do here, is to protect and advance the gospel of Jesus, to the glory of God. We don’t want to keep looking at our feet and counting our steps, we want to dance. We want a beautifully choreographed, Jesus-exalting dance.

In the narrower sense, some have thought that deacons only do practical ministry in the church—caring for the poor, caring for widows, and managing finances. This is usually based on the pattern for deacons established in Acts 6, where the apostles appoint seven men to address a practical issue in the distribution of food to widows, so that they can maintain their focus on preaching the word (Acts 6:1-6). However, at Cities we think that there’s no reason to restrict diaconal tasks to meeting practical needs, since even in the book of Acts, some of the deacons (like Stephen and Philip) have fruitful ministries involving the word. This appointment of the proto-deacons establishes a pattern that we lean on in considering the structuring of our church. And the reason for requiring skillfulness in teaching for elders and not deacons is that while all elders should be able to teach, not all deacons must.

Pastors are called to oversee and care for the flock of God by 1) teaching the word of God with divine authority, 2) zealously guarding the doctrine and worship of the church, and 3) organizing and mobilizing the church for mission, (equipping the saints for the work of ministry; Ephesians 4). That’s the noble task.

Ladies, Christ, through Paul, is not telling you to just blend in. He’s saying give your attention to blessing others in need, not drawing attention to yourself. In the words of Matthew 5:16, “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”

"Moses couldn’t take upon himself the sin of the people, he was only a man. He could not be the ransom that can forgive sin and redeem humanity. And yet on the cross, Jesus was treated as the one who sinned against God the Father, and he paid the debt that we could never pay.

The Author of life chose death so that we can live."

"Local churches are part of society. They help make up what a society is. And this doesn’t mean that Jesus is over one and not over the other. Jesus is over everything. Jesus has all authority in heaven and on earth, which means, Jesus is sovereign over society — it’s just that the church is the only part of society that recognizes that … right now."

"But what is the wind? What is it that keeps the boat moving towards its destination? It is the faithful teaching of the word of God, which the Holy Spirit uses to move us towards Jesus. So what shipwrecks the boat? When the wrong wind fills the sails. When we are 'Carried along by every wind of doctrine'."

"All that Jesus has done for us in his coming and living and dying and coming back to life is so that we might live, and say what Paul does here in verse 17: “To the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.” God gets all the glory.

Jesus saves sinners, even the worst of sinners, and God gets all the glory. "

"Glory is the beauty of God’s perfections, or the visible display of God’s infinite value and worth. “God made us for his glory” means he designed us to show his greatness in the world. And what is God doing in all of history in this visible, tangible world? Showing us his glory. And what is the height of his glory? Ephesians 1:6 says it’s “the glory of his grace.” Jesus and his rescue, called the gospel, is where God’s glory shines its brightest."

"This is why sound doctrine is so important. Again, you can’t really love God and people any other way. When it comes to people, you can’t really love people unless you point them to the true God.

That is what sound doctrine is for. Its goal is love. "

"I want to step back and think about three distinct but interlocking sources of authority that I want you to keep in mind as we work through the book. They are nature, Scripture, and culture."

If we hear that vile whisper in our ear “God will not keep you, he will forsake you, he will withhold from you in 2019.” We will be kept by Jesus, as we read John 17:26, “I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

Yes, we will be kept by Jesus in 2019 as we immerse ourselves in his Word.

God’s mercy is from the deepest place within him. That’s what it means. It means that God’s mercy is as true and sincere as it possibly could be. There’s nothing held back. This is ultra mercy. This is mercy extreme in its compassion, and it’s so surprising and unexpected that we really can’t wrap our heads around it.

Moms, you have the most important calling in all the world. And one of Satan’s best strategies in our world today is trying to get you think otherwise. (And that is in no way to say dads are dispensable.) We’re not sure what happened, but at some point in Jesus’s teens or twenties, Joseph disappeared off the scene. Yet Mary is there at the cross. God raised his Son, at some point, without a human father, but not without mama.

Whether you were Jewish or Roman, rich or poor, strong or weak, religious or irreligious, John preached to everyone, and he was really nobody’s man, and that’s what made him strange. But he was strange in all the ways we should expect. And Luke gives us the best explanation for this.

There are two threads that run through the text. Here is how we are going to talk about these threads. Let’s talk about them as two vantage points of Genesis 49-50, one from the ground and one from the air.

Jacob knows that the land of the Canaan is his home. That is the land that God promised his family. That’s where Abraham and Isaac are buried, and that’s where Jacob wants to be buried — because he knows that eventually his family is going to be back in that land.

God has put two Judahs before us this morning — the old Judah of chapter 38 whose words cannot be trusted, and whose morality is compromised, and who wields his authority to hurt others. And God gives us the new Judah of chapter 44 whose puts himself at risk to protect others, and whose word is as good as gold, and who stands ready to sacrifice himself for the good of others.

Joseph is putting on display being the wise man from Proverbs 5-7. And according to the Proverbs, typically when a wise person does wise things, good things happen to them, and that is true. That is the message of Proverbs. But there is also the message of Ecclesiastes which says that bad things can happen to good people.

Why Interrupt the heroism of Joseph for these wretched events? Because Judah is set in contrast to Joseph. Joseph is everything that Judah is not. the actions of Judah in this passage provide a stark contrast to Joseph’s heroism. There is another, bigger, reason.

There is another, more important reason. But I want to wait until the end of the story to tell you.

Just like we’ve already seen so many times in Genesis already, brothers are against one another. It goes back to Cain and Abel, and then of course there’s Isaac and Ishmael, and then there’s Jacob and Esau, and then in Chapter 37 we’re supposed to see right away that once again the whole brothers thing is not working out.

For Israel’s life as a nation, Edom served as a kind of control, or point of comparison, to show the electing love of God. Jacob and Esau were twins. God gave Edom a land, not in the promised land, but a neighboring territory to the southeast, and he preserved the nation for centuries. Edom shows what Israel might have been apart from God’s covenant.

I think there are at least two important things we learn in Chapter 34. One is an important allusion we see elsewhere in the Bible, and then the other is the main theme of this particular story.

This is the chief challenge for us. When we’re wrestling and struggling in a cursed world, our struggles feel more real to us than God. Laban’s tricks are more real to us than God. Esau’s fury is more real to us than God. Barrenness and infertility is more real to us than God. When Rachel cries out to Jacob, “Give me children or I die!” she is showing that Jacob is more real to her than God. When Jacob responds to her in anger, “Am I in the place of God?” He is acting as though Rachel is more real to him than God. Wrestling with God means that he becomes most real to us.

The promises of God to us are promises that he keeps in our details. God is at work in the tiniest things you do, whether that means picking up glass or setting up sticks. So brothers and sisters, take heart and keep on with the tiny things.

There’s more to say, and two more sons, to Leah’s story. But let’s ask about the connection to us: Have you felt hated? Have you been overlooked by someone who mattered to you? Have you been painfully under-appreciated? Take comfort in this: God loves to choose the overlooked. He loves to love the hated, to comfort the neglected. He loves to take special notice of those who don’t get noticed. Verse 31: “The Lord saw Leah was hated.” And what did he do? Pile on? Join in the hatred? No, it draws out his heart to help. He is gracious and merciful. This is our God.

This whole thing really is a mess; it seems chaotic and fragile — but then here in verse 3 we get this little sneak peak into God’s plan. We see that there’s a single thread of continuity that reaches back to the very beginning. In the middle of all this confusion, simultaneous to the conflict and inconvenience, God is actually working to fulfill his purpose for humanity through Jacob.

In other words, Isaac has come around. He now freely and gladly offers to Jacob the blessing of Abraham, as God had promised. The repetition of the blessing, and the explicit reference to Abraham, is meant to tell us that Isaac has realized his error and repented.

And this is why it’s never a throwaway word. Glory is always talking about something real and something vivid. God’s glory is the showcase of his heart, and historically he has shown us his glory in more vivid ways than others.

That’s the promise of what’s called the New Covenant. God is going to give his people a new heart with a new power. Because we cannot truly love without that power.

But that’s just not the way the Bible puts it. In the Bible, the love of God for his children is a particular kind of love. It is love that we are given as a gift, not love that we are entitled to.

But God has made it so that we never have to think this way. God has shown his love for us. He has made it plain. He has spelled it out. God has demonstrated his love for you. How? Jesus died for you.

God’s love is demonstrated.

Christianity’s hope isn’t that we’ll simply go to heaven when we die. It’s not that that’s a wrong statement but it’s just incomplete. The resurrection gives us hope in all those stories that Jesus has told about God’s kingdom, all of those prophecies of old in the scriptures proclaiming that there will be a time when all things will be made right, that there will be a world where there is no death, and where there are no tears.

In these moments on the cross, Jesus is drinking that cup. He’s draining it to the bottom. 2 Corinthians 5:21 says that “For our sake [God] made him to be sin,” and in Galatians 3:13 “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.” So Jesus is being treated by God as Sin itself, as a very Curse to be wiped out. And it is for our sake.

Here is why this matters to you. This is the most faithful human being who ever lived. Beloved son of a happy father. And he’s coming to God, believing. “All things are possible for you.” And he is praying a big, bold prayer to a sovereign God. “If it’s possible, let the hour pass. Remove this cup from me.” And God doesn’t take the cup away. He doesn’t let the hour pass. The man came to Jesus and said, “If you will, you can make me clean.” And Jesus said, “I will.” And then Jesus came to his Father and said, “If you will, let it pass.” And his Father said, “I won’t.”

In the longest section of teaching in the Gospel of Mark — Mark 13 — Jesus’s central command, which he repeats six times, is to wake up. So what does that mean and why? The goal today is to answer that question.

And so that’s the tension we see over the next couple chapters. The Jewish leaders want to arrest Jesus, but they have to conspire and maneuver how to do that — and later in Chapter 14 they figure it out, but here in Chapter 12 is the place where we learn why these Jewish leaders hate Jesus so much. Why do these Jewish leaders want to destroy Jesus?

That’s what all of this thick symbolism is designed to say. From riding on the colt, to cursing the false fig tree, to turning over the tables, Jesus is attempting to remind God’s people what the temple was for. It’s not for show. The size was fine. What provoked him was the substitution of hustle and bustle, of all kinds of economic/spiritual activity for the real purpose of the temple, which was to gather people to pray, to worship, to obey the living God.

Jesus is addressing a problem here, and it’s not a problem with just James and John, it’s a problem in all of the disciples. And it’s not just a problem with their motives in this isolated event, it’s a problem with their understanding of greatness in general. The problem is that the disciples think the way the world thinks, which is not the way God thinks.

When Jesus says, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God,” he’s not just talking about his Father in heaven making it possible, but himself. That’s why he says, “Follow me.” He is good, because he is God. All things are possible with Jesus.

When it comes to the topic of divorce, the Pharisees refer back to a permission in Mosaic law, but Jesus refers back even before that to the intention of God in creation. Jesus goes back to Genesis, and he quotes from Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24.

Jesus doesn’t want his disciples to announce his kingdom until they get it, until they understand the upside-down nature of the kingdom. So, for example, Peter confesses that Jesus is the Christ. Jesus then says, “Good. You’ve got that I’m the Messiah. Now let me tell you what kind of Messiah I am. Let me enlarge your understanding of Messianic identity.” And so he begins to teach them about his coming betrayal and death and resurrection. He says it “plainly,” clearly, with no mystery. And then Peter’s Confession leads to Peter’s Confusion.

And here in Mark 9, Jesus, who had the appearance of average-looking First Century Jewish man, suddenly changed into something else. His clothes became radiant and intensely white — and this was not your mother’s bleach. Mark says that. This was an other-worldly, intense, shining kind of white. And because we have an imagination, we can kind of get the idea. This would have been stunning to see.

Shame is a painful emotion we feel in the presence of others for not living up to their expectations. And the intentional effort to bring shame on someone in public is nothing new to the twenty-first century.

So here are three basic facts about reality. You are here and now. God—your Maker—is here and now. And this God, the living God, is pursuing you. These three facts yield a fourth—every moment of every day, we are confronted with a Choice— either embrace and welcome this reality, surrendering ourselves to the eternal, omnipresent, and pursuing God, or we can vainly try to hide from him, to resist his advances, to reject his demands.

We can hardly overstate what is happening here, because for the first time in the Gospel of Mark, someone understands a parable from Jesus. And it wasn’t the Jewish leaders of the day, it wasn’t the men skilled in understanding the Hebrew Scriptures, and it wasn’t even the disciples who had been living with Jesus; instead, it was this Syrophonecian woman with a demon-possessed daughter who lived out way by the coast in the land of pagans. This woman, in every category, would have been the exact opposite of the Pharisees! — and the most important thing that is different about her is that she has faith. That is her connection to Jesus.

It’s okay for this to feel surprising. How quick might we be today to say, “C’mon, Jesus, focus on the family.” Well, a time will come to woo his brothers and to make provision for his mother’s care as he hangs on the cross, but now is a time to graciously, firmly resist his own family’s worldly desires for him. God’s call on him can’t be held back by their ability to understand him at this stage.

Paul wants for the Colossians, and for you and me, to be mature in Christ, and that means not centering our lives on anything else.

It’s a sin to invent sins. Put another way, it’s a sin to establish your own righteousness. This is why Pharisaism is popular in every generation, and comes in every size, shape, and color. There is great power in being the cultural gatekeeper. If you establish your own tradition, and you fulfill your tradition, and you can convince others to follow your tradition, you’ve got a lot of power, especially if you can convince them that your tradition is from God, that your commandments are the doctrines of God.

Because of the cross and resurrection of Jesus, because of Easter, we have hope. That’s what we celebrate today. And Paul’s point here is to strengthen our hope by telling us that it can never be taken away.

This is one of the greatest events in the earthly ministry of Jesus. It’s actually the only miracle that’s told in all four Gospels. And I want us to look at it this morning at a couple levels. First, there is just the reality of what happened; so I want us to just walk through how this story unfolds. But then, second, there is something that Mark wants us to know about Jesus here, and that’s main point we’re going to see.

What can we learn from John’s witness here? First, we can be encouraged and perhaps convicted by John’s faithfulness and courage. He was faithful to preach the word that God had given him to Israel. Because of that, God gave him a promotion; he got an audience with the king.

In Jairus’s heart for his daughter, and Jesus’s heart for these women, we catch a glimpse of God’s father-daughter love for his people, alongside the other distinct aspects of his love. He looks on us with the compassion, affection, and protection that a daddy has for “my little daughter.” It is so good, for women and men alike, to know ourselves loved by God like a father loves his daughter, and better.

So that’s our story today. A bad guy, stripped of the evil oppressing him, becomes a good guy by the word of the one true hero. But that’s not all. Let’s not miss the secret here. How does Jesus forgive this man so easily? How does he forgive us? Because, let’s not forget, we are all like that man. Without Jesus, we are alone. We are dirty. We are addicted to and controlled by our natural desires, feeling shackled and unable to change. We hurt other people, and ourselves. We live in the land of death, without hope. And yet, Jesus can forgive us and transform us just like he did that man. But how?

And I can’t help but think about how much we do this same thing. We’re just like these Galilean fishermen in 30AD — because a lot of times when things get hard for us, when the storm sets in, we can come to Jesus saying, “Hey, Jesus, I’m doing my part here. I’m working hard here with my bucket. Can you pitch in a little effort?

In other words, there are some who trust in Jesus not because they find Jesus glorious and wonderful in himself, but they trust in Jesus because they think Jesus gets them other things they find glorious and wonderful. They are using Jesus for other things, and therefore, when those other things disappear, they don’t need Jesus anymore, and so they fall away.

First, remember the pattern in these stories. A question from the scribes and Pharisees (and in one case, from the people): “Why does he speak like that? Why does he eat with them? Why don’t his disciples fast? Why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” And Jesus answers these questions with his own question or a pithy proverb or both. “Which is easier to say? Sick people need doctors. Do the guests fast when the bridegroom is with them? Do you remember the time that David, out of need, did what was unlawful?” Each of those encounters builds to 3:1-6.

So the paralytic man gets to Jesus. And let’s be clear: he comes, expecting healing. He can’t walk. They brought him there because they want him to walk and they’ve seen and heard of Jesus’s authority. They believe he can heal. And then, Jesus surprises them. He overturns expectations. He doesn’t immediately heal the man, like he’d done dozens of times before. Instead, he forgives the man’s sins. This is a surprise. This is unexpected. And at this point, the camera zooms in on the faces of a group of men who have been listening to Jesus preach.

The church is a home for sick people — that’s why you’re here — I want you to know: it’s okay not to be okay. And I want that to be true about us. This is really a culture thing. I want this to be in the air of Cities Church. And this is where our language really matters.

For most of the rest of Mark’s gospel, Jesus will never be alone again. He will always be traveling and ministering with his disciples, showing them how to fish for men. And thanks to Mark, just like them, we’ll have a front-row seat to see how Jesus fulfills God’s promises, overturns everyone’s expectations, and shows us the surprising character of God’s kingdom.

The gospel, by its nature, is an announcement that intrudes whatever it is we already had going on. That’s the way it happened back in the first century, and that’s the way it still happens today. Here we are going on with our lives, doing our own thing, and then all of sudden we are confronted with the gospel of Jesus, the Son of God, and we can’t ignore him because he’s right here! See, Mark’s Gospel is like “Jesus in your face.”

The race that we are running is infinitely more important than The Olympics. It doesn’t merely have repercussions on this side of eternity, but forever. It echoes into eternity. It’s a race that if you do not finish, you do not live. It is infinitely more valuable, more important.

When the magi came to Jerusalem asking, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews?” little did they know that they were asking for the very title that will be written above his head as he hung on the cross dying for sins not his own: “the king of the Jews”

Overall, God is telling Isaac to stay put in the land of Canaan. He’s telling him not to leave. God told Abraham back in Genesis 12:1 to leave his homeland for Canaan, and here in Chapter 26 God is telling Isaac to stay in Canaan, “in the land of which I shall tell you.”

The Bible is a story of glory to glory. And it is the glory of the first to prepare and give way to the second. This is not identical glory. There is a glory in being first, in being the older. But that glory serves and strengthens and then relinquishes to the glory of the second, the last, the younger. And we catch glimpses in the Bible. We see Jonathan, Saul’s son, gladly give way to David, God’s anointed king. We see Elijah give way to his disciple Elisha, who has a double-portion of his spirit. We see John the Baptist, the older cousin, decrease when the Younger, who is truly Greater, arrives. And we must have our imaginations shaped by this pattern.

And a key lesson to learn in this chapter is that God’s providence doesn’t typically bring about his will despite his people — though that is the case sometimes — but God’s usual pattern is furthering his purposes in history through his people and their faithful engagement (mind, heart, will, actions) in the world he made.

The highest point in Abraham’s story came last week in Chapter 22, when God tested Abraham in the sacrifice of Isaac. That was the climax of Abraham’s story, and now the narrative of Genesis is going to begin focusing on Isaac.

Because of Genesis 22, I think many of us treat Abraham with some hesitation. We know that we ought to admire him. He’s Father Abraham, the man of faith. And yet, because of this story, we don’t want to get too close. We don’t want to be too like Abraham. We shrink back, lest God call us to do the unthinkable.

This is the scene that happens: Abraham throws a party for Isaac after he was weaned. So he’s a young boy here, probably a toddler. And during this party, while everyone is having a good time, Sarah looks out and she sees that Ishmael, who is a teenager, is “laughing.” That’s all the text says.

There’s no two ways about it. This is a puzzling and troubling passage of Scripture. Four thousand years removed from Abraham’s time, we struggle to understand what’s going on in these three passages. It’s clearly significant. God records three different occasions where one of the patriarch’s pulls this stunt. We skipped the event in Genesis 12, and we haven’t gotten to Genesis 26. The aim of this sermon is to address them all together.

The real essence of the Reformation wasn’t the doctrine of justification — vital as it was, and is. The real essence of the Reformation was access to, and personal encounter with, God himself through his word. The Reformers took the Catholic Church’s closed book and opened it first for themselves — to read and preach and write and sing — and then for all to hear.

Abraham prayed in Chapter 18 that God not destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because of the small number of righteous people who lived there. This is presumably Lot and his family (if we connect the dots), but the story makes a lesser deal about their righteousness and a bigger deal about Abraham’s intercession. We’re supposed to see Chapter 19 as an answer to Abraham’s prayer.

A prophet, however, is more than a servant and more than a ruler. The prophet is the friend of God. Yahweh has a Divine Council, made up of angels (like the two with him here in Genesis 18). A prophet is one who has been admitted into the Divine Council. Like Joseph in Pharaoh’s court, or Daniel in the court of Nebuchadnezzar, the prophet is the advisor and councilor to the King of kings.

This is a strange sign. The bloody cutting of part of the body is the sign of God’s covenant? Why? What does it mean? In order to answer that, we need to understand the rest of Genesis 17. There is still more newness and detail. In the second half of the chapter, we discover something else about the promise of Abraham’s offspring. Not only did God not forget Hagar, he didn’t forget Sarah either.

God never gave a schedule to Abram for when he was going to fulfill his promise, but apparently for Sarai ten years was the schedule she had given God — and since she still didn’t have a child according to the schedule she had given God, she concluded that God had prevented her from bearing children.

In other words, Abram’s faith in God and his refusal to seize the promise before the time, his trust in God’s goodness and wisdom and his patience in waiting for God to bring his promises to pass in his own time—these demonstrate that Abram’s ultimate hope was not in any earthly homeland. Abram doesn’t ultimately want an earthly country.

In other words, God says to Abram, I am your payday. Which means Abram didn’t need the stuff from the king of Sodom because the promises are God were enough.

So living by faith in God’s specific promises makes us open handed, rather than self-asserting. It frees us from trying to seize what we want on our own, and frees us to submit to God and his good timing.

This is something that shows up over and over again. We know that God calls his people out. Every time God calls us to himself, he is calling us to leave something else.

There’s a lot to say about these two, but for our purposes today, I want to highlight the simple claim that grace (or super-nature) glorifies nature. Grace brings nature to its highest and proper perfection. And I want to demonstrate this by focusing on the three elements in today’s worship service—child dedication, baptism, and the Lord’s Supper. Let’s begin by highlighting the natural features of each of these acts.

When it comes to this joy in God that we want restored, we should ask, restored for what? What’s the point? Because there is a point. There is a purpose, and it’s two-fold. First, our joy is about the glory of God. And then second, our joy is about the good of others.

Which means that right now, God is not dwelling at Minnehaha Academy. Last Sunday morning God was dwelling at the Riverview Theater, and then at Hiawatha School Park, and right now God is dwelling here, in this room, where his people, filled by his Spirit, are gathered in his name. And when we leave here, he goes with us. Because now, God’s presence isn’t a holy place that his people must go to, but his presence is in his people who go everywhere.

But what’s amazing about what we mean when we say “heart” or “soul” or “gut” is that we’re talking about a fact that humans have known since the very beginning of humanity. The idea of the “heart” — the idea that humans have this unseen causer in them, this inner self, this energy at the center of who they are — this is an ancient idea that goes back thousands and thousands of years ago, and you see it all over the place in the Bible.

Jesus is the true vine. Which means, he is the truer and better Israel — so in all the places where Israel wavered, Jesus will hold fast; in all the places where Israel sinned, Jesus will overcome; in all the places where Israel forsook God over and over again, Jesus will trust God all the way to the very end.

Jesus is not one lamp among many. He is the singular source of the light of the glory that illumines the world to come. He is the way, the truth, and the life. To believe in the true God is to believe also in Jesus (verse 1). He is in the Father and the Father is in him (verse 11). Jesus is the only way because he and God the Father are one.

Jesus is the resurrection in that, if we believe in him, he will resurrect our physical bodies from the grave at the end of time. And Jesus is the life in that, if we believe in him, he gives us spiritual life now so that we will never spiritually die.

But, the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, has power.

Jesus has power that no one else has. He says, "I choose when I lay down my life, and when I am ready, I will pick it back up again. I have the power to choose when I die and when I will come back to life, because I am LORD over life and death."

Where every other religion tells you what you must do now in order to make it to heaven, Christianity tells you what you have now, because of Jesus, and that you will have it forever.

In other words, “Don’t stumble over the sign. I’m the real bread. I don’t just want to fill your belly for a few hours. I want to give you eternal life. I want you to come to me and eat the bread of life. I want you to eat living bread, to feast on me, and be truly satisfied forever.”

At the broadest, most basic level, prayer is when we humans talk to God (which is not complicated). When we speak or communicate to God, we’re praying. That’s the basic definition. But what James does here is show us that we’re all coming from somewhere, and therefore we’re all praying from somewhere, which means that prayer isn’t just talking to God, but it’s talking to God from within our earthbound realities.

And when we say “until he comes,” we mean his coming is near. We are living in the last days. The Judge is standing at the door. The Lord of heaven’s armies “is near, at the very gates” (Matthew 24:33). As we eat this bread together and drink this cup together, we say, “God, make us the kind of people who live in light of the nearness of your Son’s return. Strengthen our hearts and make us patient in suffering. Keep us from complaining against each other. And Father, cause us to go deeper with you, as we taste more of your compassion and mercy toward us.

James says, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit…’” This way of talking is problematic for James, but it is not ultimately the problem. This way of talking is more like a symptom of the real problem. He explains the real problem further down in verse 16. James calls this kind of talk about tomorrow boasting and he says that this boasting is evil because it is rooted in arrogance and that’s the real problem.

Because we are relational beings, sin creates collateral damage. You do not sin in isolation. These wayward desires may originate inside of us, but they come out, and when they do, the results for those around us are often tragic. James says specifically that they cause quarrels, fights, and even murder.

If you think about it, peace is both a quality and a result. As a quality, we can be peaceable, verse 17, and then out of being peaceable we can do peaceful things — we can sow in peace (verse 18). And when we do that — peaceable people doing peaceful things — it will lead all kinds of good.

James, like Jesus is warning leaders:

1 ) The heart overflows into all of life. 2) The heart refuses to be silenced.

The resurrection means that what the Father has said about Jesus, and what Jesus has claimed for himself, is confirmed. Jesus is the eternal Son of God, fully God and fully man. He is the promised Messiah that the Hebrew Scriptures talk about. He is the King who has come. He is the Lord of all. He is the Savior of all the ends of the earth.

One way to describe the difference between demonic faith and real faith is that demonic faith believes that something is true, whereas genuine faith experiences the beauty and goodness of the truth. It’s like the difference between knowing that honey is sweet because you read it in a book, and knowing the sweetness of honey because you’ve actually tasted it.

The first thing to say is that your motives will be mixed. Those of us who have been brought forth by the word of truth still wrestle with sin and selfishness. That’s why we have to put aside filthiness and wickedness and continue to humbly receive the implanted word that saves our souls. There’s a fight in your soul between the firstfruits of God’s new world, and the remnants of the old world. So mixed motives are simply going to be a part of our lives in our pilgrim condition. And we can’t let mixed and impure motives paralyze us.

God’s plan in the new creation overall is the remake the whole world in righteousness and peace filled with his presence — that’s what heaven is. And God has made us, made Christians, to be the firstfruits of that on this earth right now.

One of our hopes as a church is to bring together two things which seem, in actual practice, to constantly repel one another. Bringing them together, holding them together is difficult, and many churches have fallen into one ditch or the other. The two things are practical help in living the Christian life and theological depth in understanding the character and works of God.

The great test of any world religion, any philosophy of life, any system of beliefs, and any individual person is pain and suffering. When we suffer, we find out what’s really inside, who we truly are, and how powerful, or weak, is the foundation on which we’re building our lives.

Community may not be the hottest topic, but it is controversial. It’s a big issue in our culture and the church. Our culture struggles with community. We have never been more connected in the history of the world, yet somehow, disconnected.

Think of it this way. You will cling to something forever. There will be something that you will seek to satisfy the ache and longing of your soul with forever. It will either be God, or it will be yourself. You will either come out of yourself into the clear sky of God’s glory and gladness and find your heart filled to overflowing, or you will curve inward on yourself, trying to satisfy your soul’s thirst on broken pieces of clay that turn to ash in your mouth.

Now this is not the first time in the Bible where see we something like this. In fact, God’s presence with his people is a central theme throughout all of Scripture. It’s actually at the heart of who God reveals himself to be. He is the God who is there, and he promises to be with his people.

That’s where we are going to be today, 1 Corinthians 6:1–11. And the plan is pretty simple. There are just three main parts to the sermon: First, we’ll read this text and establish the biblical, Christian position on homosexuality; and then second and third, we’re going to look at two implications that this position has for our gospel witness in the Twin Cities. So, overall, there are really two questions we are going to try to answer: Part One, what do we think? Parts Two and Three, what do we say?

While our liturgy is not based solely off of Isaiah 6:1-8, this passage is one of the clearest, most succinct summaries of what the whole Bible teaches about the nature and order of worship. From Genesis to Revelation, Christian worship is always characterized by God’s self-revelation and man’s response to what God has revealed. In this way, Christian worship is an on-going conversation between God and man.

Being defined by the grace of God frees us to do the hard work of forgiving. “I worked harder than any of them, because forgiveness is hard, yet it was not I but the grace of God that was with me.” It frees us to forgive, and to keep on forgiving.

So the course we’ve set this morning is to rehearse who Jesus is as fully God and fully man by looking at this remarkable Christological sentence in Hebrews 1:1–4. It is one sentence. Some have called it the most magnificent sentence in ancient Greek. I’ll read it again, and then I’d like for us to look briefly at the seven claims it makes about Jesus — sevenfold affirmations — and get to know him better in his full manhood and full Godness.

Think about your last few days. What did you use the good gift of technology for? What did you do with your phone or laptop? What did you watch on Netflix? What was the state of your heart during your daily or weekly scroll-fest on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter? How often did you use technology to sin against God and against your friends or family? How often did you use it to worship God and love others?

See, the Songs of Ascents give us a glorious vision of the new Jerusalem — end-of-time reality when God will be with his people and his Messiah will reign, but, it’s still a vision.

It’s not reality now. Reality now is still in Meshech. For now we still live in Kedar. We’re looking to this new Jerusalem; we’re living our lives with our eyes set there, but we’re not there yet. And we should remember this.

God is going to do what the psalmist is asking. He is going to make Jerusalem become that vision the psalmist longs for. Jerusalem will be the place where God’s presence dwells. It will be the place where God’s people will be with him, surrounded by the worship of him.

David is saying here, within the Songs of Ascents: God will send the promised son. God will make a restored, new Jerusalem. I can calm and quiet my soul by remembering that God will do what he has said.

Solomon turns away from the vanity of self-salvation and he looks to children, namely, he looks to the promised offspring who will come after him to reign as king forever. And God loves to do it this way, you know.

It would be like God to put the hope of the world in the hands of a baby...

These psalms are called the Songs of Ascents — that’s “Ascent” as in “to ascend.” And they’re called that because they’re connected to God’s people ascending up to Jerusalem. Jerusalem was higher in elevation than the places around it. So to go to Jerusalem means that literally you are ascending. You’re going up.

God does not leave us to ourselves to work our way out of the mess of our own making. He doesn’t leave us to rescue ourselves, to help our own selves into qualifying for restoration, but he saves us utterly through faith — through relinquishing our own attempts to work our way to him, and acknowledging that we ultimately are powerless, and ready to receive his help.

Babel gives us another lens through which to view idolatry. We often talk about idolatry as what we place our hope in, or where we find our greatest and deepest satisfaction. Idolatry is seeking the satisfaction that we ought to find in God in created things. And that’s true. But Babel also poses other questions about how to discern idols.

He’s going to rule over all the nations on the earth, and all the nations on the earth are going to be blessed by his rule. It’s going to be a good rule. He’s going to be a good king. But how’s this work?

Noah does what God says because Noah trusts God, and this actually says more about God than it does Noah. We tend to admire Noah for his faith, and that’s legit. Hebrews 11 commends him for it. But something else to consider in this passage is not that Noah trusts God, but it’s that God is found so trustworthy.

What Genesis has been doing in chapters 4 and 5 — going back to the curse of the serpent in Genesis 3:15 — is setting up a tale of two cities: the city of man and the city of God. This is, in a sense, the great story of all of history: the story of two “offsprings.” Remember what God said to the serpent in Genesis 3:15.

So before we get into Chapters 4–5, let me just state again the main message in Genesis 3:15 we need to see and settle on. It’s that:

God will ensure that the dragon-slayer, head-stomper, serpent crusher will come, but he will come with a war waged against him.

This is judgment mingled with mercy. The ultimate judgment here is exile from the garden of God. Broken relationships, painful labor, war with the serpent—all of these are awful. But the worst consequence for man’s rebellion is that he is forced at sword-point to leave paradise. The loss of Eden. This too is mercy; God refuses to let us live forever in our sin and brokenness. But the loss is real. We lost God.

They must learn to trust God’s wisdom before they can be trusted with wisdom and rule themselves. Forbidding the knowledge of good and evil is like forbidding children from driving cars. Driving cars isn’t sinful or wrong. But it’s for adults, for the mature. A child must grow up and demonstrate responsibility before he is given the keys.

The main reason you should rest is not because it’s the way you get to live a healthier, happier, more productive life — I hope you do — but the main reason for rest is that you remember that the God who made you does not need you. And what a gift that is!

We are to take the rooted loveliness of the world, guard it, protect it, and then, wonder of wonders, make it lovelier. We are to taste the goodness of the earth’s absolute givenness and make it greater.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. “Heaven and earth” means totality. It means everything. God created everything, and he did it out of nothing. Which means, he didn’t just arrange the puzzle pieces, he created the puzzle pieces, in fact, he created the very idea of the puzzle. God made things exist that did not exist.

"For us it is difficult to handle this tension. Yet the Bible often puts these two concepts, namely, our responsibility, and God's control, next to each other. We are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling and at the same time it is God who is at work in you."

"True doctrine is accompanied by living in the light. And in fact, one of the ways we fight for the gospel is by living in a way, acting in a way, behaving in a way, that fits with the gospel. Which means this: contending for the faith, a lot of times, has more to do with how we live than with what theological boxes we can check."

Imagine if you had been there as John began to write this letter. Perhaps he’s dictating it to Demetrius. He says, “I have no greater joy . . .” and pauses. Wouldn’t you say, “Jesus. Say Jesus. You have no greater joy than Jesus, right?”

But John turns and says, “I have no greater joy than Gaius — no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.”

Because we practice weekly communion, every week our professing children watch the bread and wine pass, and so every week we communicate to them, “You’re not fully a part of us.” Which means we need to have an answer for them when they ask, “What do I have to do to become a full member of this congregation?”

His main point in the letter can be summed up like this: listen to Jesus, and love one another — and do it in a world full of opposition. That’s what John says in this letter, and that’s what we’re going to look at today.

God has his own timing. That’s Peter’s point. I don’t think we’re supposed to literally convert the 1,000 years per each day. The message here is just that God has his own timing and it’s not ours. And this is really important, because until we understand that God has his own timing we will tend toward accusing him of not doing what he says, until eventually, we will misunderstand his motives toward us.

But before we go on there is one real surprise here. We said it shouldn’t be a surprise that false teachers arise. Jesus promised that. But we might say the surprise in this chapter is how little we find about their teaching, and how much Peter focuses on their living.

One of the ways we are assured that we will be in the eternal kingdom of Jesus is that we live now in a way that fits with that kingdom. Again, the way we live now doesn’t earn that kingdom. That comes by Jesus’s free invitation. And it’s his free invitation changes us. We become new people who are being fitted for a new world.

You know, we can’t control how other people respond. That’s not our part. That’s not our responsibility. Our responsibility has to do with ourselves, with what we’re doing. And if there is a relational rift in your life, the question you should ask is: Does this relational rift exist because of my refusal to ask for or give forgiveness?

"Finally, press into the Lord. In your sorrow, do not sin. Weep, wail, grieve, lament. Rage against this broken and cursed world and the evil powers that steal and kill and destroy. But never curse God. Don’t run from him. He is the only source of comfort. He is the God of all comfort. Press on to know him. Press hard into him. As surely as the coming of the dawn, he will respond."

The decreasing, the denying, the cost — it is real. We’re really giving up things. I’m really not playing softball. When you fast, you’re really not eating lunch. When you wake up early to pray, you are not sleeping. These are costs, they really are.

But then one day, when we look back, it won’t look like a cost, not when we see Jesus.

The greatest of God’s provisions for us is not earthly wealth — good gift as it can be. It is not money — useful as it can be for showing love to others and advancing the kingdom. It is not earthly possessions, but it is the very presence of God himself in Jesus through the Holy Spirit. God’s greatest gift is God himself. And when he is the lodestar of our soul, when that truth is fixed in our hearts, we are the freest of all people.

"The goal, however, is that God always remain in front of me. Indeed, the goal is that he’s always close to the center of my vision. Even when he’s not the direct object of my attention, he’s right there; he’s present and I never turn my back to him."

"When a delight in a legitimate pleasure spontaneously erupts, take the governor off. If your joy in your family is going to shoot through the roof, don’t reinforce the ceiling with steel. Perhaps even open the skylight so that it has a clearer shot."

One of our common emotional experiences as humans is the feeling of emptiness. No matter how rich or poor, how heathy or sick, whether in success or in failure, we all have tasted the feeling of emptiness. We wouldn’t all describe it the same terms, but we have felt that internal emotional sense of emptiness or inadequacy — that haunting, gnawing ache that I’m not what I should be, or that some highly anticipated experience didn’t live up to its billing.

"Our words come out from our heart. Underneath our words is a battle. It is a battle to try and figure out what to say and how to say it, between spirit and flesh, faith and unbelief, obedience and sin. The battle is in our hearts and it is a battle for our worship. And our words and the way they come out reflect where we are at in this battle."

It should make sense to us that if Jesus is preeminent over the old creation of this world and the new creation of the church, he must also be preeminent over the details in our lives.

What Jesus did changes who we are, and therefore changes how we orient our minds, which therefore changes how we live.

The best way to explain the Christian way of life is not to give soundbites, but to give a story — because Christians have a story. It all hangs together.

There’s been a transition, both in history and in the lives of the Colossians, that changes everything. And Paul speaks of this transition in terms of death and resurrection.

If you want the real Jesus he must be the whole Jesus — the Jesus who is God become man, who suffered, and who was raised from the dead.

To be anxious is to experience a loss of security. It’s to be in a state of unease and dread and misgiving about something that you care about. Jesus understands.

The most important figure in history rides into the greatest city of his first-century milieu for the most important week that ever has been.

Paul struggles with the strength that God supplies to warn and teach so that the churches grow up into maturity.

Paul rejoices in suffering as he reveals the gospel mystery in order to reach maturity by the power of Christ.

We are Bible-people and if the Bible continually holds out a theme, as it does with the gospel, then we know we are on solid ground to dwell on that theme.

The point of this passage, in the words of Colossians 3:10, is “Christ is all, and in all.”

The book of Colossians is relevant to all people at all times, but perhaps especially for those of us in the Twin Cities today.

It must have always seemed a little bit strange to Paul when he spelled out the first few words of his letters: “Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ.”

The New Testament doesn’t merely tell us about the return of Jesus; instead, the New Testament was written because of the return of Jesus.

It’s important, categorically, that we think about the ascension of Jesus not as just a one-time event, but as an on-going status of who he is.

There are a thousand different ways to unpack the meaning and significance of the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Jesus came down from heaven and he lived as a man on this earth. He walked in our shoes. And that matters.

The incarnation refers literally to the in-fleshing of the Son of God — putting on human flesh and becoming man.

What do you think was going through Mary’s mind as she held Jesus in her arms for the first time?

The sovereign love of God is the theme can summarizes the Minor Prophets. How else would God do what he has done?

We want to know how it fits in its own place in the book and how the book itself helps us to see more of God and Christ and ourselves and our world.

Haggai says “almost but not quite.” He reminds us of what God has said, and he helps us to wait in hope.

God judges nations, not just individuals. What does this mean for America?

We are living in trying times, and amazingly, Habakkuk, this little prophet, has something relevant to say to us in our day.

The seventh book of the Minor Prophets is Nahum, which teaches us what it means for God to have control over all things.

God brings charges against Israel. But instead of clear charges — like “You did this and that” — he charges Israel by asking questions.

What does it mean to faithfully bear God’s name? It’s not what Jonah did.

One of the great ironies of human love and relationships is that we experience the greatest hurt from those who are closest to us.

God will rebuild the raggedy old shack of David. This new kingdom will possess the remnant of mankind — those from every nation who seeks the Lord.

Though these prophets don’t all say they same thing, they do rhyme. There’s a rhythm and a pattern to their messages that we ought to understand at a basic level.

Metaphor is powerful. It integrates the invisible world with the visible. It helps us see things that are otherwise unseen. That is especially the case in the book of Hosea.

The most amazing of all human social arrangements is the church of Jesus Christ.

There is no such thing as generic “parenting.” In truth, there is mothering and fathering. And we do this together.

Part Two of the Together series builds a framework for how we should think about singleness, and offers three lessons for unmarrieds from the life of Paul the apostle.

[Due to a technical difficulty, the audio quality is poor.]

Joe Rigney kicks off a new series on what it means to be the church Together. He gives three illustrations for a healthy marriage rooted in the gospel.

When a narrative comes to an end, the narrative world displayed by the author rejoins the world of the readers.

This is a story of high stakes on the high seas in Acts 27.

There stood Paul, donned in an orange jumpsuit and handcuffs, speaking to the king and his cronies...

How do you conduct yourself when you know you are heading into opposition and hostility?

We live in a society increasingly more fit to create celebrities than leaders.

What will find increasing dissonance with our surrounding culture is actually the key to everything we think and say: Jesus is real; Jesus is alive; Jesus has been raised from the dead.

Acts 15 stands out as one of the most important chapters in the Book of Acts because it’s the only place where we see the church come to a theological crossroads.

Paul goes on three missionary journeys in the book of Acts. Chapter 14 shows us the the ending of that first journey, and a relevant theme emerges.

We want to train our minds to run in biblical ruts, to have God’s acts in history shape our understanding of ourselves and our own day.

The gospel and the community it creates, called the church, are on the move, beginning at Ground Zero in Jerusalem, but not staying there.

One of our goals in reading the Bible is to train our minds to run in biblical ruts. We want to learn to read the story we’re in by immersing ourselves in the stories God likes to tell.

Acts 8 is a transitional chapter in the book of Acts. We move away from a Jerusalem-focus to a wider vision of the church’s growth.

The point of Stephen’s sermon is the repeated rejection of God’s will by God’s people; he cashes it all in (verses 51–53) with their rejection of the Messiah.

The task in this sermon is to look at the first part of Stephen’s speech and ask the question: “What is Stephen getting at with these Old Testament examples?”

As the word of God grows, and the church increases, the practical dynamics of church life inevitably change.

One of our tasks as Christians is to learn to read the story that we’re in. As individuals, we have a past and a future. As families, communities, and as a nation, we have pasts and futures. And we tell ourselves stories in order to make sense of where we’ve come from and where we’re going and what our role in the story is.

One of our tasks as Christians is to learn to read the story that we’re in. As individuals, we have a past and a future. As families, communities, and as a nation, we have pasts and futures. And we tell ourselves stories in order to make sense of where we’ve come from and where we’re going and what our role in the story is.

What we find in the last section of Acts 4 is not an isolated event, but starting here, we discover a theme that is repeated throughout the rest of the book. And that theme is a vision for how the church lives in this world.

In Acts 4:1–12, we see the controversy surrounding the name of Jesus, and what that name represents — the real person who lived and died and rose again and has fundamentally changed the world and time.