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Mark Sermon

True Authority – Mark 11:27-12:12

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Good morning church! What a joy it has been for us to be studying through the gospel of Mark. As a church we’ve enjoyed the whole process of knowing Jesus through the lens of this gospel as we study it passage by passage.

Right now we are in Mark chapter 11 verses 27. As we’ve noticed over the past few weeks, these passages are placed in the context of Jesus’ entry to Jerusalem which actually begins his journey toward the cross. Last Sunday we read how the temple needed to be cleansed.

The cleansing was required because the people & the religious leaders replaced the worship of God with self-centered gain. And Jesus by driving out the sellers and the buyers, overturning the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons showed how holiness & reverence for God was so important to God’s heart.

This didn’t go down well with the chief priests and the scribes. Interestingly this passage says that this resulted in them wanting to destroy him because they feared him. They weren’t ready or prepared to receive this Jesus Christ who literally turned their religious system and traditions upside down. This forms the context for today’s passage:

27 And they came again to Jerusalem. And as he was walking in the temple, the chief priests and the scribes and the elders came to him, 28 and they said to him, “By what authority are you doing these things, or who gave you this authority to do them?” 29 Jesus said to them, “I will ask you one question; answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things.

30 Was the baptism of John from heaven or from man? Answer me.” 31 And they discussed it with one another, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ 32 But shall we say, ‘From man’?”—they were afraid of the people, for they all held that John really was a prophet. 33 So they answered Jesus, “We do not know.” And Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

12 And he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower, and leased it to tenants and went into another country. 2 When the season came, he sent a servant[a] to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard.

3 And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. 4 Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully. 5 And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed.

6 He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ 7 But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ 8 And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. 9 What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others.

10 Have you not read this Scripture:

“‘The stone that the builders rejected

has become the cornerstone;[b]

11 this was the Lord’s doing,

and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”

12 And they were seeking to arrest him but feared the people, for they perceived that he had told the parable against them. So they left him and went away.

I believe there are 3 things we can see from this passage:

  1. Struggle for authority
  2. Sinful Authority
  3. True Authority

Struggle for authority (v27-28)

So the location is the Jerusalem temple and the Top religious leaders of the time come to meet Jesus. These are not ordinary Jews – these are the pastors, theologians, worship leaders, Sunday School teachers, authors – the most learned and scripturally qualified Jews of the day.

And they ask Jesus by what authority is he doing these things? Basically, they are asking Jesus “Who gave you the right to overturn the tables of the money changers and drive out the sellers from the temple”? Who do you think you are to do this in the temple?

And who are they asking this question to? Jesus Christ. The Son of God. He was there in the beginning with God and He is God. All things were made through Him and without Him nothing was made. (John 1:1-3) In Him all things hold together (Col 1:17) He is the image of the invisible God (Col 1:15) In Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell (Col 1:19). And yet they ask him “Who gave you this right to do this”?

And this is not a new question. It is symptomatic of man’s constant struggle to submit to God’s authority. Right from the garden of Eden man has struggled to submit to God’s authority.

When we look at Genesis 3, what was the bait given to Adam and Eve? The serpent told them that when they eat of the tree – their eyes will be opened and they will become like God, knowing good and evil.

And that’s the heart of sin…the core of sin…to take the place of God in our lives, trying to make moral decisions apart from God. In other words, Adam and Eve had this insecure desire to become their only authority over their lives. They wanted to determine for themselves what was right or wrong for their lives. They didn’t want to be dependent anymore on God.

And we know what happened when they became the authority of their lives – all of humanity was thrown into a world of brokenness and sin and death. And that nature to not want to submit to God’s authority is there in all of us.

Campus Crusade had this illustration that has been really helpful for me over the years. They had this picture of a throne seat located at the centre of an individual’s heart. All of us have a throne seat in our lives. That’s the place from where we make all our decisions and choices. Everything that we chose to do is controlled from this throne seat.

Whoever sits on that throne is the authority of our life. And then they would ask this question: who is seated on the throne seat? Is it God or is it us? Is it God or is it me? Now I know that I’m preaching to people to publicly claim to be followers of Jesus so why am I still asking this question? It’s because I’m very aware of our tendencies to enthrone ourselves as the authority in areas of our lives. Christian life is all about yielding control.

Giving back the authority to God. In this life we’ll always find ourselves with plenty of reasons to repent of those areas and turn back to Christ. Just last night when I got the call from the hall owner regarding the change of timings and venue for our Gathering, I really saw how anxious my heart was & how I was planning my responses apart from trusting God.

For me that was a reminder of how real is my struggle for authority.

Sinful authority

Not only is there a struggle for authority but when we claim authority of our lives – it is a sinful authority! When Jesus is asked the question on whose authority…he responds back by asking another question to show them what’s really hindering them from submitting to God’s authority. “Was the baptism from John from heaven or from man”?

From their responses there are two things we can see are hindering them:

Unbelief

31 And they discussed it with one another, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ (v31)

John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. People were coming to the river Jordan confessing their sins openly and then getting baptized as a symbol of repentance expressing a 180 degree turn from sin and toward God.

In Matt 21:32 it tells us that the Pharisees and religious leaders did not believe John. In their pride they didn’t think it was necessary for them to be baptized. Tax collectors and prostitutes got baptized in front of them but still they didn’t change their mind.

In Luke 7:30, it says that the religious leaders rejected the purpose of God for themselves by not being baptized by John. Wow! That sounds like an opposite statement.

The most religious people of the day rejected the purposes of God for themselves? How is that possible? That’s because it meant that they would need to humbly accept their position as a sinner. And if they did that, they would be in the right posture to receive the provision of God – Our Savior Jesus.

We keep talking about believing in the gospel & constantly growing in belief. What does that actually mean? Is it just intellectually changing the way you think about some facts? I think what it means from this passage is constantly repenting before God about areas of your life that are against His character and will.

Unbelief at its core is a prideful position that doesn’t want to humble itself before God. And that’s why we see in Scripture…a true believer is always being aware of His sins and always repenting before God because what he desires the most is a right relationship with God.

Fear Of Man

32 But shall we say, ‘From man’?”—they were afraid of the people, for they all held that John really was a prophet.

The other motivation that hindered them from submitting to God was the fear of man. Why were these religious men afraid of the people?

  1. They feared losing their reputation. They didn’t want to be discredited for telling that John got his authority to baptize from man. It’s the question that comes to mind when we think “What will people think of me if I do that?”
  2. They feared losing control. Would they end up losing control over people if they said something controversial? Would people leave them and go somewhere else if they said something controversial? It’s the question that comes to mind when we think “Would I still be able to influence people if I did that?”

I remember back in the youth ministry days during a Youth Camp. We had something called a 4 corners talk which was a weird name because sometimes we had just 2 or 3 people. During one of my 4 corners session with a youth, I could see how he knew that he had to submit to the authority of Christ but he didn’t want to do so due to the fear of man.

He was fearful of what his friends would say. He was fearful of being called as “uncool”. And it just saddened me to see someone so close yet so far.

And the fear of man isn’t just a struggle for my young friend but it’s something that we face daily when we think of sharing the gospel with the people around us.

The fear of man is a real when we have to make decisions on whom to marry – in my lifetime I’ve seen so many professing believers who said that they wanted to marry a believer but when it actually came down to marriage – they married an unbeliever.

The fear of man is also real at our jobs when either there are conversations or decisions made which are unethical and immoral. Would you take a stand because of your faith?

True Authority

You might think that Jesus denies to answer their question on authority but Jesus infact does answer their question using a parable. He talks about a man who plants a vineyard. The man is God and the vineyard is Israel – God’s people.

Using the illustration of the wine-press, the tower and the fence – showing God’s protection and God’s provision for everything needed for them to flourish. And this vineyard was leased to tenants. Another version says he rented out the vineyard to farmers.

The farmers are the religious leaders who were supposed to steward and care for the field. And then God would send servants to get the fruit of the wine – these were the prophets. But what did the farmers do to them? They beat them, hit them, treated them shamefully and killed them.

Finally the Owner sends his beloved Son. What do the farmers do to him? They kill him thinking that the inheritance will be theirs. Again the same theme – it’s always a struggle for authority. It’s always a struggle for ownership.

Like the farmers we are stewards of the life that God has given us. What should’ve been our ideal response to God? We should submit to God and give what is His – our whole lives. What is instead our natural response? Take what is not ours and make it ours.

God reaches out to us and reminds us through various means – through our daily time with God in Scripture and prayers, through sermons or our brothers and sisters. However, it’s not enough to just do all these things – what matters is our response. So how do we respond?

In our sinful self, we are all like these murderous farmers. We are all responsible for the death of Jesus on the cross. Which is why God’s wrath and judgment is directed toward us. (v9) But the story doesn’t end in judgment. In v10 we hear the good news of Jesus:

10 Have you not read this Scripture:

“‘The stone that the builders rejected

has become the cornerstone;[b]

11 this was the Lord’s doing,

and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”

God used the very same death of His Son Jesus Christ to protect you and I from being judged & destroyed forever. In doing so, he poured out all His love, all His mercy, all His compassion and His righteousness upon us! And that’s the greatest news brothers and sisters. Christ came not to condemn but to save! And that’s message that the religious leaders didn’t hear.

They perceived that the parable was about them but they failed to see the answer that Jesus Himself was going to provide. And I want us to once again think about that throne seat of ours – consider how our lives have actually been messed up by us sitting on the throne.

And now think about this Jesus – the rightful owner of our lives because He created us, the one who can enact judgment but instead gave up His life to remove judgment and set us free forever. Isn’t He the best one to sit on that throne? Let’s willingly submit to His authority.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

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Mark Sermon

Faith & Fruit – Mark 11:12-25

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Good morning Gathering! It’s a joy to be with you this morning and a privilege to open the Scriptures together. It seems the more I preach, the more I feel a sense of humility when I get to stand up here and open the Word with the body of Christ.

It always reminds me how dependent we all are on the Spirit of God to lead us into understanding and to lead us in the application of God’s Word. And that’s certainly what we’re praying for this morning.

If you have a Bible with you, I’d invite you to grab that and turn to the Gospel of Mark and chapter 11. We are continuing our study of the Gospel of Mark this morning.

If you were here last weekend you’ll remember that Pastor Sam (from Red Tree) began chapter 11 for us, and we’ll be continuing in chapter 11 this morning by looking at verses 12-26.

Let me pray for our time together in God’s Word and then we’ll read our text. Pray with me.

This is an interesting passage. It contains two interactions that Jesus has; one is very well known & pretty straightforward. It’s of Jesus cleansing the Temple in Jerusalem (we’re all probably familiar with that one). The other account is a little more obscure, and it’s also a little confusing to be honest. It’s Jesus cursing a fig tree.

And at first glance these two things don’t really seem to fit together, but what I think you’ll see as I read this is that Mark intends for these two accounts to go together so that we might have a fuller understanding of a really important principle. It’s a principle that Jesus was teaching His disciples here, it’s just as relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago.

One way to think about this text is as a visual parable. Jesus was always teaching through parables. What I believe He’s doing here is giving His disciples a visual parable.

He’s teaching them through His actions about something that is vitally important for them (and us) to understand. We’ll get into that in just a few minutes, but first, let’s read our text together.

“On the following day, when they came from Bethany, he was hungry. And seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to see if he could find anything on it. When he came to it, he found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. And he said to it, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard it.

And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple.

And he was teaching them and saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” And the chief priests and the scribes heard it and were seeking a way to destroy him, for they feared him, because all the crowd was astonished at his teaching. And when evening came they went out of the city.

As they passed by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered away to its roots. And Peter remembered and said to him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed has withered.” And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him.

Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.” (Mark 11:12-25)

Let’s take just a moment and reset the scene. I want to make sure we’re clear on what’s happening in this picture. Sam highlighted last weekend that Jesus has just entered the city of Jerusalem.

This is what’s known as the Triumphal Entry. It is the closest that the Jewish people have come to actually worshiping Jesus for who He really is. You remember this incredible scene of Jesus riding in on a donkey as the people lined the street and threw their cloaks and palm branches down in front of Jesus. They all shouted, “Hosanna, blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord.”

It really is a beautiful picture and if we were there, knowing what we know  and witnessing this in real time, we might think for a moment that the people actually get it. We might think for a moment that they actually see Jesus for who He is and they’re submitted to Him as their king.

But we know that they didn’t really get it. They didn’t understand what was coming later in the week. Jesus did. He understood. He knew exactly what was going to happen. He knew that the praises would turn to jeering and the “Hosannas” will become “Crucify Him!” by week’s end.

It really is a bizarre picture as Jesus enters the city. And then Mark tells us that the first thing that Jesus did when He got into Jerusalem is He went to the Temple to have a look around. And then He left. Mark says that it was late in the evening so Jesus took His disciples and went back to Bethany for the night.

And that’s where we pick up our text this morning. It’s the next day and Jesus goes back to Jerusalem with His disciples and heads straight for the Temple. But on the way something interesting happens. Jesus stops to get some fruit off a fig tree, but but there are no figs.

Mark says that it’s not the season for figs and so Jesus curses the fig tree and forbids it from ever producing figs again. Which sounds strange to us. Why would Jesus would curse a tree for not producing something that it’s not supposed to produce. I’ll explain more about that in a moment.

Mark says that they continue to the Temple and, as Jesus enters, He wrecks shop (which American slang for He turns the Temple upside down). We see Jesus begin turning over tables and kicking over chairs. He drives the money changers and merchants out of the Temple. It’s a display of righteous anger, passion, zeal for worship and for the house of God.

And then, when evening comes, they leave the Temple and go out of the city again. The next day they come back the same way and see the fig tree that (within 24 hours) had died and withered to its roots. And this is where Jesus explains something to his disciples about faith & about fruit (which is where we’ll end our discussion this morning as well).

And that’s what’s happening in the text. If we’re going to be honest, it begs a few questions. Like, “Why is Jesus so angry at the Temple?” And, “What is up with Him cursing a fig tree doesn’t have figs on it?” And, “Why is Mark telling us these things together?” And, “What does all of this mean when you put it all together?”

Well, let’s back up and see if we can figure out what’s happening. There is 1 overarching theme that Jesus is teaching His disciples in this text. I want to talk about that first. And then, with that understanding, we’ll be able to look at two different responses that this text highlights for us. Sound good?

First, let’s deal with the main idea that Jesus is driving us toward. And to understand it, we have to recognize that there is a connection between the cleansing of the temple and the cursing of the fig tree.

Mark is using them together to help us interpret Jesus’ meaning. And the principle is very straightforward:  Jesus is coming against fruitless, empty, wrongly-motivated religious activity. It’s pretty telling that Jesus’ first action after being hailed by the people as King is to pass judgment on the religious leaders as being opposed to true worship of God.

Here’s what we have to understand. In the Old Testament the fig tree was often used to symbolize Israel and her standing before God. I’ll give you a couple of examples:

Jeremiah 8:13 — “When I would gather them, declares the Lord, there are no grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree; even the leaves are withered, and what I gave them has passed away from them.”

Hosea 9:10 — “Like grapes in the wilderness, I found Israel. Like the first fruit on the fig tree in its first season, I saw your fathers…”

Multiple times in the Old Testament the fig tree was used to symbolize Israel. Jesus, in much the same way, is making a pronouncement on the condition of the Jewish people. That they are fruitless. That they appear to have life on the outside (the green leaves), but they are without fruit.

Now, I need to to mention the season of the fig tree (as Mark mentions it). The way Mark phrases this makes it sound like there shouldn’t be fruit on this fig tree, but that’s not really the case. In fact, the variety of fig trees that grow in Palestine have two harvests.

You get an early harvest that grows off of last year’s shoot, and guess when that comes? It comes in the spring, with the leaf. So seeing a fig tree in full leaf in Palestine, you would expect to find figs.They’re not the full, big figs that you get in summer with the main harvest. These are small and not as tender, but they’re edible. And so, when you think about it, Jesus is communicating something really beautiful here.

You see, this whole time through the book, Mark has been telling us that God is doing something new. He’s been telling us that the kingdom of God is at hand. That something wonderful, something infinitely better is coming. That the fruit of this new thing is going to be unimaginable.

But that doesn’t mean that what God was doing before, to make a way for this new thing. should be fruitless. No, Israel was meant to produce fruit. Maybe not as big. Maybe not as wonderful as this new fruit that was ushered in through Christ. But Israel should be producing something, and they’re not.

And this is the visual parable that Jesus is telling of Israel. That, even though there are leaves and the tree gives the appearance of health, it’s not producing fruit. And that is not God’s design. God’s design is that healthy things will grow and produce fruit.

I think the temptation is for us to think that the old system was broken and wasn’t meant to produce fruit. That’s nonsense! The sacrificial system, the law, the prophets, the judges, the kings; all of it was meant to be temporary, yes! It was all meant to point to something permanent, yes! But it wasn’t broken. There should have been fruit. That’s what Jesus is saying.

Now, that shapes how we see Jesus’ interaction in the Temple. Like that fig tree, the religious culture of the day had the appearance of bearing fruit but was not actually bearing fruit. There appeared to be life because of the presence of the leaves, but no fruit was actually coming from the tree. Jesus finds a lot of religious activity in the Temple, but no faith.

In the space that was intended for Gentiles to come and pray, Jesus instead finds money changers and people selling animals for sacrifices. Something given by God for worship of Him and for His glory was being used by people for their own gain. And here comes Jesus, as Lord of the Temple, to purify it. You see, Jesus has come to restore the Temple to it’s original function; that it would serve as a house of prayer for all the nations. And so, He drives them out.

I think we need to pause here and ask a question of ourselves (and I’m including myself in this). Jesus still does this today, doesn’t He? He comes in with loving  and righteous intent to cleanse His Temple. But the Temple is no longer the Temple.

We are the Temple. Just like in this picture, where the Temple is being used for something other than it’s intended purpose, we often take the things given by God for worship and we turn those things into ourselves. Jesus’ purpose is to restore us to our original function; that we would display His glory to all Nations.

That’s true of all of us, as He calls out idolatry in our hearts. I think this text calls us to ask some important questions:  “What is the quality of my faith?” “Is it a faith that’s fruitful or is it a faith that’s just leafy, but lacks fruit?” “Do I just look good on the outside, busy going about my religious activity, doing the right things, saying the right things, but is that producing fruit?” These are the questions that address the motivations of the heart. This is the level where true worship takes place.

And the reality is for us all that there will often be things in our heart that do not align with biblical faith. The question is:  “How will we respond when the Lord of the Temple comes to cleanse us?”

Church, Jesus is always calling things out in us. He is always seeking to cleanse and purify His temple. And the natural inclination of our flesh is to rebel against that purification. Our flesh does not want to give up power, and authority and control. And so we have a choice to make.

Are we going to press into the Lord of the Temple and allow Him to purify us, or are we going to respond in fear and flee His presence in order to continue exercising power and authority in our own lives? That’s the response that we see from the chief priests and the scribes.

They sought to destroy Him because they were afraid of losing power and control. And the call on us to lay down our idolatry is no different. It’s the call to joyful submission that comes from faith.

After all of this, as Jesus and His disciples are walking past that same fig tree the next day, Jesus shows us what the response to His work should be. He teaches His disciples about faith. He tells the disciples that they should trust God to remove whatever is hindering them from bearing fruit for Him. That they should exercise faith as God lovingly cleanses them from the things that are keeping them from intimacy with God.

Jesus uses this image of being able to move a mountain. He’s telling us what this kind of faith looks like in the life of the believer. Things that should be impossible are possible with God where the believer is walking in this kind of faith.

Now, before we close, I want to give you a work of caution about verse 24 and then I want to challenge all of us to wrestle with the application of this text. First, a word of caution. Jesus says this in verse 24, “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”  I probably don’t even have to say the word of caution because you already see the danger here and understand the historical abuse of a verse like this.

Yes, we should pray boldly and believe that God will grant us what we pray for. When we pray according to His will and in submission to that will. This is not an invitation to treat God like a vending machine or a butler. Jesus has just taught us about submission to the Will and Purposes of God through faith. And so our prayers must be rightly motivated and in line with God’s Will. Jesus, in fact, models this very thing in the Garden of Gethsemane later in Mark:

“And he said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mark 14:36)

So what do we do with the application of this? Well, I can tell you how God is leading me to apply it in my life and maybe that will serve as an encouragement to you. The Spirit is asking me, “Where are the areas of your life that are not properly motivated toward the glory of God and being used for His purposes?”

If you are really willing to ask God to search your heart in that way, He will reveal areas where you’re turning your heart into a “den of robbers”. And then you have a choice: repent or run.

Let’s close in prayer.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

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Mark Sermon

What does it mean to walk alongside Jesus – Mark 10:32-52

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]What does it mean to walk alongside Jesus? – Mark 10:32-52

Our passage for today is from Mark 10:32-45. [READ]

As we read this passage, the first thing we notice is James and John approaching Jesus and trying to reserve a prominent place next to Him, one on his right and one on his left, in his glory.

If we are honest, the request that James & John makes shouldn’t be a surprising one for us. Because, if given a chance we all like and desire to have a special place next to the person we love and admire. Won’t you agree?

We like to be the special child to our parents and have a special place in their heart, we like to be the special employee at work – have a close rapport with our managers and bosses, we like to have a special place at church – a close rapport with the leaders, we also love the idea of been associated with famous people, etc

I see my sons Jairus & Amaze often battle with each other to sit or sleep right next to mom & dad.

Likewise, even John & James desired for a special place next to their Lord whom they loved dearly. In the last 3 years, they walked with him, talked with them, also fully convinced that He is the promised Messiah, the son of God.

When Jesus said. “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?”. They were so compelled by His love they immediately answered with a ‘Yes’, saying ‘we can’, they loved him so much that they were willing to do anything to be close to Him, however, I don’t think they fully understood what that meant.

What we see here is that their desire to be and walk alongside Jesus was a good desire, but the motive and the approach wasn’t right.

Among all the people that were following Jesus, he had 12 who were close to him, but even among the 12, there were 3 that were closest to him.

Peter, James & John.

What we see James and John doing is that they were pushing themselves to get pre-eminence over others, even pushing Peter out of the circle. In Matthew 20:20 Matthew writes that they got their mother to come to Jesus

and request him to allow her boys to sit next to him.

Looking at what John and James did, in verse 41 Mark writes “When the ten heard about this, they became indignant with James and John.” In other words, they saw it as a cheap stunt to get ahead of others in the group.

If I have to put that in the church context, it’s like us wanting to follow Jesus, wanting to come to church, have fellowship with brothers and sisters, wanting to participate in worship, listen to the word – all because we genuinely love Jesus and his people.

But the approach in which we do it could be by performance before God and others & even trying to push ourselves ahead of others

We often do that without even really understanding the truth of what it really means to be called a believer and to walk alongside Jesus.

I believe what this passage teaches us today is ‘What does it really means to walk alongside Jesus’, what does it mean to know Jesus as our Lord and saviour and walk in his paths. Three important lessons to remind ourselves.

To walk alongside Christ, we need to have the mind of Christ.

The number one lesson this passage teaches us is that “To walk alongside Christ, we need to have the mind of Christ.”
Let’s read through (v32 to v37)

32 They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid. Again he took the Twelve aside and told them what was going to happen to him. 33 “We are going up to Jerusalem,” he said, “and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, 34 who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise.”

35 Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to him. “Teacher,” they said, “we want you to do for us whatever we ask.”

36 “What do you want me to do for you?” he asked.

37 They replied, “Let one of us sit at your right and the other at your left in your glory.”

Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem, the place where he will be delivered over to the chief priest, condemned to death, handed over to the Gentiles, mocked, spat on, and hanged on the cross.

He is literally walking towards his painful death, and he is, in fact, leading the way. The verse says the disciples were afraid and at the same time astonished to see Jesus walking towards Jerusalem where the Pharisees and the teachers of the law hated him and was waiting to kill and torture him.

Can you imagine what’s going on in Jesus’s mind as he is taking that route?

I believe, all he was thinking was about was us – the disciples, you, me and the numerous lost souls for whom he left his heavenly glory, emptying himself, taking the form of a servant, humbled himself to become God’s perfect sacrifice for the sins of the whole world.

His mind was set on the purpose for which he came down to earth, sent by his Father in heaven.  To set us free from Sin and death.

He seems so full of it that he ends up reminding them once again that the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, 34 who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise.”

Now, What’s on the disciple’s mind?

Just as Jesus finished his statement, James & John immediately go to Him and says “Teacher,” they said, “we want you to do for us whatever we ask.”

Reminds me of a scenario in the office where the Manager just gave a presentation on the new marketing strategy and asks his team members to give feedback, and one guy raises his hand and says “Are we going to have Chinese for lunch today?”

It tells us two things about the guy, first, he wasn’t really paying attention to what his manager was talking, second, his agenda for the day was to have Chinese for lunch.

Is it possible for us to have a totally different agenda in our mind and be distracted when we come to church, when we approach Jesus in prayer, when we have fellowship with other believers? Yes, it is possible.

Is it right? NO
To walk alongside Christ, we need to have the mind of Christ.
Paul writes in his letter to Philippians 2:5-8

“Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

Paul is urging the Philippian believers to set their mind on the eternal things, just as Jesus did.

If we truly desire to be with Jesus and walk with him daily, we have to change the way we think, we can’t fix our eyes on the earthly things. Money, possessions, positions, pride – we have to lose sight of all these distractions and fix our eyes on the eternal purpose of God in our lives.

We can’t desire to walk with Jesus and worry about tomorrow, what we will eat, drink, where we will live and what we will wear.

It’s easy to say I want to be with Jesus but let us also be willing to have the mind of Christ – our hearts, minds and soul fixed on the eternal purpose for which we were created. – TO BRING GLORY TO GOD.

To walk alongside Jesus, we have to embrace the Cross (v38 – v40)

38 “You don’t know what you are asking,” Jesus said. “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?”

39 “We can,” they answered.

Jesus said to them, “You will drink the cup I drink and be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with, 40 but to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared.”

When Jesus said, “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?” Jesus meant to ask them, whether they are willing to carry their cross and follow his footsteps.

Just like in Matthew 16:24 where Jesus asks – “Are you willing to deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me?

“Take up your cross and follow Me” means being willing to die in order to follow Jesus. This is called “dying to self.” It’s a call to absolute surrender.

Which means dying to our fleshly desires, letting go of our carnal dreams, letting loose the things of the world, the emotions attached with the world, the needs of this world. Where we are fully trusting in God’s provision and providence for us on this life on earth.

I remember when I was a young believer my Pastor, every time we went to a cemetery or a funeral, he would look at me and say “Saju, do you know that dead men don’t feel any pinprick”, He will point me to the graveyards and tell me no matter what you tell these dead men they will never react to you, because they are dead.

And then he would go on to explain what it means to die to ourselves in the Kingdom of God. He would tell me, nothing of this world should move you or distract you from trusting in God and fulfilling His purposes. Consider yourself dead to the world.

(Luke 9:24-25) – “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?”

On the other hand, we should be aware that Christian life is a radical life, we’re going the systems of this world, the human cultures and traditions and beliefs. You are going against the very foundations on which this sinful world is established.

In Matthew 5 Jesus said you will be insulted, persecuted, falsely accused, for my name’s sake. Our family will hate us, our close friends will reject us, our society will mock at us. But rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven.

How can we endure these pain, persecution and hate? We can only do that when we are prepared to carry our cross and follow Jesus, dying to our self, denying the world & trust in God alone.

We can’t say that we enjoy the rains but don’t like the idea of getting wet.

In the say way, we can’t desire to walk alongside Jesus and don’t like the idea of embracing the cross & going through suffering for the sake of Christ. It is part and parcel of our Faith.

Sadly, every time Jesus would talk about carrying the cross his followers would keep reducing. Because even though they liked the idea of following Jesus they did not like the idea of letting go of the world.

Let’s check our hearts and see where do we stand?

To walk alongside Jesus, we have to be servants (v42- v45)

42 Jesus called them together and said, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. 43 Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

When the other 10 disciples look down on James and John, Jesus turns to them and tells them about what it really means to become great in the kingdom of God, which is what probably everyone in the room desired for.

He says unlike the Gentiles “whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first must be a slave of all.45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

No believer is called to sit on the pedestal and watch. We don’t follow Jesus or come to church just to be an audience, we are called to be participants in the Kingdom of God.

Nobody who claims to be a follower of Jesus should say that they love Jesus and love coming to church but are unwilling to serve in any manner. If our Lord whom we love and admire did not come to be served but to serve and give his life as a ransom for many. We also ought to have a heart of a servant.

We don’t wait from someone to come to us and assign us a role to serve. Instead, we ought to look for opportunities to serve in small and big measures as per our giftings.

We shouldn’t come to church with a consumerist mentality, where it’s all about us wanting what pleases us. Music of our taste, preacher of our style, church building of our status, a people group of our mindset etc.

We ought to be servants in the Kingdom of God if we desire to walk alongside Jesus.

Yes, it is great that you love Jesus but how are you serving one another with the love of Christ, when was the last time we sacrificed our time, money & pleasure to bring joy and encouragement to another brother or sister in the Lord.

Conclusion:

As I conclude, I want to encourage you to desire more to be and walk alongside Jesus but let’s do it with the motive and approach. Fully understanding that to walk alongside Jesus, we need to have the mind of Christ, we have to embrace the Cross & we have become servants.

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Categories
Mark Sermon

Gaining by Losing – Mark 10:17-31

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Good morning church! How’s everyone doing? For the last few months as a church we’ve been studying the gospel of Mark. We’ve completed a little over half of this book and are now in Mark 10:17-31.

Much of this gospel seeks to answer two questions: “Who is Jesus” and “if Jesus is God, then what does it mean for both you and me”. After all we probably know what it means to follow human leaders but what does it mean to follow God? There is this strong focus on being a follower of Jesus Christ that can’t be ignored in this gospel.

Does my entire life need to change? Or do I need to change a few habits here and there? These are the kind of questions we’ll attempt to answer as we look at today’s passage in Mark 10 starting in verse 17.

17 And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 18 And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. 19 You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’”

20 And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.” 21 And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 22 Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

23 And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” 24 And the disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how difficult it is[b] to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 26 And they were exceedingly astonished, and said to him,[c] “Then who can be saved?”

27 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.” 28 Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.” 29 Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel,

30 who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. 31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”

“You must sacrifice short term pleasure for long term success.”  Those are the words I told myself when I returned back to the gym after a long gap. The short-term pleasure being my love for eating fried food. I think every person at least superficially understands this concept: “You’ll need to give up something for the achieving something better”.

But Jesus totally turns this concept on its head when he says “You receive eternal life by abandoning everything”. “You follow me by leaving everything” “You will gain life by losing everything”. In the kingdom of God, we gain by losing everything! And it’s radically different from the way the world thinks. The world says “You gain by accumulating everything”.

After all it’s not the first time Jesus mentioned something like this. A few chapters earlier he said that if you want to be the greatest, you need to be least and a servant of all. Last week we read the passage where Jesus says unless you receive the kingdom of God like a child, you can’t enter it.

It’s truly an upside-down kingdom! The principles of this kingdom of God is the opposite of what we are used to experiencing every single day. That’s why there’s even more reason for us to pay close attention to hear the seriousness in the call to follow Jesus. It’s a weighty call but a yet a very fulfilling one.

So how can we gain life by losing everything?

We gain by losing our self-reliance (v17-20)

One of the biggest barriers that often prevents us from following Jesus completely is our dependence on our own self – our abilities, our ideas, our accomplishments, our good works.

We love the idea of a “self-made man” even though we might not declare it publicly.  We see the same trait in the rich young man. His self-reliance prevented him from:

Confronting the reality of God (v17,18)

He approaches Jesus and calls Him “Good Teacher”. Interesting way of addressing Jesus. And Jesus asks him “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone”.In other words, Jesus was asking him “Are you approaching me just as a teacher or as God?”

“Are you here just for good advice or do you want to really know me?” He had Jesus Christ – the Son of God, Maker of the heavens and the earth, the Messiah who saves the world, the sustainer of all creation right in front of him and he was blind to it.

Even his question was “What can I do to receive eternal life?” instead of “Jesus, can you give me eternal life?”.

Also his self-reliance prevented him from Conceiving the Holy Standards of God (v19)

Jesus starts listing out the Ten Commandments. “Do not murder…Do not commit adultery” And we know that God didn’t give His people the commandments so that they could perform, He gave them the commandments so that they would understand the holiness and righteousness of God.
I heard it once mentioned like this – God told us to not murder because He is life. God told us to not commit adultery because He is pure. God told us not to lie because He is truth! The rich young man failed to conceive the great divide between him and God. In Romans 3, Paul says the same thing. He says by the law no one becomes right with God…but the law was given so that you know that you have sinned.

His self-reliance prevented him from Confessing his need for a Savior (v20)

Because he thought he was doing exceptionally well in his performance, he basically was saying “Jesus, I know all this. What next?” He didn’t see how bad was his condition and how he needed to be rescued by God.Imagine a guy.

Let’s call him Jimmy who newly joins a company. A few days later he meets another colleague called Rohit. Since Jimmy is new to the company, Rohit takes time out to help him understand what he’s supposed to do. Instead Jimmy responds by saying “Rohit, you don’t have to do this. I already know all of this. I’ve been doing this forever.

” Shortly after this incident someone else comes and refers to Rohit as “Sir”. Jimmy is quite surprised and inquires and finds out that Rohit is the CEO of the company.  Trouble!!! The CEO sits down with Jimmy and tells him how he wasn’t actually doing his job correctly as he imagined. Not only did Jimmy insult the CEO by claiming to know more than the CEO but his attitude didn’t allow him to receive the necessary help to grow.

I think that’s what happens to us in our self-reliance and pride. Sometimes we are blinded to think how our efforts to have a consistent time with God everyday, being able to share the gospel with multiple people during the week or being a regular church attender or having restrained ourselves from falling into a particular sin in the week or our knowledge of the Bible is what makes us right before God.

These are all good things but your performance on these things doesn’t determine if you are right with God or not. In fact, if you are self-reliant you won’t be confronted with the reality of God as you read the Word, you won’t conceive the Holy Standard of God and neither will you confess your need for the Savior Jesus. You can see how self-reliance is a big barrier.

But not only do we need to lose our self-reliance, but we also need to

Lose our treasure (v21-25)

When Jesus told the rich young man to forsake his possessions, Jesus wanted to uncover what this man valued deeply – what he considered to be his treasure.

Jesus is essentially saying is that our heart matters more than our external acts of obedience! More than often our external acts of obedience is a mask to hide what’s really going on in our heart. Two things about heart treasures:

We treasure what we love (v21-22)

Till this point it seemed like the rich young man was willing to do whatever was needed to inherit eternal life but when Jesus told him to give up his treasure and possessions, he became extremely sad and went away because he loved money.

Right before him were two choices – Jesus Christ – Son of God – the one who could give him eternal life & money and he chose money. He gave up the eternal for what was temporary. You see the principle there – What he loved determined his choice.

You want to know what’s your heart treasure? Ask yourself this…what is the one thing or person in my life whose presence or absence changes my behavior? Think about a scenario when this thing or person is taken away from you forever, how is that going to make you feel? Would you lose all meaning to life? Would life seem worthless after that?

If the same meeting was done over and over again with the rich young man, do you think his response would’ve been different? No, because we treasure what we love.

We treasure what we trust

In v23-25, Jesus multiple times talks about how difficult and impossible it is for wealthy people to enter the kingdom of God.

Just to clarify Jesus is not saying that people above a certain income level are not going to enter the kingdom of God. Abraham, Isaac, David, Solomon are examples of godly men who were wealthy but I think Jesus meant those who trust in riches will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

But why such a strong judgment against those who trust in riches? I think it’s because wealth like any other heart treasure gives us an illusion of providing us with safety, security and joy.

It replaces itself in the place of God. That’s what makes us completely dependent on it. We say things like “We cannot live without it”. It in reality becomes our god.

I’m reminded of my friend whom I spoke to a few weeks back who went through a difficult break up. As we were speaking we were able to identify that this relationship was indeed his treasure. He didn’t know how to deal with the relationship breaking off.

To the extent where he was contemplating leaving the city and also hurting himself. I felt like it was a visual picture for me on how disastrous can it be to have heart treasures apart from God.

It’s not just with wealth and money. Some of us have made our jobs and careers our treasure. Others have made our relationships and family to be our treasure. Some of us have made self-pleasure our treasure. Maybe habits can be changed, but how do you change your love? How do you change what your trust?

That’s exactly the question that Peter asked…“Well then who can be saved?” And Jesus says “What is impossible for man is possible for God”. In other words, God needs to make a provision for you and I to lose our self-reliance & also lose our treasure.

God sent His one and only Son to the earth. Jesus Christ Himself lived the life you and I was required to live but couldn’t live. Ultimately, He died the death we all deserved to die.

He rose again on the third Day crushing not just the penalty of sin but also freeing us from the power of Sin. Do you want to change your love? Realize you’ll need God to perform a heart surgery to do that. He can certainly do it!

So what do we do in response to this great and amazing love? V28-30 says that…we lose everything that keeps us from following God and turn to Christ. We repent and trust Christ.

We repent and trust Christ. And this will invite persecution and rejection from family members as we see happening in reality with one of our brothers right now.

But we gladly follow Christ in spite of that because we love Him, we treasure Him, we trust Him and are deeply thankful for doing everything that was done for us.

Sometimes we forget how the story of God is the story of our God and Savior losing everything – he literally died so that He could rescue us in order to gain an everlasting relationship with us. Why should we be self-reliant? Why shouldn’t He be our only treasure? Lose everything to gain Him through His perfect work.

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Categories
Mark Sermon

To Such Belong The Kingdom – Mark 10:13-16

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]It is such a joy to come together as God’s people and sit under the instruction of His Word. I think it’s good for us to be consistently reminded that the Word of God is our only authority.

It is the Word of God that is living, and active and sharper than any 2-edged sword. It is the Word of God that heals, and comforts and brings conviction in our lives. It is the Word of God that will endure when all else fades away.

And so, when we come to this time each week where we open the Scriptures together, let’s come with expectant hearts. As we seek after Him let’s expect that He will transform us.

Let’s expect that He will conform us to the image of Jesus. Let’s expect that we will look different when we leave this place because we’ve been with Him.

And that’s our prayer this morning; that we would be with God in His Word and that He would bring glory to His name through our transformation. So, if you have a Bible with you, I’d encourage you to turn with me to Mark chapter 10. While you’re turning to Mark 10, I’ll take some time to ask the Lord to do these things in us. Would you pray with me?

We will be looking specifically at verses 13-16 this morning. It’s a very short text, but a very important one for our lives. And I would remind you that these verses are a part of our larger study of The Gospel of Mark.

So I would like to take just a few minutes and recap what we’ve been discussing in this overall narrative.

We’ve said before that Mark 8:27-30 represents a turning point in the life and ministry of Jesus. It’s about the halfway point in Mark’s gospel and it’s where Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ.

You might remember that Jesus looks at His disciples and says, “Who do the people say that I am?” The disciples responded, “Some say that you are John the Baptist, or Elijah, or one of the prophets.”

And then Jesus asked the disciples, “Who do you say that I am?”  To which Peter responds, “You are the Christ.”

That proclamation gives us an important dividing line in the gospel of Mark, where things begin to shift. Before Peter’s confession we read a lot about who Jesus is and how He lived. We get to read a lot about His character and His nature.

After Peter’s confession we read a lot about what Jesus has come to do; how His life is really about His death. And, as we reach chapter 10, Jesus is moving quickly toward Jerusalem.

He’s heading quickly toward the Cross and the culmination of what He came to the earth to accomplish. But as He’s heading toward Jerusalem, He’s still teaching and correcting the disciples.

We’ve said over & over again that the disciples still don’t really get the point. Which is why Jesus is always identifying these teachable moments where He reminds them of the truth about who He is and what He has come to accomplish.

Last week Saju unpacked one of those teachable moments as Jesus taught on the subject of divorce and remarriage. He pointed out how Jesus took the subject back to God’s intention for marriage. That marriage is, in fact, a covenant where a man and a woman become one flesh.

That is the way that God designed it to be. And divorce (like all of sin) is a distortion, a perversion of that design. It takes a gift, given by God for our good, and bends it toward a destructive end.

This morning we see Jesus use another teachable moment to show the disciples something significant about salvation and the Kingdom of God. And we need to make sure that we really understand this because it reminds us of something incredibly important for our lives as well. This is what Mark records in chapter 10, verse 13-16:

“And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them.” Mark 10:13-16

I’ve already said that the disciples still don’t get the point. That’s pretty obvious from this text. The picture that we have here is people attempting to bring children to Jesus, and the disciples are scolding them for it. They didn’t want Jesus to be bothered by the presence of children.

Now, culturally, that actually makes a lot of sense. In the culture at the time it would be normal to not have children around these types of interactions with adults, especially when there is teaching happening from a respected teacher.

So, culturally, it would have made sense for the disciples to rebuke the people trying to bring children to Jesus while He’s speaking. But we know that the gospel turns culture upside down. That the gospel is, in fact, creating a new culture. You see, the Kingdom of God has entered and things are different now. Jesus isn’t playing by the cultural rules that the people would expect.

So that’s one reason that Jesus opposed the disciples in this. But, it’s also because it wasn’t that long ago that Jesus had addressed this issue of children with the disciples. You might remember that the disciples were arguing about which one of them was the greatest.

And in the middle of the conversation where Jesus was correcting them, He took a child on His lap and said very clearly, “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me…” Which I believe implies that the converse is true:  If you don’t receive these children, you don’t receive me.

Now I realize that we don’t know exactly how much time had passed between that conversation and this conversation, but it couldn’t have been too long. Where Jesus said, “If you receive children, then you receive me.” And now we have an account of the disciples responding to children being brought to Jesus by telling them to go away.

It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, does it? I think the point is that the disciples still don’t really get it. They really don’t understand what Jesus is working to accomplish, and so they rebuke people from bringing the kids to Jesus. And Jesus became indignant with them.

And this provides the context for yet another teachable moment. In fact, Jesus sees an opportunity to drive down to the very core of what it means to enter into the Kingdom of God, what it means to have faith in Him. It’s found in what Jesus says in verse 15. Let’s read this again so it’s fresh in our minds: “Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.”

That’s what I want to focus our time on this morning because it gets right to the heart of the doctrine of salvation and how Jesus rescues us from sin & death. I want to begin this discussion by making a very simple statement, and then we’ll spend the rest of our time unpacking that statement:  The Kingdom of God cannot be earned, it can only be RECEIVED.

Now that’s a very different message than the message the world communicates to us. The world says that you must earn everything. The world says that who you are & what you have is determined by what you do.

We see that message all around us, don’t we? And so it’s no wonder that the religious systems that come from the world communicate the exact same message as it relates to how we are made right with God. Every religious system is a variation of that same message.

Here are the things that you must do in order to have right standing with God, in order to go to heaven. In order to be made whole and complete, you have to do these things (whatever those things are).

I’ve shared this illustration before, but this is the picture that comes to my mind when I try to describe how all of these religions work. It’s like God is on the top of a mountain and people are down at the bottom of the mountain.

And the goal is to get up to the top of the mountain to be with God. And so, Muslims believe one thing about how you get to God. And Buddhists believe another thing about how you get to God. And Hindus believe another thing about how they get to their God.

And people who claim to be Christians, but who don’t understand the truth of the gospel, believe yet another thing about how you get to God. It’s like there are all of these different paths that lead up the mountain to God, and each religion has their own path to get up that mountain.

And each of those paths represents some type of work that you must do, some type of achievement that allows you to travel up the mountain to be with God.

This is the picture of all the religious systems that have been crafted by man throughout the history of the world. But that is not the message of the Bible. That is not the picture that biblical Christianity paints for us.

The story that the Bible tells is that God is in fact up on that mountain by Himself because He is Holy. There is none like Him! He is the Alpha & the Omega, the beginning and the end, the Creator of the Heavens and the earth, the One in whom all creation finds its existence (including you & me). The Bible tells us that God is perfect in all of His ways and completely holy.

The Bible also tells us that we are, in fact, at the bottom of the mountain because of our sin. Romans 3:10-11 says that “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.” Verse 23 says that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” So, yes, we are at the bottom of that mountain separated from God and unable to be with Him because of our sin. I think Ephesians 2:1-3 puts it most clearly. “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience — among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”

So God is at the top of the mountain in His holiness. And we are at the bottom of the mountain in our sin. I don’t think that most of the religious systems of the world would disagree with that. But here’s where the truth of the Bible and all of the religious systems of the world disagree (and this is the point that Jesus is making in our text).

Where other religions say that you must do things to get to God (to get up that mountain), the Bible says that no amount of good works will ever get you up that mountain to God. That there is, in fact, nothing that you can do in and of yourself to be made right with God.

Which sounds like really bad news, right? But no, it’s actually the most beautiful news that ever was. Because God loves us so much, knowing we cannot get back to Him on our own, He came for us.

The Bible tells us that God has come down the mountain to be with us in the person & work of Jesus Christ. Romans 5:8 says that, “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

Paul says the same thing in a different way in Ephesians 2:4-5 (these are the verses right after the ones that we just read about being dead in our sins & trespasses). Paul writes, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.”

Friends, that is why the gospel of Jesus Christ is called “Good News”. We were hopeless & helpless, with no ability to do anything to rescue ourselves. But, because of His love for us, God has made a way for us to be reconciled to Him by grace.

And what is grace? It is a gift! It’s receiving something that you don’t deserve. Later, in Ephesians 2:8-9, Paul says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

This is what sets the message of the Bible apart from every other religious system ever developed by man. Our salvation can never be a result of our good works because no amount of working can get you up that mountain.

That’s because, apart from God, we are spiritually dead. I read a quote recently in a book that I’m reading on how the gospel creates in us a heart for our neighbors. It’s by Rosario Butterfield. This is what she said:

“We need God to come to us, to rescue us, because we can’t summon the strength to save ourselves and, even if we could, we would not know where to go. And this is what Jesus Christ did and does. Through union with and growth in Him, we are made new. We are redeemed, forgiven and adopted as children of God.”

The good works that we are able to walk in happen once you have been united with Jesus Christ. They happen once He has breathed life back into your soul. And so, those works are a result of the grace of God being poured out upon you through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on your behalf.

And this is what Jesus is communicating in our text. The Kingdom of God can never be earned, it must be received because it is the FREE GIFT of God to everyone who has FAITH (faith like a child).

Now, if I can, I’d like to briefly make 2 addition points very briefly, and then we’ll be done. 1) I want to talk about the reality of what happens if we don’t receive this gift and 2) I want to explain how you can receive this gift.

First, what is the result of not “receiving the Kingdom of God”? Well, to put it simply, it’s death. Romans 6:23 says that “the wages of sin is death.” That means that the payment that is due for our sin is spiritual & eternal death.

And someone has to pay that bill. If Jesus doesn’t pay the price for your sin, you will pay it — and it is eternally costly! 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9 says “Those who do not know God and those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.”

And so, the short answer is that those who do not receive this gift from God and enter into His Kingdom spend eternity separated from Him in hell.

Second, how do we receive the gift of the Kingdom of God. Well, on this point the Bible is equally clear. Romans 10:9 says, “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” This isn’t about agreement or intellectual belief. Satan and his demons know exactly who Jesus is and yet they are not saved. This is about submitting your life to the truth of who Jesus is.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Categories
Mark Sermon

How should Christians view Divorce – Mark 10:1-12

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]I’m excited to return back to the Gospel of Mark, but what we covered in our short series “Living out our Identity in Christ” was indeed refreshing and a beautiful reminder.

The passage we will be looking at today is from Mark 10:1-12 and the subject we will be dealing with is “How should Christians view Divorce“?

I want you to know that as I am preaching on the topic of Divorce this morning, both Jane and I have been dealing with a divorce situation with a very close Christian family.

The husband, who is also a father of two children, came home one day and told his wife that he is no more in love with her, he doesn’t find her attractive and that he has no feelings for her. And therefore, he wants a divorce from her.

As we walk with the family, we’re experiencing how devastating and painful it is for the wife and for the children. And while preparing for this sermon, I couldn’t stop thinking of how immature and foolish we can behave without having the right understanding of the Gospel truth concerning marriage.

We think we know these truths but when hardships, trails & temptations come our way they reveal the true state of our heart.

Today as we walk through Mark 10:1-12 and talk about Divorce I am happy for the opportunity God has given me to give you a godly perspective on this topic. As most of you sitting here are young men and women who are yet to get married, I want you to listen carefully and allow the Holy Spirit to convict your heart of sin patterns that if not dealt with can destroy your future relationships.

And as God reveals those sin patterns repent and believe in the Gospel and let these gospel truths transform your life.

I also believe this sermon will present to you the Church’s position on the subject of divorce so that you know what to expect from the leaders when such a situation arises.

If you have your bibles, let’s turn to Mark 10:1-12

To give you the context of this passage, as Jesus continues his ministry, the Pharisees envied him for his fan following and would look for opportunities to trap him. Their main intention was to turn the people against him.

Today’s passage is one such incident where the Pharisees pose a controversial question to Jesus. And the question was “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?“.

There may have been a couple of reasons why the Pharisees asked that question, and I don’t think I want to spend time exploring that aspect. But whatever the motives of the Pharisees were I’m glad that it opened an opportunity for us to get a godly perspective on the matter of divorce, and that too from the author of life himself.

When the Pharisees posed the question on divorce, Jesus replies with another question saying “What did Moses command you?” and they answered saying “Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.”

And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment.”

In other words, what Jesus was saying to them was that “it was not meant to be that way, but because of your hardness of heart & unwillingness to change Moses had to write that. If Moses hadn’t permitted divorce in that situation, you men would have done something even worse.”

And then Jesus goes on to tell them how in the beginning when God created male and female, the idea of joining them together was God’s design and that no man has the right to separate what God joined, and if a divorced man or women re-marries while the other partner is still alive or single, it is sinful in the eyes of God.

Obviously, there are a lot of practical questions in your mind relating to each one of the statements mentioned above, perhaps I will answer some of them. But what I want to do today is to turn our hearts to God because the goal of this message is not to give tips on how to protect your marriage from divorce.

The purpose of the message is to help us love Jesus and seek his Kingdom more than our spouse. It’s also to show you how in doing so, God protects and preserves our marriage, ultimately Glorifying His name on the Earth.

I want to put across three words that will help you unpack this passage for us and help us meet our goal.

Covenant

There are two basic kinds of relationships – Consumer relationship and Covenant relationship.

Consumer relationship is the kind of relationship we have with our local vegetable vendor. As long as he supplies fresh vegetables for a reasonable price, we will buy vegetables from him. But the day he stops giving us fresh, good quality vegetables, we will quit going to him and instead approach another vegetable vendor.

In a consumer relationship, our needs are more important than the relationship itself.

This is how the ungodly view Marriage, as long as they get what they want they will stick with that relationship. The day they stop getting what they want they want to get out of that relationship.

On the other hand, a Covenant relationship is a kind of relationship between a parent and the child. No matter how much mischief our children get into and the tantrums they throw, we don’t abandon them and go pick up another child.

Concerning marriage when Jesus said “At the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”

From the words of Jesus we clearly understand that marriage was meant to be a Covenant relationship and not a Consumer type relationship.

The term “one flesh” comes from the Genesis account of the creation of Eve. Genesis 2:21-24 describes the process by which God created Eve from a rib taken from Adam’s side as he slept.

Adam recognized that Eve was part of him—they were in fact “one flesh.” The term “one flesh” means that just as our bodies are one whole entity and cannot be divided into pieces and still be a whole, so God intended it to be with the marriage relationship. There are no longer two entities (two individuals), but now there is one entity (a married couple).

And therefore, in a covenant relationship, the relationship between the two is more important than the interest of each individual before they were united.

An even better example of the covenant relationship is the relationship between God the Father, the creator of this universe, with his chosen children, us.

When we read the Bible, we see a plan that was established in eternity past when God, Son and the Holy Spirit covenanted together to redeem us. We understand how God keeps his covenant that even while we were sinners, he sent his son Jesus to die for our sake.

For God, relationship with us was more important.

Therefore, a marriage relationship can be protected from divorce only when we understand and Covenant relationship. And in a covenant relationship separation is not an option.

Violation

The second word I want us to remember is Violation.

Violation, in legal terms, means ‘the action of breaking a contract or an agreement.”

If marriage is a covenant, divorce is a violation of the covenant we make with our spouse. A marriage between two believers in God’s presence, witnessed by God’s people is a Sacred and Holy union – It is what God has joined together.

In verse 9 & 11, 12 Jesus said, “what God has joined together, let no one separate. Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

Jesus is not just talking about outsiders who create divisions in a marriage, but the husband and wife themselves have no right to separate what God has joined  – No matter what excuse you have it doesn’t matter.

Separation through Divorce is a direct violation of Gods original design for marriage – even in case, the other partner is caught in adultery.

If you dig deep into the root of divorce, it is selfishness, pride, unwillingness to change, unwillingness to forgive, reluctance to bear with each other, unwillingness to humble one’s self; it is deeply rooted in sin.

In God’s loving kindness through his covenant relationship when He created us in his image, he gave us a free will, so that willfully we would obey him, honor him and Glorify him. But in the garden of Eden, we violated all his commands.

And because of Adam and Eve’s violation of God’s commands, we too are born sinful.

Since the time we were born all we do, day in and day out is violate God’s Holy commands and refuse to bind ourselves in God’s loving covenant relationship. We try to attain freedom and power and dominion without God, not realizing that the devil’s lies and deception.

The devil told Eve that by disobeying God “You will certainly not die”, “That when you eat from the tree (God commanded not to eat) your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Instead, we had to face the consequences of our disobedience, our spirit died and became eternally condemned to death. God cast mankind out of the circle of trust, bond and fellowship they shared and more devastating was that it broke our relationship with our loving creator God who meant it all for good.

The evil we see around today in our generation is the repercussions of our broken relationship with our Creator. The tendency to violate God’s Holy command is what is also seen in a divorce situation.

Restoration

But this is the beauty of Gods covenantal relationship with us. Even though we violated all his commands, we sinned, we rebelled, we disobeyed.

In Psalm 103:10 the psalmist writes “But God did not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.”

John 3:16 “For God so loved us, that he gave his only Son, to die for us, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”

In Romans 5:8 Paul writes “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us”.

Isn’t that a beautiful expression of a covenant relationship?

In Jeremiah 2:13 the prophet says by worshiping idols under every green tree we committed adultery against the Lord, like a faithless wife who leaves her husband we too were drowning in our sin.

But Jesus, who is also called as our bridegroom came back for his bride, to take all our guilt and shame, clean us from all our iniquities and  restore our souls. He died for our sake and later rose again victoriously, sitting at the right hand of God the Father, interceding for us.

And all that is required from us it to repent of our sins and fall in love with Jesus and put our trust in him.

And when we find ourselves in a relational issue, especially marriage, here’s how our response should look like.

Just, as our heart and flesh tend to violate God’s commands day in and day out. We need to change this pattern by going to God day in and day out, repenting of our sins and putting our faith in his son Jesus – Remembering the Gospel, adorning Christ, mending back our relationship with our creator God.

And as we do that, the Spirit of God deals with the root Sin, deals with our selfishness, deals with our pride, with our unwillingness to change, our unwillingness to forgive, unwillingness to bear with one another. Eventually restoring our hearts back to God.

I believe if our friend who just decided to divorce his wife had a genuine love relationship with God, he would have never even thought of separation. Christ’s love would have compelled him to love his wife as Christ loved him. Not based on feelings or outward appearance but because of the covenant relationship, he was into.

Finally, based on what we’ve learnt so far, I want to share three practical advice that you should apply to your situation.

  1. If you are unmarried and looking out for a partner, don’t marry someone who merely calls himself/herself a believer, but marry the person who’ve truly understood the Gospel, knows what a covenant relationship means and is genuinely in love with Jesus.
  2. If you are already married, my advice to you is to live a Gospel-centered life, know that your marriage is covenant relationship united by God, love Jesus more than your spouse, and whether in good times or bad times, whether your partner is believer or an unbeliever – Let your life display the fruit of the Spirit. Love, Serve and Submit to one another in all humility.
  3. If you are divorced, my advice to you is repent before God, and believe in the Gospel. If your spouse is still alive, single, believer of Jesus and willing to reunite, make every effort to restore that relationship back.

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Categories
Mark Sermon

How must we respond to Sin and Temptation

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Good morning church! If you’ve been tracking with us over the last few months, as a church we’ve been preaching through the gospel of Mark. Right now we are in Chapter 9.

We are back in our study of the gospel of Mark this week.

As you all know we took a short break from our study to do a series on Living out our Identity in Christ. And that was a wonderful reminder for our heart to know the identity that Christ has given us. Even though that series is over, we’ll often be coming back to those themes as we deal with various scriptures. We are right now in Mark 9 v42-50.

As you are turning to the passage, I’ll share the background of today’s text. Jesus announced for the second time that he’s going to suffer and die on the cross and be raised on the third Day. The disciples don’t understand what Jesus is saying and they seem to be more concerned about finding out who’s the greatest among them.

Jesus uses this opportunity to teach them on servant-hood. He says “if you want to be first, you should be last and a servant of all. You should care for the least and insignificant. You should welcome and accept those who follow me even though they might not be in our tribe”. God is concerned about all his disciples…especially the ones that are weak and different.

42 “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,[g] it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. 43 And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell,[h] to the unquenchable fire.[i] 45 And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. 47 And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, 48 ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’ 49 For everyone will be salted with fire.[j] 50 Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”

As you’ve noticed in the gospels, Jesus used different figures of speech while he taught his disciples. Sometimes he used parables, other times he used metaphors and now in today’s text he uses “hyperbole”. Hyperbole means exaggerating a thought in order to drive home a point.

Most of us growing up would have heard either our teacher or parent say something on these lines “If your friend jumps into the well, would you do that also?”

Now they don’t literally mean that we jumped into the well or needed to that in the future…it was a way for them to drive home a point to not be easily influenced by our friends. At the same time this passage has got a very direct, convicting tone. Three things that this passage tell us of:

  1. Caution – Cautioning us from being a stumbling block
  2. Cut-off – Cutting off the patterns of sin from within
  3. Confirm – Confirming that our faith is Real

Caution – Cautioning us from being a stumbling block

42 “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,[g] it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.

It’s important for us to first understand who are these “little ones”? Those are believers who the world may see as weak and insignificant. I think this could also refer to new young believers who join the church at a very tender stage in their spiritual life.

But these believers are not insignificant to God…in fact they are very precious! God loves them and deeply cares for His people especially those who are lowly and powerless.

But why such a severe judgment upon them? Jesus is saying in comparison to the judgment that will come upon those who cause these young believers to sin, it’ll be better for them to tie a heavy millstone on their neck and be hurled into the sea!

It’s because believing in Jesus is more than intellectually agreeing to facts. Believing in Jesus means that you are united to Him. It means that you belong to Him.

Just a few verses earlier, Jesus tells them 37 “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me.” It’s a very close intimate relationship that God has with His children.

Jesus takes it upon Himself to guard & protect you. Anything that causes a young believer to distrust and disobey Christ does not only mean harm to the person but Christ as well.

That’s why Paul when he’s answering the question if it’s right or wrong to eat food offered to idols, he tells the Corinthians to always think about the weaker brother and not be a stumbling block for him. He says when “sinning against your brothers[e] and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ.” (1 Cor 8:12)

I may have shared this story with you all…As a brand-new believer in Mumbai, I started following all these prosperity televangelists. What I didn’t realize at the time was how they were abusing the weak and the naive.

Even I remember “sowing a seed” in one of these ministries because the pastor promised that it’ll come back to me double-fold or ten times more.

And with their lavish lifestyle, their luxurious home, cars and expensive suits – what they were doing by twisting Bible verses and through their lavish lifestyle was feed into my idolatry.

The truth is ultimately I wanted those things more than Jesus and more and more stumbling blocks were put in my way that was causing me to distrust and disobey my Savior. I praise God that He freed me from that but we know how they continue to prey on young, weak believers in the same way even today.

And it’s not just the prosperity preachers. Prosperity preachers are more like in your face & actively placing stumbling blocks but there are other ways how we do that passively. It happens when we are persistently unrepentant of our sins. When young believers see us have a very casual approach to sin and sometimes even worse when they see us enjoy and brag about our sin, it can really cause a lot of damage.

It’s different when you come to your brothers or sisters and grieve over a sin pattern and look for hope and healing in the gospel. But what I’m talking about is persistent unrepentance. A feeling where you think “I’m okay with my sin…It’s not as bad as some others”. Sin is serious and it is a serious offence to God! That brings me to point number 2

Cut-off – Cutting off the patterns of sin from within

43 And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell,[h] to the unquenchable fire.[i] 45 And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. 47 And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, 48 ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’

It’s not referring to literally cutting yourself. It’s a hyperbole! But it does tell us 3 things:

  1. Identify the sin – “If your hand causes you to sin” You’re not being generic but very specific of those sins that you know are affecting your relationship with God.
  2. Take Radical Steps to cut off the sin – You’re not just sitting and saying “what to do? I guess I’ll be living in this sin forever or God is so gracious so He’ll forgive”. That’s not how it is for a believer. A believer does whatever it takes to fight the sin.
  3. Immediate response – It’s not telling you to deal with the sin tomorrow and sometime in the future. Right now cut off the sin! Today cut off the sin!

And this passage makes it very clear – what’s at stake is eternity! Now we know that it’s not our efforts or works that can save us from hell. Today if you have eternal life, if you’ve been given a passport to the kingdom of God, if you’ve been protected from being eternally separated from God – it’s only and only because Christ died for your sin.

But let’s realize Our attitude to cutting off sin shows that Christ’s blood has washed us. Our attitude to cutting off sin shows that we are truly His.

Imagine a guy who has a problem with diabetes. He’s got very high blood sugar. The doctor tells him that he cannot have any sugar or sweets or it’ll be fatal. The guy agrees to the doctor when he’s at the clinic and goes back and tells his family the diagnosis. However, when he’s browsing on the internet he keeps looking at the newest editions of Dairy Milk.

He goes to work and tells his colleagues how much he loves chocolate and how amazing the taste is. He looks through the magazine and gazes at the image of the newly imported Swiss chocolate that’s now available in India.

What do you think is going to happen the next time he’s at the grocery store? He is going to buy chocolates! Because even though he identified his diabetes problem, he didn’t take any radical steps and immediate steps to tackle it.

Similarly, what sin is God calling you to cut-off today? It maybe the circle of friends that you’re in close relationship with. You know that they constantly influence you to sin but you keep hanging around.

What would it mean for you to cut it off? It might be a dating relationship that you are currently involved in and you know it doesn’t honor God. Or it’s images on your computer screen or mobile phone that’s enslaved you. Or it may be social media and entertainment that’s filling your mind. Or it might be unforgiveness that has held your heart captive for so long.

God’s Word tells us to Cut it Off!  Take very strong steps to cut it off. Even if means inconvenience or discomfort but cut it off! People around you might think you are crazy to take these steps. But you do whatever it takes to honor God and preserve your best affections for Christ!

Rom 13:14: make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Confirm – Confirming that our faith is Real

49 For everyone will be salted with fire. [j] 50  Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”

This suddenly is a puzzling statement. We were talking about Caution and Cut-off but what is this whole conversation about “Salt”. Again…it’s a figure of speech. In those times, the people’s main source for salt would come from the Dead Sea. It had to be processed properly to be in a usable condition. If it wasn’t processed properly, it would taste really bad and couldn’t be used in the food.

What does this have to do in this context?

I believe what these verses say is that fire or hardships and trials will truly reveal those who are real disciples of Christ! And just as unprocessed salt is useless for the food, a life that isn’t actively cutting off sin is useless and dead.

James 2:17 says “So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” Real faith will express itself in good works. It’s like two sides of the same coin.

Let me ask you, how do you know that you are a believer in Christ? You might say “I prayed the sinner’s prayer”. I’m not saying God doesn’t use it but there’s no mention of a sinner’s prayer in the Bible. It’s not a mantra prayer that guarantees salvation.

But you may say “Every Sunday when I worship I’m really moved in my heart”. But that in itself is just an emotional experience. Well I know a lot of Scripture from the Bible and I know the churchy language. Be we know from Scripture that even the demons know a lot of Scripture. James says “Even the demons believe that God is One and shudder”.

What’s the solution then?

Don’t look at yourself and your actions but look to the cross. Look and see the Son of God who died on your behalf and rose again on the third Day to completely destroy and free you from the power of sin!

Look at his perfect provision for you. (Rom 5:8) and if you call upon him today and believe not in your works but His perfect work on the cross for you…you will be saved (Rom 10:9). Would you want to experience real faith today by trusting Jesus?

For others, you know you have real faith. You truly grieve over your sin and have tried every single way to cut-off that sin-pattern and have seen a lot of failure. I just want to remind you of the power and the tools that are at your disposal to wage war against sin. You have the Holy Spirit within you. And the Holy Spirit will strengthen you to kill and cut-off sin as you humble yourself, turn away from your sin and yield to what the Spirit asks you to do today.  

Romans 8:13 – For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

In 1 John it says that He who is in you is greater than He who is in the world.

Would you call out to God and ask Him to help you hate your sin and develop great and intense affections for the Savior today? And would you commit yourself to close group of believers who will hold you accountable and help you cut off the sin that is within![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Categories
Sermon

Living out our lives as Ambassadors for Christ

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]This sermon is from a series called “Living out our Identity in Christ”.

In today’s sermon, we will look into another aspect of our Identity which is equally important as others and the verses we will be looking at is 2 Corinthians 5:18-21.

But before we look into the final aspect of our Identity, let us take some time out and review what we’ve learned so far in this series.

I believe there is nothing more important than the subject of who we are because of who He is.

Understanding our identity in Christ will allow us to see our lives in the right perspective just as God intended it to be, making much of each moment.

In general, most people living in this world are absolutely unaware of their identity – where they came from, who made them, what is the purpose of their lives, etc.

And because people are unaware of their identity, they live as men who blindly following the traditions and cultures of this world passed on to them from one generation to another generation.

Our lives have become just like the 5 monkeys shown in the illustration below.

We are living our lives but not as God intended it to be, not according to the purpose for which God created us.

We do what we’re asked to do, we act as we are taught to act, we believe the things we’re asked to believe.

Because of which we’ve created limitations in life based on what we’ve learned from our ancestors and fail to seek the truth.

In the same way, when we become Christians we don’t stop there but go on to discover who we really are because of who God is. And as we discover these truths, we learn to live the way God originally designed us.

Therefore, if some of you have not been able to soak yourselves in the truth about your identity that has been shared so far, I urge to reflect on it again and allow these truths to change the way you think and live.

In Ephesians 1:18 Paul writes “..having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints.”

Here are the sermon notes from the same series:

In today’s sermon, we will look into another important aspect of our Identity which is the outward manifestation of the inward change that happens in our heart.

We will learn how to experience true joy, fulfilment and freedom as we live our lives based on our identity.

Lets read 2 Corinthians 5:18-21

“All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

The final aspect of our Identity is that we are “Ambassadors for Christ”.

  1. Chosen by the King

So during the time of the Roman rule, an ambassador was a respected official acting as a representative of a nation. Posted in a foreign land, the ambassador’s role was to reflect the official position of the sovereign body that gave him authority. Therefore, an ambassador was directly appointed by the King, not voted into position.

This is perfect in the sense that we too are chosen by God through Christ before the foundations of the world, to be holy and blameless in His sight,  and now accepted, loved and forgiven.

All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, chosen and saved so that we become representatives of God in this earth – Entrusted with the message of reconciliation.

What a great privilege it is – to be called ambassadors of God!  To know that God reached out to unworthy people like us, unimaginably below the standards of God’s Holiness is simply extraordinary.

  1. Committed only to the State’s interests

Once an ambassador, that person’s commitment, desire, goals, dreams and loyalty was only to the King.

We need to understand that to be an ambassador for God is a high calling. The day we decide to turn away from our sins and believe in the gospel, our hearts desires change, our dreams change, our goals change.

We fall in love with the King who chose and adopted us and who loved us in our worthlessness. As we seek him daily, listen to his voice through his word, allow his words to convicts us of our sins, continue to put our faith in the Gospel – we experience unspeakable joy in our hearts.

I’ve experienced it myself – When I abide in Him daily I see the fruit of it manifested through my conduct, speech and attitude while I’m at work. I don’t have to put an extra effort to represent Christ in my workplace.

But when I fail to abide in him, I don’t see much fruit in my life at work.

Therefore, as an Ambassador, seek him daily, allow him to change your dreams, your desires and make you passionate for something greater, greater than all your earthly pursuits – enabling you to experience things that eyes have not see, ears have not heard nor has anyone ever imagined

  1. Full Support from the King

The Ambassador gets full support from his King for the task assigned to him – whether the provision, resources, encouragement,  military support etc, the same way that our God has provided for us – The HOLY SPIRIT, our helper.

In John 14:15-17 Jesus said

 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even 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.

Through the Holy Spirit, he has equipped us to do even greater things than Jesus did.

 “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. – John 14:12-14

The Holy Spirit is given to us to convict our hearts of sin (John 16:7-11), as a counsellor (John 14:16), a guide (John 16:13) and to bring Glory to Christ in and through our lives (John 16:14).

What a wonderful God we serve.

Therefore, our dependence should be on God and the Holy Spirit whom he has given us to represent Him as His Ambassadors.

As I conclude, I believe that through these series you have gained a better understanding of your true Identity and pray that will change the way you live, talk, behave, love, accept, forgive and to know that at the end of your life, you have run the race well.

 

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Categories
Sermon

Living out our lives as New Creation in Christ

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Today’s preaching is from a series called “Living out our Identity in Christ”.

Good morning church. It’s great to be with you this morning and it’s always a privilege to open to Scriptures together like this.

With the news of increasing persecution in places throughout India, again in China, and in other places throughout the world, I don’t want to take this time for granted. Those are contexts where believers must gather together in secret locations and be very careful how they handle God’s Word in public. I don’t want to take this opportunity for granted.

We get to gather as God’s church and freely worship Him this morning. We get to come together in plain sight and study His Word together. This time is such a gift!

So let’s approach His Word this morning with a sense of reverence, with a sense of humility & awe, and with a hunger to be conformed into the likeness of Jesus. To that end, I’ll have you grab your Bibles and turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 5. While you’re turning to 2 Corinthians chapter 5, I’ll take a few minutes and pray for all of us – that the Lord would do His work in us this morning.

Here’s what I’d like to do with our time this morning. I want to take the first portion of our time to recap where we’ve been over the last 3 weeks in this series.

If you’ve been here for those sermons you’ll know that we’ve spent the last few weeks talking about our IDENTITY IN CHRIST. The reason I want to spend a good amount of time recapping those discussions is because there is literally nothing more important that we could talk about.

There is nothing more important than the subject of who you are because of who He is.

In fact, everything that comes out of our lives must be shaped by our identity in Jesus Christ or we’ll easily find ourselves doing things with the wrong motivation. Isaiah 29:13 — “This people draw near with their mouth and honour me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me.”

We don’t want to find ourselves saying & doing the right things but with hearts that are far from Lord. And one of the primary ways that we can keep that from happening is by continually reminding ourselves of our true identity in Christ. That’s the point of this series.

So, we’re going to invest a good amount of time this morning in reminding our hearts of the truths that we’ve already discussed in this series. I think there will be great value in hearing those things presented together.

And then, once we’ve done that, I want to forge ahead and discuss a new aspect of our Identity as Christians. We’ll add another building block to the foundation that we’ve already laid.So let’s recap where we’ve been before we read our text and explore what’s next. As I lay these things out, I want to encourage you to hear these fresh ears.

And, I want you to PERSONALIZE THESE THINGS. These things aren’t just true for Christians in general.

If you are in Christ, these things are true of you! And the application on all of these points is that you would believe. That you would hear the truth, be reminded of the gospel (of who you are), and that you would believe these truths.

That you would believe them to the point where you begin to act like who you really are

1) Chosen and adopted. God chose you from before the foundation of the world. You have not earned your way into God’s favour. He acted upon you. And He chose you for adoptions as sons and daughters.

You didn’t do anything to earn that name. you were given God’s family name and that now defines who you are and shapes everything you do.

2) Accepted, loved and forgiven. God has accepted you through His Son! People will live their entire lives looking for the approval and acceptance of other people.

They are really just trying to fill the longing that we all have to be accepted by God. What a beautiful reality that, in Christ, we are fully accepted by God.

And not just accepted, but loved deeply. God didn’t just foreknow you, He for-loved you. He set His affections on you.

When you and I were unlovely, God loved us. And, because of that, He has forgiven us. You have been washed clean, you have been purified. Your sin has been removed from you.

 

3) We are citizens of God’s Kingdom. This is not our home. It doesn’t matter what your passport says. If you are in Christ, your citizenship is to another place and you belong to another King.

That truth helps remind us to not tie our hope and affections to the things of this world.

Just think about this list so far:  chosen, adopted, accepted, loved, forgiven, citizens of the Kingdom of God. That is an incredible list of things that are true of you if you are in Christ.

But, here’s my question:  If all of those things are true of the Christian, if those are the things that are supposed to be shaping our identity and driving joy, and hope, and peace in our lives, then why are so few people who profess Jesus Christ experiencing actual joy, hope and peace? I think that’s a fair question.

Because, if we’re going to be honest, when you look around the landscape of modern Christianity, you see a lot of people who claim to be Christians. They claim to love & follow Jesus. They know a lot of things that are true about God and they profess those things with their lips.

But there doesn’t seem to be a lot of joy, or contentment, or satisfaction in God. In fact, the opposite seems to be true. There seems to be a deep dissatisfaction that’s driven by the circumstances of life. So, here’s my question:  Why is that? What’s broken? What’s misfiring?

I believe the answer is that there are a lot of people who genuinely do want to know God. There are a lot of people who genuinely want to walk with Him and experience more of Him, but they are living their lives with the wrong perspective (they have the wrong mindset).

In fact, I think to some degree, that has crept into each one of our hearts. That, on some level, each one of us has areas of our lives where we don’t have the right perspective or right set of lenses. In fact. I know that’s true, because that’s where idolatry & unbelief are born. They are often born in our blindness.

And there’s an underlying principle that we need to understand, if we’re really going to get to the heart of this issue:  I believe that many Christians are waiting for something to happen that has already happened.

And it’s crippling our ability to rest in God, to live content in Him, and to live for His glory in the world. That’s what I want to consider with you this morning and I want to consider it from 2 Corinthians chapter 5. Let’s read this text and then we’ll unpack it together. Beginning in verse 13 and reading through the end of the chapter.

2 Corinthians 5:13-21

“For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.

From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

I absolutely love this section of text. In fact, it’s one of my favourites in the entire Bible because it paints such a vivid picture of what Christ has done and what that has done to us.

And that’s essentially what this week’s message and next week’s message are all about. We’ll talk this morning about what Christ has done to us and then we’ll talk next week (from this same text) about what that calls us to in the world.

So, for our purposes this morning, I think that what Paul is saying here hinges on the statement we find directly in the middle of the text: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”

That’s our identity statement for this week: :  “If you are in Christ, YOU ARE A NEW CREATION.”  That phrase, in this text, helps us understand what Paul writes before and after it, and I believe it helps us understand why so many professing Christians lack the kind of abundant life (joy, peace, and hope) that we’re called to in Christ.

So, here’s what I’d like to do. I want to break this down for us in a way that we can, not just cognitively understand it, but actually live in it practically. Where we begin to walk this truth out so that it produces real fruit in our lives.

The first thing I want to highlight is that Paul uses a word for creation that doesn’t just refer to an individual person, but that refers to the whole of creation.

The way that Paul phrases this he’s really saying that if you are in Christ you are a part of a newly created order. In other words, when you are united with Christ in His death and resurrection, you are brought into the work that God is doing to make all things new. It’s not just that you are a new creation, but you are a part of the new creation.

But, here’s what we need to understand (and this is where I think we miss it): THAT’S TRUE RIGHT NOW. There is a sense in which we are waiting for God to glorify us in Christ; to finish the work that He has begun in us. But that doesn’t change who you are right now in Christ. And Paul says that you are a new creation.

Now, if we’re going to be honest, there’s tension in that for us. That sure doesn’t feel true a lot of the time, does it? Because, even though this is true of us, we still live in a fallen world and sin still resides in our mortal bodies. So, while we are a new creation, we are still carrying around this flesh that houses sin and evil desires.

This is what Paul highlights at the end of 2 Corinthians chapter 4… . He says, “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.

For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as 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.” (Verses 16-18)…

Paul is saying that there’s an aspect here of the “already & not yet”. If you are a believer in Christ, at the very core of your being, you are new and you are being renewed daily by Him. That’s true of your spiritual self, but it’s not true yet of your physical body. Your physical body is currently wasting away, but will one day catch up and be renewed as well.

So yes, you are a new creation. However, you still battle sin in your flesh. It’s vitally important that we know and understand this because, if we’re going to live out our identity in Christ, we must learn to live by the reality of who we are spiritually and allow that to shape everything else in our lives.

That’s important because we have the choice to live according to the Spirit or to live according to the flesh. This is what Paul says explicitly in Romans 8:5 — “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.”

That’s what I meant earlier when I said that I think many of us are living with the wrong mindset; we’re living with the wrong perspective. We forget about the fact that we are a new creation.

Which causes us to focus on our flesh and the struggle happening within us. Which causes us to regard everything according to the flesh. Which causes us to set our minds then on the flesh and not on the Spirit.

And that produces the opposite of joy, peace, satisfaction, contentment and fulfilment. It causes discontentment, and worry, and anxiety, and frustration, and the like.

So, the question is, how do we remedy this? How do we live differently? Well, it begins on the level of belief. Do you believe that you are a new creation in Christ Jesus? Do you really believe that He died (for you) and was raised from the dead (so that you could be made new)? Do you believe that, as you sit here right now, that is true of your life?

If you believe that, this is just a matter of changing the set of lenses that you are wearing. You need to get used to taking off the lens of the flesh and putting on the lens of the Spirit. And you need to remember that you will always have a tendency to drift back toward the lens of the flesh.

In this life, you and I will always have a tendency to forget the gospel. We will have a tendency to forget the things that are true of us. That is why it is so vitally important that we are reminded consistently of the gospel.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Categories
Sermon

Living out our lives as Citizens of God’s Kingdom

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Good morning church! As a church we’ve been doing a series called “Living out our identity in Christ”.

Why is this important? Because everything we do, every decision we make flows out from our identity. What makes us who we are. Who we are at the core of our being.

Over the last two weeks we learnt how we build our identities on many things – it can be our jobs, our role in the family, how much money we make or even in the relationship that we have. And all these identities leave us empty and unsatisfied. God has given us a new wonderful identity in Christ which is eternally significant.

So we learnt how we are Chosen and Adopted in Christ. And last week we learnt how we are Accepted, Loved and Forgiven in Christ. Today we’ll be look at 1 Peter 1 to understand our identity as “citizens of God’s kingdom”. I love 1 Peter because I believe this entire letter talks about this identity. Let’s look at 1 Peter 1:13-21.

13 Therefore, preparing your minds for action,[b] and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance,

15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct,

16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

17 And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile,

18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold,

19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.

20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you

21 who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

I’ve always found the life of a foreign diplomat interesting. Imagine an Indian ambassador that’s posted in another country. Even though the Indian diplomat is in a new culture and tries to engage with the culture as much as he can, he still preserves his national identity.

Maybe he might use a fork and spoon instead of hands when he’s in a foreign country but his allegiance to India will not change.

Even though he’s in a foreign country, he will responsibly manage his speech and his actions because he is a representative of India.He represents India to the world.

Similarly, you and I who have trusted in Jesus as Lord are citizens of God’s kingdom. We might have a passport saying that we belong to a certain country but much more than that we are citizens of God’s kingdom. Representatives of God to the world.

As citizens what do we do and difference does that make to you and me?

We live with an eternal focus
(v13) We need to set our hope fully on the grace that will be revealed to us in Christ Jesus. What is this grace that will be revealed when Christ comes back? The passage right before this one talks about that.

We will receive an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading. The reward for those who trust in Christ’s work for them is an eternal inheritance. We will also receive a new physical body that will be like Christ’s – one without corruption and sin and that will last for eternity! So if that’s the grace that will be revealed to us when Christ comes, then how can we live with an eternal focus:

Prepare our minds for action
preparing your minds for action,[b] and being sober-minded (v13)

The Greek word for “prepare your minds” in the Greek is actually a visual term used to depict how people in ancient times with their long robes would tie a leather belt around their waist to get ready to go on a journey or to do some physical work. Basically they didn’t want their long robes to impede their journey.

And that’s the term that’s used in the command – prepare your minds for action! In the light of receiving a wonderful gift of an eternal inheritance, you have to prepare your minds for action.

Have you heard of the term “spiritual vacation”? Well spiritual vacation is when people decide to take a break from their spiritual lives. Relax from all the spiritual disciplines or from living in holiness or serving people.

In my life there is a strong temptation to take a spiritual vacation on weeks when I’m not preaching. It constantly needs to be fought! And I believe we fall into this temptation because at some level we don’t believe that Christ’s coming is imminent. Or we don’t believe in the eternal value and worth of that future reward.

This kind of spiritual vacation needs to be fought. We need to remind each other that because God has assured and confirmed our eternal destiny through the work of Christ, we need to prepare our minds for action.

So even when we are on vacation with family or friends, there’s no concept of spiritual vacation for a believer. We are always pursuing the things of God. Okay, you might ask – how do I prepare my mind for action?

b.Pursue our calling for holiness

14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

The verse starts of by reminding us of our identity – obedient children. Relationally we are God’s children – chosen and adopted before the foundation of the world.

In our attitude to our Father, we are obedient. The verse goes on to say “do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct”. There is an active participation in this pursuit of holiness. Christian life isn’t about relaxing and allowing sin to take its course but it’s a constant war with sin.

The reason for Holiness – is because our Father is Holy! As believers sometimes, we forget or minimize this attribute of God. Because we are on this side of the cross – having experienced God’s grace and mercy, knowing that we’re relationally his children and His Friend we end up emphasizing less on the Holiness of God. God is still the same, yesterday today and forever.

When Moses meets God for the first time through the burning bush – God tells him to take off his sandals because he was standing on holy ground because God is Holy.

In Exodus 19, right before God gives them the 10 commandments on Mount Sinai, God commands Moses to consecrate the people for 2 days, on the third Day He said put limits around the mountain because whoever touches the mountain will be put death because God is Holy.

Isaiah 6 when he sees a vision of heaven and the 2 seraphim covering their faces and feet with the wings, they call out to each other: “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord Almighty” because God is Holy.

Isaiah seeing this says “Woe to me! I am ruined for I am a man of unclean lips among a people of unclean lips and my eyes have seen the King the Lord Almighty” because God is Holy.

Hab 1:13 “it says You who are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong” because God is Holy.

Revelations we see the 4 living creatures who Day and Night never stop saying “Holy is the Lord almighty, who was and is to come” because God is Holy!

And if this is our Father – who we worship and who Has adopted us, how should we live? We live in a culture today where what’s unholy is glorified and praised and what’s holy is looked down upon.

Taking a stand for holiness would mean being severely pressurized by the sin within us and the people around us. One of my believer friends recently wrote a Facebook post in response to the Supreme Court verdict section 377. With so much gentleness he wrote his thoughts and provided a biblical view for marriage and how homosexuality is a perversion of that design.

It’s a sin that needs to be repented of. The flak he got for writing that post was quite bad. He received such terrible abuses that I can’t even mention that in public. Another mutual friend of ours saw the post and said “if this is what your God says, then I would rather be in hell rather than support this view”.

That’s how extremely difficult it can be today for believers to live out their faith in holiness. That’s why I think it’s so very important to be in Gospel Communities where we get to encourage each other to pursue our calling for holiness and also speak into situations when we struggle to pursue that.

Both preparing our minds for action and pursuing our calling for holiness helps us to live with an eternal focus. Not only that but

2.We operate out of a gospel focus

Tying to the previous point. Holiness needs to be pursued with the right motivations. What is the right motivation for living in reverence and godly fear?

(v17-21) And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile,

18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold,

19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.

20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you

21 who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

Christ is the irreplaceable sacrifice ->  Peter gives an amazing picture to what actually happened on the cross.

We inherited sin, Satan and death from our forefathers. We were bound to sin and its passions. Sin saturated our minds and hearts and bodies.

We were literally on the highway to hell trying to get there as quickly as we could. But God wanted to rescue us out of His abundant love and mercy.

He needed to pay a ransom amount and that was the precious blood of His Son – Jesus Christ that He shed on the cross. It wasn’t gold. It wasn’t silver.

It was something way more precious than that – the perfect lamb who was chosen before the foundations for you, who willingly gave up His life for you & was raised on the third Day so that you could believe and hope in God! Do you see why it’s irreplaceable? Do you see the worth and value of Jesus Christ?

I want us to take a moment and think honestly: what motivates you to pursue a holy life? What drives you to observe spiritual disciplines? What drives you to fight sexual sin? What motivates you to speak the truth? What compels you to not cheat? Is it because you want to be seen as morally good before others? Is it because you don’t want to be judged by the others in the church? Or Is it because you don’t want to feel guilty for not being holy?

Or is it because you fear that you’ll lose out on God’s favor? If your answer is yes to these questions, then in some way or the other you are still operating out of a performance-based focus or identity.

The truth is none of this pleases God. There is a better way.  Allowing the gospel to motivate you to live in holiness. Let it coming out of a heart that wants to please our Savior and Lord because of Jesus’ irreplaceable sacrifice.

For all of us who have believed in Jesus Christ we know that it was seeing and understanding the love of Christ on the cross that melted our hearts and brought us to His feet for surrender.

Even as we grow in our relationship with Christ obedience continues to be a response to His love. Whatever helps you remember the gospel each day – do that so that it can fuel the right motivation for holiness. Maybe its passages like these. Or a song that is gospel centred or even thinking about your testimony of what God has done for you and is continuing to do in you are ways by which you can remember the gospel daily.

We are citizens and representatives of God’s kingdom! What a privilege for people who never deserved to be part of that kingdom. What do citizens of God’s kingdom do? We live with an eternal focus unlike the rest of the world that lives only for this earthly life & We operate out of a gospel focus wanting to please the Holy Judge in every way because of the irreplaceable sacrifice of His Son that has ransomed us. This is also contrary to the world that operates out of a performance-based focus.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]